The ‘Great’ Indian Tradition

She said she is not sure whether she would turn up on Saturday or not to meet us, her friends with whom she is most comfortable to share her anxiety, feelings, and dilapidation. Gradually this comfort would vanish like a veil of fog in the mid-day sun. Gradually the whole world would be a zone of discomfort for her.

No, this is not the story of a single girl. This is the reality for every one of us in one form or the other. She was actually busy in the final phase of packing her own belongings that she would carry with her to her father’s house. I called her up at that time and her voice was breaking…I called her up in the midst of that critical juncture when she was just on the verge of saying good bye to the house where she actually has dreamt to stay the rest of her life, with her beloved. And now, she was moving back to her ‘father’s house’; this has to be addressed like that only in the Indian tradition: ‘Baper Bari’.

Where I have stayed for more than two decades, where my life began, where I grew up, where every brick is familiar and accustomed with my likes and dislikes, how and why can’t it be mine anymore? Then which one is my own house? Where I have to stay with the parents of someone else, whom I have to consider as my own parents from day 1, where I have to conceal my real emotions under the veil of fake ones, where I have to smile even when I am sad, where I have to eat when I am not hungry but food is abundant and starve when I am hungry but there is no food due to some in-law relative, where I have to watch the channel that my in-laws are interested in, and where I have to compromise, adjust, and adapt with every little and huge things that have made my life ridiculous?

My husband doesn’t stay at my mother’s place even for a single night as there is no AC and the bathroom is “not that good.” But at least he permits me to stay there for a night if I want to; he is better. But what’s the use? I am not well accepted without my husband at my own place, my own bed!

I miss my TV, I miss my bed, and I miss the way I used to sleep with my granny. But now I don’t have the freedom to spend a single night like that. Is it really possible to consider someone else’s house as your own house? Someone else’s parents as your own parents? Is it possible to accept your house as your past, your ex-house? Your own parents as ex-parents (though this is officially not there in the tradition)?

These are once you are married. If your partner is your friend whom you knew since long back, let me warn you: your condition is still the same. Human beings are cruel (Machiavelli) and every one takes advantage of his own situation.

Now let me post-mortem marriage: it’s nothing but an unequal relationship between a powerful man and a powerless woman. You don’t believe my words? Ok, then just ask your sweet hubby to stay with you at your old place for some time (not even for an entire life) and behave exactly the same way as you do in his house. If he agrees, let me know, I promise to criticize, reject, amend and alter my very own definition of marriage.

This piece has no literary value; this piece should be thrown into the waste-paper basket. But this is truth. And truth, I believe can be uttered like this, without allegory, without literature to show that we are not fools, we understand, we realize, but we love you so much that we compromise, adjust, and adapt to any kind of situation only for your happiness; but when you don’t give value to us and treat us like a commodity, the world ends for us, trust dissolves and we start to loose our very ownselves.

Please realize…damn it!

[Dedicated to one of my best friends for whom I care a lot.]

19^th May 2011’ Thursday

2.00 am

Eta lala ke

Amader barita chilo onyorokomer – kholamela, jamjamat, ar sarakhan hattagol. Barite visitors der jonno kono register rakha thakto na, jei byabostha office charao poysaoyala lokeder bari ba flat e dekha jay. Tobe akhon afsosh hoy tar jonno karon seta thakle aj seta hoto amader barir aitihasik-samajik dalil. Ke aseni amader barite – Alokranjan Dasgupta theke suru kore Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay, Manindra Gupta, Debarati Mitra, Amalendu De, aro koto ke.

Amra kono banedi poribar noi – na kono ‘boroboro namidami’ lok. Kintu amar chotodida (amar lala) chilo kobi manush – Debanjali Mitra. Tar ‘Patar Manabi’ aj o kobider kache khub akarshaniyo.

Chotobelar pray puro samaytai amar keteche lalar sahacharje. Lalar amake niye chilo jato ahlad, ar amar tar kache samasta abdar. ‘Chander Pahar’, ‘Pather Panchali’, aro nana desh bidesher (Greek mythology, Russian short stories) galpo lala roj sonata amake. Kakhono birokto hoto na amr upar. Tar klantohin chokhduto sabsamay khuje berato amar sukh, amar tripti. Kono kobita likhleo tar prothom srota hotam ami – bujhi na bujhi ami abar take interpret kore tar upar comment ditam, lala tai sune vison heshe amay kache tene jorie chumu dito. Lala pan kheto khub, tar pan er gandher sathe meshano mukher gandho ami chokh bandho korle aj o khuje pai. Mangsho ranna hole ami valo khai dekhe, konodino amay na khaiye se khabar mukhe tulto na. Mona (amar chotodadu) bolto, “tomar adorei o gollay jabe.” Kintu lalar biswas chilo ami gollay jabo na – tar amar prati driro astha chilo.

Aj ami 26 – jibone alpo-bistor settle koreci. Anek jhar-jhanja-pratikulata perie tike achi, chokhe aka ache aro anek swapno. Kintu aj lala nei – nei tar sajatne sajano phulbagan; sudhu roeche monar bado gharer dewale tanano tar ekta sundar chobi, ar pasher gharer take rakha badhano abasthay koekta collage kora chobi ar tar 38 bachar boyeshe lekha sesh ‘Desh’ a prakashito kobita ‘Mrityu’. Kobitata lala tar mrityur koekdin age likhechilo.

