The Owl and the Pussy-Cat

You may or may not have seen it here, but you can now see it here.

A Night in the Life of …

One night last week, Bagli started barking and we went out to the Front verandah to investigate. It was her “snake bark”, and sure enough, it was a snake in the flower beds under the Front verandah ledge. We could hear it clearly, and see it vaguely, but none of our torches was bright enough to identify it.

We called Bagli away and tied her in the front verandah. Comet, who was visiting us was tied in the cowshed. He heard all the commotion, wrenched himself out of his collar buckle and came to the Front verandah to join the party. Badri Baba got the camera and took a few pictures: That was when we identified it as a Russell’s viper.

I took a stick and tried to nudge it away from the house. It started its characteristic ‘Pressure cooker” hiss and kept it up for  a couple of minutes. Bagli started barking and the snake stayed put. We have never had this problem with snakes before. Next we tried splashing it with water ; but it just hissed and stayed put.

The boys decided that it was too scared to move and that we should just leave it alone for a (long) while. Finally after about 45 minutes, it slowly inched away from the house . And we released Bagli, and returned to bed and story-reading.

The decline of Duraisamy

"Duraisamy propitiating the Gods" caught by Varuna

Nearly all of you who have visited us here would have met Duraisamy, our neighbour, who used to help us on our land. Over the years the love-hate relationship (We have had tremendous fights about his cows grazing on our land, his son stealing one of our trees and so on) settled into one of amicable tolerance. in fact, Duraisamy used to look after our house, dog, cats, cow when all four of us were away.

Since when we first knew him, he was always a good worker: The kallukattus which he has made are noticeable for their “cleanness”. He was also quick to grasp ideas and it was he for instance who built our cuddapah-kal benches on mud pillars. Since we first knew him, he has also nursed a grudge against his pangaalis (cousin-neighbours): “How come they have so much land whereas I don’t even have half the amount?”

This grudge slowly ripened into an obsession, and he even blamed his cousins for casting the evil eye which killed his wife (Pottiamma died of renal failure following acute diabetes). After the death of his wife, he got his only son, Thenan, married and started the process of transferring the patta of his lands from his father’s name to his son’s.

“Those whom the Gods curse, they grant them their wishes”. So says an old Persian proverb.

When the land was measured, it showed that Duraisamy’s patta extended beyond his land to some part of his cousins’ land as well. He stood vindicated. But it’s not so easy when possession is nine-tenths the law. Everyone concerned was bribing everyone: the police, the VAO’s office, the surveyors…  And Duraisamy’s obsession teetered into madness.

Now he roams around the various temples, praying, and doing little else. He has chased his son away from home (for being willing to negotiate a compromise with the cousins). He has been picking fights with everyone and his brother and has also started stealing coconuts (“for the Gods”). The villagers have labelled him “kanian” (madman) and it is but a step to children throwing stones at him. When Sonati or I talk to him, he is not so much mad as obsessed (but teetering nonetheless). We (and his family) are at a loss about what is to be done. He however seems to have reached “the field beyond good and evil” and is asking everyone to meet him there.

Pushing Boundaries

Yesterday (Rogue) Annamalai and co. were building the kallukattu (stone wall) separating our land from his. I have been aware that they have been pushing their boundary outwards into our land for a while now,  and this was an attempt to stop the attrition.

Our case was being made by a solitary bamboo plant without which I would not have been able to argue my case. As it transpired, Annamalai tried to will it out of existence: the kallukattu would veer drunkenly, I would holler and it would straighten out for  awhile. Eventually all I was able to achieve was the entombing of the bamboo in the kallukattu. And I was really worn out by the end of it.

Bamboozled

The trouble is that these people are masters in the art of pushing boundaries (I think they start as infants rolling pebbles into the neighbour’s field) and fighting with their neighbours. So much so, that if we start ranting and fighting, the battle is lost before it is begun. When one is polite (and once in a while invokes the Gods as witness), their guns are spiked. To find the balance between being overwhelmed and exploited by them, and getting angry and being rude is no easy task.

