The Racsoes

It was Sunday evening, and I was practising the Art of Laziness (yes it is an art to let your posterior drown in the cushion of the sofa, while having a million thoughts rioting for attention).
Lo and behold! The Oscars were live on the tube, with the remarkable red carpet. I wonder if they reuse the same carpet every year. Some dry cleaner in southern California must be minting money brushing it up every year.
Watching the proverbial speeches unroll one after the other, it struck me that if so much is spent on celebrating what is observed to the best of the reel world, why not spare a thought to the best performers in the real world?

So I quickly made some phone calls, and established the Racso awards. The word "RACSO" stands for "Recognition of Achievements and Conquests of the Supreme Order". Contrary to what you may hear, the origin of this word is unrelated to the Oscars.

After 24 hours of intense nominations, sleepless lobbying and tense decisive moments, the Racso Foundation announced these awards:

Best Original Screenplay:Mr. Okabu !Xobile, Chairman - Somali Pirate Association, "The Hostage Drama"
Mr !Xobile from an unspecified location 50 miles from Mogadishu: "I would like to thank my fantastic colleagues who penned every move in our attacks, as well as our gallant hostages who shared our pain all the way. If not for their innocence, my origin as a goatherd would not have allowed me to have ten mansions, fifty cars and a hundred and one wives by now."

Best Visual Effects: Swami Nityananda, scandalised godman from Southern India.
An email received from hailthebaba@swamisrock.com confirms the Swami's feeling: "I am honoured with this award. I never imagined in my wildest beards that a spiritual journey to eroticism would be interpreted by the people in such a creative way. As my fathers used to say - keep the eye shut, and the world will shut its eyes for you. I love you, dads!"

Best Sound Mixing: Hey Man Al-Zawahri, Vice-President of the Oil Qayeeda Group, for his 156th audio tape released to the television channel All Jal Jeera.
"The world beware! My talent stands unparalleled. Like in the Shawshank Redemption, I can escape from anywhere. I go Where Eagles Dare and where Tomorrow Never Dies, so Catch me if You Can."

Best Short Film (Live Action): K. Chandrasekhara Row, Protagonist of the Telengana Hunger Strike that lasted 11 days.
Speaking from his air-conditioned luxury deluxe five-star hospital overlooking the beach, while sipping on a pina colada: "Many thanks to my fans for this award. I am touched that they have recognised my sacrifice for the new state. I wish I can continue to keep my fans happy with more hunger strikes and more states created in this great nation called India!"

Best Music (Original Song): Ex-Would-Have-Been Vice-President Sorry Palindrome, for her new self-recorded track "Empty Vessels".
Gushing with delight, she spoke to our correspondent from beside her fireplace in her Alaskan home, while the sun set over the Russian horizon: "It was a creative stroke of genius! I believe that all Americans, and the whole world, should take empty vessels, or even empty heads - as I did - and let their thoughts run wild. This is a free country and a free world, and as long as we have empty minds, we shall conquer all!"

Best Music (Original Score): Maoist leader Kissing Ji, for his self-composed new National Anthem - "*West or East, India is Maoist" for the India of 2050.
"This is a dream", he spoke from inside the janitor's closet in the Writer's Building in Kolkata, where he lives in disguise as a tea-serving peon, " to see this great country in my fist before I turn 157 in 2050. I am glad that Maoists in Nepal and China as well as my enlightened peace-loving fellow Indians have recognised the true value of this score, 40 years from now, when this will be played in every corner of this country."
Kissing Ji also rubbished claims that he composed the Score by lifting the core tune of a similar-sounding song from the renowned remixer Unknown Malik. "We have standards. We may kill people in the name of ideology, but we shall never kill music."

Best Makeup: Mr. Red Krsna Advani, Leader, the Indian People's Party, for his ability to disguise his shame and humiliation with old topics which everyone has forgotten long back.
Said he from under one of the Opposition benches in the Indian Lower House, as shoes and paper missiles flew over his head towards the Government benches: "Every day it takes me four hours to put this face on. The art of making a face up to show the masses that I still have some credibility left is difficult and tedious. But I am glad I received such an award. I will come by to receive it once I become the Prime Minister in a few years."

