Chasing shadows

It's May, that paradox of a month when it's green and just the right amount of pretty on the other side of the globe and all we are left with is a big, blazing, burning sun that never shies away from showing off its summer might. Unfair!

As I sit at the kitchen table and watch the morning sun flood the apartment in rays of gold, many things scamper and skid through my mind. Off late, I have been chasing shadows a lot, of all shapes and kinds. Some go years back in time, when the sun was mellow and seasons were a part of life, and some very recent whose bodies are too patchy to give a name to them.

In such times, I came across Kamila Shamsie's Burnt Shadows — the heroic story of a woman, spanning decades and their history, who wears the scars of her past on her skin, literally, and carries their ominous shadows across the length and breadth of the world. Hiroko Tanaka, a brave, resilient Japanese woman, miraculously survives the horror of the 1945 Nagasaki bombings and trails her journey across the world, mapping her life through the troubled territories of Delhi, Istanbul, Karachi, and New York, in turn witnessing more death and disaster brought on by man upon man. Battling her own ghosts, she sees it all — the waning years of the British Raj in India, the bloody partition of India and Pakistan, the rise of terrorism in Pakistan, and finally the harrowing episode of 9/11 in New York. She sees it all, living and losing through each of these catastrophes. But what pestered me through the pages is this nagging question — whether the shadows just announced themselves wherever Hiroko arrived, or it was she who kept chasing shadows relentlessly all her life?

Some people have a reputation of casting shadows wherever they go, after all. Just like some carry a legacy of brewing storms in picture-perfect calmness.

The new view

It rains everyday. Sometimes in thunderous downpours but mostly in soothing lullabies. And when the dark clouds puff and rumble their way down, the coconut trees dance with a new-found greenness. For my green-deprived eyes, this is sheer visual poetry and much more when I realize that all this is happening when I'm still living in a big, bustling city. In India.
Of course there are the ubiquitous sky-hugging buildings too, that stand so assertively punctuating the green patch. Those rectangular dots of concrete, when strung together, that map the oxymoronic facade of this city. But on my side of the world here, unmindful of the cacophony of an always-on-its-toes city, the trees win. And so does the sky.

Tales of home and homecoming

"I let it go. It's like swimming against the current. It exhausts you. After a while, whoever you are, you just have to let go, and the river brings you home."

~ Joanne Harris

Last month, somewhere between the joy of basking in the elusiveness of a tropical spring and the sinking realization that it was almost summer, the river did bring me back home. There couldn't be a more befitting sequel to my search of home, my Bosphorus of the previous post. It all started with a trip home, with friends who had come from the exotic Mediterranean to see my state, Odisha. And the sights and smells that were once so familiar and so much a part of who I am today, came rushing back to me and how. 

Despite the initial moments of foreignness, I refused to succumb to the touristy trap of continuously being taken as the 'outsider' by the presumptuous guides and vendors. All the time, I was acutely aware of being armed with a certain pride, one that comes with the prior knowledge of one's homeland. Also, seeing it anew, after more than a decade and half, with people who did not belong to those places gave it a fresh coat of perspective. The scenes that once upon a time coloured the canvas of our childhood, had gradually, over the years, faded into the banalities of adulthood. But the fact that they were still somewhere inside me, the significant details, while answering the curiosity of our friends was no less than heroic. The exquisitely-carved dancing girls of Konark, the roadside display of vibrant colours and mirrors shimmering in the hot sun, the crimson dusk framed by groves of coconut trees - little by little, it all came back to me. Or perhaps, I went back to it.   

The lush green paddy fields. A melange of various greens; roadside poetry at its best. The Sun Temple at Konark, a world heritage site popular for its Kalinga architecture. Where Tagore had once claimed "the language of stone surpasses the language of men". The glimpses of a reluctant spring on a red cotton tree. On the ground, roadside swamps blanketed with beautiful water hyacinths and the cacophonous croak of frogs. The centuries-old Udayagiri caves which were built as monasteries for the 'arhats' (Jain monks) during the rule of King Kharavela. The Shanti Stupa at Dhauli, that magical place that offers one the perfect sanctuary away from the bustle of the capital city nearby. Blessed by Buddha, and an important site in the history of the Kalinga empire, an overwhelming serenity veils the place. Pipli, the little village known for its popular mirror-applique work. A visit to the Bay of Bengal sea mouth at Chilika Lake, the brackish wetland that's home to the endangered Irrawaddy dolphins, scurrying red crabs, and more than a hundred species of migratory birds that visit every year during the winters. A refreshing drink of tender-coconut water, the perfect cure for a hot, sticky day. Rowing back to the shore amid the soporific ripple of the waves and a breathtaking setting sun. Surely, homecoming couldn't be more picturesque. Or poetic.

Place of my heart

 "There is nothing like returning to a place that has remained unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered."

