Paradesi

Vanakkam. En Peru Mowgli, enakku innoru peru irukku, paradesi

I guess here after I would not be telling that I would be regular in writing this. I will write as I feel and might be finish it towards where I want, hopefully!

I started this episode months ago. But I wrote only the above line. After that I never came back to write it, never even thought I should be continuing it. I have started to write many things still now and I guess I have not completed even one, except for the short ones, which usually I end up throwing away here and there.

How have you defined this word paradesi? What comes to hearing this word which means nomad? Have anyone thought about connection with this word? Is it only I feel connection is the meaning that is there and still missing in this word paradesi?

If someone asks me who is my favorite hero, colour, place, food, I might tell something. After that when I think on it, which I do most of the time, I know it is not the only food, place, colour or hero that I like/like/will like. It is just at that point of time I had liked and experienced something nice so that am able to relate to them. I guess that is the reason I have nothing that I tell I miss. Being in a foreign land does not make me feel as if am a foreigner, being in my own land does not make me feel like an owner.

I had this long trip once. Every time when we were on road my friend would be missing something from his home, from his town, and would want to get back there soon. He has told me how it feels to be in one’s own land and the strength it gives you. When he asked me why I am there on that trip, I really dint have an answer that would satisfy him, I just told ‘I was curious about people and other lands. I just wanted to travel to see and find them all’. Why? ‘I don’t know’.

Another time I had this conversation with one of my other friend who told how important identity is for a person and how we should fight for it like tamil people in srilanka did or kashmiri’s do. I was not able to buy the argument. When you hold your identity so close and don’t respect other’s back ground, how will that give peace? This does not mean, don’t fight for your identity, which people can think easily. Those are the identities that worldly things give you and it is different and that are given to keep you fighting with each other, this would eventually benefit. Holding on to something makes you possessive of it and makes you feel insecure of it, which in turn makes you protect it so much that, you start to ruin others and they would rebel for it after a certain point. This is the same thing that has been happening everywhere.

Just because am born in Australia gives me an identity as an Australian with an Australian passport. Good. When I go to England, should I boast as Australian and think those people are not equal?

Today my post will be having too many questions. That is how I am getting back to the point where I was travelling to already. Nothing has changed it, just the approach which alters to give the dimension to explore myself.

I remember very well, during my sixth semester exam holidays, I was staying inside my house and didn’t go out for 10 days for anything. My friends used to go out for essentials, I used to cook, read, watch movie and just have fun. I never missed the world that was outside those walls. My friends forced me to get out. They stopped buying the grocery and pushed me out forcefully on the eleventh day. For them being out with the world would make me normal they told. I dint feel any difference. Eleventh day dint make me feel the 10 days of gap.

I left this job and joined back after two years and came to the same office after three years, standing on the same conference room, I dint feel the 3 years pass, all was exactly same, every single thing; I dint even feel like I went on a vacation and came back.

Now I will go continue tomorrow what I left a year back and even then I will not feel anything, which is what I can feel with all the experience that I have from my past.

All these things do not mean am not connected with things I do. I give my best for what I do. I love people around me. They all love me. My grandfather who tells me to make sure I work hard for next 20 years so I earn money for my next few hundred generation, he has done that and is sitting in his big home with his wife all alone on a Diwali morning without his sons all giving a call to wish him; my friend who tells me to live every second and be true to myself; my girl who just wanted me out of her life for a reason that am still waiting to know; my family who feels that making money is the only way of living life, because we have never had money or anything else told other than that; my another friend who hates me for living life on my own terms; my girl who can’t let me go even if I ogle behind other girls; each and every one of them, including you who are reading this now. The way they show their love is their own way, the way they have experienced it. I just receive it in my own that I can. I feel pity and scold my grandfather; I laugh with my friend; I cry for that girl; I care but never stay in touch with my family; I miss her; and you all to whom I talk these things as if these are my last words.

I remember a cricket match that I played. This one match stood in my heart very strongly and I remember literally everything that happened. After a usual day of college we were playing cricket, I was a team’s captain and had a very strong hitter on my side. We bowled first and gave away too many runs. Required run rate was 12 for 10 overs. When we started chasing we lost initial openers and the top order in 3 overs. I joined to play with that hitter. He is a massive hitter; he can hit huge shots continuously. I wanted to win the game, at any cost, so I was trying to give him rotation but at the same time trying to push to get the singles which would help the score going. By the time we reached 7^th over the hitter was tired of running. He is not a person who can run. Once his energy went down, his shots were not massive, his confidence also came down. I was having a good stamina to keep running between wickets. By 8^th over he got out trying to hit a nervous shot. We lost the game. In the end of the game he told me how I made him run too much and he lost his energy to hit.

