Life, surprises and positivity.

(The past few months of volunteering Saturdays at Samiksha Foundation- Caring for children with cancer)

You see a lot of pain, a lot of suffering. You often get jolted by how harsh life is, and realise how petty your complaints are when you put things in perspective. But you also see so much positivity brimming around you, so much strength and resolve in accepting the unfairness of their situation, you see people who have enough problems in life even without having a small child diagnosed with cancer, and yet, they deal with the situation and go about the new routine without forgetting how to laugh. You see each child, unique, demanding and fun, leaving an impact. You encounter many incidents that leave you saddened and touched at the same time.

A  bubbly 8 year old girl solemnly gives me advice in the middle of an English Lesson- you have dandruff in your hair, you should use Chic shampoo. It will vanish in one day. This coming from a girl who has lost her hair because of chemotherapy makes one feel oddly guilty for being so privileged. Her mother one day sat with us for a Fourth Standard lesson telling us she had to drop out of school in Fourth Standard and she might as well sit and learn what she can now. And she read the book with concentration, asking us why the K in knife isn't the same as the K in kite, leaving us answerless.  Another girl, who was bored and listless the first few times I saw her underwent a sudden transformation and started enthusiastically solving fractions, and was so confident with her answers that that she insisted that textbook was wrong when one of the answers didn't match, telling me that it happens often.

Little things make them happy and eager- on shifting the older kids to a different room downstairs in the ward, suddenly they began feeling privileged. The younger ones fought to come downstairs while the older ones refused to be downgraded to sitting upstairs with the babies doing alphabets while they had more important lessons to deal with. One day we got out a whiteboard and one of the girls got so motivated with this little change, she briskly set about making it as classroom-like as possible, writing the date, subject, heading and drawing little margins.

The kids have their own groups and even a union leader of sorts. The oldest boy among them drives them around like a responsible elder brother and yells at them if they are too unruly. All of them help in putting away things without being asked, in fact, they fight over who folds the carpets and who carries the books back. One hyperactive seven  year old takes charge of even the lock and key to the library, sternly instructing me to switch off all the lights before locking the door.

The acceptance these children show is often unbelievable- once I came across a chapter in which  there was a boy who had cancer. The two tenth standard boys listening nudge each other and laughingly tell me they are like the boy in the lesson.

The teachers, Mrs.Parvathi and Mrs,Vidhyawati are models in dedication and generosity themselves. They are both stern and loving with the children, keeping them occupied and happy. I hurriedly had packed a bun for my lunch one day since the food wasn't ready, and the two of them seeing this quietly put half of their lunches into my box for me to eat.

The birthday events of course are tremendous fun for the kids- all the pent up energy comes tearing out, they laugh with abandon at the magic show, and Suresh the magician is amazing with the kids, hitting on just the right things to cheer them up and make them laugh. One of the events included an impromptu fashion show by the little girls, who walked up and down the 'stage' content with their everyday clothes and accessorised with their mothers' handbags.

Despite the moments that make you question the unfairness of life, it is usually positivity that I take back with me each time I leave Kidwai. Life's surprises may not always be pleasant, but with a little hope and dedication, we can try and make a small difference. 

Samiksha Foundation is a non-profit organisation founded by Sandhya Sharad in 2009. The foundation aims at providing quality non-medical support for children suffering from cancer and their care-givers, by organising educational and creative recreational activities for the resident patients at Kidwai Memorial Institite of Oncology , Bangalore.

You can visit the website http://www.samikshafoundation.org/ for more details, and do contact us if you are interested in extending your support towards this programme. Together, we can make a difference. 

Inspired ?

It is everywhere. Though sometimes, you just get moved by little things, some significant and some not, without ever taking it further and doing something productive about it. (Unless you call scribbling like this productive) Things that make you ponder. And wonder. Some of the things in the recent past that moved me. Strictly not in order the so called inspiration.

