(have been reading a borrowed book: 'urdu ki behtariin shayari')

iqbal -

"gesu-e-taabdaar1 ko aur bhi taabdaar kar
hosho-khirad2 shikaar kar kalbo-nazar3 shikaar kar

ishq bhi ho hijaab4 mein, husn bhi ho hijaab mein
ya to khud aashkaar5 ho ya mujhe aashkaar kar

tu hai muhite-bekaraan6, mein hun zaraa si aabe-ju7
ya mujhe humkinaar8 kar, ya mujhe bekinaar9 kar

baage-bahisht se mujhe hukme-safar diya thha kyun
kaare-jahan10 daraaz11 hai ab mera intezaar kar

roze-hisaab12 jab mera pesh ho daftare-amal13
aap bhi sharmsaar ho mujhko bhi sharmsaar kar"

1 chamkeele kesh, 2 buddhi, 3 mann, 4 parde mein, 5 prakat, 6 athhah saagar, 7 chhoti nadi, 8 apne se mila le, 9 bekinaaraa, 10 sansaar ka kaam, 11 lambaa, 12 karmon ka pothaa, 13 judgement day

alone surrounded

i'm becoming this recluse in delhi. with none of my very few friends around and working in a place where i dont seem to fit in with the people. no wonder, when the skies suddenly cast grey outside the windows, evryone but me in office is away from their desks. max i can do is open my google reader. that is if i havent been buried under work from my boss. but i do enjoy overworking these days. except looking for data. bhagwan mil jaata hai dhoondne se but data nahin milta. anyway i wasnt intending to talk about work. i meant to talk about my daily crossing of the road from where my dad drops me every morning, with indian curious eyes following me about. while i stare at this isolated forgotten house across the road from the habitat. every day. something like the front door seems to be half open or missing. and yet there is a permanent lock on the gate. and cars and trucks not meaning to move park in front of it. even some windows show the darkness inside. you would think any house meaning to be left shut like this would be at least sealed in some manner. esp like this ideal house anyone could want. with land around it on all four sides as if real estate rates around this area have overlooked this piece. and the wilderness has taken claim. so many days i stop myself from jumping across the low boundary wall on one side and exploring the place. so often i just look at the contrast in the lawns on the two sides of the wall that seperates it from the mausam bhavan. and these days, after dalrymple's writing has made me feel like a reincarnation living in the ghost city of my last life; i wonder who lived here and when. and why is it so forgotten. to be interrupted rudely by a scream from a peacock out of sight. i strain to locate it but it chooses not to reveal. and then i'm back into present day dodging one car after another. its become a ritual to ring the bell as i enter the habitat. i push it with a practised ease, feeling the carving in the wood touching my fingers. lets forget the hours spent in front of my desk for now. they are totally alien when i read the names of the trees in chinmaya. i never noticed the little globules in the old gurudatta till i noticed it was called that and also goolar. and the board on the islamic center building with the initials of the new delhi municipal corp (or the town planning?) commission in hindi. which if read aloud just as written sounds like some raaga going na-di-na-pa-pari. its so true that when you are alone you suddenly become like this receptor. im not sure if that word explains it. what i mean is you suddenly become like this observer and receiver of the littlest words, signs, objects, gestures, manners, almost evrything that this melee of people and the world around you are upto. you overhear snippets of conversation not meant for your ears and smile or even laugh sometimes on the typical nature and predictability of people. you pick up champas fallen on the ground and wonder if its the right name or whether gulchini like your mom says is correct. i even observe people and classify them into types. and then i go to do the little ignored corner bookhouse inside eatopia a favour, by looking at its books. and i find the yellow pages almost amusing and sad at the same time. together with the discounts on them. and sometimes i sit uncomfortably alone in this crowd of loud buzzing people and try and locate others like me. before getting a secluded table where i wont be stared at for eating alone. its an obvious non practise here. and then i roam around art galleries talking to myself about how anyone could call some of these pieces art. and wondering if my life could ever have taken a course in this direction.

sometimes i just love the english language. when it lets u argue with your elders like they were your equals. it reduces them to a simple equating 'you'. no fuss. no unnecessary respect. when they talk shit. actually always. but its specially helpful when you want to gesture at them and prove them ridiculous. its a little difficult to do in hindi what with the trimmings of 'aap' and respect. an angry 'you' sounds desrespectful in some way and yet you can't be blamed for crossing the line.

what the hell is going on in this world? read this

i thought baha'is were totally harmless. what else can you say about a community that has never fretted to get attention in this communally vibrant country, other than to build another beautiful structure in the capital

climate change

its an unusual delhi this month. the old govt buildings look soaked and wet from their terraces downward. you can see their walls drinking in the water. the rain has been beating down on the Mausam Bhavan incessantly for the last day and a half. probably they saw those clouds coming from there. coz even after a whole month of rythmic rain every 2-3 days, we suddenly believe and give credit to the MET deptt's claim that monsoon would hit delhi yday; that it was now high time we let those notorious winds claim ownership of the attacks. so the MET apparently foresaw correctly for the first time, in its life(?)
and now even delhiites who aren't really used to carrying rain protection, can boast of soaked shirts in office just like the island city of our country so proud of each of its catastrophes? but here not all workplaces happily spend the first hour in the morning discussing their flood feats. notice, i say not all. the place where i worked just for a day, did exactly that. though that was much before the MET saw the homogeneity (what did they mean by that?) in the grey clouds from the terrace of Mausam Bhavan.
also, though the climate is definitely changing, its showing signs of cooling down, what with the long winter and brief sunburn we had this year. what happened to the political essays around global warming? looks like the heavens after all set an effective thermostat within the core, foreseeing the evolution of the apes. the kooking koyal that surprised us at our workdesks today seemed to agree. so did the mongoose around here today

i bumped into someone who is a native of, and is even now maybe traveling toward where i once lived. funny thought but talking to him gave me a funny feeling ... like the world that is dead for me actually survives. and thrives. people have moved forward from what i knew them to be. that part of my life which i chose to erase from memory except the beauty of the place, actually breathes and grows. and to top it, this guy seemed to remmber having met my dad when i mentioned his name. making him an unavoidable connection between - me there & the place now

there is something wrong with this world
something wrong in the anger of a human mind when just at that moment a peacock and hen call out to each other under the grey sky
something wrong in human mistrust when the cock flies toward the hen's call
something wrong in greed when the amaltas litters its yellowness so carelessly
something wrong in self pity when the world is so beautiful all around
something terribly wrong in tears when the skies threaten to pour

people suddenly sober down and apologise when they hear of someone's parents' seperation. there is sudenly an excess supply of sympathy for the person, no matter what earlier. but what about when someone's parents haven't had the audacity to declare their incompatibility. possibly one of them was naturally incompatible with any human. what about that stage of in-between when things are no better, maybe even worse, yet not obvious to the outside world, not across the line. when just because they have acquired a daily routine, they have grown banyan roots and they become a sad reality that you can't dispense with. what of those kids? what of that eight-year old praying every night for the longevity of her parents' marriage.
what you don't know doesn't hurt you. doesn't arouse any emotions in you. but what of those who live this story?