The Fort

Jaigarh Fort, Jaipur (Courtesy: www.tnstravel.com)

The old fort where the party was being held did not really have any legends attached to it. At least none that she knew about. Maybe Google would throw up something or asking some locals. Not that it mattered.

However, its location atop a hill allowed one to view unmatched panorama of the old city spread below. But it was night, so that picture was cloaked in darkness. The revelers had to pass through twisting passages, laid out with electronic red carpet, to reach the inner courtyard where the dance floor, the food and the booze were. They were advised not to step off the path to explore the unlit part of the fort.

So, she left the lit passages and walked through one of the doors along the path. And emerged into an open space, high above the ground and under a vast blue, grey sky. Moonlight created a comfortable shadow play. Her hands, when she extended them, were awash in a silvery blue and if she tried very hard, she could feel a cool tingle in her fingertips.

The shadows in the corners were shy, gathering within themselves. She was tempted to go coax them out, explore them, learn their secrets. Were there any stories hidden within their soft folds?

Later, she decided. This hushed light had its own story to tell. While it was silent all around and any noise was too far away to be heard, occasionally she heard the voices of her fellow revelers passing on the paths to the party.

She ignored them. She was drawn towards the high boundary walls. The city lay hushed and spread below her like some covered feast. All she had to do was extend her hand and scoop the darkness out, laying bare the lives that were cloaked. She turned back to the unlit, moonlit terrace. She was beginning to feel a little cheated. Disappointed. Where was the grandeur of the moment? She might never come back here. And she deserved something special. A memory that belonged to her alone, transcending time and history.

Suddenly, there was a twinkle in those cornered shadows. It caught her eye. She was intrigued but also a little wary. She had wanted something special, hadn’t she? This could be it. She was both hopeful and trying very hard to be pragmatic. Hope fluttered and quivered in her belly, threaded through a vague, unnamed fear. In the end, she walked forward. Curiosity and imagination had always been her salvation and her doom.

It twinkled again. She was now in the extreme corner of the terrace, where the shadows were most bashful. Her shoes echoed, muted in the stillness. The night remained cool, fresh, flowing through her unbound hair. She reached.

She stooped down and extended her hand. It touched a papery, wrinkly silver foil of some candy.

Disgusted, disappointed, relieved, she muttered under her breath. “Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.”

Stupid tears stung her eyes. In helpless anger, she picked up a small stone lying next to the deceitful foil. It was uneven with pointed, jagged edges. She tested the edges and threw it with all her strength into the shadows.

Getting up, she spun on her heels, leaving behind the dust of some unnamed, unrealized romance.

Sometime in the night, from some where in the soft , trembling shadows, dropped and rolled onto the silver stones, the muted tinkle from a broken, silver anklet.

An Allegory

I stand.

With green arms outstretched,

Straining, forever straining,

To that blue sky, reach.

It pulled me out of slumber cozy,

When I in brown earth dwelt.

My mother's snug womb,

I left,

Drawn by the sky's sirensong:

Notes of pure air

And the chorus of dusk and dawn.

The lyrics of a day bright and

The symphony of moonlight.

I surged out of the earth pliant,

A vulnerable shoot green,

Yet determined and so sure, 

Oh so sure, to reach the sky,

My lover. My home.

So, I grow. And grow.

And forever strain,

With arms weighed

 By  leaves millions

And the bounty - 

Of fruits luscious and

Flowers tender - 

My gift to you, my sky.

Yet, ne'er do you bend,

To touch and caress, 

Except when your displeasure is a bolt,

Through my heart.

But enough!

No more shall I yearn.

And one day, proud sky,

You shall fall,

In million shards blue, 

Around me.

Yet, i will stand tall,

Untouched, unmoved.

Triumphant. Finally.

Hugo

Poster of Hugo (Courtesy: amazon.com)

Hugo is charming. It is almost like a Dickens’ novel comes to life at a Paris railway station. A David Copperfield with just a dash of The Little Princess in her attic and a Javertesque Inspector.

