Bolpur Blues: Episode 4

Bolpur Blues: Episode1

Bolpur Blues: Episode 2

Bolpur Blues: Episode 3

Songs, music, walks, conversations, happened to increase in the weeks that followed.

My routine for the day remained the same. Wake up early, text my virtual boyfriend, go for classes, come back, go out on a tea date with myself; only the thing that severely changed was, this time I would keep on bumping into the quirk, almost every day.

One day, I returned from my classes a little early, around afternoon. Since I had nothing to do till the sun goes down and the world creates the perfect ambience for a date with myself, I lazily kept scrolling my Facebook newsfeed, and came to realize, my boyfriend has gone off Facebook.

I tried Whatsapp and that account was deleted.

I tried his phone and that was switched off.

For natural reasons, that upset me. I kept calling that number once every ten minutes, only to listen to the same robotic lady telling me the same words.

Upset, heartbroken and worried, I decided to go out, have a cup of tea, and think upon what can be done.

Tea date with myself done, I lingered around the marketplace that day.

Dark, silent lanes were only accelerating the worries.

In one of those noisy, tourist-crowded shops in the marketplace, I met the quirk, checking out a burnt clay bangle.

I went beside him and asked, “For your mother?”

He turned around, little distracted by my words from his deep inspection of jewellery, “No, for myself.”

I couldn’t help but laugh, “Do men in Kerala wear bangles?”

I expected him to get angry, but he seemed equally amused, “No no, but I want to wear. See, even the color goes with my skin tone.”

My mind kept whispering, ‘Say hello to the quirk!’

He not only bought the bangle and made me bargain with the shopkeeper, but also posted a picture wearing it on his Facebook profile.

This time, more than amused, I was amazed at the straightforwardness of a person, in public.

Anyway, days went by, my virtual boyfriend stayed lost and gone, and came Mahalaya, and that only meant, Durga puja was just a week away.

Santiniketan organizes a fair on Mahalaya, where each department of my University puts up stalls. Ours had newspapers to sell.

I was hardly interested in the fair, but in the fact that the next day I was going home; for one long month.

After roaming in the fair for some time, and getting choked by the amount of crowd in a small place, I came back to the ramshackle halogen-lit tea stall for a late evening tea.

The quirk with another friend, walked in almost then.

After rounds of lemon tea, horribly made though, and appreciation of the vintage flavor of the shop, we were out to walk back home.

On the way I told him, “I’m going back home tomorrow.”

“Oh. I’ll go too.”

“When? Go home. Anyway, the holidays are on, and there is nothing to do here.” I replied.

“I’ll go. Maybe this week. Just little lazy to book my ticket.” He smiled back.

I returned the smile and the bent to my lane came.

“Okay then, see you soon?” He smiled and held my hand.

I faintly pressed his hand before letting go, “Very soon.”

He smiled and went his way, and I mine.

The next episode is up here!

To be continued…

Bolpur Blues: Episode 3

Bolpur Blues:Episode 1

Bolpur Blues: Episode 2

By a week that followed, we had became friends; the kind that you smile at when you accidentally meet on the road. To tell you the truth, I hated this popular guy deep down for the quirk he was. But then I chose to be little civilized in the way I treat him.

And also, when favorite band merges the connection, and favorite song makes its way into human relationships, there is more than one reason to give it another shot.

The golden hour memory still very strong in the heart, and occasionally stretching my lips to a big happy curve, often advocated for the person I share the memory with.

I convinced myself saying the guy can break into jigs in the middle of the road, may be a warehouse of weirdness, but he is a goddamn guy to explore within.

And well, I needed more motivation to resume writing.

So why not get yourself a quirk character with a deep contemplative soul to write upon?

So another day, I was out on an evening date with myself, which I did ritually every day. I would come back from classes, grab a book, read a few pages, the chunk of the time spent staring through the window to the sunset outside. Then, when the sun had took away with itself almost all the brightness of the day, and just before the streetlamps would start coming out, I would get dressed and go out to the nearby tea shop.

I had a particular bench where I’d sit alone, looking away from the crowd behind, and dissolving the noise by the songs in the earphones.

I was little addicted to the view I got to see, every evening.

There was a ramshackle tea stall, mostly crowded by oldies; they would play vintage Hindi songs, and only lit halogen lamps.

The magical aura it had mostly come up for show after the moon came out.

The moon, usually on its waning phase, would appear just about the tea stall, crowded by stars.

I would often play Bhindeshi tara in my earphones and gaze at the sky; smile to myself wondering if there is a second soul not missing out this beauty.

Needless to say, the song would always remind me of the quirky guy.