That incident stuck to me. I was not able to pardon myself for not seeing others the way they were. I dint see the pros and cons. I was seeing the world as I was. This is just one incident, I have so many that shows were I always thought the world is like me, but the reality is otherwise. Seeing the world as it is was one thing that am still trying to master at. We all have a colored glass in front of our eyes, and we all think the world is in that color.

This all does not mean am not connected to anything, it is just that nothing bonds me so much for some reason. I let go things easily and also don’t let go their memories. I have no options. Any option is fine for me, I will survive. I make my own dreams of them. Last night I had a dream of my college mates whom I have not met after my college, and I saw them in my own way. It also does not mean I do not have an ideology. Now this is where the going gets tougher. You do not have any preferred option and still you have ideas and ideologies.

That is the reason I have still not felt a single place that makes me feel as home. I have felt warmth everywhere and I just keep travelling with it. People scold me that am living a life of a paradesi. I should get married, I should have children, I should settle. I don’t know anything about it, life has been wonderful to me, it has shown me edge of death and edge of life, I am walking, and it doesn’t make me feel like a stranger anywhere or with anyone.

Like the old saying goes ‘yaathum oore yaavarum keleer’ (everywhere is my native and everyone is my relation), the paradesi’s life will be same till the end. Home is a big nest that is rotating itself around the biggest star in this galaxy, and it has shown me colors that otherwise I would not have seen.

Paradesi will be paradesi to write paradesi stories that you might be bound to read or not in your colored glass that is in front of your eyes.

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Student no.1

Vanakkam. En Peru Mowgli, enakku innoru peru irukku, student no.1

Everyone should have seen the movie, 3 idiots, in hindhi, or the same movie as nanban, in tamizh. Everyone would have enjoyed one character in that movie, Chatur or Srivatsan. I have not been completely like him, but was working towards become him, the student no.1.

I have been the class leader for most of the days in my school, except when there were richer and bright kids in class. I have also been school pupil leader, then representative in college, secretary of the department. I have been the favourite student to most of the staffs. All together I grew up as a very good boy, ready to become the adult that this society really needed. That is what I thought I would become.

I remember how I used to attend school. Out of the 14 years in school I guess I hardly took 5 days of leaves. I had 100% attendance for nearly 11 years. During my 8^th standard, my Mother’s last sister got married. I attended the marriage and insisted about going to school that day, though every single person there wanted me to bunk the classes.

I got into the school van that morning and in one of the sharp turning the van door opened, I was sitting next to the door leaning on it and yes, I fell down from the running van. I had some scratches, tore my pant and knees. The driver wanted to drop me back before going to school with others. I denied it flatly and went to school that day, the next day and that whole week, though I had so much pain. I was that sincere student!

I was a good and sincerely obeying boy, no doubt. That does not mean I am a genius, a person with his own ideas, with his own character, with his own though process. All I had was altered, efficient ideas. With all the old things that I got to know, I gave it an efficient dimension, that need not be refreshing or good looking but it was efficient. Mathematics was so interesting to me, so calculations and getting things done with the given constraints was fun to me. I remember always being interested in numbers; I would be able to solve any given problem, I believed in it strongly, till date. I can’t have a peaceful sleep without getting the solution to a problem that is in my head.

This analytical brain was not sufficient to get good marks in public exam, though they needed presentation and good looking handwriting. Now this is true even in my day-to-day life – package, it is very important. Have you read fountain head? If you have then you should know the lead character, who is an architect. He can’t unnecessarily add anything to his design. He saw the necessity of the building giving the building its own beauty. The same with me, but I am not so strong souled or strong worded to oppose anyone and do what I wanted. I compromised to have at least half of what I want to get done. That would result in what the climax of that book is, a utterly stupid complex of buildings.

When I get to know it I am trying to bomb it all as he did. It is not easy for a good boy like me to move from the one side of the radar to other, from being an obedient boy to a man who wants to do what he thinks is ethically and socially right.

I still stood for it, because that is the way to live. You can have thousands of way to live. Everyone around you would adapt to that and not question. Just because all are doing something will not make it a right thing and you need not do that against your will. Everyone knows what they do, it is just they hide from their own self and keep doing what others do, following a crowd is always easy than standing alone and not knowing what is going to happen.

I chose the second path, I have fears, I am actually a shit scared person, that does not mean am going to back off from what is right. Just to get the good sincere boy name, I can’t lose my own self; instead I want to be a man of his choice and his own destiny and live to see it come true one day.