-Listening to ‘Kaatyayani’ sung by Bombay Jayashri at the Coke Studio sessions on repeat for half a day, the amount of character the slightest pause adds and the magic of listening to someone become one with ‘shruti’.

-Shopping at Blossoms Book Store being transported into a world where reality becomes surreal. And where you sincerely pity people who don’t read and have no idea what they are missing out on.

-A first presentation at work and being able to be a part of discovery and design, and seeing spaces evolve, and seeing houses that aren’t just spaces to exist in but to live life.

-Watching a leaf idly flutter by and discussing how your perception of the leaf reflects you. Whether you see joy or sorrow, or just inertia. 

-Watching a couple of four year olds play running and catching around a car, and shrieking in genuine surprise and amusement each time the ‘runner’ encounters the ‘catcher’ within the small radius.

-Catching up with a friend by discussing probability theory and life an odd hour of the night, and trying to make sense of existence using the unlikeliest analogies.

-Teaching middle school mathematics to a girl fighting cancer and actually being able to watch her change from extreme reluctance to sit in the class to actually enjoying subtracting fractions.

-Watching a baby mark her first year in the world, content playing with a hairbrush oblivious to the surrounding chaos, while her parents celebrate the miracle of her birth.

-Finding those moments when you are alone with your thoughts when the Bangalore evening weather is at its pleasant best, that make you want to freeze time forever. Such as now.

All she did was everything

Short Story attempt : -1/11/'12. Inspired by our ever smiling helper, Lakshmi. 

I go down to play everyday at 6 PM. Before that, I usually watch cartoons or play games on my computer, until Kani is free to accompany me to the park. She cuts vegetables and gets things ready for dinner while I sit in the living room. Sometimes she gets phone calls from her mother, saying her daughter is asking for her and if she can come home early, but she always says she cannot, and leaves only by 8PM which is when Mummy comes back from work. I asked her once why she can’t go home and take care of her baby daughter instead of taking care of me because I was almost 8 and I can go play on my own. But she just laughed and said “I wish the world was as simple as that”.

Kani’s actual name was Kanakalakshmi. She came to my house when I was just three years old and didn’t even know to tell time. Kani kept the house running like clockwork, arriving at 7 AM and briskly getting to work. The days she went on leave to her village were a mess, with clothes piling next to the washing machine and vessels scattered all over the kitchen counter. My bread would not have the crusts cut and my Complan would have too much chocolate. I would glumly eat the bland rice from the school canteen at lunch, and walk back from the bus stop with Vanitha Aunty who lived on the seventh floor, I would have to sit in her house till Mummy returned. I did not like her house- the plastic runners on her sofa stuck to my legs, the tables were all covered with cloths in crowded floral patterns that distracted me when I tried writing or drawing sitting at the table, and there was always a lingering smell of room fresheners that she kept spraying all over the house instead of opening the windows. I was not allowed to go down to play unsupervised, so I would wait listlessly till Mummy rang the doorbell at 8 PM and repeatedly thank Vanitha Aunty for keeping an eye on me. Vanitha aunty would insist on packing dinner for us, which my mother would refuse but I knew she was relieved she need not cook after all the stress at work.

I always keep hearing this word ‘stress’ when people talk about their job. When I grow up I am going to become a veterinarian and run an animal shelter. I will take care of stray animals and give them for adoption to people who want them. I can play with the dogs all day and not have any ‘stress’. Even our school teachers keep telling us they get stressed because of us.  Rohit got punished for drawing cartoons all over Miss Kavitha’s brand new white handbag which the principal told us was worth Rs.6000 and which was completely ruined now. I asked Mummy why someone would buy a handbag for that much money and she said it was because it was branded and imported from Europe. If I had Rs.6000 I would buy lots of dog biscuits to feed all the strays I see on the way to school, and a model of a dinosaur skeleton for myself. Maybe I would buy some toys for Kani’s daughter- I feel sad that she always has to play with my discarded toys, cars that have wheels missing and action figures with broken arms, and girls don’t like cars and action figures, even the ones that had all the parts in place.

