16.03.2010.

Dear Void,

I am lonely so I thought I’ll write you a letter. I feel lonely… lonely as the sea. The sheer expanse, the unfathomable deeps within the sea that embody so much also ironically leave the sea lonely and forlorn. Sometimes when I feel this way I miss the little boy who was my friend. Ours was an unusual friendship. The wise me… street wise, fight wise and the child him, innocent and gullible. He passed away leaving me with this haunting regret that I did not do enough to save him. And now when I think of him I mutter his name over and over, I etch it on the snow… sand sometimes. My fingertips trace the letters unmindfully making them warm to the touch even on the coldest days. Perhaps in the hope that touching it will renew faith in love, in life or perchance raise him from the earth he lay in… his blood warm, flowing again.

“... the embers left from earlier fires… shall duely flame again” – Walt Whitman

I’ll write to you again another time. Good bye dear Void.

Yours,

I Jai

14.03.2010.

The Post Script

“The state of happiness steals from our written words… the muted expressions of sorrow that turn them words into poetry.”

I read this somewhere… such a lovely thing to say isn’t it? Is that why I cannot write when I am happy? But I ain’t no poet… I just read poetry.

10.03.2010.

Tsuneishi / Japan

Latitude 34° 23.0’ N

Longitude 133° 17.9’ E

Sometimes I cannot help but think that ‘Life’ is like a child. Your own child… you cannot help but love ‘Life’. No matter what ‘Life’ does to you it becomes impossible to stay angry at ‘Life’ after a while you melt… give in. My dear ‘Life’ I too am not angry at you any more. I cannot because you are mine… you are my life.

I stood there in the dimly lit bridge, quietly gazing at the stars slowly fading into the pre-dawn sky. One shackle in water, chain up-n-down… anchor aweigh - Vitalyi Kravchenko’s voice crackled over the radio. Roger that - I heard myself say, followed by the Dock Master’s command - “Engines dead slow ahead, wheel ten starboard.” After eight miles we took the bend and entered Tsuneishi harbour. Everything was same… just as I had last seen. Except that now I knew that my underlying anxiety, the trepidation about how it will affect me was over. I felt nothing.

There are unmarked graves in Tsuneishi… a phone booth, a hill, a café, a bridge, a bicycle or that of a smile – a forced reply to the smiling Japanese guard saying ‘Mushi mushi’. Graves of the dead for whom I did not do everything I could to never forget anything about them. I didn’t make myself remember conversations or scenes over and over again to keep alive every tiny detail. I did not take out old photographs and study them or climb up the attic to open an old suitcase. Despite all that was taken away I did not cling to the one thing that couldn’t be taken away. Here in Tsuneishi I had done the most difficult thing in my life… I had forgiven unconditionally and let die. I walked past each grave. The least they deserved in exchange of my gesture was respect and they were denied it. There is no hate because even hate is an emotional response… perhaps the only one that can be more overwhelming than love.

There will be no epitaphs.

One day regardless of the distance covered in time or miles you shall be avenged.

Those who read this post are requested to not comment.

03.03.2010.

I cannot write when I’m happy.

I am back at sea. I signed on at the Singapore anchorage on the 18^th of February. We sailed six hours later heading north past the South China Sea and then up through the Sea of Japan. Leaving Vladivostok about one hundred and fifty miles to our port we headed further north till the Gulf of Tartary, then altering starboard through the La Perouse strait, with the Sakhalin islands on our port side and into the Sea of Okhotsk. Another days sailing brought us to Shiroteke Misaki in Japan off the Ostrov Kunashir islands in Kamchatka and to one of my favourite parts of the world… the lonely, deserted and almost forgotten lands beyond the 45^th North parallel. The temperature is -9* celcius during the day. The blizzard hasn’t stopped since we arrived, there’s a 30 knot wind blowing making the six on/six off port watches on the exposed weather deck a gruelling experience… and thanks to the proclivity of crane wires to part ( accursed !!! ) on every ship I join, I have slept for five hours in the last two days. But I am happy… just happy. I’m always happy when in these remote high northern latitudes. The desolate loneliness, the silence, the unbearable cold, the sheer hardship required for even the most basic everyday things we do clears my mind, gives me strength and a sense of freedom. It comforts me.

This will be a long post. I haven’t written in months. Sifting through the bits and pieces of paper that I had scribbled on and carefuly tucked away I realize it is impossible to piece them together. The thoughts and emotions are way too varied to compile into a single themed post. Hence this will be a post of excerpts. The events are between October last year and February this year.