Land issues are always a bit fuzzy. For instance on our top tier towards the west, our patta shows 30 cents as belonging to us which the villagers said had  always been “run” by their forefathers (and four generations of that family were present on that occasion: Rogue Annamalai, his father, his grandfather and his son). I had acquiesced to this 11 years ago, but now, seeing how boundary-pushing is a fine art here, the four generations could have done the boundary-pushing overnight!

The VAO’s office is corrupt and is willing to adjudicate in favour of the highest bidder. So the people become corrupt as well. If you don’t indulge in boundary-pushing, then your neghbour will take advantage of your “cissy-ness” and push his boundary. A battle between brothers is the norm when the father “retires” and the land is partitioned. There is always ranting and raving, and sometimes physical violence, even bloodshed. When the ambience is like this it becomes all the more necessary for us not to “join in this game”.

But the boundaries of our being are sometimes pushed to snapping point. And one has to indulge in the catharsis of blogging it out of our system

Another Election Day

Two years ago, Chandran had come by on Election morning, with the “voting slips” and rather awkwardly offered me Rs.50 per vote. This year, he offered Rs.150 per vote. (The voting slips this time were distributed by the schoolmaster, and had no party affiliation). I refused once again, asking him to put it in the hundi at the temple on my behalf. But the amount -Rs.150- here, in the back of beyond, gives one a handle on the scale of the “money for vote” transaction: Staggering!

Of course, I heard from disgruntled people later on, that Chandran gave them only Rs.100 per vote, and that he was given Rs.250, no Rs.300 per person to distribute. God, too is part of this deal: the temples in the villages get the first “money for vote”,  Rs.2500/-.

This time around, Sonati was also at home, and the two of us set off at about 8.30 am and were surprised at the length of the queue already formed. Sonati joined the ladies’ and I joined the gents’ queue. In spite of the hottest summer in 10 years, and perhaps the hottest day this summer, the carnival atmosphere was great to see.

Old people and mothers with infant children were allowed to jump the queue; this led to a few comic interludes: Young boys and girls who could by no stretch of the imagination claim that status became, for the day, babes-in-arms. There was also an alleged traffic in babies, which led one wag to comment that the babies, too, should have their index fingers marked with indelible ink.

One (not very) old woman -a friend of ours and a rogue- was bent over, and staggered in following a bent old man into the polling booth. On the way out she was magically erect and much younger than when she went in.

Most of this queue-jumping was taken in good part. In fact, Sonati, too was being exhorted by the women in the queue to jump the queue: “You are not used to the sun, we are; go on, go ahead”. But Sonati didn’t.

We had to wait for close to two hours, and since I did not have a cell phone, I had to borrow one and call Badri Baba at home to do the re-kneading and second rise of the bread that I had started in the morning. The actual vote-casting was pretty smooth and when we emerged, we hailed all the people we knew in the queue and moved out.

At Gopal’s kadai, Gopal’s wife ushered us indoors because her shop was in the 200m “no gathering” zone, and she had already been warned by the police not to let people hang around. We ate a banana each, and left for home, flashing our index fingers at whoever we passed by: “Vote potaachu“.

Did Obama feed the pigeons?

After all the dramatic changes at Powai and at Vashi, where I could not find my Athai’s house since it had all metamorphosed in the last twelve years, it was a comfort to see Colaba much the same as when I last saw it.

The trees at the BPT park had grown in the twelve years  since we used to take baby Badri there every evening: much as he has! The garden on Garden Road where I used to play 40 years ago, was still there much as I remembered it,  a patch of green in the sea of buildings. The museum had a cared-for look and things were in better shape than when I used to visit in my school days.

Jogesh and I even managed a trip to Strand Book Stall and People’s Book Depot ending up with a Bun Maska and Chai at Yazdani’s (the chai surely in a cup from 15 years ago). We also bought some Fiery Ginger Biscuits to take home.

The sea at Gateway had a lot of plastic garbage.  And many more people than before. But it was great to walk to the Gateway every morning with Mahuli, Varun and Badri Baba.