~ Nelson Mandela

December. That same streaming of winter sunshine through marigolds and their fragrant, dark-green leaves. The view from the portico, a blurry tracery of gold and green. The tea that hasn't changed in flavor or the doting love with which it is made and served. Aai, my ever-smiling grandmother, pairing a ceremonial saucer with the teacup despite my repeated refusals. My favourite red-and-orange marigold that is planted every winter. The constant gardener, my grandfather, fretting over the indiscipline of the dried leaves in the yard lawn. And then, there's the sea. The never-changing, ever-same sea. The grey-green waves, folding and unfolding in similar crests, humming the same restless tune for years. Their self-destructive love of coming back to the same heartless shore regardless of the continuous battering.
The place of one's heart truly remains unchanged and so does that tiny corner of the heart that houses it. It will always stay the way it once was.

PS. Also, I did not know how else to pay my tribute to a great, wise man.

Phailin's Durga Puja

I was home last week. But so was Cyclone Phailin, and there started the drama of it all. What had been dreamed, hoped, and rejoiced about since the last one month, all started to fall apart like the places and people that were exposed to the wrath of the brutal storm. As if being stranded in a place without electricity for three days and not being able to make that journey for which you had planned days ahead wasn't enough, I also had to fall sick. After somehow managing to waddle through the waves and howling winds, we finally reached home only to be in the throws of a bad bacterial stomach infection. The festive season which starts with the Durga Puja had anyway become dim due to Phailin's threat, and there wasn't much that I could have missed celebrations-wise.

Still, for someone who was visiting home after more than a year, it didn't feel right. My days were robbed and the stay at home was cut short by forces beyond my control. Amid candle-lit nights and overcast days, streets strewn with uprooted trees and disheveled decorations from Durga's pandals, I felt cheated. I know, my litany of woes are mercilessly self-centred and indecorous when compared to the immeasurable grief of the cyclone-ravaged people, but that's what I feel. Other than a handful glimpses of the puja on the tenth and the final day, I have got nothing this year. And that's what I shall give to you.

Durga in all her golden glory, punishing the sinners and yet smiling through that veil of radiant calm. The idol of Ardhanarishwar, literally meaning 'the Lord who is half woman'. Shiva and his consort Parvati, another avatar of Durga, come together symbolizing the inherent androgynous nature in a human being. Having never witnessed its presence in the pandals before, it came as a pleasant surprise. Childhood revisited it was, for every corner and every turn of the town reminded me of the joys of many a Durga Puja holiday. And it was almost a decade since I had been home during the pujas. So homecoming it was, in some way at least.  

August blooms

"Many things grow in the garden that were never sown there."

~ Thomas Fuller

Little by little, inch by inch, the spaces in our new home are being adorned with meaning and life. With the rooms almost done and the last of our shipped boxes waiting to be unpacked, the settling part at least seems to be falling into place. I had kept the garden for the last, for it needs time and patience. Like all things that need love and nurturing do.
Now, I wish, and how desperately, that I had a real garden, one where I could dig into the dirt and let my soul lose in its intoxicating earthiness. But this is a city, or as my favorite cliche would convey it more beautifully, a concrete jungle. And all I have got is a rather huge rectangular balcony where toddlers could play cricket! But the abundant space does allow me to dream of a colorful little balcony garden with rusty, unpretentious terracotta pots. I intend to create a green, breathing pad that would provide a refreshing refuge from the din and decay of the dreary city life. So with the hibiscus, rose and marigold, I dream of painting my balcony with a carnival of colors.

And so August blooms, verb or noun, quite literally.

Rust rules

I'm one restless, always-on-the-search soul these days. After taking care of all the bare essentials that go into creating a decent home, it's finally decor time. My favorite part of setting up a new home, every time. No matter how many times (eight homes, including this!) I've done it before, the thrill remains constant.

Although I miss that scrubbed, minimalist look of the tidy white wood and window blinds, and the inviting plainness of the oatmeal carpet of American homes, it is definitely more fun to play with rich, riotous colors. With the solid teak woodwork dominating most of the interior, decorating Indian homes is all about striking that perfect balance between space and colors. And often, one tends to get lost in the intensity of our bright and festive color palette. We, therefore, have decided to go the subtle way - rust and its siblings, beige and coffee, with a hint of the pompous purple and regal red thrown in here and there. The lovely, warm tones have begun painting our new place in an earthy delight. When the late afternoon sun slants moodily on our balcony, one gets the feeling of being bathed in a pale, rusty twilight.

P.S. Rereading My Name is Red couldn't have happened at a more befitting time!

Home

"Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home."