Hugo Cabret is a nine year old fascinated with and with a felicity for machines, especially broken ones. A young boy with simple dreams and simpler ambitions. His world comes crashing around his ears when his father – a cameo by Jude Law – dies in a fire at the museum, where he worked. Hugo inherits from him, a love for mechanics and an automaton that was languishing in the museum storeroom, before father and son duo started to lovingly restore it.

Orphaned, Hugo has to become an apprentice to his uncle, who keeps and maintains clocks around the railway station for a living. When the drunkard uncle disappears, Hugo takes his place clandestinely and evading the strict and sharp eyes of the Station Inspector with a wooden leg and a mean dog. The Inspector’s mission in life seems to be to find orphans and consign them to their rightful place – an orphanage. The only thing that makes him humane is the secret crush he has on the flower girl at the station.

All this while, Hugo continues working on the automaton, trying to find the missing piece of the puzzle, in the hope that his father would have left him a message through the automaton. His life changes once more when George Melies, the toyshop owner at the railway station catches him, trying to steal some machine parts.

To say more is to give up the delightful secrets that the movie hides. I just got to know that the movie is based a book called The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznik. I hope that the book is even more delightful.

The movie, meanwhile, is simple but scattered with gems that surprise you. The sneaking about of Hugo and Georges’ god-daughter, Isabelle, around the station and their sheer delight in watching the pictures move at a cinema hall. The gentle training that the middle aged French lady gives to the smitten Station Inspector on how to woo the flower girl. The lady’s own blooming romance with the portly gentleman, who is unfortunately not equally liked by her beloved pet. The day-to-day scenes at the station, through the eyes of a clock.

You smile, you cry with this simple tale of loss, victory, perseverance and miracles. The miracle of finding yourself and your dreams in unexpected ways. Of not giving up hope. Believing that there is a purpose in everything, like Hugo tells Isabelle, against the stunning backdrop of Paris in twilight. Great words from the mouth of a babe, yet they never seem strained, rehearsed because this child has seen more, lived more than lot of us.

The actors are all very good – from the seasoned Ben Kingsley as Georges Melies to Asa Butterfield who plays Hugo – but I think it is the triumph of the story and Scorsese’s consummate skill that everyone shines equally in this lovely, lovely movie.

I watched the movie on a long distance flight and I think it would be one of my most cherished memories from the trip.

And the Mountains Echoed: A Review

As someone who had loved Hosseini's past two books, I expected certain things from his latest. Not so much formulaic but I was expecting a story from that beleaguered country of Afganistan, that talked of relationships torn asunder and sustained by indomitable human hope.

"And the Mountains Echoed", the back cover tells you, is the story of Abdullah and his little sister, Pari. He is more than a brother to her - he is the father (their own is too careworn to be fully there) and the mother who died while giving birth to her. The book opens with a fable that their father, Saboor,  tells them about another father who makes some difficult choices for the love of his son. The first part of the book portrays the obvious devotion that nine year old Abdullah has for the three year old Pari. Saboor is a man, old before his time, working so hard to provide for his family that all the softness seems to be leached out of him. He is not harsh, just not openly affectionate. His love finds expression in the imaginative bedtime stories that he occasionally weaves for his young children. It is a clear evidence of Hosseini's maturity as a story-teller that he does not have to say these things - he shows them subtly.

Their lives change when the three of them undertake a journey to Kabul in early 1950s - when the country was still relatively peaceful, though the sheen of prosperity could be seen only in the capital. They go to meet the Wahdatis, employers of Nabi, Abdullah's step uncle and the older brother of Saboor's second wife, Parwana.

But just as you think that Hosseini would now trace lives of the brother and sister as they grow up, he throws you acurve ball. He goes back and forth in time, telling the respective stories of different characters - Parwana, Nabi, Nila Wahdati and even the Greek surgeon who stays in the Wahdati mansion in 21st century. All of them are loosely tied, with the common thread of their connection - often distant and sometimes close - with Abdullah and Pari. The overall impression is that the book is less a cohesive novel but more a collection of short stories, with common characters popping up here and there. And the end, when it comes, is not quite a full circle but then life rarely is.

