Maasi was mad pissed. No! It wasn’t someone not returning chai glass on time. The culprit was the weather. It’s been raining. And I knew she was finicky about people making small talk especially if someone begged a question. I asked one: Maasi! Chai milega kya? And then the rant started again. From weather, the rant shifted how stupidly people behaved in her chai shop. How moronic was I to have even posed such a question to maasi. Obviously it was raining, and it was just eight o clock in the evening in Baroda. Why shouldn’t anyone go out on the streets in Fatehgunj and have a cutting? And there I was, asking Maasi Chai hai kya?
Later, I realized it wasn’t even my question. Someone asked for four chais and took eight instead. That was the trigger. She could only serve fourteen chais at a time. If you are not in that fourteen, you are supposed to wait for the next round. And this guy had taken eight glasses out of the fourteen. And if someone breaks a glass, her rant would continue till the next day. These fourteen glasses would change hands throughout the day till 11 PM when an ugly looking dabba (a police truck) would pull up next to her kitli. The constable would blow his whistle as if he just wants to witness that scramble of the young people hanging out at maasi’s for about half a minute till police truck is comfortably parked in the middle of the road trying to shut down the city for the night. A few would walk next to their motorcycles and continue their chats, as if they are going to start their machines at that instant itself. But they would hang on. When the constable would be convinced that the day’s adda is coming to an end, the dabba would turn right towards Sadar Bazar in Fatehgunj. Maasi is usually not bothered about the policemen. Sometimes she is ready to take on the establishment when a cavalcade of the local municipal corporation’s vehicles comes to bother her or the other stalls, usually on the days when some local dignitary is passing by Fatehgunj. But on the other days, she keeps chasing youths who have no parking sense.
There are phenomenally interesting people who come to chat with maasi in the day and towards fixed evening. I never asked their names but I have seen them coming to her and either she is taking something from them or giving them a cup of tea. Undoubtedly, there are more people in the latter category but from some of these people, she takes things apart from money. There is one kaka, who come in a cycle. He usually supplies her puffs and breads. He would make a point to engage her in some kind of a banter before taking off for an errand. On days when it rains, she offers him chai. Their discussions range from spoilt bread from the previous day to the evictions across the city by the local municipal JCBs. They discuss the news that matters to them. I have seen them for the last three and a half years. On ramzan days, he is pensive. Maasi would talk less to him. One day she told me, that Ramzaan and Shravan fasts are rigorous and not meant for chicken like me. Both of them looked at me and started laughing. I just managed to smile.
Even after a kidney surgery earlier this year, Maasi must have been fasting. I wonder why she chased a bunch of foreign students from her stall the other day and that bakery wallah Kaka rebuking the boys for bringing eggs to near her stall during shravan months. He didn’t ask her if she was fasting but all of that conversation was subtle. One could almost see their eyes speak for a brief moment which I imagined to be: “I know you’re fasting for Shravan just like I am fasting for Ramzaan”. Namaaz for maghreeb was an hour away so Maasi didn’t offer him any chai. Kaka left. I realized I may not see him again nor will I witness this transaction again. How precious that moment was. As a student of social sciences, it was definitely profound, as a bystander, it was overwhelming. I don’t want to engage in any loud sloganeering for communal harmony in a state like Gujarat but here on the streets of Fatehgunj, it was implicit. Unlike some social or political science expert writing eight column full of words arguing against a proposed bill on protection of communal strife, constantly naming Vadodara or Baroda in his article, Maasi and this Kaka’s bond is simple and doesn’t necessarily reflect the kind of notoriety that this state has gained over past few years. I also know that for these people a proposed bill on communal harmony would not mean a thing. But I think I am against the sweeping statements made a group of people about a place without visiting them while bringing these places under the national radar to detect notoriety and consistently use these places as examples. Yes, you may have done a great service to the people affected by such strife but you may also give in to the schemes of the people who want such events to occur at a given place.It is not the police presence but sometimes for me, in Fatehgunj, it is Maasi’s presence that generates a feeling of security. I guess that’s all I want to say.

Rant of 2010

December 28, 2010 Around 6:30 PM on Facebook Social Networking Site

(interventions marked in bold)

What's on your mind?

Anupam Chakravartty

: welcome to the stalker's paradise!

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Diana Gomes likes this.

