Durga Puja in Cuttack

Cuttack during the pujas is a claustrophobic's nightmare. The cramped city doesn’t allow the luxury of expansive pandals that one would see in Calcutta or even in Bhubaneswar. In spite of that, in Cuttack, however small the pandal is, the idols therein are invariably beautiful and the filigree background exquisite and resplendent.

When one enters into the crowded streets on a two-wheeler, despair sets in. the streets are filled with cars, motorbikes, bicycles, rickshaws, not to mention a veritable sea of people on feet. The routes are one-way. It requires an almost meditative attention on the part of the uninitiated to traverse the labyrinth. After some time, however, one gets used to it. The beauty of one pandal spurs you to go to the next.
It's another matter, however, if your vehicle breaks down in between.

The resident of Cuttack celebrates the puja with a fervour inconceivable by the naive outsider. Being a witness to it will always remain a memorable experience.

Lies

I’m lying to you, don't you realise? My overflowing emotions are just a pretension, can't you see? I'm being downright cruel to you. I'm using you as a stepping stone to my ambitions. When you cease to be of any help to me, when I can milk u no more, that very moment you'll cease to exist for me. Why can't you read my mind?

You can't see through my designs. That's good for me. But for once I wish you were perspicacious enough.

Happiness

Have you ever experienced absolute freedom? All inhibitions gone, all beliefs suspended, all worries in abeyance....? Of course you can't lead life this way. But if you have had such an experience, even for some fleeting moments, then perhaps you have experienced bliss in its true sense. These moments serve as the revitalising tonic when you are absolutely stressed out or drowned in grief.

Taking a few minutes off from a brainstorming session to appreciate the lawn in front of your office in its verdant splendour....
Helping your sibling prepare for her debate competition, forgetting for a while that you have your majors tomorrow...
Dancing wildly to loud music when you are alone...
Speaking your mind out before the mirror...

Maintain a log of all those moments that have made you happy when no happiness seemed possible and you will be surprised at the entries when you look back.

Sketching

It's kind of amazing that my best sketches have been made during times when I have been inordinately pre-occupied or been busy with something else. But the activity has always relieved me of stress.
I feel unusually light, refreshed and even thrilled after completing a sketch. During these times sketching doesn’t seem to be an effort to me. It's spontaneous enough to make me feel as if I’m witnessing the forms take shape on their own. It gives me my moments of clarity and deliverance. Decisions become easy to take. Problems get solved and burdens turn lighter.

Tequila

Are the stars saluting me?
Is the sun bowing b4 me?
Forces oh so strong take over my person
Before voices alien I fail 2 see reason
I’m under a spell
My conscience somnolent
And inhibitions gone
The flowers seem to have bloomed for me
Even the nature's song seems to be a eulogy
Rendered just to me

Is the universe really at my feet?
Or am I dancing to the tequila beat?

Rebel (without a cause?)

When I was shown the road to follow....I didn’t budge
When I was offered the moon on a platter I took grudge
When I was asked to do what my heart desired I faltered
I wanted a course to my tastes altered
I took offence to suggestions that were fine
I didn’t accept choices that were not mine
To make them of my own I was at a loss
What was I?
A rebel...without a cause?

When there were friends sincere
I wanted none
When I got solitude
I felt so alone
What was wrong?
Efforts so useless
And feats unsung?
It wasn’t my call
No it wasn’t mine
It’s the rebel in me that made me whine

Wounds were opening up wide
There was a pain that won’t subside
I decided to open the lid
And look inside
There were shouts and screams
The rebel within was smothering my dreams
The writing was on the wall
I wondered why earlier I saw none at all

Rebel is a beast...rein it
When restrained it serves u
But ruins u when let free

Oh so sweet rain!

Though i have been soaked in the rain many times, the experience has seldom been enjoyable for me. Perhaps that is because of the fact that i have always had something to protect from the rain- my notebooks, my cell phone etc.
This afternoon, I was standing by the window of my room when i felt a gush of cool air....and guess what...within seconds it started raining! I felt a rush in me. The urge to get drenched came spontaneously. A few steps down the stairs, a kick-start and a few minutes later I was cruising on the highway on my bike. The raindrops suddenly became more voluble…as if to invite me into their realm. I went on driving for quite a while. My clothes were drenched to the last thread. I woke up from almost a trance when I heard someone greet me. Only then did I notice this six-foot twenty-something guy catching up to me on my left. He was kind of amused by the way I was smiling...clearly and unpretentiously enjoying the rain. We got off from our bikes. A few cursory formalities later we sat on a stone by the road watching...watching people.
Different people obviously react differently when bedraggled. Some take to the sheds immediately while some press the accelerator hard. Others open up their umbrellas or put on their raincoats. These are perfectly predictable actions.
What caught our eyes was a particular set of faces. Some of them were smiling, some were impassive and some were even a little pensive. They belonged to people of various ages. But each one of them had one common attribute - it wanted to be in the rain. It was amazing to see frozen expressions turn into smiles and smiles turn into laughter. The joy in these faces was almost palpable. Before we started back to our homes, I stood there just a while longer, savouring one of the most delightful moments in my life. Bliss, as they say, lies hidden in these small moments of life that we often ignore.
I returned back...richer by a beautiful experience.

