So there was this boy who didn't dance too well.
And his girl was this hoity toity sort who could, really well even.
And though there was no trouble between them, this little thing grew into a big problem.
She started hating him for his spastic dance moves.
And one day she found this other dancing person with emerald eyes. And decided that she had had enough of her spaz person.
And she tried to keep it hidden because despite her being madly in love with this emerald eyes person, she really cared for this spaz person.
But one night, one cold winter night, she lost it and screamed at this spaz person. And he stood quiet while she screamed at him. 'i'll tell you what to do Matt, take that dance of yours', she said, 'and go around the fucking world or something, go find some other wierdo who likes to dance with you, just get the fuck out of my life.'
And she left.
Matt wondered what he should do.
To be continued...
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Endinning – Part Two of Two
To know how the story ended, copy the below link, post it in the address field of your browser and press enter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Happy Diwali
The festival meant little for her. The streets of the old city bordered with cracker shops advertising Cock brand rockets and fuljharis and chakkarghinnis, little shanties done up to their best, laced with chains of little bulbs that would find the light of day when the day would lose his, large commercial complexes with large neon signs that promised to blaze the night red, blue, magenta and turquoise blue. Between these exuberant borders ran a river of people, with bright clean clothes, new or borrowed, with golden buckles and shiny shoes and polished shoes, the surface brimming with freshly oiled hair partings and the anarchic quantum foam of chunnis and ghunghats draped over heads, the air about thick with the smell of coconut oil, imitation Charlie and rosewater. A few stood out. The dervish in his tatters, conversing with invisible djinns by the oldest tree in the vicinity. The beggars, running against the common flow, trying to monetize the common flow for lunch, dinner and the cut the dons asked for, selling toys, candy floss or plain sympathy. And her.
In a stained kurta (water without detergent can only handle so much), her hair matted (it was a choice between the shampoo pouch and the bread – both of which cost Rs. 5), bent under a weight of a heavy bundle of cloth (she had deliveries to make).
While they looked away from her (the disgust), she looked away from them (the shame), she considered briefly that this might be some perverse commerce at work. Ignorance for apathy? But that wasn’t the only trade she was conducting here.
The bundle on her back, if they had brought themselves to look closer, wasn’t just pieces of dirty white cotton. This cloud of dirty white, to the humane onlooker, would reveal intricate patterns of embroidery like he had never seen before, little mughal windows complete with their delicate carvings, ripe mangoes in magical forests, fishes jumping onto the boats of ailing nobles, offering them a fleeting chance at hope and redemption, sonnets by kings and poets demanding justice from Allah and love from courtesans, the wonders of the dying craft of the chikankar, of which she was amongst the last few. The humane onlooker would rush to her, burst out in loud praises of the art she had created, demand that others give her her due. A bubble would be formed in the flow. Encircled by the praising millions, her lowly craft acknowledged as high art, she the heroine of a forgotten age raised on loving shoulders. But no one was humane. And no one looked.
She walked through the space between a shop selling flowers and another selling clothes (import rejects). Finding her way through the renowned phool waali gali, she knocked a knocker on an intricately carved door. A child opened the door, demanded kya hai of her. He wore a new WWE t-shirt, bright pink shorts, and new keds. He smelt of Lifebuoy Gold.
‘Sethji honge?’ she enquired.
‘Ruko’, the child said, and disappeared inside.
The Seth appeared, looking rather flummoxed at her sight.
‘Aaj tum yahaan?’ he asked, peeking about to notice if this disgraceful guest had been noticed by the neighbors.
‘Paise ki zaroorat thi’, she submitted, ‘ghar mein khaane ka nahin hai…Aur kaam bhi ho gaya tha…’
‘Theek hai, andar aao’, the Seth said angrily.
‘Samaan nikaalo’, he demanded.
She opened up her bundle and removed another bundle from it. The Seth took it and handed her a hundred.
‘Ek sau pachis nahin tha?’ She asked.
‘Abhi chutta nahin hai’, the Seth said, ‘agli baar le lena.’