The journey is hard, very hard and I get depressed a lot. Have you seen the movie ‘Good Willing hunting’, the lead character will be a genius in maths, but he would want to do something that is interesting. The professor would try to make him a maths genius, but he would follow his heart. Such geniuses have strong soul and mind, because they know they are good at something. If you are good in one thing then you can easily be master of anything you want.

As I told, am no genius, I am the middle class. I don’t have awesome skills nor am not that fool to be not able to think anything, I am the sandwiched population. I can’t go lower than what I am able to do, like the job am doing now, that would kill my self-respect and always keep questioning me. At the same time, I can’t become an overnight genius and be the cream layer, I will been seen down and there also I will get no respect. This is my area, I know there are many like me out there. This world population is majorly a middle class, both financially and mentally. We belong to nowhere and we are the target crowd for anything.

I have found what I am, what I can and more importantly what I can’t. Now, I will play in my area, do things that I am strong at and would be a person who can feel happiness in every breathe. This sounds too dramatic, right? Still, truth when you face practically is going to be harsh, and I am happy to go with the truth than create a false hope and disappoint myself at the end.

PS. I daily think to write, but I have not really made it. I know what all to write, still I end up not able to write. Anyways, hopefully I don’t keep the gap so long, instead have the story flowing.

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Who Knows and who cares

Have you ever been angry? Of course, yes, what a stupid question. Everyone would have been. Why? Who knows and who cares?

I am angry, right now, at this moment.  I don’t even know exactly why. It could be that I am incapable of many things; it could be because many people have taken me for granted, of course, a guy who is comfortable with everything is everyone’s man, he can be used for anything, he is just a clay, he can be made into any shape you wish, he would be more than happy to be in that shape you want, but unfortunately that guy also has a heart and it is straight and a brain which analysis. For some reason he decodes things more than required.

What will that all lead to? A million dollar question! I think answer is simple, unrest, that unrest is only within him. Who knows and who cares about his unrest?

Even your beloved ones would give you nothing but shit. What else do you expect? Who cares and who knows about how your heart and brain functions. They just want you to live, because if you are dead then that would create a gap. People around you could not live with a gap, then have to fight to fill that gap, that is not their regular task. They would not like that. They don’t want their object of choice to be replaced. They want that choice to be alive at that same place. Whenever they want they would come to you.

I hit my bloody fucking monitor with my head, and it is unbroken. Wow. Should appreciate the manufacturer, and should also appreciate me for still writing.

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In a distance, that can’t be reached, is a life that I dreamed of. It has people who are unconditional. Who have their innocence intact even after millions of betrayals, because their love is unconditional. You fucking stab them in their heart or their back, they would love you they can’t even give a shred of hatred to you, that is not in their being. I have not made that dream alive yet.

Right now, am surrounded with people who want to secure their life and on the drop of a hat call you betrayed them and give you back million times more than it.

I have been scared of many things from beginning. I have heard stories that I was born out of fear. My mom was still fearing about sex still I was born. Every mating was equal to a rape. She dint don’t know anything about mating. When she knew, she already had two kids and it had become a nightmare. That does not mean my father is a rapist, he is just a normal man bought up in the society. 3 decades back it was not possible discuss sex with your wife too. I guess even now there are couples who have not seen their hubby naked, they just do it in dark and the kids are god’s gift. A boy born out of that fear is simply equal to fear and commotion. That is me.

I am no one to comment about anyone. I should not. That is ethically wrong if I do. I have seen and learnt from things that I have experienced.

The things I have experienced are making me cry now. The drops that fall on my fingers while am typing this tells it all.

I have got some comments for this blog. One of it says that I should compare myself with someone in Africa or gaza. Another says something like how am important because am shouting here alone. The thing is, I am not here to ask anyone help. I am not asking for a robin sharma’s book. I am telling what has happened in my fucking life. From where, I have travelled to where. That is what am telling here. I am telling this only for myself and to the tow people who love me unconditionally after their conditional loves broke. I have wanted to write this all for a long time, but never did. This time, with death looming around my head, I am writing. I work the better under pressure people tell.

So please I know only very are reading this. I am giving words to the feelings that only we feel. Everyone has crossed or experienced this sometime in your life. I know what all is the possibility. I have seen more than I should have seen by this age by this so called society. Never even think I have not thought of a possibility for a question. It is just after knowing what is there infront of you, you lose your hope to fight for it.

This is a communication to tell what all has happened in a person’s life. He has gone through so many lovely things, that he thinks after this there will nothing as good or bad. Everything from now on is going to be an incident or fact. It will not imply to anything, it will just happen.