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Anupam Chakravartty

and then: "school days, cool days, wtf-you-were- you-doing-on-a Sunday? challenged the constitutionality of this incestuous tradition in bureaucracy, recognised an unmistakable homogeneity and a couple of big words to marinate your ego unde...r a red lamp, traced the faces of farcical keepers of myths circulated by the ravenous messengers of deaths, penned a news column for a bikini dealer, who made bikinis for goats, ended a letter to the sea and sand ... that reminds me of my wasted hands that wants to grow artistanarchistic cauliflowers, dreams of yet another Lockerbie bomber trapped in a space suit that seemed like Event Horizon was a spiritual space hogging monster made by men, sent to space but crashed in to Hollywood. so what the fuck were you doing on a Sunday?"

"O I was hiding from the self centered red faced turnips that grows on my backyard. Rabbits like them, I hate them. Rabbits dont pay taxes. I pay taxes. That makes me a taxpayer. no! not a human yet. dont be mistaken. humans dont work on Sundays. Sabbath is Eurocentric. but Saturn is heliocentric. Saturdays are alcohol centric. But we work on Sundays. Did i tell you today's monday? They say you are allowed to cry on Monday nights thinking about dead babies or kittens, so that tooth fairy pays you a visit. See i told you it was all about tooth fairy visits. No! it wasn't about being in Gujarat and Assam. Nay! not the national kinds. my editor in delhi is the national kind. i am a voyeur. predator of information. footprint of enormous reserves of carbon in my lungs. i speak journalese. no wonder cats do not understand me anymore else it would all make sense. in subscription to the tail of the stalker, i will let it out. more music, more trampled under foot romance to come."See more

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Anupam Chakravartty

but you played your music? didn't you?

"Yes i did. i thought there were songs to be sung, boomerangs to be thrown, posters to be pasted. but i have no walls. no clean walls. someone's been making graffiti on my wall. for crying out loud, the...re were no walls. a distinctly subliminal message on my inbox was good enough to get me going for an errand. but it ended there. it was a silent ghost. no it didn't attack me. it didn't move. it stood there brooding over a dead kitten. and then nothing happens. no one calls. no one hears the lullaby manufactured in a toy store. these toy stories include over-sexualised puppets from future dancing to Daft Punk and 1000 Homo DJs. and here, Sheila's adolescence was suddenly a topic of discussion in my town while their overarching post-apocalyptic graphics include flags. and nationality includes armed insurrections. but strangely, inclusive growth eludes. so past participle for that lingering feeling is called hooked. his infancy ridiculed and rescued at the same time. matured thoughts need raw reflections to further the case of 'fertilizing daffodils'. enough for the friendly little stalker with high anxiety in his/her hormone. play stations are better. play space stations will give you a power trip depending on which side of the world you are at. if you are in India, it doesn't go beyond Ionosphere. If you are in Russia, your payload is not enough. If you are in Iran, then forget about it. North Korea is a lie. U.S. is trying to rescue NASA from open source seekers. Richard Branson will be taking you for a ride. no future cannot be predicted by this close analysis of your facebook updates for one year, FB would not process your Hindi updates. they think its parochial. so is Bejan Daruwalla. he is afflicted by the parochial understanding of the cosmic agony that people face especially when time announces its yearly shift. Vishwa Hindu Parishad will not bust your new year party but they may bust you for your ideas. they all follow Gregorian calender but still that doesn't make them gregarious. what to do? VHP is from moon. you are from mars. i was assigned Venus but they called it feminine. earth belongs to no one. that bit about your carbon footprint makes you a polluter so don't be so happy. grow your food. next year is apocalypse. we would hear the sound first, then the fury. this is not Bejan Daruwalla predicting. this is the proverbial egg yolk that just melted on my pan. it is still a Monday so things can change."See more

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Anupam Chakravartty

concerning recently diagnosed diseases:

"Phil-har-mo-ny: Earlier it was called oribarmy. But then we realised how difficult it is to come up with a new word in this shrinking linguistic universe terrorized by pot-bellied lexicographers who have sold their soul to the devil viz. the mobile phone companies. so apparently, they chose 'phil' from syphillis, and harmony from a certain college's annual cake baking festival. there were other suggestions as well. a prominent choice was 'philanderer'. but then we already had 'syphilis'. 'philanderer' could be considered as secondary for the creation of 'phil-harmony'. but it is a disease. somehow, the word sounds more malign than any other tumour afflicting the cheeks of a recently botoxed herbivore superstar. doctors say that it is a random dedication to the music one likes. on working days, the disease manifests itself in its true form. the slave's painful groins make him log on to Youtube and post the first song that comes to his mind. while the master hurls the choicest of his/her abuses to the slave, the slave defies all the norms. the patient (the slave) fantasizing his freedom, drifts to this parallel world that is defined by the screen and a pair of headphones.