Her work would be sold for close to ten times of what she was getting, perhaps even more. But she didn’t know that and received what she was given with grace.
She gathered her bundle and turned to leave.
‘Ruko’, the Seth said, ‘Rukhmani!’ He called for his wife and asked her to be directed through the backdoor.
On the road again, she passed the sweetshops to the old Nawab’s. His Excellency was given to the selling of horrendously overpriced antiques. His wife, meanwhile, maintained a boutique, which was fair in its equal fleecing of the NGOs that supported it and the chikankars she leeched off their craft.
Led directly into the servants area (there were guests over), she was served chai and mithai in a steel plate and saucer. Peeking past the zenana into the living room, she saw guests served in bone china plates. One day… she humored herself, her face, wry with a smile.
She made her last delivery to the modern home - a new entrepreneur who had recently gotten in touch with her. He was stocking up for his new shop. Sadly, he still operated at the old rates. The sky had started lighting up with fireworks. There were diyas at his door.
They let her in. The child was instructed to bring her sweets. Busy at his Playstation, he asked her to get it from the kitchen herself.
She had just walked in when the grandmother screamed.
‘Malaich’, she screamed. A clear reference to her dirty clothes, ‘kisne ghusne diya is malaich ko rasoi mein?’
She had defiled the kitchen, even more auspicious on festive occasion than its usual self.
Hanging her head low as the matriarch screamed insults at her, she wished she had the money to shampoo her hair and bathe and the courage to steal one of the clothes she had embroidered for herself.
The entrepreneur intervened, taking her to a corner and asking why she was such a nuisance. This was Diwali Day after all, couldn’t she have picked a better day to come and that he was out of cash after all the shopping.
‘Cheque likh raha hoon tumhaare liye, ki tumhaari manhoos surat hafte, do haft eke liye na dekhna pare.’
‘Naam kya daalon?’, he asked as he made her a cheque for a hundred and seventy.
Odd, she thought as she answered, no one had asked that question for some time, ‘Lakshmi’
In a stained kurta (water without detergent can only handle so much), her hair matted (it was a choice between the shampoo pouch and the bread – both of which cost Rs. 5), bent under a weight of a heavy bundle of cloth (she had deliveries to make).
While they looked away from her (the disgust), she looked away from them (the shame), she considered briefly that this might be some perverse commerce at work. Ignorance for apathy? But that wasn’t the only trade she was conducting here.
The bundle on her back, if they had brought themselves to look closer, wasn’t just pieces of dirty white cotton. This cloud of dirty white, to the humane onlooker, would reveal intricate patterns of embroidery like he had never seen before, little mughal windows complete with their delicate carvings, ripe mangoes in magical forests, fishes jumping onto the boats of ailing nobles, offering them a fleeting chance at hope and redemption, sonnets by kings and poets demanding justice from Allah and love from courtesans, the wonders of the dying craft of the chikankar, of which she was amongst the last few. The humane onlooker would rush to her, burst out in loud praises of the art she had created, demand that others give her her due. A bubble would be formed in the flow. Encircled by the praising millions, her lowly craft acknowledged as high art, she the heroine of a forgotten age raised on loving shoulders. But no one was humane. And no one looked.
She walked through the space between a shop selling flowers and another selling clothes (import rejects). Finding her way through the renowned phool waali gali, she knocked a knocker on an intricately carved door. A child opened the door, demanded kya hai of her. He wore a new WWE t-shirt, bright pink shorts, and new keds. He smelt of Lifebuoy Gold.
‘Sethji honge?’ she enquired.
‘Ruko’, the child said, and disappeared inside.
The Seth appeared, looking rather flummoxed at her sight.
‘Aaj tum yahaan?’ he asked, peeking about to notice if this disgraceful guest had been noticed by the neighbors.
‘Paise ki zaroorat thi’, she submitted, ‘ghar mein khaane ka nahin hai…Aur kaam bhi ho gaya tha…’
‘Theek hai, andar aao’, the Seth said angrily.