Her

Her infectious smile, her beautiful eyes, her lilting accent, those meandering
steps....can't stop thinking 'bout them. I think I'm in love with her. That's precisely the
reason I feel an urgent need to purge these thoughts out of my mind. Being led into
uncertainities is something i simply cant afford at this stage.

Slow Living

I deliberately decided to spend the day in slow motion. Everything I did had a stamp of sluggishness. The celebration of languor began with the brushing of my teeth. I ate slowly, I walked slowly and I watched a movie at half the normal playing speed (DVD players, thankfully, allow you to do so). Even the rate at which I'm typing now is abysmally slow. Any sudden change - change in temperature, change of environs-is exhilarating (though with exceptions). So was this experience of mine that was delightfully different from the usual scheme of things.

But the process of living slowly calls for some compromises. You can’t, for example, study slowly or you will flunk your tests ( tests do matter however hard you detest them unless you are a Newton incarnate). If you work too slowly you won't get paid (then you can't afford to lead a slow life in the first place. It's a diffrent story if you are a servant of the Indian govt...we 'll come to that at a later time).

You can't watch television in slow motion. The process of skating slow can be particularly tiring. You can't drive your bike slower beyond a certain point. Scratching slow might in fact aggravate your itch. You can't tell the ambulance driver to be slow when a near one is ill.

Personifying laziness may not go down well with your girlfriends (or, if you don't have girlfriends, your friends and relatives, who are often conveniently ignored, unless of course, you are dumped by your love interest...but that's beside the point). There is a world of diffrence between being lazy and being slow but u can't possibly explain it to the faster of the species.

There are a lot of other things that can't be performed slowly which i should imagine you have guessed by now...if at all you have been patient enough to read through this piece which is utter crap...but then reading crap can also be interesting at times...after all it's different from what you read all the time (dearest blondes, no offence meant).

Above all, you can't think slow.

So, I guess, my experimentation, though enjoyable, has to be a short-lived one.

?

I feel there has been a fundamental change in my mental and moral constitution - a change born out of a clash of ideas and a churning of thoughts. I don't know if that has had some manifestation in my demeanour but the change has been so perceptible to me that i have almost seen it happen.
One feeling that has deserted me of late is nervousness. Whether it's a new mission that i choose to undertake or a gamble that I venture into knowing the high stakes involved or some loss - real or perceived - that would have otherwise brought me despair, the butterflies in my stomach are conspicuously missing. It's not conscious optimism or logical reasoning that has resulted in such a change. That would have been understandable and admirable. Rather it's due to an intuitive mechanism the existence of which was hitherto unknown to me.
But am I leading my life in gay abandon? No, absolutely not. The nervousness in me has given way to a feeling of constantly being on the edge. I'm not frightened, but I can't be free of concerns.
My mind right now is a bundle of contradictions and conflicting emotions. Every moment I'm pulled in different directions. Every decision I take is the result of a long drawn-out mental struggle.
I need to know what drives me these days and what ought to drive me.

when u'r a bit unruly

what's so bad bout being bad
what's wrong in the occasional fad
when you go beserk and a bit unruly
it's good actually
you show your potential fully
yeah baby when you are a bit unruly...

on the edge you are kept
you find your feet in the air lept
your stomach butterflies churn
your mind is kept on the run
your talent blooms truly
yeah baby when you are a bit unruly...

On a Sleeping Beauty

The train jogs on, its chugs pounding hard on my nerves. She lies with two inverted champagne cups under her blouse tilting, swaying, drooping on rhythm...her feet slightly apart, the skirt tugging her legs opens up a vale of unexpected possibilities. As she wades through her dreams I twitch, stretch and wriggle as she braces, turns and sighs...her slightest motion seeming to be an approval of my silent propositions...