it is a pity that anxiety is just a symptom and not a disease. Anxiety, because as soon as he posts the video, he/she waits for someone to say 'Like'. he/she would use 'alt + tab' to switch between MS word and his page. so yes there is an end here somewhere but one needs to find it. it is clearly not a sign of frustration. it is just some kind of immediate, urgent freedom from this cubicle existence. one doesn't mind going back to a cubicle. they had to concede: a philharmonic needs his music like he/she needs a womb. he/she sleeps in foetal position listening to his headphones because there is no other truth apart from what he is listening to. Phil har mony is incurable."See more

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Diana Gomes

‎"so past participle for that lingering feeling is called hooked." -i like that, it goes down in my book of quotes :)

"no wonder cats do not understand me anymore else it would all made sense".- not true entirely.. i think they can they just... choose not to :p "earth belongs to no one." - quite a thought that one is. it makes me feel good somehow but there are loads that have yet to understand it. "difficult it is to come up with a new word in this shrinking linguistic universe terrorized by pot-bellied lexicographers who have sold their soul to the devil viz. the mobile phone companies" - liam and i were just having a conversation about coming up with words... inventing rather, those that don't already exist in the oxford version of the dictionary. just a coincidence.See more

13 hours ago · LikeUnlike

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Diana Gomes the welcoming note is a tad creepy but it's a super interesting read.

13 hours ago · LikeUnlike

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Katharina Felidea Rich why stalker´s paradies?

10 hours ago · LikeUnlike

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Anupam Chakravartty Paradise is notional :)

9 hours ago · LikeUnlike

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Anupam Chakravartty gomes: thanks for the cake. "no wonder cats do not understand me anymore else it would all made sense" comes from the movie Kiki's Delivery Service, when Kiki's friend forgets how to talk to humans.

9 hours ago · LikeUnlike

Whatever happened to Tacky Tack - An Interview

Before Tacky Tack started writing about murders and homicides, he interviewed his own computer to see if it could really process an emotional outburst. Later, after the interview, he poured kerosene on his computer, and set it on fire before he left the city. Excerpts:


Would you explain yourself, ever?

No

Are you sure you will ever be able to jump over the hedge?

Yes.

Will that take a long time?

Yes

Are you communicating now?

Yes

Do you think you can communicate better? May be 'interact'?

No

But this can't go on like this. I hope you know it is not something binary?

Yes.

So do you think I am doing this as an exercise?

No.

Do you wish that world is a simple place with yes or no as answers for everything?

No.

But your answers ... they seem to be only 'yes' or 'no'. Does it not mean that you think the world is made of binaries?

No

But your approach is obviously binary in trying to understand the nature of this problem? Isn't it?

No.

Well it is ... and this is how you work: you have been carefully analyzing my questions. Your reasoning skills cancels out the contradictions in any argument and forms a conclusion, which therefore depends on whether you accept what i am saying to be true or otherwise ... and this you express in form of yes or no. What is true for you is a yes, what's not is outrightly rejected as no. So the truth is corresponds to acceptance, while what is not true for you becomes a 'no'. But with this approach, aren't you clearly denying the existence of other truths, which may not be true in your case, to exist? You are being totalitarian.

No

But you are rejecting them?

Yes.

Now, here is the problem: I have no clue as to why you would do something like this instead of answering the questions. Do you think reasoning is below you?

Yes

Oh well, then who would explain your actions. Do you think one needs to explain their actions?

No.

Even as you say no or yes, you are reasoning it out for yourself. Therefore you are a hypocrite if you say I do not reason, but I just do it. Aren't you trying to play this Eve Democracy character from Sympathy for the Devil?

Yes.

Oh! So you are some kind of wannabe?

Yes.

Just analyse this situation if you can. I ask questions, assuming things since there is no reference whatsoever to what your thoughts are, no words except an affirmative or a negative. You say reasoning is below you which I think follows a wellknown Eastern mystical philosophy. Am I right?

No

So this is your own philosophy?

No.

I mean something that you have devised it yourself over the years ... say for being the witness to the vagaries of life; that the moment you reason, there's going to be an argument. Since, reasoning offers infinite possibilities, therefore no argument is either flawed or perfect. Therefore, silience on some basic issues, would eventually lead you to solution but not by reasoning per say. Are you with me on this?

No

Are you saying 'no' because I am counting only the fundamental issues?

Yes

So it is a worldview?

Yes

there exists a common solution for all the problems?

Yes

And the solution is ... Answering things as if they are absolute answers? Or the joke is on me?

