The Perfect Frown

How can you get more bang from your frown?

What is the recepie for the perfect frown? How can you intimidate people more easily?

What are some useful techniques to deal with road rage and bad drivers on the mumbai roads? How can you scare bullies away and become a winner in life-threatening situations?

This might be a good starting point.

Bombaykku oru OO podu!

That's what this one is about. Bombaykku oru 'O' podu.

You want to be part of the 'O' puttufying publics? Click the link and get on board, quick!

Cell for Cell??

I wont be able to drink and drive. I wont be able to speak on the phone when I drive.

Which is fine really. But you know you live in a terribly managed city when rules keep changing overnight and the most impossible things get monitored and punished with a fine or jail terms.

You know its time to move cities when -

• You cant blog anymore when you drive.
• You cant do Sudoku when you drive.
• You cant finish that elusive level 5, arena 10 of Snakes III when you are on the highway driving.
• You cant park freely wherever you want in fear of the ugly towing vans.
• You cant even write Sriramajayam while driving.

But if you agree with this, perhaps this city needs you!

Left, Right and Centre

Close your eyes.

And take a good long look. Are you tilting more to the left or more to the right?

Or do you feel rock steady?

If you do, you are probably whole-brained. The way to be.

Left brained, click here. If you are right brained click here.

If you can see through what could be behind these links, you would click anywhere.

Lead Us From Darkness To Light!

Can you do something, anything even if it means just the way you walk or just the funny mustache you sport that will make about 5000 people erupt in laughter spontaneously?

Can you hum a tune that will Be too woven forever in time?

Can you write a sentence that will be seen for its depth for miles after you fall forever asleep?

Can you deliver a speech that will be quoted for the character of its content for decades after you are gone?

Can you make a work of art with nothing? Can you make darkness an expression of art? And have people clapping in frenzy?

Can you appreciate art?

Can you click? Here?

The Learning Years

You never know what you don't know. And sometimes you barely know what you know. Or what you have just learnt.

Life throws up learning opportunities and teaches us lessons in its own way. So subtle and so silent, you hardly know you are experiencing a learning moment.

And that learning is the kind that will stay with you for a life time.

Lets sit down and learn something now. Go here.

Saar Post!

Wat are you thinging? You are thinging there will be a new post?

You are corrrrrrect. Get a pakate of Bannnnana Chips and go here.


Lafterrr garendeed.

Wind and Unwind...

7 days a week.

5 days bartered with an employer in return for a 3" by 7" paper called "pay cheque".

Internet banking stole that piece of paper too. Whats left is 2 days to live a life that originally was all yours to begin with.

The weekend is coming again this weekend. You will have a chance to live your life for 48 hours. How hard do you think about finding the best way to spend it?

For, believe it or not, you have not more than 2000 weekends in your working life.

What you gonna do now?


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The Wave Effect

A high decibel indulgence when I was much younger sprang up in my head sometime back. And mammaries came rushing. err...I mean memories - damn, my mallu friend is beginning to have quite an influence on my English diction.

Anyway, Have you ever ridden the wave? Sample this and tell me.




Go here.


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I've Lost it.

I have terrible news. But then this is no longer news. For it happens far too often lately. For the 4th time in a period of about 9 months, I lost my phone in June - and worse all your contact numbers.

If we havent interacted after june, just give me a call and let us catch up and let me store your number again.

While i am at it, using this blog post as a message board, id like to also bring your attention to the rather prominent link at the bottom of each of my posts urging you to comment.

Its just a simple matter of clicking and punching a couple of keys. It wont take 5 minutes and perhaps 10 calories.

well....hope to hear from you soon.

Help! Theres a Tiger in my Train!

Have you heard the Tiger story?

The one where the boy goes shouting Tiger Tiger and the tiger never shows up. And one day when it actually does in the F and B(for Flesh and Blood – as it would apply in OUR point of view; NOT Food and Beverage as it might in the Tigers’ point of view), no one believes him.

Well the boy in question happens to be in Mumbai right now even as you read this. And it must be said that he didn’t come here for pleasure. Or for business. He, to cut a long story short, set off to save his ass. Yes. That’s quite a natural reason. For if you knew the events that occurred over the months prior to us discussing his precise whereabouts in Mumbai, you would agree that it was quite a natural and commonly acceptable and socially agreeable impulse to embark on such an expedition.

Let me elaborate clearly on what I mean by 'saving his ass' before I explain the build up. He just didn’t want to be mauled and killed. And if he did escape an attack, he certainly didn’t want to live a life with a handicapping inferiority complex. For which self respecting man would like to picture living his life, especially the part involving his raw youth, with bums that are scarred like they rested on a hot griller? I wonder if you can fathom the enormous plight of the man whom we now know is in the thick of raw youth.

Well for months before he embarked on this mission in Mumbai, the young man has been much like the BMC that says its roads will be ready and smooth before the monsoon. Monsoon after monsoon has come and gone, yet they tirelessly parrot the same thing over and over. Potholes remain. More often than not, they get worse. If a pothole doesn’t get worse, there’s a new one that miraculously 'surfaces' - pardon the pun - close by. You must admit though, without prejudice, that the BMC has been fairly consistent and dependable on their message to the public.

A satellite picture of the moon and Mumbai roads might look the same.

So our young man has been predictably shouting 'Tiger Tiger' for as long back as ones memory can serve one.

And, as the story gives us to believe, and, as the good Lord expects us to, the probability of the Tiger showing up in the F & B was increasing each time the words 'Tiger Tiger' passed his lips. For, the benefit of a lie or a thoughtless promise never served anyone longer than ones lifetime. Sooner or later it is bound to catch up. And so it would, in the life of the youth under discussion.

The thing with stories like Tiger Tiger is that they are painstakingly simplified. And the result often is that similar events, situations, occur oft in our lives – so awfully inconspicuously that we seldom realize it. It takes enormous wisdom to see the parallel.