‘Samaan nikaalo’, he demanded.
She opened up her bundle and removed another bundle from it. The Seth took it and handed her a hundred.
‘Ek sau pachis nahin tha?’ She asked.
‘Abhi chutta nahin hai’, the Seth said, ‘agli baar le lena.’
Her work would be sold for close to ten times of what she was getting, perhaps even more. But she didn’t know that and received what she was given with grace.
She gathered her bundle and turned to leave.
‘Ruko’, the Seth said, ‘Rukhmani!’ He called for his wife and asked her to be directed through the backdoor.
On the road again, she passed the sweetshops to the old Nawab’s. His Excellency was given to the selling of horrendously overpriced antiques. His wife, meanwhile, maintained a boutique, which was fair in its equal fleecing of the NGOs that supported it and the chikankars she leeched off their craft.
Led directly into the servants area (there were guests over), she was served chai and mithai in a steel plate and saucer. Peeking past the zenana into the living room, she saw guests served in bone china plates. One day… she humored herself, her face, wry with a smile.
She made her last delivery to the modern home - a new entrepreneur who had recently gotten in touch with her. He was stocking up for his new shop. Sadly, he still operated at the old rates. The sky had started lighting up with fireworks. There were diyas at his door.
They let her in. The child was instructed to bring her sweets. Busy at his Playstation, he asked her to get it from the kitchen herself.
She had just walked in when the grandmother screamed.
‘Malaich’, she screamed. A clear reference to her dirty clothes, ‘kisne ghusne diya is malaich ko rasoi mein?’
She had defiled the kitchen, even more auspicious on festive occasion than its usual self.
Hanging her head low as the matriarch screamed insults at her, she wished she had the money to shampoo her hair and bathe and the courage to steal one of the clothes she had embroidered for herself.
The entrepreneur intervened, taking her to a corner and asking why she was such a nuisance. This was Diwali Day after all, couldn’t she have picked a better day to come and that he was out of cash after all the shopping.
‘Cheque likh raha hoon tumhaare liye, ki tumhaari manhoos surat hafte, do haft eke liye na dekhna pare.’
‘Naam kya daalon?’, he asked as he made her a cheque for a hundred and seventy.
Odd, she thought as she answered, no one had asked that question for some time, ‘Lakshmi’
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
friends and lovers
Michael Stipe, Brandon Flowers, Ludovico Einaudi
Orhan, Michael Chabon, Brett Easton Ellis,
Scott Pilgrim, Richard the Third, Rorschach (close, but someone borrowed him)
Bessy (the former cow/buffalo/giraffe (i don't really know (i just have her skull)))
the Six Soldiers (my pearl pet water bottles)
Flurry, my pet soulfish (the screensaver on the mac)
Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum (the high back and the ottoman, respectively)
the ghost of you, sitting across, smoking
Orhan, Michael Chabon, Brett Easton Ellis,
Scott Pilgrim, Richard the Third, Rorschach (close, but someone borrowed him)
Bessy (the former cow/buffalo/giraffe (i don't really know (i just have her skull)))
the Six Soldiers (my pearl pet water bottles)
Flurry, my pet soulfish (the screensaver on the mac)
Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum (the high back and the ottoman, respectively)
the ghost of you, sitting across, smoking
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
the last 10,000
so my lovelies, as much as i hate to admit it, this blog is a bit on the decline.
where there was a tsunami of comments on every post (18, or sometimes even 19), nowadays even 1 is a call for a black label, large and with coke. it's only logical, of course, people move on, there is no constant but change, etc etc, fuck, there are so many allusions to the cliche. but it hurts, not in the overwhelming cascade of tears kind of way but more in a my goldfish died kind of way (often sometimes in the rather tragi-comic my larger goldfish ate my smaller goldfish kind of way). and quite frankly, i am a bit of a sucker for inertia. if i had my way, i'd still be 14, staring out of my classroom window trying to evoke the seventeenth century back into being, writing shit verse for the class bully to try and salvage some empathy out of that profane tiffin stealing mass of khaki and athleticism. and then i wouldn't have met so many of you. or, for that matter, started this blog.