My first blog had more than hundred likes and as I started writing it has got down to few 30 40 people and out of that I don t even know how many really read this and out of that I don’t know how many even understand it the way I tell. Even D would not understand it exactly the way it is in my mind, but he would be the only closest person who finds what I mean. There is also another soul, syatchi who would know what this is all about. Other than that, who knows and who cares.

This no fucking inspirational blog or any fucking plea request to ask you all for any inspiration, to get away from this life. I know exactly what this life would give me and I have seen things that you would not even imagine to see. I have been open with everything. I have given even my spoon the liberty it needs, every single cell in my body works in its own aspiration. Nothing forces anything. That is the reason I could be on both side of the radar. No one understands this part of me and I don’t think anyone can understand it. There was a person who was so close to this, but she left. She was the aadhi baghavan for things that opened into my life.

I don’t mean disrespect to anyone who would like to help me live by their moral support. I totally understand what you all tell, it is just, I am telling you not to make any judgment before this ends. Do not imply your experience here. I know it is hard to be reading this without any prejudice, but try it, that is how this is going to work.

Whenever I feel to cry I write, the more I write means the more I am looking forward to cry and shout to tell how am all alone here. The more I cry I have found that am the only person who is sit and crying here all alone. Everyone would come by, see by, pass by, like just some dust that comes with the breeze that is blowing. No one will come even close to it.

It is only the self that is true and is going to stick with you. Find yourself to get the feel that is inside you. Everyone exactly has it within them but since they see the other souls’ shouting near to their ear they can’t hear their own soul’s word.

I am becoming more alone as day pass by. I am reducing being a choice in anyone’s mind or life.

Am either there or not, that’s no more a question. There is no grey, only black or white. My black and white love has been growing so much, that all other color becomes meaningless.

Anyways today is the part where am telling you find you before even thinking anything else is going to be making you better or your life better. Just because you have a good degree, good job, good money, your life does not go by. Of course this is not for all who believes in that. This is for those lonely people, who knows what is the colour of rainbow and how it feels to stand in the hot sun to just get a glimpse of something you love and get shivered by the snow for sheer pleasure of the pain that coldness gives and open heart for the rain that follows.

Come on, it would rain always and are you ready to get wet in it to feel what it is?

bhaktiman

I committed to myself that I would write daily, as usual, in vain. With too much mood swings and the stupid ideas that keep popping up, holding on to the time and reality had been difficult all these days. Now, somehow my hands are on my keypads. Hopefully I would continue my commitment…

Vanakkam. En Peru Mowgli, enakku innoru peru irukku, bhakthimaan.

I am from a middle class family. My grandfather was a farmer. My father moved to city for job and then married a city girl and got settled there only. I am the first and last generation which had half village and half city background. This village and city dint matter when it came to god. We have at least 16 festivals in 12 months in our religion other than that we also celebrate other religion festivals for the biriyani and cake.

I was not grown like mowgli in a forest by some other parents. I was named after a god and I was destined to be a bhakthiman, follower of god. During my school days I would wake up with my grandfather at 4’o clock, bath in cold water and go to temple during all 30 days before pongal as it was the month of margzhi. In our village we had big speaker sets to announce small donations that people give. One uncle with salt paper voice would do the announcement in stage tamizh and I would give some murugan/amman song casettes, to hear my name on speaker.

My dad goes to minimum3 temples daily before he goes to work, this is excluding the prayer time he spends in home and company before the photos of god. My maternal grandfather also has a similar kind of routine. My uncle, aunty, enemy, friend, uncle’s father, auntie’s brother, anyone you name, all were having similar kind of routine, at the most the difference was in the time and who their favourite god was.

The daily routine would be something like this, man of the house, after bathing would come inside home with his towel around the waist, stand in front of god photos and does all the prayers before getting dressed and eat. Then on the way to work he would go to some temples, then after reaching work place pray in front of the god photos there with freshly bought flowers. Woman of the house, would begin with a kolam in front of the home, making tea, breakfast, bathe children, pack food for all, send them to school, then finish all other work, go for a bath, then come pray god and sit to watch serial or go talk to neighbors.

I grew up seeing all this. I am a good follower, like all Indians. I did all the same things like man of the house. Everyone was very happy that I am being so faithful to god. I never missed prayers and would recite so many small books that my dad would buy for me. I very strongly believed in god and trusted so much that if you believe him and only him everything will happen.