As it is in the case of the youth. For months now he has been yelling 'Tiger Tiger'. No tiger showed up. People were annoyed with him and were beginning to realize what a load of gas this youth was turning out to be. They heard him say 'Tiger Tiger' increasingly with the same involvement, the same eagerness and the same conviction that they heard, for ex., the weather report or G0rge Bush’s speech.

And the mood sort of caught up with our young man. One morning, before dawn, our youth was, out of the blue, hit by a lightening bolt of wisdom. He could tell that the Tiger would indeed be right there staring at him one day. And he would have to then run. Run for dear life. The blood curdling snarl of the tiger behind him would push him to run faster. He could almost feel the warm panting breath of the angry tiger around his ankles - how could he think of outrunning a Tiger!? He could picture the tiger taking a calculated leap. Its paws opening menacingly as it flew in the air to pounce on him and pin him down. If he was luckly the Tiger would have timed its leap badly. And he would survive. Albeit with the deep gnashes of its paws on his youthful bums. On the otherhand, if the timing of the leap was impeccably perfect, he figured that just sheer fear would pass him out before he got mauled.

And he resolved he wouldn’t shout 'Tiger Tiger' anymore. So he decided to set out of his comfort zone bravely and come to a place where he can himself confront the tiger head on. With chin up and chest out. Head-on.

Like a real man.

And bury the tiger forever. Once and for all.

So he took a ticket to Mumbai’s Churchgate station and headed straight to the booking counter. And took a two way ticket. And waited for the 6.07 pm local train at on a weekday.

This would be it. He would confront the Tiger. Finally. And fulfill a promise. And regain his own honour.

It was 5.57 pm on his watch. And he waited for the Local to pull into the busy Churchgate station.

He was breathing heavily. There was much at stake. What mattered most now, was his honor. That was paramount. He couldn’t be bothered with his bones now. Or of having the Tiger rip the epidermis off his ass. Honour. Honour it is.

He saw the Tiger appear far away. It was but a tiny speck in the distance. Becoming bigger with each moment as it came closer. It was now about 6.03 pm…..and the speck grew into sight, and the Virar local pulled into platform 4 at Churchgate … . . .

A Postal Delay

At 4 pm on a rather stuffy Saturday afternoon, as I was nearing home, I became aware of a sort of a crowd outside the building I stay in. I shuddered inside, hoping it wasn’t some accident or fire in the building. But as I came closer it seemed more a sort of a friendly crowd that had gathered.

If you have ever studied psychology at some point in your life, you will know what happens when such a friendly crowd gathers around – a few members in the crowd initially have something to say. And if the GPS location of this crowd matched someplace – any place – over the Indian sub-continent, then each and every member feels compelled to add something better to that, they first start talking, then they start talking at the same time and each wants to be heard by everyone else and slowly they strain their respective vocal chords and raise the decibel level and before you know it, they are all shouting and besides vocal chords, they are also straining their ear drums and soon it is entirely cacophony.

And then there are a few riff raffs – not entirely of their own accord, but its just the dynamics of the crowd that puts them naturally in that role - two or three or four younger members whose shouting and jumping is just not creating any hoo haa in the crowd, and they typically are on the outer periphery of the group – and begin to feel sorta left out. So as it happens they sense each others predicament and relate to it and some sort of unsaid camaraderie is established amongst them. And they may not even have even exchanged a word amongst themselves yet. So they move around the crowd, annoying the others, adding to the shouting with irrelevant content, smiling to themselves, just adding to the whole chaos.

That, somewhat, was the state of the group around the time I arrived. And I was considering various reasons for this crowd. None of the reasons that popped up inside my head seemed appropriate and I still couldn’t fathom the reason why this crowd gathered.

The closer I got, the more curious I got.

And suddenly it hit me. It hit me with such a force that I almost fell.

The 'riff raffs' who were rather absent mindedly walking around noticed me approaching and I could see one of them raise the hand, point at me and say something to the nearest person.

The cacophony suddenly reduced to a deafening silence. If someone dropped an empty can on a tin roof, you could hear it (yes, a can on a tin roof. This is Bombay and the noise pollution is appalling – so the proverbial pin would be rather ineffective and wouldn’t make a good idea to do a ‘test for silence’ with – something more effective like a can on a tin roof has been widely acknowledged to being more appropriate).

And as abruptly as the noisy group fell silent, it erupted into a roar. And before I had time to process visual impulses, I could see the blur of the crowd thundering directly at me – rather menacingly I might add.

I barely had time to let my instinct kick in to take over the auto-pilot. Good old instinct nevertheless kicked in and set me on the very dependable auto-pilot and a few moments later I discovered myself running rather wildly, with a shoe under each armpit, sweat trickling down my chin, three buttons undone, shirt flaring in the wind, feet trying to keep at least about 20 kmph, torso trying to catch up with the speed of the feet. I remember turning back occasionally to see if the gap was increasing or reducing. The gap was in fact closing. Oh and take my word, it really was a dreadful feeling.

When the good ol’ instinct in question allowed my brain to finally take over, there was much turmoil. Brain interpreting the series of events seemed appalled at the situation. It questioned the instinctive decision to turn around and scoot. Good old Common Sense had something to add too. And wisdom and logical reasoning too joined in what seemed like a committee meeting going on inside my head.

The resolution finally was passed. And I had clear instruction now that now seemed more sensible to act upon. Well Ok. I was also tired and my supply of adrenalin was depleting and I was getting fatigued – but nevertheless it did help me execute my unquestioned acceptance of the resolution of the committee.

I stopped. Turned around. Puffed and panted. And as the crowd caught up with me, I had successfuly achieved a state that allowed some words to pass from my lips.