On the first morning, we saw the pigeons being (over)fed. By the tourists who wanted their picture with the pigeons. But mainly by  a man in white kurta pyjama who drove up in a car with driver, attendant and (literally) a sackful of food for the pigeons. Besides channa, the pigeons got jowar, bajra and wheat. The crows, whose territory was different got broken biscuits, the stray dogs got chapatis, and the fish got Nutri-nuggets. But no-one got so much as a smile. Least of all, Mahuli, who tried to wangle a handful of grain from him. She was shooed away peremptorily.

Next morning, at Mahuli’s request, I carried money to buy channa for the kids to feed the pigeons. But alas, the channawallah wouldn’t sell me 5 Rs worth. He insisted that the minimum was Rs 10 worth; and stuck to his guns even when he realised that I had only 5 Rs on me. We had to be content watching White kurta-pyjama dole out his largesse.

Third time Lucky: The boys and Mahuli eked out the 10 Rs worth of channa, getting the pigeons to eat out of their hand; retrieving what the pigeons dropped or what fell from their hands to recycle. A great contrast to the white-clad seeker of “punya“

A related question that arose: Since South Bombay  and the Gateway area in particular was shut down for Obama’s visit on the 7th November (when thankfully we were at IIT), Did the pigeons starve that day or Did Obama feed the pigeons?

IIT campus: pandrah saal baad

For me, it was a visit to the campus after more than 15 years. The first thing that struck me was the traffic on campus: I think I saw more vehicles in a day than I did in all four years of my B.Tech. I later heard that the situation had been even worse before motorbikes had been banned for students. Perhaps the campus should have a no-motorised-vehicles Wednesday or some such for people to realize what is possible with cycles.

The other thing that strikes one is the number of new buildings and buildings-under-construction. Infinity corridor seems to be acquiring an infinity of buildings. I suppose this is unavoidable given the four or five-fold increase in the number of students and the concomitant increase in departments, faculty, administrative staff, what-have-you. After all outside, too, things have changed dramatically: One night on Gulmohur Terrace, I was stunned to see the lights of “Hiranandani”: The last  time I looked, it was undulating hills as backdrop to the lake.

The lake: Well, now that Vihar is out of bounds, Powai lake is the only lake accessible to campus residents. Surely the uncared-for look of the lake is avoidable. On one of our morning walks, Varun actually burst into tears and said, “The next time we come, there won’t be a lake”. From various conversations I had with faculty and students (I won’t quote anyone:You are free to comment on this post if you like) I too got a discouraging picture. The students claim they are overworked, and have no time for extra-curricular activities like cleaning up the lake or anything else. The faculty seem to suggest that students inhabit a certain “comfort zone”, and the sense of “One person can make a difference” has disappeared.

This sense of disempowerment, I am quite familiar with, living in Thekambattu: People feel that one person cannot make a difference any more; so one may as well join the herd where there is safety in numbers. It is quite possible that the increase in size of IIT-B with the increase in bureaucracy has given rise to this sense of disempowerment.

As I see it, the two stakeholders who can be prime-movers are faculty and students. The faculty are the long-term residents and the students are the most numerous. It is obviously impossible for fifty faculty to gather on a Saturday morning to pull water hyacinth out of  the lake, but three or four faculty working with fifty students can make a great difference. Together they could create a sense of community which could come to include mess workers, non-academic staff, and just about anyone who enjoys an evening walk or a morning run along  the lake.

I know of one success-story-in-progress at Baner Hill in Pune which started with Rohit and a handful of people and now boasts involvement from people from all walks of life.

And, who knows, if the campus residents can script a Powai Lake success story; the next time I visit, I could perhaps take the boys out rowing from a functional boat-club rather than having to tell them 25-year-old stories about it while showing them the unused jetty.