By now, my subconscious, without my permission, had entangled his memory with my favorite song.

So, when I was done with sky gazing, and two cups of tea and more than two smokes, I started walking to explore the town I was new into.

Marketplace is crowded, the other lanes mostly don’t have lamps, shops are noisy; I was just deciding against going for a stroll and taking myself back, when I saw him. This time standing in a cigarette shop, not buying or smoking, but chatting with the shopkeeper; with that bright smile throughout.

This time I went and tapped his shoulder.

He turned, the same smile directed towards me, “Hey!”

“Just going around. Nothing much to do here after sundown, you see”, I said, and God knows why, I was pleasantly surprised that I had bumped into him.

Any day, a quirk is a better company to go around with than going back home and having no one to talk to.

“I am thinking of going Kasahara. You want to come?” He said while taking a phone call.

“Where is it?” I was clueless about the place he was talking about.

“It’s a restaurant. Come, I’ll take you.” He got all worked up.

We started walking, and he started taking, from Nietzsche to Lacan, from Philosophy to music. I was mostly listening, and somewhere far behind my head, Bhindeshi tara kept playing in a loop.

We walked lazily, sometimes taking the long way, through the halogen lit lanes, through the University campus, often bumping into my classmates and seniors.

Surprisingly, he knew all of them.

All these months in Santiniketan, and to this day, when people ask me what is the best thing about the place, I usually have conjured up images of the evening campus in my head; mostly dark, and some places brightly lit by yellow lights. Some places, the lights came through the leaves and created patterns on the road.

The lights made everything look like made of gold; gave a bright sepia tone to the visuals the eyesight met up with.

Coming back to conversations, I started liking the way he talked about the things he is passionate about; and I guess that is a good way to start with, to revert my opinions about him the other way round.

The fourth part of the story is up here!

 To be continued...

Bolpur Blues: Episode 2

Bolpur Blues: Episode 1

I had an evening film screening to go to, that day.

After a hectic seminar, where I slept mostly though, the air-conditioned auditorium with the lights blinded, was just another place to sleep in. I was doubtful I might snore.

Anyway we went and the popular guy went with us too. I thoroughly hated him for making me pay for all the transports we took. And then we reached Lipika, the auditorium where the screening was scheduled to happen. I got seated and looked around; the popular guy was gone.

I mean what the hell? We came together till here and he just vanished?!

I bothered less about him and more about the sleep that followed.

I had a virtual boyfriend then, who I was under the impression to be very much in love with. A PhD scholar settled in Australia, we met through Facebook and never met in real life.

My days usually started little early since Australia was four hours ahead of us.

So the day started with me waking up to good morning texts at around 7. After two hours of vigorous virtual love exchanged, I went back to sleep. I had no intention of going for classes.

Around afternoon, the hunger woke me up.

The most brutal thing about Bolpur is you don’t get meals after 2pm.

Even when you luckily do, they are usually leftovers; like they would give you if you pay or they have the dogs to the rescue.

Post a horrible lunch which I chewed less and gulped down the most, I met a friend while buying cigarettes. With no plans already done for the afternoon, I chose to accompany her to Kala Bhavan, the fine arts department for an adda session.

Since the first time I have went to Kala Bhavan, I happened to have an instant liking for the place.

Not for the vibrancy it is smudged with, not for the legendary alumnus it holds record of, not for the scattered sculptures all over it has to advocate its artistic backdrop, but for the trees.

The whole campus is hugged inside out with trees acting as shade for all; from students, to professors, to dogs and monkeys.

And maybe, it is the only place in Santiniketan where you’d find a professor and a student discussing something totally out of their syllabus’ vicinity, and the professor would offer cigarettes to the student.

Anyway, coming back to where I was initially, I walked the streets to Kala Bhavan to find most of my batch mates already there.

I sat there, having bananas, followed by cigarettes and lazy irrelevant gossips.

Around from behind, after sometime, the popular guy appeared.

He came and sat, and instantly asked for my cigarette.

I muttered horrible under my breath and gave him the one I was smoking, all the while with a disgust disguised in a smile.

And then he asked me, “Hey can you come for a walk?”

I prayed he would understand from my face that I don’t want to, but then he asked me again.

T o say the least, I was little bored in that gossip gang, so I chose the walk.

Also because, the sun was drowning by then and the scattered sculptures reflected the halogen-isque golden hour from all sides;

Who wouldn’t choose a walk in a time and place like that?

We went little far and sat on one of the benches kept.

He took out his phone and told me,”Hey can you please translate a song for me? I love the tune but I want to understand the lyrics.”