Best Foreign Language Film: Ex-President Bill Cling Ton for his audacious day in Pyongyang to rescue two American ladies jailed by North Korea.
Smirked Mr. President with a cigar in his mouth, while Kim Jong Il pulled a rabbit out of his own bushy hair behind him: "Aw, you know what? I like women, cigars and pizza - and ever since the wifey's been peace-mongering those bickering idiots in the middle East, it's been a bit lonely. So I thought I'll drop by and say hi to my old pal Kim. And look what I have landed here," he points to the two relieved women reporters.

Best Film Editing: Mr. Hamid Karzai, President of the Glorious Peaceful Nation of Afghanistan, for his classic doctoring of "Democratic Polls after The Taliban"
Adjusting his loosening turban, Mr Karzai stares into the camera and sends us this message - "In Afghanistan, we have peace and poppy seeds. Who wants more politics? My editing skills have always benefited this nation." In the background, one could hear the snippety-snip of the fractious politicians cutting away at each other.

Best Direction: The Raju Brothers for the gripping real-life crime drama - "Satyam: The Truth Prevails".
From their pest-free, air-conditioned cell in the Hyderabad Prison: "Thank you Mom and Dad. Thank you, thousands of Satyam employees, for trusting us through your doubts and allowing us to lead the firm down this path. But most of all, thank you Chandrababu Naidu - for without your guidance, we would not have been able hit such a jackpot so quickly!"

Best Costume Design: Mr. Nicolas Jacuzzi, President of France, for his exquisite piece - "Law to Ban The Inhuman Burka from French Public Places"
With a beaming smile and hands locked with his beau - the gorgeous Ms Bruno - Mr. Jacuzzi held the Racso in his other hand and said into the camera: "French women are beautiful and I don't get to appreciate the beauty of my country with this cloth blocking the view. I would like to thank all these women for giving me the chance to show the world that we French lead the way when it comes to freedom!"

Best Cinematography: The Dubai Government, for its breath-taking work in "The Assassination of Maha Mood All My Boo"
A report from the Dubai Home Ministry, which received ten Racsos for each of its technicians who maintained the closed circuit cameras, applauded the recognition and thanked Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, for handing such a wonderful opportunity to show the world that Dubai had a better Big-Brother system than the big daddy of them all in the UK.

Best Art Direction: Mr. Suresh Call Maddy, Head of the New Delhi Commonwealth Games Organising Committee
An unusually emotional Mr Call Maddy choked on his own beard and said - "I thank the Racso Foundation for recognising my race against time to transform this slumpolis into a state-of-the-art games city. My special thanks go to the thousands of ad-hoc labourers who chipped in at the last minute to help us finish the stadiums and attach doors to all lavatories in the city."

Best Actress in a Supporting Role: Ms. Rachel Uchitel, Honorary Mistress No. 1 of Tiger In the Woods
From the deck of a luxury yacht cruising in the Caribbean, Ms. Uchitel smiled at the camera while a certain famous golfer massaged her back, and spoke about her feelings - "I thank all the other Tigresses, err, I mean Tiger mistresses, for coming out of the closet later, and thus making me the most sought-after of them this winter. Ladies, I share this with you!"

Best Actress in a Leading Role: Ms. Mayawati, Part-time Illusionist and Chief Minister of the Northern Territory, India
Agreeing to speak to us for a moment out of her busy schedule, her hon'ble presence said - "I am thrilled to hold this little statuette in my hand, since all other statues of mine this year have been left incomplete. Here I am planning to erect everlasting symbols for the Dalit community, and look at what the courts are doing to this grand plan! I will not rest though, and I thank the 9000 farmers whose lands have been grabbed during my tenure, for funding this project!"

Best Actor in a Supporting Role: Mr. Balls Thackeray, Supremo of the Shove Sena, India, for his stellar performance in "The Royal Snub to the Cricketers from Across the Border"
At first refusing to accept the award because it's not named after a Maratha warrior, Mr Thackeray finally relented. From his mammoth terrace in Mumbai, he spoke to us while sipping on a glass of wine from the Hunter Valley in Australia - "I would like to thank all my Pakistani brothers. I would also like to thank all my North Indian countrymen. But special thanks go to Show Rookie Khan and SuchInnings Tondulkar. As long as I live, I will support Tondulkar's bid for the Bharat Rasna, and Khan's belief in his Khan-ness!"