Damroo workshop

We just got back from Bombay, having attended a workshop on “Creating Content for Children” at the IDC at IIT Bombay. When Monty (Raja Mohanty) invited us, it seemed that it would be really interesting; and so it turned out to be… A get-together of so many people doing so many interesting things. It was quite overwhelming to see the work of so many creative people.

We staged Macavity; for the first time outside Thekambattu, and so The Thekambattu Travelling Theatre became a reality. Then with great enthusiasm on the part of Swati, Nitin and Roma, students at IDC, we helped produce “Catch that Crocodile” as a shadow puppet show. That was performed to a packed house.

And a rather noisy audience: Actually a few rowdy kids  kept up an insistent cat-calling; luckily my voice rose to the occasion. Twenty years ago, I might have stopped the show to throttle the kids: Alas! for the respectability of age…

The boys, each in his own way thoroughly enjoyed the workshop (and the IIT-B campus), though except for Rahi, they were the only children in a sea of adults.

Badri, literally, kick-started the workshop by knocking over a few of the “inauguration” diyas. Then he settled into doing his own work, attending some of the sessions, and working in  a group with Ajit Rao and others. He also showed  a short clip of “The Sponge Cats go to Gegypt” and made  a neat presentation on its making starting with “Can everyone hear me?” and winding up with “Any questions?”

Varun hung around the venue with a chessboard, taught some people chess, played with others, played with the dogs and generally had a blast. He made his own arrangements for lunch with Siddharth and Srirang, and did not condescend to eat the workshop lunch. He suddenly woke up to his “responsibilities”  and gave Shilpa a hard time towards the end of the workshop; insisting that he finish his story, and that she scan his drawings, and what-not.

As for us, the time was too short to meet everyone and see all the work going on, but we managed by playing hooky amd leaving the puppet show production in the hands of Nitin, Swati and Roma at times.

All in all, a great workshop: the open-ended approach was  a success. It is difficult to approach such a workshop without pre-set goals and pre-conceived ideas, but the eclectic group of people assembled by Monty, Shilpa and others pulled it off.

The Sponge Cats go to Gegypt

For a long time we were not aware that a film was being made. And after we realised what was happening, we were not allowed to see the process. The boys finished making their movie last year, in time to carry it with us on our Bharat Yatra. Now, you can watch it on Vimeo

Murder at Maniargundam or Dasarathan Dies

Dasarathan was shot dead at the doorstep of his house, as he stepped out for a pee, on the night of February 11th. The “bullets” were 4″ kambi (iron rod) pieces cut and sharpened.

I have met him a few times; “Hello”, “Nalla irrukengela?”… the last time in the Gas queue at Karumandurai, the Saturday before his death.

His father had come up to the hills, many years ago; Dasarathan was “born and brought up” here; and father and son farmed 40 acres of land now, intensively, with many wells and much water usage.

One explanation of his death was that the neighbours’ wells were drying up as he drew more and more water. Another is sheer envy that “they” had so much land, all of which used to belong to “us”.

There are also murmurings of misbehaviour with local women. but whoever suggests this also adds a codicil to the effect that if you want to attack someone, then this is the best peg to hang your grievances on.

Half a  dozen villagers were rounded up by the police, beaten up, and the “culprits” identified and locked up.

The situation is now ripe for politicians of all hues to jump into the fray and create a Tribal vs Non-Tribal ‘situation’.

And all this has happened because victim and murderer have different labels. Had they both had the same label, the case would not have been so ‘situation’-worthy.

Perhaps this is more often the case than we realise. Policeman vs Naxalite. Innocent Civilian vs Encounter Specialist. The very labels we use betray our sympathies. Perhaps it is time to realise that in every case it is a human being who kills and another human being who dies. And this inhumanity : where does it come from?

Ponder what Primo Levi writes in his book “The Drowned and the Saved” about the guards at Auschwitz:

” They were made of the same cloth as us; they were average human beings and save for exceptions, they were not monsters. They had our faces but they had been reared badly–many (of them) indifferent, fearful of punishment, desirous of a good career or too obedient. All of them had been subject to a terrifying miseducation provided and imposed by school and youth groups.”