St.Valentine Weeps

This morning I met St.Valentine
Sad, sullen and in deep pain.
‘Cheer-up man! It is your day today’- I said
‘Gifts, goodies and cards -all in your name made!’


He wailed loudly
‘Puppy love, passionate cards and crazy gifts
Not lasting families, but dressed up dates
No love, no man, no wife, just party mates’


‘Oh tell me, tell me’ –He cried
‘Has reason been lost in my name?
Has love been diluted in my name?
Has purity been put to shame in my name?’


I shook my head and walked away.
How was I to console him anyway?

The Blue Flask and Grandma

During a recent visit to my parents’ house I saw some very old stuff they had taken out of the loft after several years. And after nearly a decade I saw the Blue Flask, the first thermos flask I had ever known. A long, stripped light blue flask with the name Hammer Master written on it. I took the flask in my hands and the cap fell down. I laughed aloud, because the falling of the flask cap brought fresh memories of old times.
More than 25 years ago, my grandmother and I had carried this flask every day for a week to the hospital where my sister was admitted. She was a hardly four and she was hospitalized for an upset stomach. My parents stayed with my sister day and night and I was with my uncles, aunt and grandparents.
At 7 pm my grandmother would make supper and fill the flask with warm water and take them and me in an auto to the hospital. Being with grandma, even today can be embarrassing or amusing depending on the way one looks at the situation. She can bargain endlessly with any human to whom she has to hand out money. If she can do that emphatically now in her eighties imagine her vigour in her sixties. So she scolded and she cursed, she reasoned and she pleaded with the auto-driver to reduce the charges for our hospital trip. I can simply recite from memory the words she used for bargaining with the auto drivers, I chuckled then and I chuckle now. When the bargaining was over and the money actually left her hand (Phew! ), we got down from the auto to start moving towards the hospital. 'Tat-da da tat', there was a noise 'what was that Hannahma?' my grandma asked. 'The flask's cap','it has fallen down' I screamed. Together we crawled all over the auto and under it without letting the poor auto-driver drive away. The auto-driver would panic thinking my grandma would take back some of the money she had just handed him. After five minutes that seemed to last for an hour we found the cap and went into the hospital.
The next day, we would call out for another auto and my grandmother scolded and cursed, reasoned and pleaded for reduction in auto charges. And just when the money left her hands the cap left the flask. I started enjoying this. So I giggled, crawling up and down the auto in search of the flask cap as my grandmother lamented loudly and the auto driver accelearted his throttle impatiently. Then when we were back home I enacted the whole drama to my uncles and laughed so much. Grandma is a good sport so she laughed too but she ensured that the cap never fell off from the flask again.

Having relived those funny moments, I bent down, took the cap and screwed it back tight on the flask.

In a couple of weeks, the then four-year old sister will be walking down the aisle in church in bridal garments. Grumbling grandma will be gleaming grandma at her favourite grand daughter's wedding. Thanks to the many cars her sons own, some fortunate auto-driver will have a peaceful evening that day.

Ah!! Those Gadgets

People around me are obsessed with gadgets. Cell phones, iphones, iPods, mp3, video games… the list is endless. Gone are the days when people would build a conversation with fellow passengers during a train or bus journey. Now anyone who begins a conversation is considered a nuisance. We have let our love for gadgets kill the goodness of the human spirit. When two people talk continuously during a bus journey, the other passengers start getting their earphones to shut themselves out. They don’t realize that the bacteria earphones can bring into their ears, are far more harmful that the cacophony of fellow humans. It’s pathetic to watch the children of this era. It used to be common to find children in a super market or circus holding hands and giggling, despite inability to understand each other’s language. These days when a child stretches out his hand to another, I see parents pull him away and entertain him using games on their iPod. Can the sounds and visuals on the iPod ever replace the warmth of a human smile and touch?


Also gadgets have made us an impatient generation. Everything at the touch of a button, that’s the rule of the thumb. But most things are best relished when received after a wait. Nature offers nothing instantly, neither rain nor food, nor flowers nor off-springs. The waiting doubles the joy of receiving. But look at us, if you dial the number of a dear one and the recorded voice says ‘The number you have dialed is not reachable’, panic strikes us. If we forget our mobile phones at home, we feel like fish out of water and those that dial our number think we have been kidnapped! If you are introduced to a new person in the office one day, the very next day he wants to be your friend on FaceBook. We go ahead and accept the friend’s request and never drop a line to him for the rest of our lives. Friendships that last a life time most often take a life time to build. STOP AND THINK. We are becoming a rude, discourteous, in-different and impatient generation by clinging on to our gadgets.

Mark a day of the week as ‘No sms’ day, Mark a day of the week as ‘No iPod day’, Deliberately leave your earphones at home one day of the week. Mark a day of the week as ‘Two-minute phone conversations only’ day. Mark a day of the week as ‘No TV’ day. Sit down and write your dear friend a letter, not an email or sms, but a real hand written letter. For when he receives it, he will first sit down, and read it, and then re-read it and then preserve it.

