Have you ever seen the stars light up on Marine Drive- the few that do show up- when the moon's absent, right before the dawn breaks, with the whole queen's necklace sparkling, giving you the hope that some day one of those diamonds will sparkle in your beloved's eyes?
Have you ever sat at Under the Banyan Tree and thought this is where you'd've liked your first date to be?
Have you been to the Mocha at Churchgate and sat on the largest table with only your girl at it and just cracking inane jokes and laughing your head off over an M&M shake?
Have you ever sat at Bandra Promenade at 2 in the night and thought you could listen to the music of the waves forever... and make music of your own... an alaap from Malkauns that turns into Summertime...?
Have you ever walked from Churchgate to Colaba to the Taj/ Gateway back on Colaba Causeway to Theobroma, nibble at some chocolate indulgence, move into a cab, and make out as you head back for a private room to follow things up?
Have you ever walked through Dadar Parsi Colony late in the evening and smelt the October Fragrance and had a "haaaaa" moment every time it finds you?
Have you ever (/been) bought the biggest bunch of ANY white flowers across the Not Just Jazz by the Bay and felt so elated about it you thought you didn't need any particular person to be in that state of being in love?
Have you seen a movie at Regal or Sterling and kissed the neck of the girl sitting right beside who you might just have the most amazing evening with, or might just get slapped?
Have you gone shopping at the Fabindia in Fort and ended up making out in the changing room cuz no one cares there?
Have you gone visiting Jehangir Art Gallery to see crazy modern art and ended up explaining or being explained something and then actually liking it? Follow it up with a cuppa chai at Samovar and memorabilia s/he will never forget?
Bombay has just so much love in the air you'd have to be two to take it all in.
21.10.09
Overrated
I actually managed to arrive at the title for this post even before beginning to pen it. Perhaps because I’ve been saying it too often lately about so many things. Though it’s not necessarily about the things and people in Bombay, I guess it gets place on Bombay Chuddies for the fact that it is here that I’ve had these realisations.
So here’s my list (editable and addable) of things overrated:
1. MBAs are top of the list for now. It’s like a done-to-death topic with all my MBA as well as non-MBA pals already, but I just need to put it in writing now. High time. What about them fascinates people to gawk open mouthed and wide-eyed? They’re horny like any other, though have no horns on their heads (or even nose, like a rhino, which would be really something). And they can’t talk about anything beyond… uhm… 5 lines? And their passions are so… lame. I haven’t used that word in ages for anybody, but it’s just erupted out of nowhere. It’s as if their being from a premier b-school makes them superior to intense emotions; as if banalities such as a chhotu yellow butterfly are too frivolous for their over-exploited time. Juiceless.
2. Crowds in the Virar Fast local train. It is not crowded all the time, so stop looking so aghast, for heaven’s sake! I travel in them all the time (ok, non peak hours, but so what?) and I’ve managed to get off everywhere… from Dadar to Bandra to Andheri… Beyond that, of course, I refuse to tread, so I don’t know.
3. Living in South Bombay. It is not always expensive to live in this precious part of the city, unless you’re a spoilt brat who’s had EVERYTHING all his/her life. I mean seriously, how hard is it to alter your life to fit in a 6:00 am to 10:30 pm open-gates hostel lifestyle? You have Lata Mangeshkar, the Ambanis and Rahul Bose in the neighbourhood. The sea isn’t farther than a 10-minute walk. It’s a bargain I’d say.
4. Sex. Yes, sex. It is kissing that needs some serious attention now. Men go about grabbing your jaw, biting, licking, exporting litres of saliva and just don’t know the art of kissing. How the heck are you supposed to get to base 4 if you can’t even get past base 2?
5. Pollution in Bombay. A couple of months back, when I was still at the Bakhtawar office, and when I still hitched a bus from Mantralaya, a woman snubbed me for throwing some plastic in my haste to catch the bus. I mean, what’s the hullabaloo about messing up the air, water, roads, et el? As Abhishek once said, if we didn’t diry, the cleaners would lose their jobs (aside: Steve Jobs didn’t lose his despite long sick leave and despite Apple thriving even while he was gone- saala… as Chintan says it). They say it’s the developed country that can add maximally to environmental redemption substantially. Developed nations must develop, must use, must waste resources and dirty the whole place nicely and become all big and developed and thriving before it can be shaken into eco-consciousness. So, jaa na be!
6. Cell phones. Another over-researched point of contention. When I didn’t have my phone all of last Thursday, it felt so cool to be just living in the here, not just the now. I realised if anyone needs to reach me, they have my landline number. We seem to hate the prospect of anyone but the intended receiver picking up our calls. Why? Are we so important or busy that we cannot waste those two minutes on introducing ourselves to a stranger, making conversation, requesting to be connected? As a species noted for its social tendencies, we’re losing them.
7. Non-vegetarian food. Now I hear a loud murmur about how wrong I am, how Bandar kya jaane adrak ka swaad (which, btw, is ironical), but come on! If you’re a “pure non-vegetarian” – which is such crap, man – you can’t be Indian, have Indian non-vegetarian cuisine and then claim to be pure anything! What about all the hefty amount of spice and ancillary veggies that go into making that aromatic curry or slurp roast or fry… sigh… All there is to it seven different meats for the days of the week, as opposed to a whole new concoction every single day of the month. Variety baby, variety.