which brings me to a side story, think of it as required reading for the greater story (and not as the thinly disguised narcissism in nostalgia that it really is). there were 3 of us back then - the angel, the fat whore and myself. the blog was started out of my closet in lajpat with the sheer intent of becoming mark zuckerberg at the whore's insistence. the 3 of us were fairly thick, and complete conformists to the kind of immortality such a thickness dreams of. the whore got married and buggered off, eager to satisfy the aspirations concealed behind the reading of jim morrison's biography, aldous huxley and other such pretentious crap. the angel, however, persisted. the blog is named after where he was staying at the time. i could walk into the new friends colony community center any time of the night or day and be assured of serendipity guiding me to him. him moving out of there brought the foretellings of doom. the ground shook beneath my feet. the center of my world was lost. his seat at the cafe, now annexed by a sleazy real estate agent who keeps buying me americanos and inviting me for drunken liaisons with his girlfriend and him. i still go and sit there, hoping for a waft of what it was, destroying myself with caffeine, nicotine and shawarmas.
of late, the angel informed me that he was getting married. on the 31st of december, at rampur. now, for the average human being this presents a dilemma. the 31st of december is normally reserved for newyearsdeparty, girlfrand, shiny disco balls and those kinds of things. going to be with your best friend in what's easily the most monumental day of his life obviously must take second priority, given the scheme of things. now there were two important factors that were determinants of the outcome in this game.
a. owing to the usual mismanagement of financial resources i had a paltry 10,000 at my disposal. the entry to the club we were scheduled to go to had this as the entry fee. a night of dancing would yield harsh impoverishment for the consequent 10 days (i get my salary on the 10th of every month).
b. undertaking this journey would cost a trifle comparatively. also, this would fit in with the ideology of the preceding nostalgic rant (that forms a massive chunk in my narrative on life) and establish me as a man of substance with the added benefit of keeping my self respect and dignity intact.
quite obviously, b. was the preferred option. however, an interesting chain of events ensued that changed everything. the girlfrand threw a fit and threatened to go to the party with a random variable EX and other hot boys of european origin. a friend's friend who worked at the club promised to get us free entry. also, my boss mentioned that it would be highly irresponsible of me to flee the district given that an important pitch that would determine the future of our little advertising agency was due. what dawned, at this moment was that we all had, in fact moved on. only logical, i thought, people move on, there is no constant but change, etc etc,
as i write this, i am on a bus to rampur. if all goes well, i might make it for the angel's wedding. the girlfrand, as per our last conversation, is wearing her hot pink dress for her night out. enclosed in my bag is a suit i bought for the wedding on an impulse before leaving. it's still in the store's navy blue paper bag. the price tag, attached to the jacket's collar, buried between black and black, in the wake of a white shirt dark in the absence of light, by the trail of a tie that is actually red, reads 10,000.
where there was a tsunami of comments on every post (18, or sometimes even 19), nowadays even 1 is a call for a black label, large and with coke. it's only logical, of course, people move on, there is no constant but change, etc etc, fuck, there are so many allusions to the cliche. but it hurts, not in the overwhelming cascade of tears kind of way but more in a my goldfish died kind of way (often sometimes in the rather tragi-comic my larger goldfish ate my smaller goldfish kind of way). and quite frankly, i am a bit of a sucker for inertia. if i had my way, i'd still be 14, staring out of my classroom window trying to evoke the seventeenth century back into being, writing shit verse for the class bully to try and salvage some empathy out of that profane tiffin stealing mass of khaki and athleticism. and then i wouldn't have met so many of you. or, for that matter, started this blog.
