Tied in a game

Three disparate objects

Rahul, aged 12, joins Shalini’s birthday party exactly about 30 minutes late in a baggy shirt and a casual looking trouser.  Shalini, looking graceful, in a wine red dress opens the door.

They are friends from early childhood, living in the same apartment complex and going to the same school. Now, with their teen maturity, birthday celebrations are low-key affair with only the close family friends. Decorations and other paraphernalia have given way to more of discussions, schools, preparations and the things happening around.

Apparently Rahul is not carrying a gift, which makes Shalini angry.

Shalini obstructs Rahul at the door and asks with a tinge of anger and mischievous smile on the face: “Where is my birthday gift?

Rahul answers with a naughty grin:  “I was busy the whole day and did not manage time. Will make sure you get it next time”.

After little more chit-chat and banter, Rahul is allowed to enter. He plops himself unceremoniously on the bean bag at the corner, which was in Shalini’s possession till now.

Then, he slowly brings out one small tear drop sized ear ring from his back pocket and hands it over to Shalini.

Rahul: “Here is your gift”.

Shalini (utterly shocked): “Only one!”

Rahul (promptly with a smirk): “Gave you the other one last year. Have you lost it?”

This makes Shalini angrier and she is at a loss what to do with this boy while other friends are amused.

Shalini after few minutes, as if nothing has happened and in a cool disposition, hands over Rahul half a piece of cake on a plate.

Rahul (with a veil of innocence on the face): “Only half, is there a shortage?”

Shalini (disguising smile): “Be happy that you got the other half three days back in the school on Sudip’s birthday “.

Shrugging his shoulder, Rahul, says “Ok, ok”, being satisfied internally that his plan has worked that Shalini is now trying to take revenge in some way or other.

Friends and other family friends are quite familiar with these bitter-sweet verbal dual between these two and everyone enjoys as it never gets ugly and both know where to stop and draw the line.

However, Shalini’s mother jumps in and tries to cool down the warring folks by hugging both of them together trying to divert the topic to something else.

While on the rounds to meet others around the house, the picture of the WoW prompt on Shalini’s study table caught Rahul’s attention and he enquired about it.

“Interesting”, says Rahul after getting the details from Shalini’s elder sister- a writer and blogger for quite some time now. Few other friends also joined them at the study.

Rahul (addressing everyone): “Let’s put our brains to work for a fun game.  Let’s connect all these three either through a common word or sequence of events.” Everyone seems to like the idea and agreed, including Shalini, who was so far sulking at everything Rahul was talking about.

Abhi, a gadget freak amongst the friends, comes up with the idea that the ear ring is actually a Bluetooth device which gets paired with the smart phone to make an order for a birthday cake.

Seema conjures up with a short story that they went out for celebration at Dominos on her baby sister’s birthday last month. The cake has just arrived when her sister started having a pain in her left ear from the recently done ear piercing. To relieve her of the pain, her mother took out left ear ring thinking that will take care of the matter in next few minutes. When the ache did not ease, her father used the smart phone application to find out the nearest doctor for a quick visit. The party started in full swing once they came back. 

While everyone is busy with what can be the possible stories or events, the author-Jay, incidentally present at the same birthday party to pick his daughter comes up with an idea of involving everyone in a picture dumb charades.

 Jay will provide the connecting clues and everyone has to guess the connection.

With that, he holds out the ear ring.

When someone says “ear ring” amongst other guesses like “small”, “beautiful”, “jewelry”, he points to the “ear ring” and gestures to break it into parts in the way one does as per the rules on dumb charades.

They decide on to consider the second half that is “ring” and then Jay imitates a music player playing a tune.

After different attempts for few minutes, Tua, holding out the smart phone from Shalini’s mom, comes with “tone” which completed the word as “ring tone”. That makes sense to everyone and they settle with that answer. Everyone is satisfied and happy that ear ring and phone got connected with the common word “ring tone”.  With that being done, the cake is left, pushing everyone’s brain into a spin to dig more on to what can be the next connection.