“What do you want?” was all I could muster.

And then one from the mob stepped up to me and told me exactly what. My mouth went even more dry and jaw hung. I couldn’t speak for a whole minute.

I could have taken any explanation. This, was probably not even the last thing on my mind.

Now those of you who have followed my posts might be able to make the connection better than those that haven’t. If you indeed have read every post I have posted you will be able to understand and find some reason to what I heard from the mob. But again it depends on why you have been regularly following my posts.

You were following my posts for one or more reasons from one of the following two categories of reasons –

Category I

• You like to improve your sense of humour and you find Just Pathe a good place to do that
• You are absolutely crazy about what I write and visit jvpathe every hour in the hope of seeing a new post, reading which will make your day
• You are a publisher who is trying to fix a value to my writing and you can’t be sure if you have to write M or a B on a cheque before the letters ‘illion’.
• Smiling is such an impossible thing in today’s life and only Pathe makes that elusive smile appear on your lips.
• You absolutely are in love with my writing and Pathe is your ultimate idea of good writing
• You are an honest, balanced and mature critic and you think Pathe is the answer to the incredible vacuum in the writing world.
• You want to track the life of a repressed writer who goes on to win the Pulitzer
• You just love me to bits and therefore anything I do, no matter how abominable, you love to bits too

Category II

• You have a morbid sense of curiosity to the things I write (to quote from an earlier post)
• You have nothing better to do and use my posts to appear busy at work
• You like numbers and like to see the visitor counter on my blog change every time you click jvpathe.blogspot.com
• You like to see how depraved I am in life through my posts
• You are kind, especially to me.
• You are just pretending to regularly visit my blog, although you care a duck.
• You are just bored and jobless
• You were a postage stamp in the past life, so it is an uncontrollable impulse and a natural drive in you to follow every post.

Well, I am digressing. I am deviating from my task. I have this incredibly frightful mob inches from my face and I am going on about other things, meandering and rambling and indulging in pointless Pathe.

“Where is the post on the Virar Train that you had promised?” Was the only thing the mob had to say before they all shook their heads in sad disappointment and dispersed. The once-angry and indignant crowd now diluted and dissolved right in front of my eyes, dragging their feet and heavy hearts as they left.

And I stood there with my head hung low and feeling terribly responsible and sad that I didn’t keep my promise.

Jo Vaada kiya, voh nibhana padega.........

I walked back home making a resolve that I will write a nice long post on the Virar Local soon.

Thought of something

A few moments ago, I stumbled on a jolting insight about myself.

I tend to be more an observer of my life rather than an active participant.

Corollary -

There are two kinds of people in this world.

Those that actively participate in life. Get into it. Like the soulful actor that gets into his role, becoming one with the character. And is able to forget that he is acting. Cry genuinely, feel the pain of the character, feel hurt, laugh, feel anxious. Letting the character merge with the Here-And-Now.

And then there are those that observe their lives, watch it from outside, live it with curiosity and amusement. Not quite becoming one with the character. Those that can be the audience and clap and laugh and snigger and get bored and applaud and boo at the actor. Those that can be the actor, always aware of being an actor. Never letting the character merge with Here-And-Now.

Just a brief ramble I wanted to share with you. Just a thought. About something or the other.

Which one are you?

The Height of Weights

As I sat at the table and performed the ritual of flapping the napkin and decorating my lap with it, an incredible aroma lifted me off my chair about a couple of inches and if I was any lighter I would have floated across the dimly lit restaurant towards the source in ghee.

Er.., I mean glee.

It was a glorious evening, and, evidently, I might add, it was an evening in the honor of the olfactory senses. It was a festival of delicious aromas. Nerve impulses were transmitting millions of pleasure signals to my brain, overworked as it was processing the load of information each discernable aroma carried with it. And it wasn’t just my nose that was transmitting signals. My ear joined the party happily. The provocative sounds that go along with each aroma in the process of cooking – the “tishhhhhhh” from the tadka, the “chissssshhhh” of onions dunked on hot oil….the clanking of the ladle against the pan. And my brain, rising to the occasion, was rapidly interpreting each impulse - basil in olive oil, mild garlic being sautéed in butter, smoked chicken being pan fried….. To say the least, I was getting a heady fill of intoxicating olfactory and auditory delight. Or, to emphasize the degree of delight, ecstasy. Yes, that’s probably the right word, ecstasy.

If you happened to pass the table I was at, you might have encountered a young man sitting upright, eyes closed, silly, indulgent smile plastered against the face, neck stiff and alert to perch the head high enough for his rather phenomenal nose to actively draw the aroma in, ears perked up and alert, and if you were blessed with the fantastic power of observation complemented by eyesight that picks up incredibly minute detail, you might have also seen small hair follicles standing on the nape of the young mans neck and if you had cast your eyes lower upon his bare arm, you might even have noticed goose pimples.

And if you paused long enough to recognize this young man, who you do know from a long time ago and said, HEY JV! I wouldn’t have heard it the first time.

If you persisted and yelled my name aloud again and pinched me, it would have shaken me off my reverie.

And woke me up from my sleep. Damn you. You just ruined a fantasy.

Well stop it. I hate apologies, especially if you have no clue its not your apology that would alleviate me from this rather unappealing, unsettling state I find myself in. This really is causing a lot of disharmony in my otherwise self-satisfied life.

Well, I might as well tell you what I am on about. I just discovered I am fat.

It wasn’t easy discovering that. It’s not as simple as you might think. There is this serious looking table that Google uncle helped me find – the Height and Weight chart.

Now a normal simple guy or girl next door, (a category I think you are a part too) would expect height on one column and weight on another. In Kg.

But no. How can life be that simple? To start with it was all in pounds. And then there were four columns – here take a look yourself.