Best Actor in a Leading Role: Mr. Ajmal Kasab, for his acclaimed performance in "How to Live in Luxury after Killing Innocents on Live Television"
Winning the much-competed category, Mr Kasab spoke through a translator as on this day, neither his English nor his Hindi were by his side - "I would have liked some Mutton Biriyani alongwith this trophy. But I am still delighted to win this trophy. Terrorism is an art, and I strive every day to prove to the world that regardless of religion or nationality, one can survive for so long in this industry. I thank the Indian judiciary for believing in my rights, and letting me eat off the same taxpayers whose families I murdered."

Best Picture: "The Hurt Onlooker", a scathing narrative of how innocent cows get blown to smithereens in bombing drills held by NATO.
In a press release by the esteemed organisation that runs some of the hottest wars (Afghanistan, Iraq, etc), the producers of the movie accepted this award and said - "We bow our head in humility in front of this great award. Our movie documents the effect of misdirected bombing on innocent people in those countries. Since we could not use real humans in the shooting, we decided to use good old cows. This way we ensured an accurate measurement of the collateral damage, since these cows and those people are not much different anyways for us. Such creative thinking and out-of-the-world vision has been recognised with this award, and we thank the Racso Foundation for this!"

The Racso awards were held remotely this year due to the enormous security threat involved in getting the winners together in the proposed venue in Antarctica, due to unanticipated protests from the natives there - the penguins. But I promise you that I shall lobby harder next year to roll out the red carpet for the nominees and the winners at a venue near to you!

The Brown Man's Burden

Just before the end of the ninteenth century, Rudyard Kipling penned a poem which is much lesser known than his legendary "If". This poem, originally intended to celebrate 75 years of the Victorian era, is titled "The White Man's Burden". In that insightful piece, Kipling laid bare the natural calling of the white race, to explore the world and to rule the lesser races, at the cost of its own peace and inner sanctum. Most critics of that age and this, rate that piece as a shining example of Kipling's disdain for all other races, even though he was born in dusty India. The legendary author carried that stigma with him even after he had gone back to the dust that he came from.

Ironically, just a little over a hundred years later, there's apparently a little storm raging in the teacup called Mumbai (most storms rage there nowadays). Nay! This storm has not been stirred by any Sena or any Khan, but by the ghost of Mr Kipling himself. The powers that be are toying with the idea of making a musem out of Kipling's infantile residence where he stayed till he was six. Some critics have panned this project, while some are considering it to be the final pardoning of Kipling by our magnanimous country.

But why am I telling you about something that you can read in a newspaper anyway?

The answer to that lies in the very phrase "The White Man's Burden". This phrase was the unspoken, redeeming motto of every imperialist that sailed out of Europe. The Portuguese, The French, the Spaniards, the Dutch and ofcourse, our favourite - the British, carried with them the innate sense of pride in bearing The White Man's Guilt. Thousands of them took on the stormy oceans and unknown worlds over hundreds of years in search of gold and greatness. Many of them had a one-way ticket to faraway lands, dying on the way from scurvy, pirates or mutiny. Many reached safe shores, but perished in battling hostile indigenous people. But those who survived and flourished on alien shores made the world smaller in countless ways. They went with the fear of falling off the face of the flat Earth, and collectively raised the flag of human adventure to a height where the benefits of modernisation and science benefited the rest of mankind. They sincerely believed that since they had the advantage of inventions and clever ideas on their side, it was their moral obligation to rule the savages, at the cost of their freedom and happiness.

No, this is not even an anthem to imperialism.

Today, on India's festival of colours, I would like to pay a tribute to the current tide that flows through each ocean - The Brown Man's Burden.