Afternoons with Kani were different- she would meet me at the bus stop with a little treat for me, sometimes two biscuit with a cheese slice in between, sometimes a couple of strawberries. We would walk back and I would try to make her memorise the seven times tables along with me. We would stop at the apartment park for a few quick dashes on the swing. Once I forced Kani to sit on the swing when nobody was there in the park- she sat after I begged and begged, and held her sari tightly as I pushed her. As she went higher she laughed and laughed, and we stopped just in time when the security uncle passed by, looking at our uncontrolled giggles in suspicion.

After going home, she gives me another small snack and then I take a short nap while she busies herself in the kitchen. Then I would chat with her as she folded clothes, I used to help her until one day when Nandini Aunty was visiting and remarked “Looks like our Rishi does half her work for her and she gets paid a hefty sum.” After this she never let me do the little odd jobs I used to do, like watering the plants which I used to enjoydoing.

When it was time to go down, she would make me freshen up and insist on covering my face with talcum powder.  I play with Nakul, Sahil and the other boys. Kani sits on the bench watching. She usually doesn’t talk much to other maids, who exclude her from many discussions because she is divorced unlike them.They act like they dislike her but I think they secretly admire her. I know this because once the maid with the curly hair who works in F block came home when I was lying down but not yet asleep. She was crying about her husband and how he beat her because she came home late after cleaning up from a birthday party, and how he refused to give her her own salary money, because of which she has been walking three kilometres to work the past week. I saw Kani lend her money, and I heard her telling Kani she wished she had the guts to do what Kani did. Kani said “It is all because of Shilpa Akka’s help, I was lucky I had her.” I later asked Kani how she managed to lend her money when she herself had not bought a new sari in years in order to save for her daughter. She said sometimes you had to think of other’s needs as well.

Kani seldom complained, and always discouraged complaints from me. When I complained about homework she would remind me of that if I wanted to become a veterinarian, I would have to deal with a lot worse than homework. I knew Kani had far worse problems than me though she never told me much. She used to come to work with bruises and cuts, and I would see her and Mummy talking in hushed tones and overhear phrases like ‘time you take the baby and leave him’ and ‘no use putting up with this torture’. I told Kani to listen to Mummy and that they can both come and live with us in the spare bedroom. Though I like being alone, it might be nice to have someone to share my toys with, and I don’t have to go to Vanitha aunty’s house ever. Then when her daughter Parvathi grows older, she can join my school and we can go together. I can tell her how to get into Miss Kavitha’s good books by using a ruler to draw neat lines after every answer in my notebook, and how to be careful to never sit with my head resting on my palm in Miss Roshni’s class.

I had it all planned out and I began to like this new picture of my life. Both Mummy and I could be more relaxed while getting ready in the morning and Mummy need not worry about getting home on time. And if Kani occupied the spare room, then maybe we wouldn’t get visitors like Kannan uncle who would stay almost a month and use my computer to play Freecell for hours, or Nandini Aunty complaining about Kani and watching back to back television serials with crying women bringing in coffee and revengeful mother-in-laws calling up gangsters.

I was excited about my idea and explained it in detail to Kani. She gave me a hug when I finished and started crying. I asked her if that meant she was coming but she said she can’t, and said she knew I would grow up to be a generous man. I tried asking Mummy to convince Kani but she just smiled sadly and said it was not practical because Kani had a child.

Kani did eventually leave her husband, but didn’t come to live with us. Mummy told me not to ask her about it but I used to overhear her talking about her new house-owner who objected to her separated status, and about her mother who has come to live with her. Things didn’t change much for me after Kani’s separation but it must have changed a lot for her. Though sometimes she would not pay attention to what I was saying or would cut vegetables staring at the blank wall, she laughed more, and relaxed more. She would sometimes tell me about how she dreamt of her daughter becoming a school headmistress and how she would move back to her village and build a small house of her own and not have to worry about the next month’s rent. I asked her who would cook and take care of me after she left, but she said I would be old enough to take care of myself by then.