I was studying fourth standard. I had two best friends, Narayanan and Karthi.  We would all go together wherever we go and would crack jokes together. Only a small definition of best friendship was that I was sticking with them where ever they went, as they were one of the toppers like me and spoke nicely about many things.

For first time my grandfather had bought me a purse, wallet. I had a photo of god in it and little change. I got that purse after seeing Narayanan and Karthi having it.

On that wonderfully fateful day, my purse fell down. I was playing around the class. While running I stamped on the god’s photo that was there in my purse. It had fallen and opened up to show Shiva’s family photo. My shoes foot print was left on it. Narayanan and Karthi had seen it, as they were only chasing me.

I was very sorry for stamping god’s photo. I was praying and telling sorry to Shiva’s family. They both were telling I am going to be punished. No way to escape. Narayanan was from a Brahmin family, so asked him what I should do.

He told that god’s are angry on me. Showed the photo and told that the circle behind their head has turned red, now there is no way out, I will be punished severely. I asked how to cool them down. While going back home in bus he told me what to do. I stopped talking to all and was just closing eyes and praying. Those two were preventing others to talk from and explaining what had happened in detail.

I went home worried. Removed clothes and shoes, put them for washing, polished my shoe and kept, kept my tiffin box opened at washing place, washed face and changed dress, asked mom for a tumblr of milk and went into our bedroom cum prayer room. We were living in a 1 BHK home, so bedroom is where all our god photos were kept.

My sister was playing, I removed the god photo from my purse, kept in a small vessel, then with the milk that my mother gave for drinking, I was telling all the prayers and pouring it on the photo. I was literally shitting in my trousers; my mother thought that I have become too serious and since it is god she didn’t ask any question. My sister went out playing. I was there doing this for nearly half hour and another half hour saying prayers and waiting to see if the red hallo behind Shiva’s head goes off, but it was getting brighter I felt.

The whole evening I was just seeing the photo every 5 minutes, no use, the halo was red. I never stopped reciting prayers. Next day also this prayer continued, but my mom didn’t give more milk. Narayanan told I have to face my fate. I thought my world was coming to end.

After two days, weekend started, I went to my parental grandparent’s home in village. I hugged my grandmother and slept hearing my grandfather reading stories for us. After that I forgot about it.

Later in my life I started seeing all god’s photos and found a halo behind their head, so I soothed that how Narayanan had misguided me. It is been more than a decade since I went to a temple for praying, I go for the food or sometimes to see my girl or the architecture. Recently the architecture in the olden temples is interesting to me.  

Now I am fan of anbesivam…

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banian jatti da

Vanakkam. En Peru Mowgli, enakku innoru peru irukku, banian jatti

I am from the place which produces it in excessive quantity for this world. That was not the reason for this name.

I lived in a big compound where nearly 6 families and two companies where there. My house was right behind a temple. That temple was very small like me, and it also grew along with me till the time I lived there. I never saw it growing after that. I always wondered how come temples keep growing. Anyways that is not the reason for my name.

First thing I do as soon as I reach home from school is remove shoes, put socks for washing and polish the shoe. Next remove the launch box, open it and keep it in washing basin. After this, I remove my school dress and put for washing. From that time till my mom scolds me or hits me for the day or I break something for the day or do a mistake of breaking someone’s head or leg, I would be roaming only with my inner garments, which is banian and jatti.

I loved to roam around like that. It was so comfortable. I would go wearing only that to buy things from nearby shop for home, to watch tv in nithi’s house or in kala akka’s house. The whole compound knows about this.

In one of the banian companies, there was balasamy anna, he was the owner of that company. He only gave me that name after seeing me roaming like that. Everyone in that compound also liked it and kept calling me with that name. This never was a trouble to me, but not for my mom, like all other mothers she was not okay to hear it, she wanted to hear praising names, not like this. So every time I go out like that, I would get either scolding or beating in steel or wooden ruler, though I loved steel rulers, which I borrowed from my class mates once or twice, I dint like the same ruler when I used to get beating out of it. It is a painful experience.

The beatings never stopped me from doing that. I think after seeing this attitude of mine my aunt gave me that tribal, aadhivaasi, makeup for my fancy dress competition. Other reason was that I was a muradan, tarzan , and had big lips because of sucking my thumb during my childhood, there is a legend that I have nearly spoiled all the sofas and bed and even my grandmothers toupee for that habit, people who have done that as kid knows the pleasure of it.

One fine evening after my usual school day, I went to kala akka’s home for watching tv. It was late for my study time. I was there with my usual costume, banian jatti. If my mom gets to know it, that day also I would get beatings. So after seeing time, I decided that I should run fast and sneek in to home without grabbing her attention, but as usual fate had its own plan.