We, who come from the loins of the Indian landmass, are everywhere. Like unstoppable bullets, we have left the shores of the sub-continent and spread to every nook and cranny of the world. It's true that it started with pseudo-slaves being shipped off to the Caribbean and Africa. But in the twentieth century, it was the teeming mass of ambitious young men and women who went off out of their own volition. In just within a few decades, we have crossed all borders possible and been drenched in the rain from every sky on this planet. A survey last year revealed that there are registered Persons of Indian Origin (PIOs) in every inhabited nation in the world, including North Korea and Iceland.

Why is this significant?

There are three loads that have made us the new Atlas of the world, bearing the burden of this era.

The first load in the burden is the fact that we are the only civilisation that has a claim to ancient cultures and development, and which is now at the pinnacle of human advancement. The Incans vanished, the Mayans never got out of the central American jungles, the Egyptians went back to the shores of the Niles, the Romans and the Greeks fought so many wars that they eventually imploded, and the modern-day imperialists shut their shops and sailed back to their homes around the Prime Meridian. This leaves the Chinese, stuck in their stubborn view of Communism as the road to salvation and with a stranglehold on the world economy through a bullish grip on the throat of American consumerism. Inspite of their millions who struggle to make everything from mittens to motors, they will reach a bursting point in our lifetimes where their yoke on the world trade will become a flat curve. On the other hand, inspite of our own inner turmoil, we promote the equilibrium of a scientific temper and the chutzpah of capitalism in everything that we do. Whether I am a businessman in Guyana or a construction worker in Kuala Lumpur, a Nobel candidate in the US or a surgeon amputating limbs in Sierra Leone, this brown brain trains its grey cells to overcome its natural laziness and do better every single day.

Secondly, unlike our colonial predecessors, we are a peace-loving and a patient herd predominantly. Whether it has been inbuilt into our genes through years of being in the most difficult situations, is a theory up for debate. But the truth remains that we possess the capacity to laugh at every ourselves and at every bad card dealt to us. We may get beaten in Melbourne, but we will still continue to treat every Australian in India as an esteemed guest. We carry an unofficial burden of being the ambassador of "anything goes" throughout the world. Many of us cringe when we see our fellow countrymen behaving like idiots, but that still does not diminish the pride within us. What are we so proud of? Our uniquness, or our strangeness? The fact that we are still the flagbearer of mysticism in the world, or the fact that our collective IQ is higher than most races? Or the fact that most of us have infinite love for our parents, even when they are wrong? Or the fact that an India tabla player went to Afghanistan to perform and got blown to bits, when he had no real need to do so? Or the sight of multi-coloured faces on one day in spring every year when all virtual boundaries in life disappear in a country that is itself filled with racists? With a million questions, we doubt our own pride, and hear a hollow sound when we tap it. But it still continues to live, and that conflict is the burden.

The burden is complete with the third load - our own yearning to beat the adventurers at their own game. With millions inadequately fed and clothed, we are engaged in a race with our Chinese neighbours to reach the Moon, now that it's open for all. None of those imperialists achieved that, so there you go! The former USSR is dead, and even if the Americans wiggle their way out of their own problems now to refocus on the Moon, we would be having our fingers dirty in their pie as well. We will not rest in peace until we set foot on that soil.

This burden never let the white man rest in peace, and thus is the same story with us. We may think that we have crossed all limits of human glory, but for every one of us that is a tiny piece in this giant puzzle, the box is not yet quite ticked.

Either we carry this burden to Eternity, or we call it a day and hand it over to someone else. Who could that be?

Who Ate My Head?

I am a cannibal.

A peace-mongering and relentless cannibal who has eaten himself up in the hunger for something new. Let me explain.

Yesterday I woke up on the wrong side of the bed to find my own bones strewn around. At first, it did not strike me and I frantically searched for a mirror. There was a broken mirror lying on the floor and when I looked into it, I saw a grinning apparition. I instantly knew what had happened. The venom of indulgence had started eating my grey cells slowly but quietly. I yanked off my own head, reached into my brains and set the philandering thoughts to task. They had spent enough time running amok and pretending to be doing something fruitful. Once I set my head back on, it felt queasy at first but the Return of Clarity was much welcome.

I have missed this Island of Contemplation immensely - this little page on the Internet where the sparkling white sands have not been trod on recently. Rid of the mental mutinies, I am back to pitch camp on my island. To my blog.

