thela aur thel

Was invited to do an essay for Blogbharti, for their Spotlight series.

Here it is.

And since it is related to chai, here are the rest of the links as well.

Chai 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Pledge in the new year

We sent wishes. Didn't we?

May the moon charm you and the sun warm you. May your lips be assaulted by laughter. May the year bring health. Jobs. May you... may you... may the new year bring....

And the new year brought.

The news that even before the sun had a chance to dawn upon the first day of the new year, that two women - escorted by men - were molested by a mob of about seventy men.

Exhibit 1 of the year. Mumbai must be reeling. It reels rather regularly, this safe city of ours, no? Especially over the last few years, when photographers have been around to record her shame. The pictures have ensured front page fear where the news would otherwise have been a 'briefs' item or a single column somewhere.

I've kept that article open on a different window all day. Returned to it several times, trying to understand.

Is there a language with which one discusses this sort of problem? Some anthropological jargon? Some special gendered lens through which one can peer and begin to develop a perspective?

Where do I begin? With this, that I've never much been taken in by the 'safe city' bilge? With reminding myself of myself in Mumbai, of my friends there?

Or do I conjure up a remembered image of the Gateway of India?

That time I'd walked there with a male friend and he'd been sitting right beside me and how, within minutes, a bunch of men had begun to appear all around, to my right and left, and behind, crowding us in, and how their hands had begun to touch and I could only feel appalled that it should happen in a male friend's presence in broad daylight! And the fear of what it would be like if I had been sitting there alone. And how I have never, since that day, sat down to just look at the sea at the Gateway of India.

Perhaps, I should begin differently. Perhaps, I should talk of class, instead, and lifestyle divisions.

That there are people who stand outside... outside... looking in. That there are five-star hotels and parties and tickets that the average citizen cannot afford. That they stand out there, looking in, waiting, and when the party-goers step out, as they must at some point, then... then what?

What shall I say about this, then?

Shall we try to look at this as a migrants problem, then? As a problem of single men, throbbing with sexual desire and unable to touch the beautiful rich women they do desire?

Shall we try to look at this as a cultural problem, then? As a problem of men who have never partied with single women, never sat down and had a drink with them, never danced with them, never picked them up from their homes and safely dropped them off, never ever seen them up close - the sort of women who wear slinky, western clothes and go partying at night?

Shall we try to look at this as a western influence problem, then? As a problem of women who go out partying with men, drink with them, dance with them, step out into the fresh air at night?

Ah! It's beginning to sound easy, isn't it? It is beginning to sound like something we know, have heard, can believe. We know this beast.

This beast does not seem to understand that sex is a two-way street. It seems to think that the female of the species does not have a will of its own, does not deserve one. This beast is not empathetic. It only knows what it is, and it is not a woman.

This beast... how well I know it.

This beast says, don't. Don't, if you want to live. Don't, if you want to be safe. This beast stands breathing hard over our heads while we live fractured, fractioned lives wherein we build ourselves smaller and smaller cages to curl up and die in, unmolested.

And the thing is, that it really is a battle between us and the beast. At least, for me, it is. It is us or the beast. So, in a way - a rude, blistering, numbing way - it is time to pick up the cudgels and renew the pledge.

Because I had a nice new year's eve, you see. I had a nice time sitting at home with a few old friends, laughing and gossiping about the old times. Unafraid young women because they were home, locked in from the big, bad world. Women who kept glancing at the clock after eleven at night, and rushed home soon after midnight hugs and wishes, because they would not risk driving by themselves any later than that. Women who spent twice as much as they needed to - taking taxis instead of autos, because that's the price you pay for wanting to be out in the evening. Women who were clothed head to foot twice over since it is a cold winter night, but would have worried nevertheless.

And today, I renew my commitment to Blank Noise.

Because I will not expect it, and will not accept it.

I will not stop buying 'provocative' clothes. I will not be modest. I will not behave. I will not treat the night as a na-mehram I cannot be seen with. I will not change my stride to side-step the maps of our molestation. I will not call a violation by any other name. I will not make unwanted rules for myself.

I will crush the beast where I see it. With a stare, with a slur, with a scream, with a camera, with an alphabet at a crossing, with a pamphlet, with a map, with a voice, with a can of paint, with anything that comes to hand.

I will take the sun AND the moon, the day AND the night, the sky AND the sea, the daily grind AND the parties. I will take my rights as a citizen and nothing less.

Dear Stranger,

Will you help?

War tales and the staging of a blog

A little bit of history just might have been created on the capital a few days ago. I have been to see Baghdad Burning (in Hindi) at the National School of Drama last weekend and it was (to my knowledge) the first time in this country that someone put together a dramatic production on stage, based on the text of a blog.