 I started running home. kala akka’s home is on the left side of the temple. There is a pathway between their compound and temple’s compound, that is the way through which we used to go to my house if we are walking, it crosses nithi’s home and that first company, after that is the entrance to our compound with veetukkara aatha’s, owner, house in the middle with their two sons on either side, we were in the far left, straight behind the temple and opposite were two small portions with one having a bachelor and other having a poor family. On the far right was balasamy anna’s company.

I started running from kala akka’s home. Adjacent to their house they had a small bike mechanic shop, as soon as you cross that shop on the right is the pathway to my compound. Exactly at this point there is a big drainage, this drainage is always open, it runs along that main road till it reaches a river, which was once upon a time important source of water and now the biggest drainage for my city, something like koovam for Chennai, which was less than a kilometer from there. The main road and my compound’s passage are connected with two big black flat stones, karungal slab, to cross that drainage. Those slabs were always shaking so you have to be careful.

The scene that was created that evening by my fate got registered to me very strongly as those were my initial days when my mind was registering things. I ran from kala akka’s house and took my right by keeping my right leg on the right side karungal. Then there was a black out for a second or even a minute or an eternity, but I was snapped out of it immediately also. I was being pulled by that mechanic anna and there was a big crowd by now on that small junction. As it was evening peak hours, the main road passer bys were also stopping by. The stone had given me away under my feet. I had twisted to fall into the puddle of black liquid that was flowing through that ditch towards the once upon great river. I was clogging its flow for a brief moment before I was pulled out of it.

Only thing that was running in my mind was how much I am gonna get beat for coming out in banian jatti and also now that is fully dirty and black as I had fallen here. I thought this time i might even get soodu i.e., taking a long spoon, keeping in fire, making it hot and then keeping it on your leg, hand, back, thigh or anywhere, it is mercy of the mother in anger. It is told that this cure’s many adangapidari diseases.

I heard my mom running towards me. I was shivering in that heat. Everyone where giving their comments to play their part. My mom pulled me inside the compound. veetukkara aatha, that old hag, told that I should not cross that compound gate’s pipe and be washed there itself. She always enjoyed when I get beating’s. Like everyone of you would have had a old hag in your life, I had her. She would always be first to complain to my mom when I did something wrong and would stand to watch me get scolding or beating. That day also she was enjoying the show and was telling something to infuriate my mother more.

As my mom washed me with the water that was flowing down from that gate’s pipe, all the dirt and black fluid I had taken from the ditch was going back to the source and will continue its flow, but before it continues to do its work, it has to get all the scolding that I was hearing and should get lathered and carry that new friend along, mysore sandal soap’s lather.

My mother was feeling very bad. She was feeling that whole world was laughing at her. She was telling that if I keep my leg outside my house again without her permission, then it would be broken. She was swearing many more things. Then she was crying. This is a usual ritual. When I do something like this and get beaten up by her, she would end up crying and would give me loads of advice. As usual my sibling was enjoying this show.

That evening after finishing two soaps and throwing away a pair of my banian jatti, I was standing in front of god and promising that I would listen to my mom and be a good kid. I would not be running around like this and get bad names. For everything, I would be standing in front of god to swear not to repeat it.

God was an important part of my life.

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PS: I wanted to write something else, and even after giving it a very deep though, I am not able to get the line on which I was thinking. Hopefully I write on that. This is one thing that happens with me, I lose track of everything. Anyways I would try to keep writing this daily so we don’t lose touch of the story.

Muradan

Vanakkam. En Peru Mowgli, enakku innoru peru irukku, muradan!

I got this name from my maternal grandfather for my dashingly heroic activities. When I say dashingly it is to the literal meaning, that is how my golden breaking touch worked. Anything I touch would be broken, be it a Horlicks bottle, be it my friends head, be it my neighbor’s kid’s leg, be it my own hand, be it a new dress or trousers, be it anything you can imagine I touch and it is broken. I have broken so many things that I have lost track of it all together. Right now when I turn back I see only a broken soul dried out of life source.

If someone would call me I would just run, without seeing things around or thinking about anything that would be on my way. My speed was important to me not my vision, so blind running was there always. That is why I was a good defender in my football team. It was so awesome to be fast. I would be all around the field making sure the ball never passes our side, that is my side. The same I did in volley ball, backing up everyone. This came with side effects of me breaking my knee, dress, shoes.

I was so excited to do things fast and be first. When people told that am strong and can do anything I felt so good. People would call me superman for being everywhere in the ground. These words were giving so much pride that I would ignore my bleeding wounds and continue to play.