Update of the day - the USA continues to be The Land Far, Far Away, especially when one returns from the motherland after an unforgettable trip. The time spent with loved ones feels like sand trickling through the fingers. The magic of meeting old friends, hanging out with adorable cousins, a darling nephew, a grand surprise birthday party, unforgettable road trips, Mom's incessant attention, random run-ins into yet older friends, shopping sprees, in-laws' fawning, a riverside picnic, mutton curry, an excruciating tooth extraction, a flight diverted due to fog, a wedding fiesta in Chennai, midnight wine in the cold, watching the PM zip by amidst screaming sirens, more delicious mutton curry, being shooed by cops from a restricted area, overcoming an old fear, corrupting my family by teaching them how to gamble in Poker, smiling endlessly at wedding dinners, gorging on egg chicken rolls with the ever-blissful Thums up, Grandma's smiles, an accident followed by a mid-road altercation, still more mutton curry, beachside languor, and many more myriad components of a month spent in India continue to keep the mind hostage.

Yet I leave it all behind, like many of us, and return to a different rigmarole. What happens to my logic which I take pride in? Are these my thoughts or are these the cannibal's?

The cannibal would not have been born if I had disciplined my wayward thoughts. I would have disciplined my wayward thoughts much earlier had not I been ambushed by the chaotic wonder of my country. In many vacant moments, I question the nomadism which has led to this state of affairs. Hopping from day to day, and year to year, this mind operates like a Time Machine - one that can transport me into any moment in the past and bring it back into life. The same mind can overcome buried fears and break open needlessly shut doors.

The new year started without the realisation of its arrival. I was busy fending off these new symptoms of procrastination and merry-making. Little did I know that these were the tricks of the cannibal, designed to throw one off his guard. Many of you have made resolutions, I am sure. I used to make one every year until I discovered that a new year is simply the same merry-go-round on which we are all seated on little wooden horses. I keep telling myself that "new year's day" is a figment of the collective imagination, merely a reset of a man-made tool called a calendar - a tool that makes us go round and round in cycles. Years come and years go, and we think we grow older. We plan our lives into little boxes of work, holidays and celebrations, hoping that these things will keep us busy enough to overlook the fact that none of us have a clue about where we are headed.

What if there was no calendar?
No media to tell us what's happening in the world?
No rotation of the earth, and thus no day and night?
No dates and deadlines?
No way to plan anything in life?
What if you were stranded on a desert island where the sand was white and there was no ship coming to rescue you?

All resolutions would come to naught.
All plans would be meaningless.
The only choices would be to eat the cannibal or let it eat you.

So let's stop patting each other on the back because a new calendar year starts. For the cannibal is always lurking within. You can see it when you grin.

Weightless

(or, The Last Day at Work)

The gush of wind, in my face
thru' the jagged glass
Destroyed, like Twoface hath
I wonder which one to pass

Far below, the serpentine streets
With sirens, hissing at me
The flames on me, the panic beats
As my clothes burn in glee

The clock is still, as this world ends
The moans have slept, and the crackle roars
This paper and pen, my parting friends
Huddle with me, in this forsaken place

No anger, no grief, but Starbucks taste
and the parting wave of Jane's smile
Yanked from me in fiery haste
as I crawl off the morbid pile

These are the last words I write
On this memo to hell
Bloody smudges and fading light
Make me laugh, make me yell

Here I am, like a dragonfly
Neither wish nor prayer, no fervent hope
Is gonna make me cry
As I look over the charring ledge

Off you go, you A4 sheet
Some random hands you shall meet
I am right behind you
To meet the devil, 100 stories below my feet

- This could have been the last words written on a piece of paper by one of the people waiting to die at the WTC on Sep 11 2001, before they made the painful choice between burning to death or jumping to it. It could have been me. It could have been you. It is as plain as that.

The Great Indian Hope Trick

Until about a few weeks back, I was rummaging around within my head, grumbling that yet again I could not cast my vote in an election in India. Here we are, a superlative diaspora that has taken over every nook and cranny of most countries and corporations in the world, and yet we don't have overseas balloting in place. With this angst, I was twiddling my thumbs, half-expecting to watch the mantle of power slip away and fall into the hands of the BJP and its khaki-clad maniacs, who would again set us ten years back.