So there is Small Frame, Medium Frame and Large Frame. What the …? The difference between Small Medium and Large ranges from 22lb to 45lb. Which is about 12kg for me. If I was a small frame I would be about 61kg, but if on the other hand I was a large frame I would be 12kg more, but I would still be normal? Ok. So how do I decide if I was Small Medium or Large frame? For the sake of an academic discussion, if I classified myself as a large frame, I am suddenly not overweight. (Hmm...I think I rather like these academic discussions).

But that’s not the way it works does it? When you wear your pants, you struggle and you know something is wrong somewhere. And if you have an IQ of an average crow, you can guess something about the girth of your waist is causing this difficulty when you slip into those pants. Or try slipping in.

Thankfully, I have been blessed with an IQ much better than that of a crow. Well, an average crow, lets be more precise in the interest of being truthful and accurate – not to mention piss the crow fraternity unnecessarily. Besides, lets face it, these self-look tables never fail to get you to assume the worst and see a bleaker picture than how bleak the bleak picture really is.

So I assume I am 12 kg overweight and the moment you come to terms with that sort of a truth, its always grotesque the first time the truth stares right at your face.

But when you come to terms with it and accept it, it’s a different thing. For a while you walk around with this cloud of gloom over your head. A whole new demeanor overcomes you without your knowledge. As you walk by glass doors you give a silent shudder when you pass by restaurants you sigh, when you see people eating happily, you let out a muffled groan. When you see pictures of delicious food, you gaze at them lustily.

Oh lets stop this boring philippic. I’m 15 kg overweight for my height. And I am on a diet. I haven’t been eating butter, ghee and all the delicious other food that suddenly hold a brilliant new appeal for me.

Well anyway, if you pause to think about all those metrics, the way I did, you would agree that its really not a weight problem I have. I am simply not tall enough for my weight.

In the light of these new interpretations, perspectives and insight, I shall excuse myself - I think i shall call Dominoes. The stringy cheese in their ads is quite mouth watering.

Arrested Development

Many years ago, a man was flying a kite. He was a quirky man. For which man would think of combining outlandish ideas with the rather straight forward and simple activity of kite flying?

This man did. And history rewarded him with, I dare say, gratuitous, and in my horribly politically wrong opinion, glory.

I am beginning to realize that the Modus Operandi of this man was rather simple and, brace yourself – this is going to be an oft-repeated word in this post, outlandish. He tried irrelevant, unrelated, bizzare combinations of odd activities and things to arrive at inventions.

Take Kite flying. A rather simple, straight forward pastime for many. Here in India we even have a structured ‘Tyohaar’ around kite flying. And for generations we have done it like normal people would - flying kites and getting a kick out of simply flying kites, certainly not getting outlandish or quirky with the activity.

But this man, he did. He couldn’t simply just fly a kite. He had to make the pursuit outlandish. He dipped the twine first in milk, and then flew the kite. Nothing noteworthy happened.

So he dipped it in honey. Flew the kite. Again, nothing.

And then dipped the sad twine in wine and flew the kite again. And then in milk, honey and wine and then flew the kite.

Still nothing.

Then he tried flying the kite with nothing else but just a pair of socks on. Later with just one bare foot. He even tied the twine around his toe and jumped into a lake to see if the airborne kite would transport him across to the other end – this is recorded, btw.

Then he tried flying the kite wearing a pumpkin head-gear (chop the pumpkin in half, scoop out the seeds from one half and turn it upside down on your head – Voila! Your own personalized pumpkin head-gear is ready!). But BF, being one of our most famous inventors, had a head packed with more gray matter than normal heads, which is why he was an inventor par excellence. He invented things as routinely as we eat Chaat. And for the same reason he wasted several pumpkins, for in order to accommodate all the extra gray cells, he had an oversized head. In the pursuit of finding the right size of head-gear, he had to deal with several sizes of pumpkins and wasted a lot of time, not to mention money, before he could find the right fit for his head. By then monsoon was approaching. Although he wasn’t able to hit on any invention for the longest time, he kept on.

And then the quirky man came up with the most bizarre and outlandish thing any one could have come up with – the thought of sliding in a key around the twine.

A key! A key!!!!??? Why!! How!???? Who would ever think of sliding a key around the twine. It could have well been a ring, a tap, table, a book, or even a cow for goodness sakes.

But tried as he did, it was impossible to slip it inside, for the kite was bigger than the loop in the key. So after a few weeks, with sore arms and a very airborne kite, while he was about to melt the key, he realized that a twine has the tendency to always have two ends. And that’s when the thought of the simpler idea of slipping the key in from the other end of the twine occured to him. And he slipped it in with delight.

And then it struck him. Actually two things struck him.

The first was a bolt of lightening, owing to the conducting key around a twine attached to an airborne kite.

The other was his wife.

“I should have you arrested for this. You’ve been out of the house with that stupid kite for 4 months. Theres hardly anything to eat. And if I was any cruel, I’d have wished that bolt of lightening had a better effect on you. And I ought to have the lightening arrested too for letting you off so easily!”

And that’s how with the invention of the lightening arrester, the story of electricity was born. Theres huge debate on whether BF invented electricity. Oh theres a bigger debate whether anyone INVENTED electricity at all, for it was always there, and could have only been discovered.

But the general opinion seems to be that BF at best invented the Lightening Arrester, although I happen to believe his wife should be given the credit for it.

Benjamin Franklin has an incredible track record. He truly has been active all his life right till the age of 84. He is arguably one of the most active scientific minds the history of mankind has ever known. And thankfully to my advantage, he was also regarded as a humorist. Andthats one reason I took the liberty of talking about him in such a tone. I dont wear a hat, but I could buy one so I could truly do it and mean it when I say, "Hats off to you Ben!"