~ Basho

Home. After two years. That familiar sparkle of happiness on two sets of tired, waiting faces. Those old, unaltered spaces of comfort. Books, old and new, awaiting my arrival, neatly stacked by my father. The enchantment of summer all around. My mother's garden, a playground of colours. Faint whiff of hibiscus in the air; some decked up, fresh and dewy, on the sacred basil every morning. Mangoes galore, those forever summer magnets. Their trees laden with fruit, an orchestra pad for cuckoos and other chatty birds. Wake up calls and evening ballads they leave behind, every day. And every day the journey gets lovelier, more complete.

Of course, Ma's food adds the final dollop of bliss to this perfect summer recipe.

Daffodil greetings

Half asleep, half awake and very much groggy by still being on the painfully long seven-hour night flight, I saw the sun's early rays embrace the Cascades. I dismissed it as a dream and went back to yet another bout of interrupted sleep. Moments later, forcing my reluctant eyes wide open, I paid more attention. The flight was tearing through a thick cloud blanket while a green coniferous stretch looked up at me. There, I knew that was it.
It was really difficult to let go of the magic that Hawaii is. Strangely, it felt a little like leaving one's homeland; may be it was the overwhelmingly familiar tropical essence, or may be because I know I belong to some place else, or may be it was just the sheer carefreeness of a vacation.

And what could be more welcoming than stray clumps of daffodils that seemed to have sprouted from nowhere on the roadside. No other shade could have cheered my sleep deprived state more than their vivid, speaking yellow.
The creature of habit is back to her pad.

Back home

"Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home."
~ Basho

We got back to a wet, fog masked Seattle this evening from the cold but sunny farmlands of Kansas. A dank, dense veil of mist hung with a long, drawn face and wrapped the naked, cold arms of the trees. What comfort its misty, chilly embrace offered the forlorn branches, I know not of. But they looked just fine. The festive spirit perhaps?!

Getting back home is always such a comfort. It is for me at least. The everyday ordinariness of the scenes that unfold in front of your eyes - the faint morning sun streaming through the windows, the casually flung book on the coffee table, the green from the bamboo plant decking up the kitchen window, the shy glitter of the sequins from a wall hanging by the warm lamplight, the worn pair of fuzzy slippers by the couch side... I could just go on and on! Such inconsequential, quotidian details yet when pieced together, they create the most perfect picture of belonging and warmth.

True, once the hounding beast of monotony creeps in, the walls begin to look a lot like those of the Lady of Shallot's. 'Half sick of the shadows', the heart longs for an escape. But such is the tug and pull of the word home that once away, the urge to get back becomes equally intense. After all, home is where the heart is, they say.

Of monsoons and memories

It is almost a year and some stubborn bouts of homesickness since my last trip home. I remember the monsoons had just waltzed in, washing away the dirt and sins of a merciless summer. How deliciously green everything looked! Shining with innocence and stripped of pretense, the very air smelled of love. And by love, I mean that first teenage crush, the galore of unexplained giggles and the ignorance that it can never end. Blessed foolishness!

The feisty gulmohar, in its blazing orangeness, played the perfect coy mistress to the hilt. She was the star of the garden and who were the dashing paper-kite butterflies to resist such charm?! What a grand garden feast it was! The pomegranate tree carried a confusing weight of both the blossoms as well as the tiny fruits, as if in a hurry to greet the rains. Amid all this burst of life surrounding me, a mean viral fever tried hard to dampen my joy, but in vain. The bedside window wasn't good enough when the earth was crooning its most romantic song.

The plump mangoes had fallen of their branches, impatient to rest on the fragrant, rain-kissed earth. How we had devoured them - raw with salt and red chilly flakes, chutney-ed, juiced, pickled. There is something about mangoes that always brings back childhood memories, of summer vacations and grandma's old house. That is the place where stories are told and memories are spun, where parents cease to be themselves and allow you to make a clown of yourself.

The rains also brought a winged guest one afternoon - an enchanting kingfisher. I had never seen one from such proximity and thus was thrilled beyond imagination. It sat on the same branch for about an hour, in its blue finery, as if brooding over its hapless past. Sometimes it made annoying faces and ruffled its beautiful feathers, as if I was a paparazzi interrupting the precious meditation. I was only too fortunate to have a treasure trove of some perfect birdie shots and how effortlessly! As if the kingfisher knew it takes only moments before I would get tired from perfection, it flew away, perhaps to some faraway distant place.

Just like I did after a fortnight.

Seattle loves them who love Seattle II

It is that time again when nothing feels right. Nothing, except the place and its faint cry of belongingness. Hence the sequel.

Before chaos gets to me full throttle and warps my grey cells with life's little surprises, I better scribble away the updates. True, after wasting almost half a year cocooned in a monotonous hotel suite, one does become somewhat disoriented with spaces. And I am no different. Having said that, howsoever greedy it sounds, I am insanely preoccupied with hoarding every single minute of domestic bliss; etching my presence in every nook and corner of the apartment as if I never ever lived in one.