I and ‘Shine or Crazy’ (we haven’t yet decided which one of us is Shine and which one Crazy) had a gala time over the last two weeks. Idyllic days, evenings and late nights spent sipping limited edition Johnnie Walker whiskey, watching the Crossroads Guitar Fest, listening to blues, discussing books, movies, politics, driving around Calcutta and eating at our favourite joints. The idea to come home at the same time is a hit and we plan to do it again this October. The other grand plan is, to buy books worth ten grands every year from now and turn one room in the apartment I soon plan to buy into our exclusive library. Another room is to be turned into a gym and the drawing room into a movie lover’s paradise with a projector and a state of the art sound system. Last but not the least a fully equipped kitchen for my gastronomic delight J

I avoid shopping malls the way a now married friend of mine avoids his innumerable ex-flames… that’s more doggedly than any of us would avoid bubonic plague. However on the rare occasions when I do visit I have keenly obeserved the youngsters who throng the malls. To me they all look alike in attire, behaviour, attitude, lingo… everything. They all seem to know everything… done everything and appear equipped to handle anything or perhaps… everything. I am not sure if I’m awed by them or annoyed. I had a much more interesting childhood. The naivete of those times and the lack of wikipedia made many discoveries a lot more enjoyable. Not like now when instant gratification seems to be the flavour. I guess these kids can actually make Maggi in two minutes.

There are a few places in Calcutta that are not just mine - Hindustan Park, Bliss, Southern Avenue, Gurusaday Dutt Road Barista, Someplace Else, Tollygunje Metro Station, Gariahat Barista, Tea stall near Chandni Chowk Metro Station… and a few more.

I hate being in the spotlight. It annoys me… more so when I find myself in it as a direct consequence of the high refractive index of so called “success and achievements.” I absolutely despise people who judge others based on their acievements in academics, career or wages earned.

An idyllic afternoon spent talking and sipping beer with ‘The Thinking Man’ followed by a drunken and dangerously insane scooty ride across south Calcutta brought out the wild teenagers inside us. We still rock the party on the house mate. I had told him – “Two wheelers scare me these days.” He had looked at me and said – “I have never before heard you utter the word fear.” Next morning I looked in the mirror and told myself – “Only when you have something to loose do you begin to fear.”

Sunday mornings are my favourite, I do not step out of the house on Sundays. Because every Sunday morning my home is full of single digits aged between two and a half to nine or barely ten. My activities range from playing farmer to discussing Feluda, Tintin, Asterix, Famous Five and computer games. It fills me with overwhelming Joy as they are the only ones who know and believe that I am in reality a cyborg… an ex²tremely advanced android called FNT 7900 (Friendly Neighborhood Terminator being the name and 7900 being the model number). I serve His Majesty His Royal Highness The Prince of Pithrasgarh as his enforcer operating across galaxies and distant stars. The car that they see me driving is actually a camouflaged Tdrideinegeepeedee i.e. a hyper computerised, intergalactic time barrier defying space rocket. I also have an android girl friend called Annihilina. Her design is more or less based on Anne from The Famous Five series (Okay okay I never quite got over that crush). Guillotimaton is my sworn enemy. He is the cyborg pressed into service by the Sondonesians (the same bad guys who helped Rastapopulas hijack the plane in Tintin’s adventure ‘Flight 714’) who in turn are the worst enemies of the Princely State of Pithrasgarh. With these basic facts in place the story line endlessly meanders from Sunday to Sunday depending solely on my imagination.

Closer

I was stuck in traffic for nearly ten minutes. The song playing was ‘Yeh arzoo thi tujhey gul ke rubaroo katrey.’ After a fair bit of hesitation (I’m often told that let alone be approachable I appear rather hostile to strangers) the scruffy looking South Indian man (the accent) on the motorcycle next to my car asked – “Who is the singer?” Abida Parveen I replied. “Even in hard times such a song can make you forget so much.” – He said. The traffic rolled and we smiled at each other and moved on.

For that single moment we two complete strangers were closer. Closer in our…

Payday

DISCLAIMER – This excerpt is not to be perceived as disgusied show off or suave vaunting.

I sat there in my cabin. The crisp green dollars in my hand… twelve days of wages earned, just twelve days and so much money. And couldn’t help but feel what one of my readers put as ‘gentle melancholy’. Ironic isn’t it that my family or I do not need that much money anymore. We have a simple middleclass Bengali lifestyle and already have all the comforts that we can wish for. Sitting there with the money in hand I drifted back to a day some years ago. It was Ashtomi and the whole city was alight and alive… happy, boisterous revelry everywhere. I sat in my car parked next to a highrise in South Calcutta… blank and staring. I was jobless, penniless, career at stake, my pesonal life in ruins and precisely nothing to look forward to. Amidst the crowd I noticed this old woman stumbling half naked, crying, delusional, blabbering, phlegm dribbling all over her face. Impulsively I had stepped out of the car and given her the last hundred rupees I had and told her to eat something. Incredibly she had held my hand and said – “Baba amar eto chaina… eto chaina baba amarey tumi dui ek taka dilai hoibo.” I don’t need so much only a rupee or two is enough. I had stuffed the note in her hands and hastily walked away. I was scared. I didn’t want to be like her ever. I wanted to want… everything and more and more and more.

I am not trying to be humble and deep. I hope that this isn’t some warped sort of hubris either. I am just a little lost… unsure and fumbling. I do want… I enjoy the good things in life. But somehow what I feel now is not what I thought I will feel when I achieved the goals I set. I think I am not at all well equipped to handle happiness. Like the veterans of war I find myself more at ease facing obstacles and trying to beat a path out through contingencies.

But I will learn. I will learn to handle happiness. And I will learn to write when I am happy.

I will.

I Jai