A snapshot of the roles he played along his long, eventful life
A:Abolitionist Almanac maker Advertiser B: Balloon enthusiast Bifocals inventor C: Composer Cartoonist Civic Citizen Chess Player D: Deist Diplomat Daylight Savings advocate E: Enlightenment thinker Electricity pioneer Experimenter Entrepreneur F: Founding Father Flirt Fire fighter G: Glass Armonica creator Gulf Stream mapper Genius H: Humorist Health nut I: Inventor International celebrity Insurer J: Junto creator Journalist K: Kite flyer L: Librarian Lightning rod inventor Londoner M: Medical Engineer Militia member Mathematician Mason N: Natural philosopher O: Organizer (militia, fire dept., street cleaning) Odometer maker P: Printer Public relations master Publisher Prankster Q: Questioner Quartermaster Quintessential American R: Revolutionary Reader S: Scientist Swimmer Self-made man T: Traveler Treaty signer U: University builder V: Volunteer Visionary Vegetarian (temporarily) W: Writer Weight lifter X: Xenophile Y: Young prodigy Yankee Yarn spinner Z: Zealot

Going Local!

Have you ever been within about a 3 feet radius from a 5 foot wide beehive? A teeming, fully loaded and buzzing beehive I mean. And fully habitatted at that, if habitatted is the word I am looking for. And, importantly, with you facing it frontally? (The beehive I mean)

Well, fundamentally, deep down in the depths of my heart where good feelings for others slosh about unhindered, I genuinely hope you haven’t.

But, because truth is more often than not, ironic and, assuming you want to know the ironic truth, I wont mind telling you this – that in another chamber of the same heart – where opposite feelings are encouraged for diverse other causes, (primary causes of which I will of course discuss in just a few moments) I actually am hoping you have been within about 3 feet radius from a 5 foot wide beehive.

And if you really have found yourself in that rather discomforting situation, you will have found yourself staring at a monstrous waxed up colony – buzzing, if you will allow me to use that word again, with activity. A sight, I dare say, that looks much like Kandivli from the western express highway (from a BEST bus – certainly not from an auto or a car).

And now, since the scene is set, imagine you are intensely gazing at the buzzing 5 foot beehive from 3 feet radius and imagine the hive gets upset. And, more importantly, the bees get upset too. You will continue to stare at it, though at this moment when you perceive about a million bees flying furiously towards your face, you’d rather pretend to be a complex non organic compound. The bees buzz around you fiercely and you are numbly aware of the humming getting worse than Himesh Reshamya.

Can you actually feel that anxiety in your mind now? Can you feel the helplessness and the overwhelming feeling of hi-strungness if I may term it so?

That is somewhat how I felt that day at Churchgate around 7 pm. Churchgate is terribly crazy at this hour. On a weekday. But, as some may argue, not worse than VT at the same time of day. VT may certainly be worse by all means, but Churchgate was where I was. And for a person who finds himself in Mumbai’s good old Churchgate at 7 pm on the very second evening he arrived at this incredible city for the first time in his life, it can, take my word on this, be quite overwhelming. Trust me; I didn’t really care to process the bit of stat. that VT was worse that exact moment. It certainly didn’t make my demeanor less unsettled.

And so here I was at the ticket counter, asking for ‘Andheri’ by second class after 30 minutes in the ‘Q’. I must put it on record here that I wasn’t really uninformed about what to expect at this hour at Churchgate. I sure was quite clued in as to what to expect. But then there has never been any recorded incident of any fully inducted, comprehensively updated and duly sensitized non me-mumbaikar that arrived in Mumbai, trained to completely expect everything one might imagine, and find himself at Churchgate the next evening at 7 pm and not feel overwhelmed. I was. I truly was. In fact I was overwhelmingly overwhelmed.

I had the yellow ticket clenched firmly in my fist and walked towards the LED displays. And I noticed four starting points. The display boards displayed cheerfully (how they manage that cheer at 7 pm at Churchgate on a weekday is quite a mystery to me in hindsight) letters such as A, B, Bo, V, etc. I had no clue what those words stood for and I really didn’t care. I had this vague understanding that all trains pass Andheri since Andheri was not too far and since all final destinations were allegedly too far, any train had to pass Andheri.

The buzzing around me was steady and since I had descended on Mumbai with a starry pair of eyes, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to state that I was sort of happy being where I was at that moment. To be in the good old ‘city’. To be part of the buzz.

I had longed to be in Mumbai for as far back as I could remember and so these were important moments to me. When you long to be in a city like Mumbai and finally arrive you try to put on the air of a seasoned Mumbaikar although you have no clue what it’s all about. At least as yet.

And so, I bought a Mid-day with my free hand, the one that wasn’t busy soaking the yellow ticket from the May swelter. And like a Mumbaikar might, tucked it promptly under the left arm and bought a cup of FP – or Fountain Pepsi.

Off now to the train. From the four tracks, I had to choose the one that I had to board from. Being as uninformed as I was about A, B, Bo and V, the probability of picking either was equal at ¼. Since the FP shop was to the right of the architecture, I naturally found myself walking towards the platform between tracks 3 and 4.

People people people! There were people every where. But of course, silly, I told myself. This is Mumbai. It was a sea of people like ive never quite seen. And I was feeling alternately amazed and stunned. Recall frontally-facing-from-3-feet-a-beehive-of-5-feet analogy. That’s how it was.

To my right was a train. Long and quite bright and eager. I walked close peering through the windows as I walked to find a relatively empty compartment. And before long, there it was…

Hopped in and rushed to the seat making the rush as inconspicuous as possible. The hat was still on. You know which one I am referring to.

As the wooden seat received my rear end, I felt a wave of pride envelop me. Wow! There I was in Churchgate at 7 pm with midday in my hand inside a crowded train – And seated! That must mean I had beautifully adapted to this city! Who gets to sit in a train at 7 pm at Churchgate? On a weekday!