which brings me to a side story, think of it as required reading for the greater story (and not as the thinly disguised narcissism in nostalgia that it really is). there were 3 of us back then - the angel, the fat whore and myself. the blog was started out of my closet in lajpat with the sheer intent of becoming mark zuckerberg at the whore's insistence. the 3 of us were fairly thick, and complete conformists to the kind of immortality such a thickness dreams of. the whore got married and buggered off, eager to satisfy the aspirations concealed behind the reading of jim morrison's biography, aldous huxley and other such pretentious crap. the angel, however, persisted. the blog is named after where he was staying at the time. i could walk into the new friends colony community center any time of the night or day and be assured of serendipity guiding me to him. him moving out of there brought the foretellings of doom. the ground shook beneath my feet. the center of my world was lost. his seat at the cafe, now annexed by a sleazy real estate agent who keeps buying me americanos and inviting me for drunken liaisons with his girlfriend and him. i still go and sit there, hoping for a waft of what it was, destroying myself with caffeine, nicotine and shawarmas.
of late, the angel informed me that he was getting married. on the 31st of december, at rampur. now, for the average human being this presents a dilemma. the 31st of december is normally reserved for newyearsdeparty, girlfrand, shiny disco balls and those kinds of things. going to be with your best friend in what's easily the most monumental day of his life obviously must take second priority, given the scheme of things. now there were two important factors that were determinants of the outcome in this game.
a. owing to the usual mismanagement of financial resources i had a paltry 10,000 at my disposal. the entry to the club we were scheduled to go to had this as the entry fee. a night of dancing would yield harsh impoverishment for the consequent 10 days (i get my salary on the 10th of every month).
b. undertaking this journey would cost a trifle comparatively. also, this would fit in with the ideology of the preceding nostalgic rant (that forms a massive chunk in my narrative on life) and establish me as a man of substance with the added benefit of keeping my self respect and dignity intact.
quite obviously, b. was the preferred option. however, an interesting chain of events ensued that changed everything. the girlfrand threw a fit and threatened to go to the party with a random variable EX and other hot boys of european origin. a friend's friend who worked at the club promised to get us free entry. also, my boss mentioned that it would be highly irresponsible of me to flee the district given that an important pitch that would determine the future of our little advertising agency was due. what dawned, at this moment was that we all had, in fact moved on. only logical, i thought, people move on, there is no constant but change, etc etc,
as i write this, i am on a bus to rampur. if all goes well, i might make it for the angel's wedding. the girlfrand, as per our last conversation, is wearing her hot pink dress for her night out. enclosed in my bag is a suit i bought for the wedding on an impulse before leaving. it's still in the store's navy blue paper bag. the price tag, attached to the jacket's collar, buried between black and black, in the wake of a white shirt dark in the absence of light, by the trail of a tie that is actually red, reads 10,000.
Saturday, December 25, 2010
zizi's garden of cruelty
the scene opens on a lovely garden where zizi is guiding an eunuch about the place. both of them are dressed in fancy pre french revolution garb, with the eunuch pretending to be male and zizi, female.
this be my garden, she says, batting her lovely eyelids.
lovely, much like yourself, mentions the eunuch, but what be this monstrosity you seem to have grown.
the camera now focuses on a man, planted in the gound and looming large on account of being taller than required. his nose is massive, his spectacles thick and his name, max (of the black variety).
oh him, she says, her voice now morose and lacking the efferversence of youth, he's a preserved species, can't get him chopped off.
the eunuch, overcome by sadness at her predicament, puts his arm around her.
don't worry, it says, we can cut it up after it dies. it'll make for lovely furniture.
they make mad passionate love then. but she feels something is amiss.
this be my garden, she says, batting her lovely eyelids.
lovely, much like yourself, mentions the eunuch, but what be this monstrosity you seem to have grown.
the camera now focuses on a man, planted in the gound and looming large on account of being taller than required. his nose is massive, his spectacles thick and his name, max (of the black variety).
oh him, she says, her voice now morose and lacking the efferversence of youth, he's a preserved species, can't get him chopped off.
the eunuch, overcome by sadness at her predicament, puts his arm around her.
don't worry, it says, we can cut it up after it dies. it'll make for lovely furniture.
they make mad passionate love then. but she feels something is amiss.
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