Since food plays the utmost important role in man's comfort, our story must begin from the kitchen. I had missed my baking sorely, but mostly it was the aimless loitering around in quest of ideas and ingredients. Nothing feels more cathartic than basking in swirls of aromatic goodness crawling out from the oven, and watching the sun set amidst a cluster of mossy pines. To put it in an elegant way, the calm reverberates T.S. Eliot's evening - "a patient estherized upon a table..." During such moments one does wish the reverie to continue, for the calm to live forever. Unfortunately, I am a creature of the real world and return must I to it.

The most precious icing to my perfectly baked Seattle cake is the thrilling proximity of the dramatic Cascade mountains, aka "America's Alps". While returning from an evening stroll a few days back, we spotted it for the first time in all its glory. There it was, hovering like a spreadeagled creature on the evening sky, humbling and towering at the same time. The best part is, on sunny days (which are oh-so-rare here) when the skies shine, I can catch a glimpse of the magnificent snow-caped peaks from our patio. What more could a mountain lover ask for?!

If the mountains humble and soothe my frayed self, spring does a beautiful patchwork on my ever tattering quilt of hope. The burst of colours in my patio infuse an unknown courage in me, one that I wouldn't know otherwise. What else is life after all? You dream, you fly, you fall and before you know you are dreaming again!

In the manner of a true bedouin, I'm guarding every inch of my newfound space, soaking in its every single drop - decorating, gardening, baking and of course ruminating. Like a caterpillar devouring a leaf's green life, I, too hold on to these little quotidian moments ferociously before life comes knocking again. The caterpillar knows being a butterfly ain't easy after all! Beautiful? Yes. But certainly not easy.

To have a room of one's own is probably the greatest of all joys. I have learnt that well during all these years of the on and off living out of suitcases. Virginia Woolf once wrote, "A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction". Since I own no bank, a room would do just fine. For the moment.

Musings of a cat lover

Hero, a year and little old

"Who would believe such pleasure from a wee ball o' fur?"

~ An Irish saying

Cats and I go back a long way. It all started with a bowl of milk for a wandering grey tabby cat in a sultry summer afternoon. This was how we found Jhumri, the veteran girl of our cat family. The consequent generations had funny names too (courtesy me), irrespective of gender - Elli, Biti and Hero. My father was never fond of the brood and much to his chagrin there was always an addition or two every year. With time he became tolerant although he would remain aloof as ever. While my mother would be attentive to their whimperings, my love for them was overwhelming. I would sacrifice my share of fish for the greedy Elli who was the dearest of the lot and would swing and rock Biti's newborns no matter how ridiculous a spectacle it was. I was scratched on countless occasions as a means of retaliation for the suffocative, smothering love. Once I tried to chase off a poor garden lizard who was being stalked by Hero only to end up with a badly sprained leg. This time when I visited my parents, there was a looming emptiness. For the first time in ten years it was a cat-less home. There was no furry bundle cozied up under the blankets or sniffing flowers in the garden or trying desperately to catch its owl tail in circles in the most comic manner. Their absence felt louder and more annoying than the ruckus of meows on the fried fish days.

The other day as we were watching our neighbour's Persian cat, Sam casually remarked, "You must be this only crazy cat lover who doesn't own a cat". Not many would understand how crushing it felt at that moment. I always lament our nomadic lifestyle and how I can never have a cat until we have a permanent home of our own. Or I might just end up as one of those batty old English women sitting by the fireplace reading or embroidering, with a cat curled up in my lap. Sigh!

Homecoming

A moonlit summer night back home. This is our mango tree bursting with this year's harvest. Thanks Bapa, for sending the seasons attached in emails.

So the restlessness has finally made its way into my days. The time has come when nothing, absolutely nothing can inspire me to be at peace with myself. My mind feels like a giant time bomb, ticking away furiously. In just another week I shall have what I have been longing for since what feels like ages. At last, after a year and a half, I will be home, that one word which is so powerfully potent of exciting so many emotions at one throbbing gush. The carnival of faces of your loved ones, the celebration of the familiar, the surprises because so many things have changed...

At the moment I feel a little blurred with emotions and so I have run out of my word bank. I think I must borrow the haunting nostalgia from Agha Shahid Ali's Postcard from Kashmir, which has often been by my side whenever the longing for home has swallowed me up.

Kashmir shrinks into my mailbox,
my home a neat four by six inches.
I always loved neatness. Now I hold
the half-inch Himalayas in my hand.

This is home. And this the closest
I'll ever be to home. When I return,
the colors won't be so brilliant,
the Jhelum's waters so clean,
so ultramarine. My love
so overexposed.
And my memory will be a little
out of focus, it in
a giant negative, black
and white, still undeveloped.