Hosseini's writing style has matured from the heartfelt and simple to sophisticated and articulate, in the style of modern classics. I admire that - his growth and his penchant for learning. The characters are all individuals, with their flaws and perfections, their hopes and dreams charted across a canvas stretching from the fictional Afgan village of Shadbagh to Kabul to Paris to Greece and finally US. This book is probably more daring in its narrative style than The Kite Runner or The Thousand Splendid Suns but yet there is something lacking. It has heart but not the emotions that made the other two so much more. Throughout the book, I kept waiting for that tug at the heart, the emotional wringer (not sappy mush) which is Hosseini trademark but it never came.

Oh, there are lovely scenes galore - Abdullah trading his only shoes  for a rare peacock feather because his sister loves them. Or, Parwana's one-sided love for Saboor, even as he is enchanted by her beautiful twin sister. Saboor as a child telling the twins how the big tree in the village has the power to grant wishes - ten exact leaves on your head a benediction. But, it just needed, perhaps, a little less sophistry.

It is probably unfair - an author's work biggest criticism being his growth and the high benchmark of his own books - but that is just how things are.

Final recommendation: read it. It is better than lot of other books out there - it only falls short of Hosseini's own standards. 

Roads

Once upon a time, there was a girl, barely ten years old, with delusions of grandeur. She thought that she could be a superwoman. She could decide how old she would stay all her life. She could win not one but several Nobel prizes. She could be a CEO, a celebrated author, a, acclaimed scientist – everybody rolled into one. And of course, she would be super-rich and all the people she loved would always be around and never, ever die.

As the girl grew older, her delusions began to fall aside, but slowly. Oh, so slowly. First went the ability to decide her age. Then, the gleaming Nobels. One by one, all of them left her, until just one remained.

But now the time has come to decide if it truly is a delusion or something real that could turn into a regret.

So, I have some decisions to take – not very difficult but not so easy either. That explains in part my absence, though not all of it. Work has been the usual culprit. I hope, however, that things would ease up a bit and I would have the time to choose the right path, even if it is less travelled by.

Colours of Escape

As a child, I had little talent but a lot of enthusiasm for colouring and painting. Then I grew up, got a career and the colours – the sketch pens, the water colours, the oil paints, the crayons – all dried up, grew stained and were finally abandoned.

But I have discovered an iphone app that lets me play around with colours like I have not done in ages. It is my newest addiction. And you are about to be assaulted with some of my “artistic” escapes. Don’t say that I didn’t warn you J

I am a shooting star

Dance in the Moonlight

Let me be

Seaswept

Spring is here

Wild, wild tangle

River through the woods

Silhouette of a Dream

Paradise

Footsteps

Unleashed

Fly Away

The Red Ball

The ball was almost as big as the two year old trying to tame it. It was red, with Mickey and friends painted on its shiny surface.

A few paces away, the child’s grandmother kept a watchful eye. The dusk was growing deeper. The sea was a safe distance away but could not be ignored. Her charge was precious and the fickle waves had to be continuously watched.

Suddenly, the child kicked the ball hard and it went tumbling towards the quietly murmuring sea. The child rushed after it but the grandmother caught him before he had taken a few steps.

“Let it go”, she murmured soothingly. “I will get you another one.”

The duo turned away from the sea and walked back towards home.

The sea seemed to look after them beseechingly, as slow rumbles churned in its belly.

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The next evening, there was no child and no grandmother watching over him on that shore. The sky was serene and awash with the colours of the sunset. But the sea still roared threateningly, though the temper was now simmering.

Had the ball, that shiny red globe, come back, it would not have ever found its playmate. The sea and the earth in a devastating show of strength, anger and plain whimsy, had wiped the life from the small hamlet, leaving behind the wrecked fossils of those who had once lived.

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The fisherman waited patiently. He had not yet given up hope, though he was more than aware of the slowly undulating sea. He had heard from the village headman how the earth had moved under the sea, causing really big killer waves that had destroyed entire villages and a few towns. It was only a few weeks ago. This had happened in a land across the sea but that was the reason why his own hut had also trembled.