The wooden seat was getting warmed by my slightly plump bum from Chennai, plump because life there is a lot less high-strung (life in Chennai I mean, not life in my bum, silly), and we eat a lot of Ghee down there (down in a geographic sense, not physiologically. No one to my knowledge eats a lot of Ghee down there physiologically).

Very soon, the seat was warm and so was my heart. And, it was slowly dawning on me, so was the compartment, which was filling up rapidly and before I knew it, it was packed.

I didn’t know yet, but I was in a Virar Fast.

(For those of you in Mumbai who have traveled by train regularly, that’s a good shocking line to end a chapter – or a Blog post. For the benefit of those who haven’t, well, trust me it is. If you want to know why, I will post another post about what happened to me during the rest of my journey. Not to Andheri, mind you. You will learn how it is to travel in second class on a Virar Fast Local from Churchgate at 7 pm on a weekday to Mira Road.)

Let the truth be told...

The Lizard on the wall catches the attention. Just at eye level. A tiny thing. Must be no more than 5 days since it came into being. Must be a really unique life, that which is lived in the men’s room.

A gentle blow. And the little thing wiggles up a bit. Its thread-like tail achieving the deception it was meant to accomplish. Now it’s about a couple of feet above the pot slapped against the wall. Perfectly at eye level now. It is pale, and if you weren’t strong in your semantics, you would be tempted to call it transparent. The bones beneath that thin sheath of what is actually skin are almost visible. The eyes. They are almost outside the tiny head.

And then I saw it. Between the two bulbous jet-black eyes, a black spot clearly visible beneath the skin. The brain? No, probably not. But what is that? It must have a skull and if it does, there should be a brain inside it. But this black spot is outside the skull - if there was a skull…..

I was drained. I didn’t mean, ‘tired’, but you know what I mean. I blew a bit at the tiny chap. He wriggled up a bit again. And I could see that heart beat rate get rapid from the throbbing on the sides. Just behind its front legs. Tiny as can be, again. And I could say it was experiencing some level of anxiety. I Blow again. The tail moves first and the chap wriggles up more. And I look down and realize I’ve been standing over the pot long after I’m done.

I come out thinking of the little chap and the black spot between the eyes. A small head and a smaller brain. And that filled to the full with the experiences of 5 days, add to that instincts of over 10 million years.

The experience of breaking the shell from the inside. Hearing it crack and fall apart. Experience of seeing blinding light rushing in through the crack and flooding it from all sides as the shell falls apart.

And the first experience of moving a limb. Comprehending and ‘taking stock’ of the number of limbs and tails. Realizing and understanding the function of each projection of what it now thinks of as its body.

What force of nature makes it realize and think of its body as ‘its body’? That’s another question by itself. The head on my body throbs.

Experiences of stepping into the world. The first pang of hunger, and instantly the instinct of over 10 million years or more comes to the rescue, just as that little insect further up on the wall does. The first prey, the first meal and the first burp of satisfaction.

Whatever happened to the insect’s instinct? Ah! The head throbs again at the thought of this big game of nature. An almost sadistic scheme, if you think about it from one level.

“10,000 ways to get your dinner” – a convenient ROM in the name of ‘instinct’ of 10 million years . And part II by the same authors, “10,000 effective ways of escaping from your predator”.

How long is the life span of a normal lizard? 6 months? A year? I don’t know. But can’t be much. It doesn’t really matter. I think of this chap. This tiny friend of mine with transparent skin. The friend I made in the loo.

Look at his life.

Event 1: – enter world. Even if the fellow’s concept of the world is limited to the wall in the loo.

Event n – exit the world.

What, just what the hell really does happen between the two events? Cumulating personal experiences and implementation of the instinct of 10 million years? Add to the database of ‘10,000 ways to do this or do that’ so the next generation can use them?

What? Why?

Between the two events, how does it matter where the lizard lived? Or what insects it hunted? Or how its success rate was highest on the walls of that loo? Or how it courted its mate? Or how it hurt itself at the hinge of the door? Or how it struggled for a whole week without food? And how it thought it was Gods way of punishing its sins of a past life, while it was just that the loo was visited by the pest-control guys. And how after that week, the sudden appearance of a cockaroach made it think God had answered its prayers?

The futility of the life of a lizard. It’s obvious. Glaring. Almost blinding. There simply is no higher form of purpose that it could be indulging in.

Eat. Sleep Copulate. Fight for life. Eat. Sleep….

And the futility of the life of a frog. An elephant. A giraffe. Man. Its plain clear. There is no spirituality. There is no higher form of life. No higher purpose. No higher meaning. No higher sense of achievement or accomplishment.

Meaning. That there is nothing of.

We kid ourselves. We are as mundane and boring and pointless as that lizard.

I must really wind this up. I have to plan my taxes.

More Pathe

Here I go again. Come here. Sit here next to me.

All of a sudden, I have this overwhelming, overpowering impulse. I want to open my heart to you and share this intense feeling I have right this minute. And I want you to appreciate this moment of mine by understanding more precisely how I feel. So allow me spare a moment to accurately describe how this feeling feels.

You step into a swimming pool at the chest-high-water end. Wait. Not my chest-high-water end. I’m talking your chest-high-water end. I don’t want you getting in at the 3 feet end. That would not give you the feeling I am trying to establish in your prose interpreting mind.