While everyone is aware of various kinds of ring tones as piece of music, jingles, the next indication from Jay comes in the form of decoration around, balloons, babies enjoying a party.

The way Jay presents the clue with his immaculate mannerisms-it was not difficult for everyone to get to the famous “Happy Birth Day To You” song as the ring tone from the phone indicating that cake follows just after the song.

With glee in their faces and content at being able to ultimately decode the connections, everyone thanks Jay to come up with this teaser in the short span of time he is there. They all look happy, satisfied. Rahul and Shalini did not notice when they forgot the initial acrimony that they both were feigning at each other and got involved into the hilarious flow. 

Dinner is served by now. Everyone gorges over the delicious food and enjoys the blast in the party.

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This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.

This weekend we have a picture prompt for writing.

This Library comes to my dream- the way I want it

Ting, Tong.

As soon as the sensor detected me at the door step of my library and made the bell ring inside, there were hushed discussions amongst the inhabitants of my den. Over the little commotion in next few seconds, they arranged themselves in a disorganized mode to suit my liking. Yes, I like them all disorganized lying here and there just like they would behave over a pot of grass.

They are my friends, my closest ones – my books with the audio system, the simple wooden ebony-black furniture, oak-paneled table of 6”X10”, 4 chairs with high back rest and leather seats, olive green carpeted floor in this cozy place of relatively large size. They understand me, keep track of my mood swings and present themselves accordingly. The hue of the room, the melody on the audio, the brightness of the lights – all tune to me the best. Before I need to tell them anything, they are ready and dressed for the occasion. The stage is set for the rendezvous and yes, you guessed it right, this is my library.

Times get locked and books get read in a cheerful and jovial mood. My dear puppy, Angela, sits there motionless - all ears to the novels and fictions. All the books that I have yearned to read for such a long time get to come first. After a chat with them briefing them with the reasons how my busy professional life had prevented our tryst, I immerse myself into the blissful world of reading as time flies by.

This is the library that I desire most in my dream.

On a day of solitude, I would spend hours together in this alcove of mine, in my very own way, alone. On some other days, friends would meet up there, in my study, for hour long discussion on politics, cricket, society, arm-chair strategy of our country – in one word, meaningless “Adda” (generally used in Bengali for long discussions) over uncountable number of cups of tea and smoked fish fingers.

While I have a penchant for reading, I am an utter failure to the term of an ardent reader-not able to manage time knowing very well the fault is within me. There are many others, in a similar situation as mine, who still manage to carve out a good amount of time for books. I am amazed at how my wife and daughter make merry (eat, sleep and drink) with books and a tinge of jealousy certainly crosses my mind. As I am not able to do justice to reading, I have somewhat curbed my strong craving for new books- non-fictions and other genres, to get to the typical smell from them. They really can be a person’s best friend and provide the much needed break from the mundane day to day activities.

While living my life the way it is now, I do dream and long for having my own study cum library and make use of all the time I will have in a relatively less loaded period of my life- during my sunset years. I visualize myself in white hair, house coat over the pajamas and gown along with the sandals getting into a place of my own and spending time as long as I want, in the way I want.  That dream is still alive and I water that every day, drop by drop.

This post is written for Indispire in indiBlogger for following prompt
“What would your dream library look like?” #DreamLibrary

My Thoughts: You Can Light Up Raghurajpur

My Thoughts: You Can Light Up Raghurajpur

You Can Light Up Raghurajpur

The story about Raghurajpur @ DoRight.in could not come  at a better time.  Believe it or not- I was just dabbling with a similar idea with one of my close friends of resurrecting a dying art of handicraft of our state through help of technology.