But I am not. Kani is leaving us in two weeks and going to her village. Mummy told me it was because of her grandmother falling sick and her mother wanting to move back along with Kani and her daughter, as there was nothing left in the city for them anyway; Kani’s husband and in-laws didn’t want anything to do with her or her daughter.  She tearfully told my mother that she would have to find a house in the adjoining town to work in, and that she will never forget us and visit whenever she can, and made us promise we would attend her daughter’s marriage after she grows up. I wish we could go with them- I would like to live in a village with big green fields and no noisy vehicles. But I know Mummy has her job in the city which she cannot leave.

Mummy is trying to be strong about it but I know she is very worried. I met the new lady today who will be coming to work, when she came to speak to Mummy. She seemed alright but she didn’t smile much and had a harsh voice. And I don’t know whether she will cut the crusts from my bread and put the right amount of Complan in my milk. I gave Kani a picture I drew as a parting gift – it had a picture of Kani in a nice little house with a garden and a chimney, waving to her daughter with spectacles and a handbag going to the school to teach, and next to her house was me in my animal shelter playing with all the dogs. I hope all our dreams come true. 

Music cures

(Disclaimer: This is not a music review)

I’m listening to A R Rahman’s new song from Kadal- ‘Adiye’ as I write this, and wondering how he does it. What is it about music that makes such a personal bond between song and listener? We all make a hue and cry about travelling but sometimes with music you can travel the world sitting in a room. You can shut yourself from everything with that simple invention, headphones. Or an instrument, or if you happen to be lucky enough to have a decent voice, then you need nothing. Touching the right note can be enough.

The song has now changed to ‘Anbin Vaasale’. Which pierces its way into your mind and demands your attention. What is it about this album ? Each song seems to stand out as a product of genius. This is not an album that you can play in the background, you have to stop and listen. (I’m taking around five minutes between sentences here while writing, and I stopped listening to it at work because it made my hands stop typing at the keyboard. )

 Maybe its me, but I don’t remember being this affected by a music album in a long time. Listening to each song for the first time had the anticipation of unwrapping a long overdue gift. From the time ‘Nenjukulle’ aired on MTV unplugged, it was the first song that would grace my Windows Media Player every day , until ‘Elay Keechan’ pleasantly arrived to compete. Each time he sang the line at 4:39 I wanted to hear that bit again- surprising what the slightest, almost unnoticeable modulation can do.

Listening to the rest of the songs yesterday, I couldn't stop at a comment or a ‘like’, there was something about this album that was capable of changing your mood tangentially in a mere four or so minutes. (I’m not presuming to ‘review’ this music- one can’t review something that one cannot hope to achieve in a thousand years)  Moongil Thottam and Chitthirai Nila in their separate mellifluous ways prove that people can do magic with notes and voices.  

Maybe when Roja first released it felt something like this? I was unfortunately too young to witness the magic back then, but I think this album is always going to remain special in its own way.

Attempt eight .

This is the eight time I’ve sat down with the firm decision of writing a new post. My hope of ‘at least one post a month’ has proved to be over ambitious, in spite of numerous attempts of sitting with pen and paper only to discard whatever I write within half an hour.


First I tried writing about music. It was one of those phases when I’d discovered a new song that stuck me as absolutely brilliant and was mulling over how it would feel to be a person who could create scores -pun intended-of brilliant songs that reach out to thousands of people you will never ever know personally but who would live with close personal ties with your music. I suppose I kept wondering and listening to the song, and in the process quite forgot that I was to be writing about it.

Then I tried a short story. Going into long winded descriptions of the place and the gate and the door bell, it seemed to be more a reflection of me and my surroundings than a story, and after repeatedly trying to establish a ‘storyline’ and characters with impact, I failed to manufacture any semblance of interest, and abandoned the story.