The sun was slowly sinking. Now his own hopes began to dim. His was really a hand-to-mouth existence. He had only two children and a wife to support, unlike his father who had eleven kids and three wives. Still, he was struggling to make ends meet. He had not touched his wife in a long time, afraid of another mouth to feed.

He began to draw up his woefully light net. No point staying any longer. He had spent all his life on the sea or near it. He thought he had seen the worst storms but now he was more afraid of it than ever and did not like to stay out here, alone.

He steered his boat homewards. Something red flashed by him. He wanted to ignore it but he did not. Who knew, maybe it was a mysterious good luck charm. It happened often enough in the fairytales his wife told their children.

He had to change the course of his boat only a little for the object to come plainly in view. It was round, shiny and red. It winked like a beacon in the orange light of the evening.

He flung his net. On the third attempt, he managed to snag it. He pulled it closer and hauled it in.

It was a ball.

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The fisherman’s children were asleep by the time he reached home. His astute wife knew that when her husband was late, the catch, if any, would be meagre. No point waiting for a filling meal, then. She had served watery gruel to the children and convinced them to sleep before their barely filled stomachs complained of hunger again.

The fisherman showed the ball to his wife. She cast the happy animal figures on its surface a tired look. “Maybe the children will not feel so hungry now that they have a ball to play with”, she mused. Her children

Picture Source: www.clipartguide.com

were wise enough to know that they could not afford the toys which some children in the village played with. Yet, envy was hard to keep at bay. This would, at least, give them some joy.

The fisherman’s son was delighted with the ball though the daughter was not so impressed. The red ball was the boy’s favourite thing in the world.

The happiness lasted for a whole week before his parents decided to exchange it for food. The food lasted them for three days.

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A month after the fisherman had found the ball, some people from the city visited his village. The village headman took them around to show how the fishing folk in this part of the world lived.

The visitors were so moved by the plight of the villagers that they decided to do something about it. They offered to support the education of ten children from the village. Since the village had no school, the children were to be taken to a big city, where they would study and live. The fisherman’s children were also chosen.

The bus in which the children were to go was white and so clean that the children could see their faces reflected in its sides.

The fisherman’s seven year old son, however, stood a little apart from the excited children. The kind lady from the city noticed him and asked him though the village headsman, “What are you looking at, son?”

The boy pointed to the red ball, his favourite thing in the world, which sat on the old, wooden table of the grocer.

The lady smiled.

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The bus left with ten excited, nervous children. And among them was a happy boy with a red ball.

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Many years later, the fisherman’s son, who was now all grown up and successful, came to live in a country across the sea from his father’s village. His new house was not very big but it was pretty and comfortable.

It had glass cupboards in the drawing room to show all the medals and trophies that he had won. And along with those, there was a slightly grimy, old red ball with faded cartoon characters. The cheerful shininess still shone through when the light caught it at certain angles, like the gleam of happy memories in tired eyes of grandparents.

His neighbour was an elderly lady, who waved at him, every time he saw her – on the road, in the garden, at a store.

One day, she knocked on his door and very humbly asked in her broken English for that customary loan – sugar.

He let her inside and requested her to wait in his drawing room.

When he returned with the bowl, he found her standing entranced in front of his trophy case. He called her. She turned and he found her crying.

He was alarmed. He tried asking what was the matter but she brushed him off and slowly took the bowl of sugar and left. A defeated, sad old woman.

Next day, she came to his house again. Wary, he invited her in. He requested her to sit down but she didn’t.

It was then that he noticed that she was clutching something in her hand. She offered it to him.

It was a crumpled old photo. It showed an old woman, older than his neighbour but similar looking. Perhaps, a relative. With the woman was a child, about one and half to two years of age. They were smiling into the camera with a tranquil sea in the background.

But the fisherman’s son’s attention was fixed upon what the child was trying to contain in his chubby arms. A shiny, red ball with Mickey and friends painted on its surface.