But lo and behold! Our gregarious voters have thumped Manmohanism on the back yet again, even if their motives might be questionable. Within a month, the fortunes of the stone-aged and rabble-rousing ilk of the bitter Advani and Modi team has spiralled down into the murky depths of the Ganges.

I am a little late in igniting fire-crackers, so I will let that display of triumph pass by. I am sure that thousands of my compatriots have already danced on emptied streets and burst a million crackers in jubilation. However it's hard to not wonder at the fact that this is the first time in the last 50 years that the same Government has returned to consecutive power after an election. None, not even Indira Gandhi or A.B. Vajpayee, had managed this. More impressive is the fact that Congress actually managed to strengthen itself further by having more than 200 seats this time. Call it the result of fractious infighting in other parties, or the dereliction of the fanatic saffron parties by their bruised allies such as BJD, but the truth is that the BJP is failing even more nowadays in achieving its single objective - to fool all the people all the time. I, for one, am really glad to see their fall. I do not hero-worship Manmohan Singh or Rahul Gandhi, but I would prefer them anyday over the dodo-ist, head-in-the-sand Advanis or Modis who still have not been exempted of the alleged massacres that they have led in the past. Opportunistic as they are, they have also somersaulted on their own "dynastic politics" rhetoric they kept shooting at Congress by hosting Maneka Gandhi and her son from their party. An Indian voting for the BJP is like a German voting for the Nazis in 1933, where either sheer blissful ignorance or boiling and misplaced venom can be the only motivations.

What is even more amazing is how Rahul Gandhi has juxtaposed the possible misplaced expectations that the rally-attending masses of our country has from him, with the opportunities that he had while at the helm of the Congress campaign. Focussing on the correct issues and the right amount of media posturing worked solidly for his team, while his embittered cousin distanced swing voters even more with his Hindu rhetoric. Whether Rahul Gandhi and his ilk emerge to be leaders of substance or not, is something that we shall see unfold over the next five years. However this time, it shall be a much more transparent callibration of the Congress mandate, with no ambiguities of policies now that unwanted ingredients such as the Left and the RJD are out of the soup. 417 million voters put in their ballots this year, and the giant jigsaw puzzle that is the Indian map has shaken itself back into political shape again.

If one is a pessimist who never gives up, then this is the moment to rebrand oneself. For every 75 MPs who have active criminal records in the new Parliament, now there is one IIT-IIM alumni in the Lok Sabha (Prem Das Rai from Sikkim). That is some glimmer of hope. Since none of us are ever going to bring an overnight revolution in the country, the only path of furthering the future is to watch the radicals run home one by one.

It's slow and noiseless progress, almost like a glacier. But I welcome it.

The Grey

My mind hurtled through the highway of my follies, masking each blotch with a better colour. A better colour that eventually turned into blue, regardless of my thrashing around the periphery. Blue is supposed to be the colour of calmness, of the equal sign that sums up all emotions. Sitting there on the tree stump, I huffed and puffed, and let out imaginary rings of smoke into the afternoon air. What was that colour I had seen on the train? Why did it keep dodging me? Why did it refuse to turn into grey? I had no name for that colour. Was it the result of a cosmic joke, or the merger of bitter elements? Was it a constant reminder to me that just around the bend lay nothingness, and that I had no time left? It had dazzled my eyes, and yet had made me place my palms on the window in restless thrill.

I could not have travelled in a time machine, for that fantasy of mine had not been invented yet. Yet the dirt road of time eluded my gaze when I turned round at the top of the hill and looked back as far as I could. The sky beat like the magnified surface of a drum, and the spectrum of some weak rainbows submitted itself to the rule of that colour. It spread out all over me slowly, gobbling every dormant cloud and vanquishing the rays of the distant star that gives this world life. The fingers on my hands. They, which had held so many brushes, giving shape to my imagination and my wildest dreams. Now they were idle, queued up like hungry labourers waiting for a truck to come by and give them back their purpose and will. They had distorted faces of tourists on the streets of Sydney, making their laughter crooked. They had swept across large strokes of thick brushes, catching snapshots of my nightmares in larger-than-life dimensions. They had held the ears of hares as I had pulled them out of my hat in India. They had glistened with excited beads of sweat whenever I had heard applause and cheers of appreciation. All those moments. All those flights across man-made borders, travelling on a shoestring, tasting the water and kissing the soil of each land. All the time, growing wiser by the day and nourishing my obsession with wanderlust.

