hello first monday of June 2014

I really want to take this one page a day challenge seriously. God knows if I will be able to keep up at it. Jury is day after. Film is still not ready. It has become so windy here. And I have to pack also. Suddenly it hit me that how this day was so different a month back. And two months back. And six months back. And specially an year back.
Still stuck. Still confused. Still hung up on. But happy for a change. Although won't be able to witness the amazing Pune weather before leaving for Delhi. And as I reach home, their will be BA exams waiting for me.  How amazing. But before that I just want to go to Cafe garden once. Have their amazing Irani chai and watch the kittens who must have grown up now from a distance. I have never stayed away from it this long. It's been three weeks now. And so much has changed and happened in three weeks itself. I have been loved-hated-adored-hugged-kissed-ignored-shunned and silenced all of a sudden in one go in just a span of three weeks. Wow. Talk about life not ignoring you sometimes. And forcing you to sip dirty martinis.
I still dream of having a one room house with a big window in some corner of the camp area in Pune.
And then I think how beautiful this day was an year ago. People kept their promises and love. There was freedom and hope. But accompanied with a lot of illusion. All that is gone now. And the illusion too. For the good I guess.
It doesn't look like Im going to Kashmir this june after all.
So it will be pretty much Delhi heat and rains.

Long time and no see again.

One more week in this city this semester.Pretty much to myself. And my keyboard spacebar is really really fucked.
I don't know what to feel right now. Considering the highly overtly dramatic person I am interms of words and not speech, it feels weird to face loss in the matters of heart again and again. And then you just gather yourself thinking that at least you haven't fallen apart entirely and the film which you are working on for the last six months is now coming alive on the editing table.
Maybe Film makers have to face all this. Maybe that character of canteen owner from the movie ROCKSTAR was right. You have to be heartbroken.
Worse or best, is when you can't put that person to shame. Why? It wasn't their fault! It was yours entirely. It was ours entirely. And then the whole saga of forgive yourself and forgive everyone and move on and star afresh starts. Knowing or unknowingly.
Memories and nostalgia scented moments will be turned hopefully into screenplays and storyboards. Old places will be less visited. Or will stay in occasionally taken photographs.
Will have to resort to our own bodies to derive the pleasures we din't even know that existed when awakened by their kiss on our feet while we were asleep.
we are faced with their questions of 'what do you want?' even when they know that all we need is nothing but them. How hard it is to understand?
Why unrequited love is so important to infuriate, enrage or engage us so that we can shut ourselves from love again and indulge only in personal gratification.
Why communication itself is so difficult when it actually makes everything so easy. Or why do we ALWAYS fall prey to the beast called PSEUDO Relationship. These terms and tags and labels have always been confusing and repelling for a person who ends up feeling like a stupid 16 year old in love after every failure in life.
They say failure in a relationship is two sided. Never one. And you always see it coming. Some even anticipate for it. But what about those who slept one night peacefully and the next in tears? Those who never get an answer for why they were loved one day and ignored the other. Those who were treated to be faded away from everyone's and their own memories. Weren't we always honest about our feelings? Din't we make ourselves clear? Din't we tell them not to keep us on hold? Then even after million pleadings and infinite kisses later, It is always the one who loves is never answered to.
They talk behind our backs. They share us with those who shared them in the past.
We think we gave our everything into this and for them it was just messing around.
And yet we keep telling ourselves that they aren't bad. They aren't bad and yes they are indeed bad.
Sometimes it doesn't really hurt to accept the reality because you know that all the courage we took to fall in this and get hurt in the first place, they don't possess even an atom of it.
Maybe over the course of time, we will grow up as they wanted to see us to be but not for them. They won't be their to see it neither they deserve to.
We will finally take that bus or train which we had taken once with them. But this time we will go alone and for ourselves. When we will finally be independent even though we were never dependent on them.  And we will stop visiting places which they loved because as much as they are dear to them, they are more than that to us.
It's not even my city you know. All though I owe it to this place for keeping me alive even in the worst situations. Debt is not that bad a word too.

Here is a picture of Ritu's Fibi.
She is a cute lil creature who doesn't know what all this means.
What all we humans go through willingly and unwillingly.
All of us. Even them.

Pune 411038

No good and enough pictures from Goa this time.
Writing due to lack of sleep.
Insomnia can be productive sometimes.
I think I am overestimating myself.
I forgot to wish a friend happy birthday.
And Im still just a friend and liability for someone very close.
I think I know way too many good people but just do not know how to use them for my benefit.
Had a month full of co-incidences. Self realization and more.
The shoot today was good.
Im not even very happy with my shoot in Goa this week.
But I met and spoke to more than two very good souls.
Letsee what happens at the editing table.

Im not allowed to fall in love. 

So now it is time to go back in disguise once again.

It is time to go back and become a rock again. 

Lives around me are collapsing, some are struggling to rise from the dust, some are already dust, and some are settling down back again on the ground after the process of loading. 

The feelings of distrust/betrayal/disloyalty etc are coming back.

Suspicion level is high once again. 

The judgement on life has already been passed. 

Once again there is negativity in the air. 

And they say it's all in the head. 

sshh!!!! Don't say all this on a public forum!

arrey arrey! talk to someone in private!

Oh please! Don't start whining all over again man!

Oh! Thankgod! It's a wake up call for you now finally! 

NOW GET UP. AT LEAST NOW WAKE UP.

Fix that cycle. 

I think it's beyond repair. 

You owe your life to someone else and it is not yours. 

Voila. 

I want to make films. I want to make love. And kids maybe someday. 

I am also scared of immature kids stealing my stories. Hence I refrain from narrating it to them like an old granny. 

I don't miss mine. She is wicked. Never told me a single story. 

