Trichur

Today my first leg and four day sojourn at Trichur comes to an end. I had a great lazy time in this city, eating, sleeping, watching the rains and occasionally visiting the city, mostly making parikramas around it’s heart, the Vadkkunathan Kshetram.

Trichur is a pathetic place to live in, if you have to attend school or go to work everyday; but it is a beautiful place if you are someone who has enough time at your disposal, good health, a bar full of variety liquor and a good mallu cook at home. Thankfully, I was on a vacation and I belonged to the latter category. Although the rains tempted me to, I didn’t do the liquor thingy this time, and that’s the only anguish that I am taking away from this city. I am sure, I will be back soon, and find enough room and reasons for doing that.

Trichur is a beautiful, vibrant and lively city. Unlike the desert where I spent my days just a week back, each little miniscule of land on this place is infused with life. Why only land, there’s life flourishing even on compound walls built around our apartment building. The funny thing though, is that every time I land here, I get a feeling like I am dead and in the heavens. And frankly, if this is the heavens, I would rather prefer to live a dead life like this.

The very moment I landed here, I was inspired to write; to write about this place, its rains, the greenery, its temples, its churches, its people and those silk and gold shops that I know, do more business than Corporates based in metro cities and listed on prime stock exchanges. The sad thing though, was that, the moment I started writing, I realized that I was short of words. It is not easy to write apt about a thing of beauty. One must be highly endowed and blessed with the right talent to do so. Anyways, I have decided to go ahead and write a few lines. I hope I have done justice. If not, please forgive.

Quatrains on Trichur - The city, its rains and its people.

It’s Heart

A one way roundabout,

as big as the city itself.

On whose centre lodges,

who else, but mighty Shiva Himself.

It’s Transport

Flying Auto Rickshaws,

driven by self proclaimed pilots.

With passenger seats big enough,

to fit four extra large buttocks.

Private Transport busses,

with little girl and boy names.

Speeding, avoiding potholes,

splashing muck on the by lanes.

It’s Buildings

Piercing Church spires,

taller than the tallest towers.

Their bare moist walls,

held by slimy algae, and creepy climbers.

It’s Business

Multi storied garment shops,

sell wedding saris like hot breads.

Alongside shimmering gold boutiques,

that trade jewellery like peanuts.

The Ambience

Moist cloudy days,

and cool cosy nights.

Verdant green plots,

and slippery cobbled tiles.

Rains playing concert on a temple,

Lashing the trussed plastic rooftop.

In an ethereal fusion symphony

with drummers and birds chirping atop.

Beautiful, bright motley flowers,

smiling on smelly garbage dumps.

And those hidden white lotuses,

peeping out of roadside drain culverts.

Moss carpets, creepers and plants,

decorate bare walls along the road.

Fertilized by voluntary mallu men,

easing bladders, squatting tiptoed.

My Keralam.

Part 1 - God's own Country

Golden Showers and Trumpets adorn each lawn,

Yawning over naked walls of Laterite stone.

Here fungi finds its serene abode,

and every drop of rain recites an ode.

The land of majestic tuskers, and birds galore.

For the earnest, there’s wildlife, plenty to explore

Dragonflies on rocks, along beaches that glow,

In this land my friend, life is slow.

Lazy mornings on a hammock, lie each,

followed by rummy and toddies by the beach.

Crisply fried shrimps and mussels too,

where each moment is akin a heavenly déjà vu.

God’s Own Country, this land is for sure,

and every moment on its lap, is so pure.

Where religions collide and live in harmony,

Her tongue, The Malayalam, is a soulful symphony.

My Keralam,

The most beautiful art thou

You, my mother, my dearest,

How dearly I love you.

Picture lifted from my cousin, Binoy Bennet's FB Photo Album - 'My Homeland'

Part 2 - God's own People

I see buxom lassies and their supple midriffs,

 sway to the breeze in their kasavu veshtis

Their luscious eyes, deep as the sea

and that playful smile hidden deep beneath

distract bare-chested lads as they play kalari

and that Theyyam face, goes fierce ruddily.

Yes friends, what they say is true,

If the land is beautiful, its people are too.

My Keralam,

The most beautiful art thou

You, my mother, my dearest,

How dearly I love you.

Ramadan Kareem

Ramadan Kareem to all my friends.