That is why even when my grandfather told that I have to uproot a coconut tree to brush my teeth rather than a neem stick, I went and started pulling a tree, they never thought that I would go and do that. They all enjoyed the show, they liked me being so daring, till date everyone talks about it. The same people are not able to digest that fact that I try new things than the regular things. They don’t want me to have a beard as it is like a rowdy, no growing hair that is like loafer, no wearing t shirts when you go to others house, I should not have my own wishes, all I should do is what they tell and what they is what they think that others are thinking when I do something. Man, give me a break.

When you read all this it would be funny, but for me that is what I was and am. I can do anything that I was told to do. For that I would try everything possible. I would run, fall down, hurt myself, get bruised, lose everything I have, still I would enjoy all of it to just see the end of that side. That is why during my travel anything was not looking like a trouble; that is the same reason the six months in my dream world was not being so tiresome for me, that is why I have bent so much for everyone, but that does not allow them to take me for granted and make me a puppet.

This all does not matter to anyone. I was just being rough. I was called insensible boy. I was not using my brain. I was not taking care of my properties. I was not worried about what people called me. I was being naïve and innocent. I was just going around like a clown. That is what I was told. I had numerous sessions and classes for this. My mom, maternal grandfathers, only two out of three would do that, the middle one was enjoying whatever I did and he would be the first person who saw what can be done with the potential in me, he wanted me to join a military school and become an army man, as he know I was durable person, but my parental grandmother said a single solid no; maternal aunts; maternal uncles; parental aunts and uncles and even their kids were making fun of it and enjoying it.

Here no one understood what my character was. What all I would be able to do. They harassed me, that is how my speed has gone down, my consciousness has grown that I don’t dare, taking decision has become pain, facing someone has become slow and lifeless, this is what has happened to the muradan. My trousers don’t tear anymore between my legs, as I don’t run. My knees don’t break, as I don’t jump to catch anything high. People don’t make fun of me, as I am not running around for any silly things like my wishes instead am making money from abroad. My silence to all their talks has earned me name as a good boy from a descent family.

With all these new masks my attire has grown. Still from beginning I have enjoyed lesser clothes to cover me. I won fancy dress competition for being portrayed a tribal. I had mango and neem leaves tied around my waist and coal powdered and painted all over my body. No more can I do that, it is only for the fancy dress competition, in the present competition to survive and live a life, I have to wear my formals and have the never ending fake smile on my face to win this society.

Then why do you think I would enjoy this softness? How will the muradan be able to live? If this soft descent man is alive, what would he create? more fakeness or more good?

It is too tiring for a small boy who loves to run and play. Telling a boy to run safely is different from stopping a boy from running. Letting the boy try and learn new things is different from teaching only things that you think are safe. Showing the world equally is different from showing the world from where you are sitting. Allowing the boy to learn and become an adult is different from suppressing the boy under the make up a man.

That is the reason I would like to tear of the mask, remove the make up, get wet in rain to wash of all that has accumulated during this survival before I can revive some energy to let the boy become an adult by himself. For that I have to surely kill the man that the society has created. Who knows what would happen….

Yam ariyen paraparamen…

PS: Thank you D for sharing my post to all these people. I see not much have answered my question in the previous post. It would be nice if it is a discussion, which is why I am publishing this in a public forum. If you all want to separately write to me, then write to me here, on my FB page

Dejavus to continue…

Beginning from the end

This morning, a clouded summer morning, I called D to tell ‘I quit. I cannot do this anymore.  I am going to die’

I had my reasons, of course everyone have their reasons for their actions, right. Anyways, the point is simple ‘ennala mudiyala. Sema vazhiya irukku’. Every single thought process in my mind is streaming down to one point - death. I feel it is better to die, this whole fight is worthless.

I prepared lentil (kollu)rasam last evening, that was for my today’s lunch. If you have ever tasted it in your life you would know the specialty and importance of it. 12000 miles from my home, I had made this rasam to replenish my memories so that I can find energy to keep going. Such small and beautiful moments are the ones that make up my life. Rasam was spoiled this noon during my lunch, half my rice also had got wasted with it. The pessimist in me tells now I am half empty stomach. The optimist tells am half full stomach with wonderful lentil dhal and curd rice.

My mind goes with the pessimist inside me now. I am not able to take the fact that all that I had done has gone waste. Like musician has his very important piece somewhere in the middle of his creation, rasam is very important note in my lunch menu.