He played the song, and sometime from then, I just kept listening to ‘Bhindeshi tara’.

I smiled and said, “Who told you about this song?”

“Last day you were talking about your favorite music band, I overheard. I went home and Googled, this song came up first.” He smiled sheepishly; and everything from the golden hour, the shady trees, the song, the conversation, to the sultry stubborn weather just seemed perfect.

Click here to listen to Bhindeshi tara.

The third part of the story is up here!

To be Continued...

Bolpur Blues: Episode 1

Okay to start with, it was autumn. The leaves had a different shade; the kind that says they are growing old and getting ready for fall.

The fine arts department of Santiniketan organized a seminar on Art History and I had to go and sit there and understand nothing but note down everything, for making news out of it for my University Chronicle.

I thoroughly slept through it.

I had a partner to go with and I made a deal with him; pre-break he would note down and I’d sleep and post-break vice versa.

So when I woke up during the break, I shamelessly had puffy eyes. I yawned and reached for my partner’s notebook, “Wrote everything?”

He stretched his arms and said casually in his Malayalam accent, “Mostly. I’ll go get food now, and then I can sleep”; the last part of his sentence had a certain smirk.

I caught his expression and rolled my eyes, “I am hungry. Let’s for now concentrate on food. Please.”

He agreed to it and said, “Let’s go out. I have a Malayalam friend waiting outside. I’ll go meet him and then we three can go for lunch.”

I nodded and started walking towards the door of the seminar hall, avoiding eye contact with people who I suspected had seen me sleeping.

When I walked out of the building, I saw this guy.

Curly hair, checked shirt; first three buttons undone, talking to almost everyone of the crowd that came out, smiling at everyone, and visibly looked very popular.

He came towards my partner and greeted him in Malayalam. Of course I understood nothing. I just blankly stared.

Then my partner introduced me to him, “This is the friend I was talking about.”

I formally smiled and he returned the smile with a bigger one.

I was intolerably hungry and with no further greetings exchanged, I started ranting about food.

The popular guy stared at me and said, “I’ll go Arashri Market. I don’t have money. There’s a shopkeeper who lends me food when I’m running short of money.”

My partner chose to go with his friend, and I took the opposite way to the University canteen.

When we returned, the seminar was still due to resume. So I, my partner, and his friend went out for a smoke.

His friend asked me,”Hey, you’re from Kolkata right? I know Jadavpur University.”

I smiled back and said, “That’s quite famous.”

“Actually I’m shifting to Jadavpur next year for a course in Philosophy”, he wanted to keep the conversation going.

“But you joined here this year, right?” I was searching my bag for a lighter.

“I love Philosophy.” He said stretching his arms in the air and making patterns, I don’t know why.

Then he broke into a dramatic dance moving his arms and body saying, “Philosophy is my girl and I’m the warrior fighting for her.”

Both I and my partner looked at him in disgust, and praying people around can’t see us with him.

After all this circus done, we climbed the stairs back to the seminar hall. You should have seen the reluctance on my face when I realized it was my turn to note down and my partner can sleep.

My partner went out to pee, leaving me with his friend for company.

I pretended to pay attention to the seminar to avoid talking to him, especially after the little jig he had done outside and embarrassed his company.

He conjured up a topic for conversation out of nowhere, and that ended with asking for my number.

I pretended to not hear.

But this damn guy kept asking.

I finally said, “Why do you need my number? We can anyway meet here.”

“So I can text you.” He said as if that’s something so stupid to ask.

I gave him my number and didn’t even ask for his.

The second part of the story is up here!
The third part of the story is up here!

To be continued…

Known city's unknown hour

I had an early morning train to catch to a place I don’t like going back to.

This is pointless saying now that I got so tired of my own city that I ran away to this place in the first place.

But pangs have its own wicked way of creeping into us.

The moon was still up, and just a day post the much-talked-about super moon, it still had her large shell on, and was oozing out light like a big-damn nature-electrified streetlamp.

The sky was yawning its wake, and the sun needed more volume to kill the moonlight and fight its attention in.

As the car wheeled through my known city in its unknown hour, I saw it in attire I’ve never experienced.

And that was when I knew exactly why it is home, and why people keep returning back to.

It is the city of nostalgic returns, more than fancy goodbyes.

I, since childhood, more found more fascination in the rearview mirror more than the broad windshield; looking at things getting smaller with distance than gazing at things getting bigger and detailed with speed.

Through the known roads, often the known lanes the car went in its own mood and velocity. John Denver in my ears, visuals fed me with extremities of beauty; my time of leaving the city and it trying to seduce me back in.