My dreams had been in sepia, with specks of red thrown into the moments that terrified me. Like the one in which the huge wall of a tsunami raced towards me and I sat on the beach, frozen by my own urge to let myself be swallowed, while desperately screaming at myself to run for my life. The water turned green, then red and loomed over the world like a gigantic spectre of doom. Yet I just sat there, as if I was a part of the earth, my eyes glistening with the tears of forgotten horrors. The yellow blinding torchlight of my future self always woke me up just in the nick of time, saving me from an apocalyptic death, and showing me the indigo around me. That indigo, which like spurts of ink on a new shirt, refused to disappear. They held the memories of the people I have killed and the revolution which I worshipped. Until the Revolution, I had been nothing but a nomad, wandering across the latitudes, earning my bread and butter by putting brush to canvas, and playing second fiddle to Zach, the brilliant conjurer of poor men's fantasies.

Like the spread of oil on water, the colour now beckoned to me from the sky above. Or could I call it a sky anymore? Its eerie shimmer fell across the landscape, as I struggled hard to identify what colour this was. The trees waved in the rising wind, as their shadows also queued up to felicitate this new colour. The Revolution had sprung suddenly on mortal society, led by those who despised the false gods and the enslavement of mankind by the non-existence of free will. All philosophers who died before then, turned in their graves. The revolution made brilliant sense. Remove all borders. Wipe out all religions. Erase all existing currencies and stick to one. The birth of the new world. A world where white, black, red, yellow, green had no role to play apart from returning to the folds of nature, where they came from. Like a microcosm, it spread from mouth to atheist mouth, from idle mind to creative mind, from desperate will to crushing desire. Men and women trooped out of offices, fell out of social orders and disappeared from organised rigour. What led me to it? Was I insane? Or was I just swept up in the promises the Revolution showed? It was not Zach. In fact, poor Zach was simply sleeping in his hotel room, dreaming about his next trick, when I crept up and smothered him to death. I had to do it. His brilliance and my reverence for him was a huge barrier for the Revolution. I had to let myself out from under the shadow of morals. Many revolutions have gone by where the forces, the people who led the mobs, had selflessly fought, waiting for victory in some lifetime or the other. Not for us. We wanted immediate, overnight results.

I am not much of a speaker. But a voice I do have. For those Seven Days of the Awakening, as The Leader had named the Revolution, I bathed in grey every dawn, while the world fought a raging battle around me. I treasure laughter, and mine meant the most to me. I still heard it, as I sat on the tree stump, resounding in my mind like the blaring trumpet of blind ambition. Hundreds of us united in breaking free of the shackles, murdering everyone we saw who was not with us. We swore allegiance to the Leader, who was himself faceless, but always dressed in grey. It was the colour of the new time, and all we saw around was grey. The grey between morals and apathy, the grey between motive and mayhem, and the grey between order and chaos. Day turned into orange dusk, and bloody dusk turned into black rivers of dried up blood. I was on top of the world, just as all the other greys around me were.

Then the Leader showed us a colour I had not expected. He wanted all Creativity dead. He declared the goal of The New Society to be the Uniformity of Will, and the Absence of Idleness. He wanted this to become a perfect world.
The dazzling and overwhelming light of this new colour had hit me then. I realised, standing in the middle of vanquished cities, that I could never paint again. I could never dream of a magic trick again. The grey itself was a nightmare, and was going to be the colour of the tsunami now. And I thought I loved grey.

I had been a fool, but atleast I will not die one.

The dazzling colour, now so eerie, made me forget hunger and thirst. I ran like an enraged madman, over crushed cars and overturned trolleys, through smoke-filled buildings and over moaning bodies, past celebrating comrades and seas of grey.
Each grey I saw reminded me again and again of what I had to do now. I had killed Zach, and now I had to repay.
I ran until I was breathless.