Samay palteche dhire dhire ar samayer sathe sathe samparko. Monar sathe amar katha nei bahudin, tai jatayat o nei ar dotalar ghare. Lala jakhon jibita chilo ektao din jayni je ami school theke firei, siri diye ek lafe tar ghare giye, tar sada chadorer talay dhuke, take jorie dhore, chumu kheye tar kach theke galpo sunini. Ar aj atai ekta galpo.

Dewal e tanano chobitay hoyto dhulo pore geche, hoyto ba poreni. Kintu asob amar syllabus a ar kothay! Baro hoechi, chakrir subade edik odik jete hoy, koekta jayga, jar naam lalar kach thekei prothom sunechilam aj koto kache, ar amar oporer oi gharta amar theke koto dure sore geche.

Baritao palte geche anek – abadha, nishup, ar sarakhon hattagol.

9^th May 2011, Monday

1.10 pm

Inconsistent flow of thoughts...

Culture matters, value-system, taste, and ideology matter a lot. I don’t want to go into the various definitions of these terminologies put forward by Hoebel, Eagleton and others to show my knowledge and intellect on the subject and display and impose my superiority on others which is the trend currently. I simply know that these things matter a lot and now my practical experience has solidified my old knowledge.

In my childhood I used to cry thinking I won’t be able to compete with the rich fellow mates of my class and cursed by grandpa for not being able to nourish me in an elite family. My grandpa always smiled at this stupid desire of mine. One day he taught me something that left a permanent imprint on my mind. He said, “Why do you always compare yourself with the better-offs?” He added, “Always thank God that He has shaped you in a perfect way, that you are not physically or mentally impaired.” I was convinced and the shabby images of poor crying children on the by-lanes of the filthy parts of the city appeared in my inner eyes. I never cursed grandpa since then. Now I often preach this axiom to my friends and students, but I fail to convince them. Either I have poor influencing skills or they are too mature, recent worldly products to accept it.

Do you know why are we dissatisfied souls? It’s because our demands and needs accumulate more quickly than our wealth and wisdom. Sheer materialism enters into our body like a poisonous serpent, pollutes it and then transforms our souls.

In our childhood we cry when we don’t get a lollypop or a balloon. But the moment the lollypop or the balloon is in front of us we become the happiest persons in the world. In our adulthood we cry when we can’t purchase a flat. But the moment the flat is in front of us we want a car. Then the new, fashionable car generates the urge of having something else, something bigger, and the vicious cycle continues…

Do you know why we fail to retain a relationship? It’s because we want more importance than the person at the other end; we want our things to be heard at, we want our priorities to get accomplished, and gradually without even knowing, we start imposing our demands on someone who we think we love the most. Again, the person at the other end also repeats the same set of things. Eventually, demand clashes with demand, priority with priority, and finally emotion with emotion. Demand supersedes over demand, priority over priority, and emotion over emotion. When our demand, priority and emotion supersede we are gratified; our friends congratulate that at last our 'unconditional' love has changed the mind of the person. When our demand, priority and emotion are superseded; our friends nullify our efforts, and we immediately get ready to create and flesh out stronger demands, priority and emotion to win the next time. When we fail repeatedly we start hating. People (and also we) think that our love has changed to hatred. But it was neither love nor hatred for the person at the other end; it is love and hatred for our own. The philosophy of “possessive individualism” dominates too much and it gradually destroys us.

I know you will say I have uttered bullshits and at times repeated the old, simple truths which are no longer acceptable in today’s world of ‘Social Darwinism’. But if it’s ‘old’, ‘simple’ and ‘true’ (bearing all the traits of a sage) why can’t we take it? You will ask me to stop now and think that I am drunk. But I am not. Still, let me stop; the piece (if at all) has lost its track much earlier. I should stop now as I would not edit it to make it consistent. Let it be my…let’s say ‘inconsistency unedited.’

(Note: Someone has said, "inconsistency is the simple awareness of the world of stark contradictions.")

9^th May 2011, Monday

12.40 pm

Preface sort of..

I am influenced by someone to express myself through words. She has an entire write up on influence, research, plagiarism, etc. So, I am thinking to put the author’s surname and the date of publication within brackets (xyz, 2011). You know this is my problem… and I think I am insulting her and I should never publish.

I was not like this from the beginning. Yes, I always wanted to focus and get myself established, earning my own decent livelihood and that of my mother. But I was never a materialistic one who studied to sell her proposal. I never expected anything from books except knowledge. But I am not the same anymore. I still enjoy reading but always try to think whether another project proposal can be written in that framework. I am not criticizing the approach. But sometimes I start hating myself and my nearest one’s consolation also fail to convince me.

Childhood is the golden times in life whatever difficulties you face. Then once you start growing up, it’s always that you hate others or others hate you (except the persons at your immediate workplace…you or they cannot afford to do that). You turn hypocrite as you grow up and let me warn you: if anyone says that he/she is not a hypocrite that is a false statement, a statement that itself reflects hypocrisy.

I also want to write and express like others. In articles, project proposals, and other professional things you can write, open an entire avenue of new research, put your original insights, but may be you can’t express the mound of personal thoughts and feelings that remains accumulated in the deepest layer of your heart. I now want to dig that mound and explore my feelings; I want to write to express. I don’t want to modify, change and revise them. I would place them raw – they would be my EXPRESSIONS UNEDITED!