The reality of the reality shows

My granddad at four must have run around the house and played with mud and twigs and goats all day long. My father at four must have been busy eating groundnuts, looking at older boys spin tops and fly kites all day long. At four I went to LKG in the morning and played with my neighbours in the evening. My son is four, he goes to LKG in the morning, does home work in the afternoon and watches TV in the evening. And what does he watch on TV. Four year-olds dressed in designer wear sponsored by a textile giant, singing the latest movie numbers on a show sponsored by a communications giant. In the audience are their parents flinching at their every mistake and rejoicing at their every accomplishment.

What is the motivation? Money and fame! The two most notorious culprits that have dirtied every human endeavor. When money became the motivation for the medical profession, doctors became swindlers. When money became the motivation for educational institutions, teachers became commodities and students money wending machines. When fame became the motivation for news channels, News became dramatic and ‘exclusive reports’ became unbearably common. When money and fame became the motivation for the cinema industry, cinema ceased to be a vehicle of social reform.

May be these parents should stop and think. Its time these children got their childhood back. Many a student has skipped one whole academic year of education just to rehearse and participate in these reality shows. One year away from their friends, one year away from the comic books, one year away from the fun in class, and one year robbed off their childhood. Is that a justified trade-off? All the parents who send their children to these reality shows just want to realize their dreams through the child. So what if they spot talent? A wise parent only nurtures talent, never insists exhibition of the talent in a public forum. That is for the child to decide. This I think is the only way parents can let their children live a whole life. A life lived as execution of parents’ instructions is void and meaningless. I strongly recommend that all parents read about the damage Michael Jackson’s dad did to him by thrusting stardom on him. Especially those that have great singers and dancers for children, and intend to make them super singers or start singers and dancers.

If you want a house or a car or an LCD TV, or an i-Pod or a cell phone save up money and buy it. If you want your children to be stars just facilitate and let them live their lives. Actually each child is a star just like the numerous stars in the sky; each of them is unique and full of energy. Never try to use the reality shows to do either of these. As for the companies that sponsor, why not set an SMS chain in motion for the purpose of charity. I mean ask users to send multiple SMSs at the cost of the SMSs sent for voting purposes on reality shows. The revenue thus generated can go towards charity. The world will be a better place I am sure.

Elegy for my Grandfather

Two years have gone since I last saw your face.

Tears stream down as I think of the bygone days.

When I was but a child, you respected me as an adult.

And spoke to me at length of many a fear and guilt.

I loved to stay around you; your stories never bored me.

They never failed to move, thrill and inspire me.

How I had hoped your dementia would go away-soon.

And that you would talk sense to me someday –soon.

‘When I die, I need none of you by my side’- you often said.

You died with no one by your side just as you said you would.

I am glad you died alone,infact your most preferred way

But I tell my self 'he should've stayed on'- on many a day.

Especially today, your eighty seventh birthday.

A story

Martyred

Prema was making tea for all at home, when her husband came to the kitchen door and said “Tea with cardamom today please”. So she added cardamom to the tea filtered it into a glass and called out to him- then she broke down in to tears. How the dead tease their beloved by visiting them in flashes and visions!! Her husband’s latest prank on her was fresh in her mind and made her chuckle. Alas! The body of Major Mohan, Prema’s husband was to be brought that morning, to the military quarters in which his family lived. Prema wiped her tears and began sipping her tea; her son joined her quietly and drank his cup of tea. Soon both were dressed in mourning clothes and were ready to receive the cadaver.

Draped in the national flag and carried by uniformed men, the coffin was lowered from the van and placed on the ground. Prema and her son were joined by many families of soldiers, captains and majors. Each family wondered if their dad would face the same end and sobbed profusely. The district collector, the local army chief and many military men who knew Major Mohan stood in silence and mourning. Tears swelled up in the Prema’s eyes as she clung to her son in grief. Major Mohan’s battalion was summoned to the war zone two months ago. She knew, when he left that he may not come back alive. He had been killed twenty days ago, but the body could not be retrieved immediately because of cross firing. Heavy snowing in the war zone had preserved the body very well. Now at last the Major had reached home. Wreath after wreath followed and mourners lined up to glance at the face of the Major one last time.

It was a cloudy day, dark clouds seemed to get darker by the minute and the rain threatened to fall anytime.

The guns boomed, the trumpets sounded and the Major’s body was solemnly saluted. The officials took the microphone one after the other. The collector said “The Major gave his present so that we may have a future”. The army chief said “He was a brave soldier, he has laid down his life for a cause” A neighbor said “Major Mohan’s name has entered into the book of war heroes”. It was the turn of the family member s to speak a few words about the dead Major.