No or Yes

Oh we have state like that ... “a No or a Yes”. That is absolutely fantastic. This is where you go fuzzy. This is where all your truth tables are a waste. This is where you have a moral dilemma. I have trapped you finally my friend. Therefore, you are free to speak now. You have sealed yourself in this morass of absolutes to this extent that now when we move towards a “logical” end, you appear to be confused while I am sure of my actions.

Tack disappeared like many others did when they realised that only one set of people are going to live in this world. The mainstream was the only stream.

Clove Oil and Other Lovers

It was the first day of the war. Everybody was laughing on the other side of the fence.

“I am very serious Clove. How could you come up with such a thing?” Ripon kept on laughing. I am sure he did want an answer. But like everyone else, he wanted euphoria of this war to persist. I didn’t know what those savages might be thinking. Are they prepared with guns? Using guns … what a cliché. Although killing with a gun is serious and immediate. There is some kind of urgency associated with this thing called gun as if the moment I utter the word gun, I am supposed to demonstrate what it is meant for. You know why Ripon and other commanders are laughing today? Because they know that this war will not have a single dead person. There will be a lot of people who are going to be hurt … mentally.

The Structure decided to ban all the weaponry from the face of the planet. Enough of that threat perception and mistrust. It was a load of bullshit fed to a lot of people. The last war in which people were killed also ended up to be an orgy of sorts. Thanks to the brave seductive revolutionaries of my time, all the rights of the men to make love to other men (and not war!) were intact and obviously disease, urban loneliness, individualism, and most a shift in the sexual politics helped us to establish the new structure. I think the shift was from the feudal to personal in sexual politics. The body ethic moved towards the experiential rather than being based on the principles. The experience was the first principle. Being loved in the true sense by this unknown stranger. The stranger after the revelation turns out to be mere attachment. Like, once Swollen Lily wrote in her memoir about her lover: “I may take thousands of years to forget you, or may be this moment.” But I don’t know how human beings could overcome attachments. May be they tried and changed the terms of engagement. I am sure the revolutionaries did away with all the attachments and started living in the communes. There was no question of anomaly creeping inside this commune.

From then till now, the eve of this war that we are fighting with ourselves. The savage occupied territories still burnt in rage over the question of owning their own bodies. They were defending their right to engage in feudal sexual practices (and also their will to own vast amounts of territories). We called them dogs that did not like their pictures to be taken while fucking. On the other side, this so-called war was an experiment on our own. The practitioners of ancient pornography prepared monobiots to click pictures of every possible problem in the savage occupied areas. Earlier, we respected them, and they respected us. However, revenge as a feeling had crept inside The Structure. Ripon doesn’t call revenge as revenge, war as war…he calls everything a corrective measure. That way I am a throwback, so I use similar phrases used by the earlier generations. Sometimes, they suspect if I still have my savage mafia tendencies. Here is the textual news report that appeared in the war:

“At 0935 hrs in the first half of the Lunar Cycle, 2109 Common Era, the first attack on Savage reservations occurred. 700 monobiots entered the savage occupied regions. Dastard and his Men of Skills, whose expertise on filming all the genders in their sexual activity has been an object of academic interest, controlled Monobiots. As it was predicted, the obvious body ethic of the feudal savages paved the way for the images of their own sexual scandals on large Unavision screens installed by the savage technicians. For next two hours, there was intense activity in the region with people cocking up their rifles to kill the other men for sleeping with their wives or daughters or sisters. Then, suddenly realised that someone who is not a part of the Greater Savagery did it. There was consensus of sorts as Shaak, the Savage leader addressed everyone through a public announcement system, while the technically superior monobiots had already placed its bugs in the image pools of the Savage computers that relayed images of young Shaak as an Inspector for the allied forces in 2050 CE brutally raping a convict inside the prison. His wife, as captured by one of the monobiots, was bewildered, was about to shoot herself with a gun, when monobiots quickly relayed the image cutting Shaak and the rape visuals. Shaak’s son reached for the gun as soon as he saw the image in the smaller Unavision downstairs and saved his mother. By 1600 hrs, Shaak issued a statement of surrender of all weaponry. However, it remains to be seen how The Structure makes Shaak surrender his feelings of hatred, jealousy and de-feudalises the Savage society. The Structure has called back all the monobiots back to the base and congratulated Dastard and his team for the success. -------static------

This claimer

I am eternally indebted to my Cartesian doubt followed by Nihilistic preoccupation with the physical self. In plainspeak, I am bored therefore this blog exist. Feel free to pour vitriol on on every possible attempt to make.