Then I thought maybe I would be inspired if I write about a book, one to me that was no mere’ story’ but a marvel of how a book should be. I started off writing about Jem and Dill’s innocence, of Atticus’s defence, of falling in love with Scout’s narrative each time I read the book, of Miss Maudie and Mrs Dubose and Calpurnia and how each of these non principal characters still left their impact in their own way, and of course, of enigma called Boo Radley and the soap dolls he made, that touched you in a way that was quite inexplicable. And well, I started reading the book again, and there ended that attempt.

Then came a half hearted attempt at a travelogue- half hearted is quite an exaggeration, I actually didn’t even reach the stage of sitting with a pen and writing a word. Then an article on out of place signs and quotes, that came out of seeing a person in a Playboy t-shirt at Tiruvannamalai temple. Again, unfortunately, I could only think of enough material for a status update or a tweet, not quite an 'article'.

Yet another short story attempt followed- this lasted around four lines. Then I tried succumbing to technology, sitting on the computer, opening MS word and trying to ‘type away’, expecting the bursts of randmomness I used to be capable of, but got distraced by Notifications, GIFs and YouTube videos of the sing I initially started off writing about, and finally shut down without even getting to the point of doing a Ctrl + S .

So finally, I’ve succesfully( and conveniently) managed to ramble on for a page on my unsuccesful writing attempts- please wish me luck for my next post to be slightly less futile than this one !

Guess who changed her profile picture ?

Mom : I just spoke to Mrs.S . Her daughter R’s marriage has been fixed she tells me.

Me: Yes, I know. The boy is called A.

Mom: But how did you know that ?

Me: Facebook. He works at ABC. They all went for a trip last weekend to Mysore…

Welcome to the world of the non social-networker versus a regular. Of how my mother fails to understand how I possibly get to know things about people to whom I have barely spoken three words. She mentions a distant relative and I know which university his daughter recently graduated from. I often remind her about her friends’ birthdays after seeing a ‘Happy birthday mom’ status update from the offspring who is my ‘friend’. Sometimes she excitedly shows me pictures someone would have quaintly mailed her and she is incredulous hearing about how I saw them long back on Facebook. I wonder how she would react if she knows that sometimes I can even tell her who went for which movie in which theatre and with whom sitting in my room seeing their ‘check in’, or even what somebody cooked for last nights dinner, all thanks to Instagram that make all dishes seem mouth wateringly palatable. ( I have to admit, I have been at the ‘posting’ end of this one ! )

Sometimes, the flood of primarily useless information is unbelievable, and as luck would have it, its somehow far easier to remember and repeat utterly uninformative ‘information’ about who is on what terms with whom rather than which deal was signed by which Chief Minister. And one person’s updating of her status message on the extent of her boredom or her new haircut becomes much ‘liked’ and ‘commented’ , while another person’s update on a significantly more important than life event like winning a national level prize or a new job goes unnoticed.

And of course, there are categories of these people. The addicts who ‘check in’ even at the gym and broadcast minute by minute updates of their playlist and how much weight they are lifting, and have sleepless nights when they don’t get enough ‘likes’. The invisible-but-omnipresent who seldom comment or share but are perfectly aware of which shampoo who is using and who coloured his hair recently. Then there are the anti-socials who are forcibly part of these sites though they hate them, and occasionally sign in to get revolted by the amount others are sharing. Then of course, there are the middle-aged-and-young-at-heart who want to catch up with the times and actively post updates and upload baby pictures of their children now almost adults, much to the consternation of the latter. And there are the elderly who make sure it is their duty to know what the ‘youth’ are upto , and the kids who actually believe it is normal to have one thousand friends even before graduating high school.

And the rest of us normal people who occasionally put up arbitrary status updates and change profile pictures, some of us who do all of this and still mock the website.  

At least I’m glad I have a mom who is still shocked that I could know that a vague acquaintance had a baby in London three minutes after the birth rather than one who is the background browser and gets to know what unsuitable cuisine I had for yesterday’s lunch by seeing my check in. Phew. 