I went to see the play because I knew that, whether or not the production was any good, this would mark a historic moment in the cultural landscape. Blogs are producing poetry, stories, essays, perhaps serialized novels. Blogs are producing journalism. For all I know, blogs are also depositories of scripts and screenplays, and if that is the case, they may well have been produced and staged already. But so far, (and correct me if I'm wrong) blogs were not yet being interpreted and adapted specially for the screen.

Baghdad Burning is a fine blog that treads a wonderful line between experiential journalism, write-it-as-I-see-it posts and storytelling. There is inherent drama in an unfolding war and the inevitable tragedy for the citizens who neither propagated it nor supported it and had nowhere to run when it came to their homes. That it calls for a wider audience goes without saying and taking it to the stage, where non-bloggers also have a chance to experience the narrative is a great initiative.

As for Baghdad Burning, the play... I have two reasons for reviewing it here. One, maybe Riverbend might want to know how it turned out (if she has access to the net). Two, I'm hoping that somebody passes on this feedback to the team that put it together. Not because it is a terrible play, but because it has fine moments of intensity and a sorrow so delicate, it was beautiful to watch. I wish the team well, congratulate them and want them to fine-tune it so that the plays gets better reviews and is invited everywhere.

The play opens to the forward left corner of the stage. A laptop, a dim light, a girl sitting with her back to the audience. She begins to read – in English. And right there was stumbling block number one.

I am not a great fan of mixed-language plays. If the characters themselves use a mix of tongues, that's okay. But to have the narrator speak in English and the rest of the dialogue in Hindi does not make a lot of sense. I rather like the fact that it was in Hindi. That brought an immediacy and urgency to the natural poignancy of the text. You could so easily substitute 'Baghdad' for 'Delhi' and the story would be this – the words in the mouths of the players would be this. In just such an idiom, just such a turn of phrase.

Unfortunately, some bits of the text were read out as they were. In a strongly accented English. [Aside: I confess that I'm squirming a bit in my chair while saying this, for I don't want to be accused of diction snobbery] Badly spoken (annunciated) English, on stage, is… is… well, unless it is deliberate and serves to embellish a character, it is just an annoyance. In this case, the diction was making the viewers work hard too hard at deciphering the text. The narrator's voice, then, ceased to work as an effective tool.

I won't bother with a synopsis of what you see on stage – it is complex and should be allowed to stay that way. Also, the structure of the narrative is loose, sequential, just like a series of blog posts, and that too should be treated as legit.

One of the early sequences is that of a family sleeping, or trying to, with war all around. The girl and boy begin identifying the make of the craft, the weapons, the targeted areas, through the sounds of bombing and shelling. It is a game and a sad one. The bad news begins to filter in at the same time. Missing friends, dead phones, the raids at night.

Some posts have been chosen for their telling commentary and some of their stories. The one where a young girl comes seeking legal help, looking for her arrested/missing family. The one where the narrator's aunt comes visiting from London, laden with gifts, only to be witness to a terrifying surprise visit by soldiers (or militias?). The one where an old woman shows around a visitor in a bombed-out place that has become famous for its 'designs' – people hurled with great force against the walls and their death shapes left imprinted there – almost a tourist attraction (my favourite portion). The one where the narrator's home becomes host to a long line of buckets since it is the only one with a thin trickle of water. All these are well-done.

There are parts of the play that are more like short skits which hold together various sequences, and their execution is uneven. There is one sequence where all the various puppet presidents are introduced, which is quite well done. There are sequences more figuratively interpreted than actual (though I cannot recall each post on the blog). One where the central character's laptop is taken away by armed mullah-type men, representing the militias I assume, for the clampdown on women is severe and is represented through the taking away of toolkits, certificates, schoolbags, cracking of whips, and their mummification in white bedsheets.

There is another sequence which is meant to represent the vulgarity of the 'liberation' of Iraq – a man dressed in a silver shirt and a shiny silver pant rides up on stage on a motorbike, with a woman dressed in a skimpy top and a shiny silver skirt riding pillion. They proceed to dance – terribly – and mouth George W Bush's meaningless words about 'liberation'. The sequence goes on way too long to hold audience interest, especially since the dancing is bad and the music loud and garish. In fact, I was mildly uncomfortable with this representation because it seemed to take potshots at American culture: suggesting, perhaps, that dissonance and a bling-bling aesthetic was all there was to it, and that this alien culture would now invade Iraq, along with the soldiers and tanks. Even if Riverbend had expressed concerns about cultural invasion, there are other ways of staging the idea; this was a simplistic, reductive technique that borders on insensitive. If only this was cut out, or cut back at least, the play would be vastly improved, especially considering that it appears early on.