(The shimmer of this colour now was creeping up my own body, as the star sank below the horizon, and the heavens yawned.)
Today is the Eighth Day of the Awakening, and we saw The Leader for the first time. An ocean of grey clapped and cheered. They looked wild, the men and women and children of tomorrow. Did they know what was in store? I then realised that this teeming mass of the new humanity was the tsunami, the one that I always gave into.

As The Leader was about to speak, I shot him. From the top of the tallest building. Straight through the head. A trickle of brilliant red ran down over his grey suit as he collapsed.

Since then, they had been looking for me. I had run into an abandoned train and hurtled it out of the city. I had gotten out of my greys and was now wearing nothing. They were hot on my heels, a furious mob, baying for my blood. I was not concerned about the murder I had just committed. The bigger crime was the killing of colours.

As I sat on the tree stump, I looked up the hill and saw the thousands. They swarmed down the hillsides. I think they have spotted me. They did not look like the ones I had fought with. Maybe it was this colour. I had never seen it before. My eyes flashed with a new fury, and this time they bristled with this new colour. It cracked on my fingers, and glowed on my skin. It made the whole world new.

I start running. Uphill this time. I am laughing loudly. The sky is again throbbing. The mob and its yell is nearer now. I come over the top of the hill, and I stop in my tracks. They are there, panting and waiting for me. All around me, is the madness. The madness I was a part of. I look up at the sky, and scream to the colour. I wonder if they see it.

I won't live long. But I know one thing.

I won't die grey.

The Threshold Dilemmas

Spring's around the corner! That's what I was told a few weeks back, and there is still no sign of it. Not that the cold isn't bitterly entertaining now that we are used to it, but the sunny skies are deceptive every morning.
On such deceptive days, music is a great friend on the commute to work, but since my commute is only a 5-minute train ride, this is what happens nowadays:



One dilemma with being on the threshold of winter and spring is the daily decision each morning as to whether one should wear a sweater or not. Unlike what you may think, a sweater can have different roles to play in life, as shown below:



When you meet someone in the elevator and there is an immediate blank-out of topics to discuss and you realise that the elevator is stopping at every floor, you try the following topics in that order - how the weekend went, how the weather is playing tricks and last but not the least the economy. It seems everyone has mugged what The Economist has to say about the economy. But I think the best way to look at the economy is:



I stole some minutes from work recently and tried to get some alternatives researched on options we have regarding cable TV. I myself do not know why, as the definition of TV in India has morphed into the following in the last few years:



But when no options came up on the TV thing, I resigned ourselves to watching mediocre cable for the time being. The excitement surrounding the upcoming general elections in India will have to be tracked over the ubiquitous news websites at work. These elections will be very interesting, most of all for the BJP, who have been riding high on their own pedestal for the last term. However I think Advani is losing sleep, not something that many would know. Do you want to know why?



It's doomsday for BJP in these times. Perhaps it's my wishful thinking though. However talking of doomsday, "Knowing" is about to be released and even though I am a fan of thriller movies like most of us, what have we learnt from most Hollywood doomsday flicks?



Speaking about Hollywood, Aamir Khan has confirmed in his latest interview that Bollywood movies are still being made with the Indian audience in mind, and that when the day comes when we start targeting the international audience, we won't fare too bad. I am inclined to believe him. In the same interview, Aamir has admitted that he is embarrassed by many of his earlier movies. I am a huge fan of his, but I would have liked him to take pride in all that he has done. Are his roles better now, or are his movies better after 2000? Hard call to make, because if you take his top ten characters and measure them against each other in terms of memorability and impact, the results can be interpreted in various ways. For the sake of reverence, I have not included his all-time classic character of Amar from Andaaz Apna Apna in this comparison. That would have been a crime even Teja would not have committed.



I wish he looked at himself from a fan's eyes and realised that characters like Sanjay Lal, Munna and Siddhu remain as some of his best characters till date. Is he getting deceived by his own perfectionism? Or is he stumbling due to the sheer frequency of having to work amongst mediocrity andf yet having to cross the threshold over into excellence?

Wake up Aamir, spring's round the corner, and so are Three Idiots!