Now my life is like my rasam. The very important moment is spoiled, ruined. There have always been very small things I had loved and enjoyed, but all that has spoiled now. I don’t see meaning without them. Like my lunch, it has now meaning. There is reason for the food and the order that we eat it. Similarly in my life there were things that had to be in order and how it should have gone, but now all is topsy turvy. I do some here, I dream some there, I wish to be somewhere when all I am is here without any interest. This is not I should be living for.

Okay, let me go do what I want, I thought to myself, I planned for it; promised to be strong for it; hoped to get back and do all that. Still I called D this morning.

It is the same me who had changed a suicidal girl into an ambitiously career purser (she would be devastated if I die now, her own words);  who always stood till end of everything to see what happens next (I have seen and made 10 more people to see Anti-Christ movie till end); who thought defeats leads to great victory; who had ambition to become a very filthily rich person; who wished to have dozen kids playing all over his home and farm; who thought living in itself was a pleasure; who was so eager to make a mark in this history before dying; who wanted to have even strangers come mourn over his dead body.

What happened to this ‘same me’? Why do I feel to quit? I have gone through all this hurdles for this?

These are the questions that come to you, the same that D asked me. I have never been good at explaining things to anyone, leave D alone. D can prove gravity is up and I cannot even prove that the word ‘apple’ starts with letter ‘A’. That is my case.

Same thing happened this morning. He has convinced me to be alive, for a time period where I would write down all the reasons that I have for dying, or atleast turn back to see what I have across to get this mind set. It is not so strange right? More than that there is one more thing, he had asked  ‘you have believed me every time, believe this one time, if you feel the same after that point, then I will not stop you’. This is the first time he had asked me something like this.

I have never been able to be rigid or say no, that is how I had grown. I have seen very less people telling no on others face, on top of it, this is D, how can I tell no

As per his request, I am going to live for some more time in this world, I do not know how long that is going to be for. Before I quit I would like to record things that have been running in my mind and things I had faced. It should have happen to all of us, at one point of time. By writing it down here, I would be able to connect to that moment of yours with my moment, like a Dejavu. Let us see how much of it we come across. I have had many, people around me know about it.

From the time I am able to remember, I have had this question, ‘why do people want to live?’ With all killing troubles around them, people want to live, they want one more last second, one more last minute, one more last supper, one more last hug, one more last day, only one more of all of it. Why? Why everyone is so focused for it? Why afraid of end? Is it so horrible?

One reasonable explanation is that no one lives the present moment, so they need more of it to enjoy it more.

For me, I do not know if I had had lived all my moments, but my life has been a satisfactory one till now. So why to die then, if life has being so good and satisfactory?

The reason is this, the little boy inside me is in his death bed. The pressure in his respiratory pipe is constantly increasing. He has been breathing very scarcely for years now and whatever he has breathed is only poisonous smoke. He is being tortured. Who is doing all this right? Why should a small boy be killed? Answer is simple- he has to become a man. So to be a man I myself am killing the boy, I have to, if not there is a big queue to kill him.

This small boy has been the very source for my satisfactory life till now. If he dies I die; my identity is lost; there is no more anything left of me. I don’t want to see me living a single day like that. I have to kill this man before this. This is not a decision that was taken in a rage, anxiety, rush or any feelings. This has been a well thought out solution as of now. Mother nature also has told me to do this. How? I will tell you that part of the story as we go, it has an interestingly silly and serious side.

I have been seeing every single person around me after they have lost their girl/boy. I have seen various countries’ people by now. With all that experience I have seen that all have a slight trace of her/him, but this life and its day-to-day pressure has made them not think about it. If they think about it, they would become a rebel or kill themselves, but they can’t do their usual work. That is why they have to forget it.

I am going to tell the story of this boy. He has so many colours as a rainbow. He has tried to uproot a coconut tree to brush as his grandfather told, but the same grandfather is afraid to tell him to remove his beard; he could have been a good husband, wonderful son, great employee, a terrific rapist and a serial killer, still he became a losing farmer, possessive lover, absconding employee, philosopher who doesn’t know when to stop talking and a tissue paper for others.

To understand all this I have to start from the place where this all begins and give you all the important incidents that had shaped him to become suicidal.

Before that, I will ask you all two questions.

-          Why do you want to live?

-          Why do you think a person (me) should not suicide?

I will ask these same questions at the end of this series of memories. Let’s see how it goes.

I was named mowgli, but I wanted to change my name as priyan ahktar, though I was called as banian jatti, muradan, pappu, aandhai, aloo… all these names have a history and that is what is now coming back to show you all the reason why I should die…

Dejavus to begin from here…