My friend narrated me a story about one of his close acquaintances from school days - some 25 years back. It revolved around how difficult it was, financially, to rent out a gallery in those days to display handicraft and art items from wood, brass and other different materials - with fine grained artistry. Though the skill and dexterity behind those fine pieces of art form ran in his family and they did not know any other means of livelihood, it was increasingly becoming difficult for them to sustain the occupation against the threat and competition from their more opulent, easily available but with less artistic cousins. His sole intention to come to city was to connect with a larger customer base which was not being possible staying there in the village and his failure was hitting the family and the village hard. They were at the brink of accepting menial work leaving behind this great form of art in the face of hardship and other challenges of basic amenities.

That story, then, and today’s story of Raghurajpur, near Puri, Odisha , similar in nature, evoke a sense of failure on the part of our society as a whole - how we are failing to protect and survive these rare capabilities which, at one point of time, used to be a significant differentiation of our country.

The above picture says it all – how involved and the intense the work is. After all these, there cannot be worse irony if they get cheated by middleman or don’t find buyers in time. The video here clearly brings out the sordid state of the affairs at Raghurajpur where the clan is trying to make their ends meet in an honest and just way.

I commend this initiative of DoRight.in, as a first step, to come up with a website for creating a worldwide awareness about this heritage art form and the village.  It will surely drive up the demand for these and will directly connect the artists with their customers-worldwide.

Having done my part to support the cause to the best of my abilities, I take this opportunity to request all my friends and all of you reading this story to do your bit here towards supporting the initiative. 

Additionally, may I request all to remember to spread this message, at the minimum, by sharing this post in your networks or tweet about it ?

Every bit of help from all of us will go a long way in shaping the lives of many - a village community altogether. Let’s join hands to do something better.

Moreover, I plan to offer my services - drawn from experiences in my profession, to help taking this whole initiative to the next level where it can be transformed to a self-sustaining business model - run and managed like a well-oiled private organization. With bit of planning on training the villagers, hosting and storage capacity , monthly maintenance model, logistics, e-commerce and above all marketing through social media and other channels , the initiative would transport the village to a world of happy customers in a perpetual basis. Doing it right the first time will result into having a happy customer returning back multiple times. 

In the Fantasy Land

I have been travelling for days now but not an iota of life around me.

Everything around me is in a fixated state. All lights are gone barring a moving green pearl shimmering in the tunnel, its rays creating an envelope of mesmerizing beauty all around. Through the sideways and alleys, I see males, females and children, all in a state of daze and motionless- as if someone was playing a game of statue and everybody got fixed to their positions. It was clear to me that once what used to be a happy kingdom with the usual din and bustle, colors all around, beautiful gardens with trees in full bloom, flowing rivers and green pastures –was now motionless, stuck in a limbo of perennial immobility. Was it due to some blight or bane that life has paused here and is ready to be in motion just at the touch of a magic wand?

I remember getting into the tunnel towards the center of the earth from the midriff of the beautiful Sarovar where I was playing by the bank. Someone, probably a messenger from Heaven - a Debdoot, called me and I just followed him towards the middle of the lake. As soon as we reached the middle of the lake, an arrow appeared from nowhere, parting the waters and creating a deep tunnel in the middle. I just followed him and continued walking. Though I am the son of King Aradha of the Himalayas, and am considered to be the crown prince of this planet, I was feeling homesick and terrified and tears welled up in my eyes. How do I survive here?

With the intention of trying to find someone to talk to, I moved around a bit more but wherever I go, it is the same deserted, forlorn story. It just looked to me a simple touch is what they are all waiting for to bring them back to life.

Is it that I am the last person to live in the world - the feeling itself is as eerie as it sounds? But then do I have a secret of my own to do something about it, me being the prince of world? 

Suddenly it struck me that I still have one more boon left with me- two others had already been used to rescue Gods from the clutches of demons and to prevail over Saturn to spread love in the world.

I got into action to invigorate the power of the third boon and got deep into prayer and meditation. After a long hour, I opened my eyes to find a golden magic stick in front of me and could hear a voice from behind.