The son of Major Mohan stepped up to the microphone. His mother gasped in anguish. Still a mere boy at fifteen, the little fellow seemed very resolute as he began to speak. Perhaps knowing of his father’s death long before he could see his body had emboldened the boy.

“When I was five I saw the bullet injury on my father’s leg and asked him who had hurt him, for my father was a loving man, jovial and kind. I hated the man that hurt my father, but my father said the guy who shot him was just like him”. “He must have been a loving father and good friend himself, my son”, he told me. I was surprised. My father explained to me that war is shameful; men of war follow instructions not convictions of their heart. “Every man who trains for war has a heart that can love, he kills not out of hatred or reason but out of duty”, my father said. “You my son must seek peace and pursue it”-my father often told me. That’s why he gave me this strange name Shantham, which means peaceful”.

“You all speak of a brave man of valor who did not dread to die and lost his life in battle”- Shantham continued. “I am speaking of a man who hated war and was ashamed to be a part of it. I speak of a man who firmly believed that, he who shot him was no wretch, but another soldier like him obeying orders. Countries win war after war and take back lost boundaries, but the lost lives of fathers and sons cannot be regained. I do not hate the man that shot my father dead; I only hope he can make it back home alive to be with his son”



“I have lost my Father!” – Shantham chocked as he spoke. “A man of love and a man of peace” he continued. “The madness of war has eaten up the man that taught me to spin a top, to ride a bicycle, to whistle aloud and to hate war”. Tears streamed down Shantham’s eyes as he spoke. “Who will fill the emptiness he has left in my life”. Shantham wept bitterly.

The sky joined him and shed her tears-the rain came pouring down.

Thanks to the rain, every man in the crowd, uniformed and civil wept shamelessly, allowing their tears to fall. Each knew that he played a small but sure part in the great shame of mankind –WAR.

No one knew how to wipe away the shame from the face of the earth.

China Clay Boy

A couple of weeks ago, I bought some play dough for my 4 year-old. He was thrilled, his imagination ran wild and he started making an eagle,a motor bike a mixie all as he saw them, so the eagle was just a huge staright line of dough with a protruding speck for the eagle's head. As he played with it, I recalled how expensive and rare dough was when I was a child. It was called China clay then. If there was one thing that my sister and  longed for as play item it was china clay. Only one cousin of ours in the whole wide extended family could have it. He was an only child and his parents beleived in making the best things available to him. He was good at making moulds with the china clay. I clearly remember him making a radio, a hut  and a car with it. He would share the china clay with my sister and I but he was ridiculously paticular about how we handle it. Most often I was just happy to watch him make shapes and models out of it. Thoughts of china clay brought many other memories about  the same boy. He was a talented guitarist and was simple amazing with the bongos, but I never heard him sing or hum to himself, I never saw him close his eyes and loose himself in the tune of a song.
Those were the days when USSR was a mystery to many and the Sputnik and Misha were two magazines that seemed to let you peep a little into that mystery. No one I knew, except the china clay boy, had subscribed for Misha the Children's magazine from USSR. I loved to visit his house during summer vacation, for I would get to read all the issues for the previous year. China clay boy however did not seem excited about Misha and its contents. Not once did he hand me an issue and say 'Hannah this story in this issue is very good' . To me the learning of new words is an unexplainable thrill, he never turned my attention to the several he may have learned from his priceless books.
One cannot remember the time when Herge's Adventures of Tintin were inexpensive in India. Till date one needs to pay through ones nose to buy a copy. The Week, a weekly would carry a page of Tintin in every issue, I would beg and plead with my uncles to buy The Week just to read the Tintin. But boy!, the china clay boy's house was full of them. I fell in love with Captain Haddock, admired Tintin, adored snowy, laughed at the detective twins and marvelled at Prof. calculus all in the couch of his house. Sadly the boy himself never shared with me his joy of reading Tintin. Who was his favourite character, did he secretly cry out 'Blistering blue barnacles' like me. I never knew.
China boy died an untimely death, his parents were shattered. As I walked in to their house that day, they wept and asked ' You look for meaning and try to explain everything around you Hannah, give us an explanation for this sorrow'. Tears fail me when I need them most. I just stood there motionless and let them cry on my shoulders. Why would one with such a wide range of exposure in early childhood, shun adult life? Why would one so talented and gifted find no meaning in living? Why would one who received so much love be so devoid of hope. Despite spending dozens of summer vacationa at his house he never played with us, never laughed out loud, never shared experiences. In short he never became a friend.
May be it is not so important to give the best to your children or love them with all your heart as it is to teach them to love themselves and many many others with thier short comings. May be, as an individual it is not so important to be talented and gifted than it is to use the little that we are given, to plant a smile on another face. No amount of love, talents, books or music can make life meaningful unless you let it touch your soul.