It is Ramadan, and what a wonderful time to begin my second year in blog writing; especially starting with a blog about it.

Although I am myself not a follower of Islam, through my interactions with my many Muslim friends I’ve gathered to know enough about this religion and here are some things that I know:

The essence of Ramadan is to become humble, simple and free from all ill-will, anger, meanness and hate.

Earlier I used to wonder, why we humans require a special month every eleven odd months to become genuinely good and humble; shouldn’t we be good all the time?

In the same lines, there’s something that I’d keep telling my elder son Kevin, and that’s “If you are good, you have to be good all the time, and not just during those periods when we are around the toy shop or a candy kiosk” and invariably he would reply back “Okay Papa, I’ll be good all the time”. He’d also add in saying that he’d take care of this new toy and never ever break it and be a good boy all the time. But as time would pass, he’d become the same little angry boy, turning into Hulk, throwing around his toys, back answering, rebutting our advices, troubling his little brother, so on and so forth. Well, that’s how kids are, aren’t they? And I guess that’s how God Almighty sees us; like a kid. For Him, we are all his little kids and I guess the Holy month of Ramadan is God Almighty’s much bigger version of ‘prove that you are good’ time that I impose on my little kid from time to time.

The month of Ramadan is to be spent experiencing goodness and not to be endured as a pain.

Growing up in Gujarat, India, I never realized when the Holy month of Ramzan commenced and even finished. I’d realize that a month of fasting had ended only when it was Eid holiday. I remember, while in the Higher Secondary School, in my class I had two brothers who were Muslims. Both of them were not good in academics, and had ended up in my class after repeated failures. Although cliché says that bad academics equates to bad personality, I found them extremely fantastic human beings, great friends and true Muslims. During the month of Ramzan, they’d fast, and we’d not even know that they were fasting. During the recess breaks, we’d have our Tiffin and they’d just sit there chatting with us without bothering. Although fasting, they’d always be cheerful through the day, and like any one of us, they attend school; take part in sports and other such activities. I particularly remember that the elder brother was also our hockey team captain and would play tournaments without cringing while fasting. No complaints at all.

Many years later, I was in Dubai, and during my initial days, used to commute a lot using public transport. On one such Ramadan day, I had been waiting for almost two hours at a bus stop on the Al Wasl Road and eventually found an illegal taxi run by an Afghani Pathan. This guy had a weary look on his face and haggled a lot with me asking me to pay up twice a much arguing that soon it would be dusk and that all roads leading to Sharjah would be chock-a-block with the returning traffic. For a long time he went about persistently bargaining, which was mostly laced with ill temper directed at I don’t know whom and what. Anyways, since there was no other transport in sight and since the buses too wouldn’t let me in as they were full, I gave in. Once in the taxi, I experienced the heat from hell as he let himself loose cursing me on finding out that I was not one from the community and that I had not fasted. Later, as we entered Sharjah, he just dropped me off at the King Faisal Street denying any further ride saying that if he dropped me to my destination (that is my In laws house at Al Hazana), he would lose that seat for Iftar outside the King Faisal Mosque.  I got down and walked home, feeling pity and sorry for this man.

I am a great fan of the local Al Jazeera TV and few days back, I was watching a documentary on the many startling opposites that exist in India’s little brother and Islamic state of Pakistan.

In the first part of this documentary they showed events taking place within a training camp in a remote and far away town nestled within its northern territories. There were young lads, barely four or five years elder to my elder son. They had cute innocent faces with rosy cheeks, and in their little hands they bore Kalashnikovs and were shown aggressively chanting some very angry and jehadi slogans, the real meaning of which, I am sure, they were yet not aware of.

In the second part a group of some forty odd tough looking huge middle aged men, clad in pathani suits, some with handle bar moustaches and fierce looking eyes played soothing violin, practicing for the Sachal Orchestra in Lahore.

I was touched and realized that looks can indeed be deceptive, needless to mention, every guy who wears a long beard and an Islamic cap need not be a menacing terrorist and that the least that we could do is to not be judgemental and jump on to conclusions before we actually get to know his heart.

As I end this blog, I pray to Allah to touch those little boys and bless them, to replace their Guns with Violins and save them from the clutches of those men who have bound them. Amen.