Following the instructions, I went inside the palace, turned to the north-east corner, went up five stairs, turned to my right, got down ten stairs and walked for ten steps in the front. There was an urn lying enclosed in a small wooden chamber. I was told not to touch the chamber lest the power of the wand vanished. Very carefully, from a distance, I used my golden magic stick to take out the urn using the knotted string tied in its’ throat without touching the chamber and not allowing a drop of nectar to trickle behind.

Once in my possession, I spread the nectar all over the place bringing them back to life. Everybody was back to their usual selves with smiles all around. I was pleasantly surprised by the utter absence of misery and pain, cruelty or jealousy in that land that saw only happiness all around.

The grateful King of the land met me that evening and proposed marriage to his daughter. We lived happily ever after making sure – with our vigilance that our beautiful planet doesn't go to that sordid state again.

*Thoughts influenced from stories read on Fantasy Land (RupKatha) during childhood days.

Pankaj Mishra- Winner of the Windham Campbell Literature prize

The thought behind the post is not to repeat whatever is already available on Internet (@ http://www.pankajmishra.com/) about Pankaj Mishra – the author-writer, but only to celebrate his winning this prestigious award from Yale University in the non-fiction category. There is a sense of elation inside me today.

Yes, I felt proud after following Pankaj for some time now. The distinctive flavor that he brings in his books - specifically Asia as a territory and craftsmanship of thought-grouping amongst Indian, Chinese, Muslim and Ottoman countries, bring freshness to the post second world-war thought processes regarding the region.

"Pursuing high standards of literary style, Pankaj Mishra gives us new narratives about the evolution of modern Asia," the university said in the statement while announcing the prestigious honor.

While few might argue that his essays and articles being published in all leading journals and publications, this might be nothing more than just another feather in the cap, but to me – like many of his followers, this is fortifying recognition of the contemporary Asia  and its dominance in many facets of today's life along with a new look into rebuilding processes of modern Asia after all kinds of oppressions from West through different approaches – be it colonialism or subjugation in many other fronts.

"Such delightful news! As a freelancer obliged to make a living from writing, you are always scrounging for bits of time in which to write the next book, and this wonderfully generous prize will help me secure a long undistracted period," Mishra said.

From my limited capability and a little bit of audacity, I wish Pankaj all the best.

Lovely Love

Below is my submission under 400 words @www.figment.com on the topic: Reader and Character are falling in love.

“Hi, what is your name?  Will you be my friend?” a husky wafted voice came out of nowhere.

I was at page 31 of an old thriller, based on 18th century France, that my grandfather acquired during his visit to countryside. It was gathering dust for quite some years  in the musty corner of the naphthalene smelling attic. Carefully I was turning the pages -turned yellowish brown and cleaning them while straightening the creases.

“I see you are taking good care of me for some time now. Thanks for taking me out of that cloistered shelf with dimly lit  space and almost no air to breathe”, rattled the voice.

Being baffled and confused with the suddenness of the situation, I closed the book hard to silence it. Thinking it might be some paranormal activity, I threw the book down. A beautiful girl of 12 years with an angelic look in a blue floral frock, brownish hair neatly plaited was smiling there in front of me. With golden complexion and medium built for that age, her big dreamy eyes were telling me so many things. 

While I was making efforts to take my mind away from what just happened, she was pulling me towards her. Almost in a trance, I had to give in and picked up the book again. I asked myself if this is really happening and what Rowling wrote about life being imprisoned in a book is unfolding in front of me.

She eventually started telling me her story.

“You know, I have started liking you a lot - you are of my age and none has touched me so delicately so far. You must be a good person at heart. Only thing I remember about my early days is that we used to be a happy family and now I can’t recollect even my parents. I have not been loved for such a long time” said my new friend as she clutched my hands tightly.

Dumbfounded I was sitting there motionless listening to her with a liking growing inside me- like a flame of a slow burning candle. My first interaction with adolescent love - did not realize how sweet it is. I was just getting drifted towards her and entangled in her persona with each passing moment.

With an effort to hug her, I fell down from bed bringing me back to mundane earth shattering my sweet dream.