One hour from the commence, I saw an entire city stretching its arms, throwing off its blanket and getting out of the bed. The sky had finally veiled the moon and applauded the entrance of the sun.  The skyline to my left was blood-red, and occasional trees in the vicinity with their silhouettes created a frame that you don’t just see, but you breathe in.

People, very finite in numbers, in their tracksuits and hyper-active limbs, started to be seen, trotting the lanes. The teashops saw shopkeepers lighting the stoves and sometimes, simply struggling to blow and light the chullah. The vintage almost-breaking-yet-standing-upright housings to my right looked down at me, drinking the city-wine, like a voyeur.

By then, I was on the Howrah Bridge, and just when I saw the Ganges and the Howrah station outline in that 5.30 in the morning, I knew why this city is not over-hyped, in fact with all its beauty, is indeed less talked about.

Birthday, away home.

I am going to sulk for the next few paragraphs.

First birthday away home and there are so many things I miss right now.

My grandmother would prepare the payesh for me every year only to have a hard time pushing a spoonful through my tight lips. Right now, I would catch any damn train to go back and have a bowl of that.

My mother would hug me on this day, bit tighter and longer than other days; maybe it was her way of saying that she is glad I messed up another year and grew older by one.

My dog cared no shit about the birthday. He would let me slip my cold feet under his belly and make them warm. And sometimes, when he would be bored, he would go from room to room, find me, encircle me, find him a good spot, place his paw on my thigh and sleep on it.

My siblings made me feel, it was more of their birthday and less of mine. My brother would take me in his arms horizontally and go round and round screaming birthday. He would also dance weirdly but let’s not get there.

I still remember my last birthday with my grandfather. There was no one home and I was as usual sulking. He called me to his room, and pushed money and a piece of paper in my palm. When I asked him about the paper, he told me to make a list of the favourite things I want him to bring home for me. I couldn’t write a thing. He died exactly a week after.

Four years later, there is nothing I would not do to go back in time, and write on that paper, his name.

My mother would come from office all sweaty and tired, and still would cook up something favourite for me.

My father would take us out to eat; I would order the same mainstream Chinese, and the day would end in happy burps.

Precisely, miles away from home, and the first time at that, wishes from people I don’t even care for the rest of the 364 days, choke me.

This place, I am at right now, there is not much wrong about the place, but probably the only right thing is, it made me write a blog after almost two years.

Pangs work in weird ways.

Going away.

I have been trying to get the hell out of home for a long time now. And we all know, when we try to get 'the hell out', a long time seems a really really long time.

Desperation has its own way of stretching time. Desperation is a bad bitch of only one kind.

And now I have a way out.
And only when there is not even a full twenty four hours left for my much awaited way out of home, do I realise so many things.

I realise how I would miss the way my mother would let me sleep on all days. I have this one kind of mother. I have people complaining how their moms would wake them up early; my mother would let me sleep instead. Everytime i asked her why she doesnot call me up, she would smile and say, 'afternoons are morning for you, I know'.

I realise how for days, I had only woke up on afternoons and binge watched friends, in a locked up room; and noone bothered me.

I have this habit of kissing twice my dog, before going to bed. Twice, always; on his head. I realise how from tomorrow, he would wait for that kiss and I won't be there.

There had been days when I would just stare at the wall. I did it today while lying on my back and I saw that little cobweb in one corner. I realise it had been there for days. I would not get to see that from tomorrow.

My grandmom makes sure I have my morning tea; even if that's 1pm when I leave bed. Noone would care to slip the cup from the door to my bed without making a sound, because I would be too damn busy watching friends, from tomorrow.

My father has been giving me money; more than I need to survive for a month. I keep telling him that I can always withdraw from the ATM. But he is like, shut up and take this. I realise he cares.

I took a stroll during the dusk around the house today. I saw moss at places, places where noone cares to clean. Beneath water pipes, corners of the boundary wall, behind the hypotenusely placed ladder. I realise they have grown when I was home. The next new moss that grows here will grow in my absence.

I gazed at the streetlights today, infront of my home and it took me some time to fix the focus of my eyes, because by then emotions have been the bitch, tears have started coming and I have became volatile.
Whatever.
I realised how beautiful streetlights can be, and how heartless have I been to never have appreciated it.

And just when I have to leave, do I realise that there had been so many things I took for granted all this while.
All the times grandmom wanted to tell her little funny story and I was busy texting, all the times mother came home and I was too lazy to make her a cup of tea, all the times my dog wanted to play but I just let him sleep on me, all the times brother wanted to spend some more time and I was not feeling like.
All the times, I took love, care and home for granted.

Going way might be adventurous they say; Going away is difficult too.