So you get into this pool… and oh yes. I know your secret! Before you got in you knew you would encounter cold water welcoming you in. I know you stood there for a few moments contemplating the water. Then you looked around. Watched distractedly at people, yeah you did notice that fat man with his belly spilling over so much that it almost covered his swimming trunk. One bountiful trunk covering a rather skimpy trunk. Skimpy, perhaps only in contrast. Judging by that ample waistline, it was probably stitched out of an old tent. Not quite out of place for that tent in any case. Because you also noticed a forest just about a foot north, right there on his chest. Then there was this little girl, part of her hair has escaped the rubber band and was falling over her face. 'So cute' how she comes out gasping for air, but encounters more hair than air. 'Awww so cute' how she pushes back that hair in several quick strokes every time she comes out of the water. And then there’s that big man on the diving board. Let me wait for him to jump and swim away, you thought. Will he make the perfect dive? You then looked at the sky, perhaps felt a breeze and thought about the cold water immediately. All that rigmarole. I know. I know.

Damn. This is terrible. I am a disaster. Pull me back, pull me back. I keep derailing.

So……yeah the prarallel I am trying to draw to this overwhelming feeling that i'm feeling.

When you finally do slip into the pool, the water rises to your chest (or you sink down to your chest, whichever you like). And then you give this soft, stifled, silent gasp. Remember that gasp? Remember that feeling?

Remember? That’s it! That’s it! That’s the one!

That’s how I am feeling now. I just got a similar overwhelming wave. I feel like opening my heart to you. I want to throw open its doors and windows to you.

I want to share with you that I have this overpowering feeling to Pathe right now.

Oh! Waitaminnit! Did I just…..?

Oh well, thanks anyway. Now i feel like I just invited someone to my house when they've already arrived. Thanks anyway for being there. Thanks for listening. Thanks for being such a friend.

Sour, because I can’t soar

And then, there is this friend of mine.

Intelligent, witty, clever, wise, kind. And hopeless. Hopeless because he just cant find his niche. He wont take a job. Gives in to an easy state of equilibrium – a no energy state.

If you can’t decide what to do, what do you do?

We all have at least one friend like that. Someone you just KNOW can do so much better, but does not. Who could be better off, but won't be. Who could be in a much better job, but is not. Who could be in a much better career, but is not. Who could be more satisfied, better paid, but just won’t move his ass.

We all have at least one person we know close to us who seems to prefer to drift. Who prefers not to see the truth of the real world, who prefers not to let that truth shake him into action. Who seems to go through life in a daze. A perpetual state of complacence Almost like he took sleepwalking to a whole different level - sleepliving. Who just cant overcome inertia.

And time passes, and the years pass and our friend refuses to change, stuck with that one thought or that one quest or with one desire, and refuses to discard that purposeless thought, hopeless quest, impossible desire, to just get up and smell the coffee. A dream that will never be realized, for he just wont awake from his slumber.

And he drifts.

Like the feather of a bird on the ground. Moving when there is a gust of wind. And settling back gently into a state of rest. Another gust and it rises up twirls a little, dances in the air, shows its brilliance against the light and settles again. And again gives us joy with the next gust with its grace and charm.

Alas. What a purposeless existence. If only it knew its rightful place and stayed there, how it could have made a bird fly, swoop and soar!

Stop Bugging me!

She went to the temple today. She folded her hands and prayed. Her eyes were closed for 11 minutes and 48 seconds. She dropped 30 Rs.5 coins in the hundi. Touched the bronze plate with her elegantly painted finger tips.

She smiled at the security. She scratched her left eyebrow once. That stupid fly. It had no clue the landing strip it chose was in fact, actually the eyebrow of Shetty,Shilpa, The. It sat right over her left eyebrow and troubled the poor delicate skin it sat on.

Those long bow shaped eyebrows that stretch across the forehead all the way to the temple twitched for an instant. The temple, you might have guessed, that is on either side of her forehead. Not the one she was in. The ones that throbbed when a racist tongue waggled at her. Not the one in Prabhadevi. Not Siddhivinayak.

But when one throbbed, the other beckoned.

Ah but Shilpa Shettys eyebrows are as exciting as her visit to the temple. I can’t live a moment not knowing whether she went to Siddhivinayak or not. Times of India said today, “Shilpa Shetty with Bigger Brother”. On the cover page. Right at the Top. Right there In your just-out-of-the-bed face. That’s the news I want to see in the morning. It makes my life meaningful. It gives me a feeling of being informed and ‘clued in’. That’s the kind of news we need to create happy, informed, well read, successful, cheerful citizens who contribute to the society and make this a better, bigger nation. You think I am being sarcastic don’t you? Well, bless you. I am. I swear I am.

Because I’m riveted to news like that. It makes my day. My life as a matter of fact. How can I even imagine one breath in day without news like that? Why do I pay Rs.5, (inclusive of complimentary copy of Mumbai Mirror worth Rs.2), if I don’t get to know about Shilpas visits to the temple, masseuse, that NGO that takes care of the down trodden?

Why do you think we have been served with fifty million words on what happened to her over the last few weeks?

I think the newspapers and the media think we are interested. Maybe you are. You are aren’t you?

Well I hope you are. I certainly am not. But I hope you are.

I rather like the idea that I am being stupid and indifferent and cynical and lead a bored lonely life not caring a hoot or two about such hugely significantly consequential world news. I am too old and disconnected. If no man is an island, it proves that I am not a man, for I certainly seem to be an island. I just don’t like that sort of news. It’s BORING. I just can’t be bothered.

But I hope you are, because if you are not, and if you feel the same way about it as I do, then something is very, very wrong with our world today.

To be fair, I have no clue what happened there. None at all. I am aware Jade said something wrong. As far as I am concerned, what was said was said because a mind came up with a thought that made a tongue move. The mind was wrong, the thought was wrong and maybe the tongue was wrong too. I don’t care. It’s that mind that needs to worry and debate and deliberate and correct itself. Not me. I don’t have to spend a moment more on it than it takes for me to hear it. Granted it certainly is not nice to hear it. Certainly is not nice to have people racially slurring along their daily lives. But I won’t be affected if someone has a tongue that slurs racially. Even if it slurred at me.