One of the things I like best about the play is the minimalism of the sets. Very few props. The black box method was in evidence, except that this play used benches and used them to good effect, using the simple lines to create flexibility and speed that was essential to a play like this, which moves time and location so often.

I also liked that, despite a smallish cast, many stories could be told. Many of the actors were playing several different characters, which threw me a bit at first. I'd begin to wonder whether it was the same character, reappearing in a new costume. But once this happened a few time, I saw the pattern and even began to enjoy it. Riverbend herself seemed to be constant, though not in a direct way. Her costume didn't change, thankfully, which left constancy and flow to the sequences.

The costumes weren't bad, though the scope for improvement is vast considering that the right clothes can always be borrowed. The men playing mullahs were dressed in long black robes that appeared to have been made for Christian priests in some other play. However, this was a student production and it was obvious that budgets were small.

I liked the music too – the local music, that is. One song was especially catchy; the one with 'umrika umrika' in the chorus. (The silver-shirt-and-skirt sequence was an unfortunate auditory assault.)

I'm afraid I don't have the brochure now so, don't know the names of the cast or crew. But it was a good show, all said and done: a brave effort with some rough edges; nothing that can't be fixed. What is important is that the play retained the quality of humour tinged with bitterness, that it sought a voice of despair combined with spirit, along with fear, pathos and anger. I do hope that it will be staged again in a better, improved form. And I hope that, wherever she is, Riverbend and her family are safe.

Blink

Like always, you turn to poetry, when it seems as if you cannot find the words....

"Sabse Khatarnaak woh chaand hota hai
jo har hatyakaand ke baad
veeraan huye aangano.n mein chadhta hai
par aapki aankho.n mein mircho.n ki tarah nahin gadhta"

[That moon is the moon dangerous
that, after each murder,
rises above these desolate homes
but does not descend into your eyes like chillies.]

From Paash's 'Sabse khatatnaak cheez' or The Most Dangerous Thing.

A lady called Chandni sent an email today, citing these lines; she also forwarded a message from Anhad along a breakdown of the voting patterns in Gujarat. It asked us to remember that the margins were slim. That for every 37,722 people who voted for the BJP in Rajpipla, there were many more who voted against (37,091 for the Congress - a difference of 631 votes - and 2807 for the BSP).

I hardly batted an eyelash when I'd heard of the result; I hadn't allowed myself to. But for some reason, this email is making me blink. Furiously.

I'm going to try and put up that list in this post, but in any case, you can go and look at the details on the Election Commission website.

	CONSTITUENCY	BJP VOTE	CONGRESS VOTE	DIFFERENCE	BSP	IND
1	RAJPIPLA	37722	37091	631	2807
2	MANDAL	34843	34166	677		3818
3	KHAMBHALIA	40358	39560	798		4275
4	KANKREJ	37930	37090	840	28934
5	JAMNAGAR	33021	31941	1080		1098
6	KADI	65835	64508	1327		3848
7	GADHADA	50579	49152	1427	1478
8	SURAT CITY	39607	37908	1699		RJD-2584
9	ANAND	63745	61975	1770		12134
10	KALOL	27565	25255	1884		1427+1016
11	CHIKHLI	59471	57204	2267	2708
12	SIDHPUR	52610	50181	2429		2694
13	MANGROL	48256	45625	2631	3389	2782
14	BOTAD	69662	66474	3188	2134	3188
15	VIRAMGAM	47643	44327	3316	3286	3364
16	MANSA	44381	41011	3370		10478
17	GANDHINAGAR	81864	78116	3748	1766	5128
18	RAKHIAL	53993	50048	3945	1395	1428
19	DASADA	38174	34108	4066	3898	2408
20	SIHAR	50756	46638	4118	3501	2973
21	AMRELI	48767	44578	4189		3143+1397
22	VISAVADAR	38179	33950	4229	3399	2074
23	UPLETA	36602	31917	4685	1946	SP-4141
24	SOMNATH	61233	56004	5229	7099
25	BAYAD	40395	34711	5684	3107	3569
26	CHHOTA UDAIPUR	44422	38304	6118		8056
27	KALAWAD	39497	33225	6272	3449	3693
28	WADHAWAN	47466	40564	6902		23261
29	DANGS	56860	48977	7883		5010+4446
30	KUTIYANA	37130	27980	9150	3064	8060
31	VADGAM	50481	40776	9705		16372
32	ABDASA	39004	28985	10019	12397
33	CAMBAY	50163	40086	10077	3081	8684