Mosaic Tiles and Mismatched curtains

It is one of those pleasant Bangalore evenings- cool with a hint of oncoming rain, and silence. I sit on the concrete ,once wooden bench in the compound of my grandfather’s house. The luxury of having a place to sit that is neither in, nor out. I am shaded by the roof above me but can also see the sky. Having the seclusion of a blank wall in front of me but also a view of the road to my left. The road, one of those idyllic cul-de-sacs, which used to have at least enough trees to give us food for countless tree-to-tree games. Now most of the trees are gone, but at least the coconut trees inside the compound of a few houses still stand. I remember collecting the tiny dried up ping-ping ball sized coconuts that fall down and playing with them.

In front of me is the tulsi plant with the miniature shrine. Painted a bright yellow by my grandfather a few years back, it is a reminder of how central it used to be in their lives of yesterday. A small one-and-a-half foot wide strip of ‘garden’ runs along the length of the compound, no fancy manicured lawns or exotic plants here. Just a homely mixed growth of green. In front of the spot where I am sitting used to be a banana tree – a bright vivid shade of green, exciting to a child’s eye .The hibiscus plant still stays, from which we used to try extracting and tasting the nectar.The old fashioned gate remains untouched as well, with its carved flowers and musical instruments, from where I have swung watching the going-ons of the road and the way the maid would wash the stone outside the gate with cowdung and draw a ‘kolam’ and make borders on the stone.

To my right is the garage. Having never owned a car but still owning a nice ten feet by twelve feet garage with a rolling shutter,  the garage doubles as a multipurpose store room for odds and ends, discarded furniture, a clothesline where the laundry was transferred when it rained, the odd scooter that a relative or a random uncle would leave temporarily. The garage had been a wonderful playroom for me, sitting on a chair that been converted into a swing, making tents out of bed sheets, spreading the same bed sheet on the floor for games of ludo, and getting fascinated by the operation of the rolling shutter and its heavy rattle. A tall wooden stool that also doubled as a ladder while taking things from the loft still stands there. It is now a pale yellow but it used to be painted a bright blue. Just like most of the other wooden things in this house- cane chairs, the window shutters, even the back door.

Each of the rooms used to be painted a different colour, and the colours used to also be changed each time the house was repainted, and the little peeled off bits of paint would reveal what the colour used to be, leaving you wondering how that room would have looked in the other colour. The ‘hall’ was a shade of blue somewhere between sky blue and cobalt blue. The main bedroom was green with cornice bands of lavender and pale yellow. I remember how this room permanently had a spare cot that was placed on its side at one end to save space. I would clamber on to the gap and pretend it was a witness stand and enact courthouse scenes.   The other room that had a view of the road , that was and is still called the ‘front room’ or ‘outside room’ when translated into English was painted a light purple , I fail to remember the colour of the dining room but I remember the foldable brown formica topped table with the oddly shaped chairs.  

The small kitchen with the cement counters, the bathroom, not to be confused with ‘toilet’ that was a separate entity, had a rough granite floor, ‘anti skid’ in today’s terms, and used to have a large ‘boiler’ that heated water.

The backyard , with the washing stone and built in grinding stone, and a small water tank that I have on occasion used as a swimming pool/bath tub, and the small outdoor ‘Indian toilet’ with once red-oxide flooring, the projected sil where I have sat many a time playing with the hooks that hold the wooden shutters in place and the rangoli powder that was always kept in this spot, the old quaint wooden sign bearing my grandfather’s name and the name of the bank where he worked, the uneven portions of the ground where water would collect during rains and where we would make paper boats, the common walls with the neighbouring houses which we would jump across while playing hide and seek...

The house may have had mismatched furniture haphazardly arranged leaving no space for movement and oddly coloured walls and doors and a cluttered showcase where objects went on display regardless of  aesthetic, but the memories overrule the absurdities -sometimes absurdities are what make  memories so much more vivid...