I can say “6 million years ago, a lunatic distractedly built a small sand hill on the river bed. Because of some plutonic activity the hill grew and grew and now has become the Himalayas. The hill sucked, and so now the Himalayas suck too”.

Do you feel sad for the Himalayas? Or should you feel sad for me? Will the nation like the Himalayas more for my slur?? Will Tony Blair and his gang meet the Himalayas and fall all over it? Will the queen meet the mountain?

Oh well. I hope I am clueless. I hope I am warped. Cuz if you feel the same way I do, then we are subjected to agony in our lives that we really don’t need. And something is very, very wrong.

But well, the Himalayas are nice and so is Shilpa. I have no comment on her to make. I am just a little troubled the way we all reacted. Oh but that’s how it looks from my island. Do what you like in yours.
And the fly isn’t to blame. But hey, let’s not allow our affections towards Shilpa undermine the fly. This fly lives at Siddhivinayak. It lives everywhere. And has perched on countless people. An endless list of celebs, common everyday people like you and me, thugs, underworld people, politicians, Abhishek Bachhan, Ash, Anuradha paduval, Sachin Tendulkar, and the panwala down your road. That’s really a long list if you have any idea.

Oh what fun to buzz around and sit on the eyebrows, head, hair, nose, ears, and many exciting places on several celebs.

Ok, the fly just followed the forehead out.

Later she bought a new lamp shade. And a new bamboo floor mat to do yoga on. She sneezed twice in the last 3 days and a little speck of dust went into her left eye. I can’t wait for the papers tomorrow.

The fly. A Makki. Makki? koun si makki? kiss Makki? Oh Mika. Kiss Mika!? Oh well, thats another story altogether. Some other time.

The Fly. Sigh. Look closely - it’s really a bug.

Main Bhi Gir Gaya.

Sab Kuch Teak Hai!

Hello again and welcome back to jvpathe.blockspot.com. My block, “JustPathe”, has been on a longer holiday than I was myself blessed with. One of the first rules in starting a block is regular posting. I didn’t and don’t intend such long gaps between posts. When you are on the blocking mode, you want your audience to come back regularly and enjoy the block. If your gaps begin to widen, your readers may realize they in fact love the gaps more than your block! And then they long for the gaps. They may still come back to your block, but don’t be fooled. That they only do only to heighten the pleasure of the gaps. Oh I am so not for giving you that pleasure!!!!

You might think I have a bad cold. Nope. You might think a Blog becomes a Block only when you have cold that impedes acceptable jugalbandi of the mouth and the nose. Nope. I didn’t say Block cuz I have a cold.

I’ve not added a post for over 2 weeks now. I had planned a good long break. Two long weekends, and the whole of the week that got sandwiched between the two and between xmas and new year. As my luck would have it, and owing to a few shortcomings of mine such as planning in advance, putting foot down, respecting oneself and ones break, acknowledging the importance of a holiday and so on and so forth, it turned out that the long holiday became as long as just 3 days. One of the sides of the sandwich came off. And 2 days from the filling came off. And all I was left with was Thu, Fri, Sat, Sun and Mon. With 1 whole day devoted to travel, that left just 3 days. Considering the completely rural mode of travel, it required at least a day to recover from the journey. And so I had a long holiday that was effectively 2 days. Although the whole world around me took 10 days off - the whole complete sandwich, owing to my sense of self importance, unjustified I must add, I decided not to take such a long break from work. And thought I would write a lot while I was at Gir.

Not! So Not!

I want to meander off for a bit to confess something. That Para you just read…I wrote it a week back. Such is the block. A writer’s block. That’s what I think happened. And that was the grounds on which I developed a thought that I should call this Block instead of Blog.

Jvpathe.blockspot.com. Now that makes sense.

I did tell you that meri maa Gir gayi. Phir 3 weeks ke baad main be Gir gaya. It was a very refreshing visit. The air nippy and the lions as much jeep friendly as camera friendly. Its not easy to encounter lions in Gir when you Safari about in a jeep. Thanks to Meena, I actually was able to manage about biting distance from two lions. Roopsundari and Devraj. They had just had a meal and were resting. They did see me nosing about them. The lady lazily raised her head to see what trick I was attempting every time I shuffled my feet. I could tell they were annoyed. I could tell they were quite resigned too. “Roopsi (short for Roopsundari in growl language), lets not bother with this jerk. Hes boring meat. You can tell he is totally tasteless, not to mention classic junk food and quite fattening.” “Oh! Are you cubbing? (For kidding. These lions are funny!) Mating seasons just round the corner and I don’t want my figure all pumpkinized again. Besides I don’t want to get my paws dirty with 3X+ blood. He is dumb enough to scare himself away on his own. Is he one of the humans? Why does he have that funny nose?”

“Jeez Roopsi, 4 years in this jungle and you think that’s his nose? That’s his camera. He’s just so edgy he’s pressing it tight against his face even when he’s not clicking”

I could hear them muttering low growls to themselves. And then they rested their heads back to sleep.

But we had fun. All I could see in the jungle was dry leaves, so dry that one step makes a huge ruckus. Dried leaf off Teak trees. Teak trees every where and I for some reason I was fascinated by them. Not quite the trees themselves really, but more the leaves. As I was leaving the jungle for the last time, I announced “is jangal mein sab Teak Hai!!” Meenas field assistants had a big laugh at my silly pun. I’ll put a picture in my next block. Not of my silly pun, silly. I meant the teak leaves.

But heres Roopsi the lioness that made derogatory remarks of me. See her considering me lazily.

mmmm....nice lunch....................What was that?.................Oh Dev, its just some junk.

did i hear something?..Yes, theres a sound! I see it.. Thats a man..Oh it doesnt look edible.

People, I am back. Comment. I did comment back on some comments of people who commented. Look at the earlier “PatheBack” link of the earlier Block post.

Adieu.