8. Poets. I had this conversation with A. last night: so many of us seat poets or even the aspiring good ones on a pedestal for nothing. You understand jack shit of what they write and think, ‘Wow he knows his shit man. He can put so much into a few words/ lines/ verses/ rhymes.’ No, no, no, love! They’re just so bad with vocabulary that they try to fit in everything into short sentences and finish it off as soon as possible. And because it’s all so ambiguous, you think they’ve been born with higher sensibilities. And shit like that.
9. T.V. Need we say more?
So here’s my list (editable and addable) of things overrated:
1. MBAs are top of the list for now. It’s like a done-to-death topic with all my MBA as well as non-MBA pals already, but I just need to put it in writing now. High time. What about them fascinates people to gawk open mouthed and wide-eyed? They’re horny like any other, though have no horns on their heads (or even nose, like a rhino, which would be really something). And they can’t talk about anything beyond… uhm… 5 lines? And their passions are so… lame. I haven’t used that word in ages for anybody, but it’s just erupted out of nowhere. It’s as if their being from a premier b-school makes them superior to intense emotions; as if banalities such as a chhotu yellow butterfly are too frivolous for their over-exploited time. Juiceless.
2. Crowds in the Virar Fast local train. It is not crowded all the time, so stop looking so aghast, for heaven’s sake! I travel in them all the time (ok, non peak hours, but so what?) and I’ve managed to get off everywhere… from Dadar to Bandra to Andheri… Beyond that, of course, I refuse to tread, so I don’t know.
3. Living in South Bombay. It is not always expensive to live in this precious part of the city, unless you’re a spoilt brat who’s had EVERYTHING all his/her life. I mean seriously, how hard is it to alter your life to fit in a 6:00 am to 10:30 pm open-gates hostel lifestyle? You have Lata Mangeshkar, the Ambanis and Rahul Bose in the neighbourhood. The sea isn’t farther than a 10-minute walk. It’s a bargain I’d say.
4. Sex. Yes, sex. It is kissing that needs some serious attention now. Men go about grabbing your jaw, biting, licking, exporting litres of saliva and just don’t know the art of kissing. How the heck are you supposed to get to base 4 if you can’t even get past base 2?
5. Pollution in Bombay. A couple of months back, when I was still at the Bakhtawar office, and when I still hitched a bus from Mantralaya, a woman snubbed me for throwing some plastic in my haste to catch the bus. I mean, what’s the hullabaloo about messing up the air, water, roads, et el? As Abhishek once said, if we didn’t diry, the cleaners would lose their jobs (aside: Steve Jobs didn’t lose his despite long sick leave and despite Apple thriving even while he was gone- saala… as Chintan says it). They say it’s the developed country that can add maximally to environmental redemption substantially. Developed nations must develop, must use, must waste resources and dirty the whole place nicely and become all big and developed and thriving before it can be shaken into eco-consciousness. So, jaa na be!
6. Cell phones. Another over-researched point of contention. When I didn’t have my phone all of last Thursday, it felt so cool to be just living in the here, not just the now. I realised if anyone needs to reach me, they have my landline number. We seem to hate the prospect of anyone but the intended receiver picking up our calls. Why? Are we so important or busy that we cannot waste those two minutes on introducing ourselves to a stranger, making conversation, requesting to be connected? As a species noted for its social tendencies, we’re losing them.
7. Non-vegetarian food. Now I hear a loud murmur about how wrong I am, how Bandar kya jaane adrak ka swaad (which, btw, is ironical), but come on! If you’re a “pure non-vegetarian” – which is such crap, man – you can’t be Indian, have Indian non-vegetarian cuisine and then claim to be pure anything! What about all the hefty amount of spice and ancillary veggies that go into making that aromatic curry or slurp roast or fry… sigh… All there is to it seven different meats for the days of the week, as opposed to a whole new concoction every single day of the month. Variety baby, variety.
8. Poets. I had this conversation with A. last night: so many of us seat poets or even the aspiring good ones on a pedestal for nothing. You understand jack shit of what they write and think, ‘Wow he knows his shit man. He can put so much into a few words/ lines/ verses/ rhymes.’ No, no, no, love! They’re just so bad with vocabulary that they try to fit in everything into short sentences and finish it off as soon as possible. And because it’s all so ambiguous, you think they’ve been born with higher sensibilities. And shit like that.
9. T.V. Need we say more?
6.10.09
October Fragrance
It is what I call the October Fragrance.
What a pity to not be able to feel something with all your senses... You can seldom spot it, you can't feel it on your tongue, and it's so light it barely stays in your nose for a while.
And it's returned to me. I used to associate it with my neighbourhood back in Baroda, but it's caught up with me, like the flamingoes that return to the Rann of Kutch each year. It returns like the mating season, like a festival, like the falling beauty of autumn. With autumn.
It's probably got something to do with me. I was traveling to Powai the other day, late in the evening, in a cramped auto, with Nishant and his friend, when the fragrance suddenly emerged from all the wooded corridors along the road and the darkness. Looking for the source would'a been vain, because there are no street lights on that road. But I smelt it again last night, while I was driving to KC, and it found me again! And I go a little ballistic inhaling it. And I try exhaling as quickly as possible so that I can take another shot...
These flowers are mysterious. Their fragrance hits you first. Then the curiosity of where from it emanate, and finally if you're lucky and persistent enough, you might spot the picture perfect tree. Like a cluster of umbrellas-in-miniature, waiting for the rain to stop, shading the white bunches from its wrath. The strangest thing about this sweet odour is that you cannot taste it. It is not like a Mogra or Jasmine, you cannot feel it on your tongue.
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