The night is bitter again. 

Somehow this part of Pune makes me write obnoxious stuff. 

Stuff nobody cares to read or reflect upon. 

It's a burden to love you. 

And it's even more painful to carry the burden of trying to accept myself all the time. 

Nothing happened. 

It's all so fragmented. This place is so fragmented. 

Loved and be alienated again. 

Measure everything and then control everything. 

Unconditional and Expectation can never go hand in hand. 

I don't think there were any mosquitos biting that night.

As much as they are biting now. 

Writing has gone beyond the highest limits of ambiguity now. 

Yes. This is indeed a rant of a misunderstood human being. 

And I empathize with all of you. 

Take care. 

The ATM never works here. At least there is good music in the world.

I want a house where I only make dinner and love. Where there is a huge wall size window looking out into what that particular city looks like. A small gadda aligned right next to it. Every time i spend my monsoon weekend evenings with a mug of tea, the raindrops better splash unto my face too. The corner next to the shower room and kitchen should be where i sit head into my lap with legs touching my chest and face.

Dining should happen on the kitchen floor. cross legged. I will play all the old cassettes I have on an old tape If i can. Breathless/Aqua/Munni Begum/Ghulam Ali...

All of them. whatever is left now. 

There should be a sofa. More of an armchair. Just to watch films sitting on. It should be old and rough. Cozy with my own warmth. The table next to it should be small and big enough to take the burden of all my books. Read and unread. My alma-rih should have that one special place for my camera and the clothes I would wear and not wear on of one of those lovely days. Days when I only get to love and love more. And still get to sleep like a baby. And shower room be door less. Sheers would do. Sometimes. 

This house I will build everyday piece by piece. 

Now is the time to start reading The Surgeon Of Crowthorne.

The ATM  wasn't working again today. So had to step out of the campus. 

It is said if you stand under a railway bridge while a train pass on it, Every wish or prayer you make turns out to be true.

I don't know If my life took those prayers way too easily and is hell bent on making them true. I don't even want to live here anymore. I only dream for a house right now. And good food. I know I have these unrealistically and impractical small expectations from life. Par ab kya karein. 

Or it is life's yet another joke on me being played in full volume. 

I ate some really bad food in the evening yesterday. Sometimes places with an old charm trick you into doing so. Like all the god things in life. Port wine tastes amazing but the squeezes and churns the life out of my intestines making my brain go blow itself out. 

I'm yet to receive my parcel from amazon. 

I thought college life would be fun. 

It is just one word. Inconvenient. 

I pray that all this ends one day. I pray while I stand under the railway bridge while Azaad Hind Express or Jhelum pass over it. 

To be in the city of bridges

Glad that i was back again with an old friend. Testing times you know. So Sunday afternoon I go to that part of the Pune city which tricked me into actually loving it. Shaniwar Peth. Chai used to be for Rs. 7 over there when I had my first misal paav with some batchmates including Swaroopa and Amit Deshmukh Sir.
And then I got the chance to sip on the same tea after two years and eight months for Rs. 10 while Renu and Himalay gulped down glasses of Sugarcane juice each. It felt good to be in the 'sheher' again. Followed by maharashtrian lunch on a lazy sunday afternoon made by a beautiful lady. And then the toil of a student film shoot went on for the next few hours. Sunday well spent. Regardless of the fact how dicy my academic life seems like at the moment.
So ready to head back to our respective shit holes, for some reason I am left stranded on the road near one of the Pune city bridges with my friend and then we wait while coming to a decision on as to where to go or not go. The next moment we see fireworks, And my friend goes " Pune the city of bridges" and laughs it off. Sarcastically i guess. I just guess. Not sure.
An auto is taken towards the other developed Non-Pune like part of the city, passing by lottery ticket stores and buildings and buildings which don't seem to be hanging on in my memory, cause all I care now is for some sleep.
I reach. I collapse. I wake up and eat. And all the merry takes place in front of me in a flash of a few tiring and happy hours.
And then you wake up to the morning with a content feeling you were longing for since ages.
Brunch time becomes crisp. Im still wearing the same clothes and they stink. Of sleep and sweat and warmth.
I leave and reach Cafe Garden. And spend time with all the things lovely. Like the cats and cups of tea. My second favorite after the Shaniwar peth chai. Religion changes. Area changes. The taste of chai differs. But it all tastes good. The difference in taste is amazingly good. Why can't we just accept it?
Anyway.
I'm not alone at the cafe anymore. I have all the things lovely and real for the next 3-4 hours. I finally say goodbye.
I see the cashier at the counter change from the afternoon fellow to the evening one. He was happy to see me again. Again and not alone.
The Chaass at Cafe Garden sucks by the way.
But fireworks and moments of short lived happiness juxtaposed against a cool breeze of air at 8 pm in the evening is a sight to feel. 

3:45 am today.

I see two pair of legs lying side by side with the rest of the bodies, as i myself lay right next to them, on my right side. A little further is a cupboard on which a few books and stationery is kept, and a bottle of port wine, in which there is some amount of liquid left, waiting to be consumed, or rather, the liquid consuming me itself.

Right infront of it is a big window. With transparent sliding doors. Most of even that is covered by a dull yellow thick curtain. 

The street light is falling on the wall next to the cupboard and the woman's legs. The smoothness of the skin is tempting. His legs are just there. Just casually. And carefree. And tired. 

All I can hear is the cars outside on sv road. And the fan on full speed to keep the mosquitos away. Fail. Why this city doesn't sleep. Well there are many reasons. But so peaceful. I wish i could just lie here and look at the motor vehicles passing by outside as well. Keep a count of them and then unknowingly just fall asleep. Consumed by sleep itself. Night time insomnia is sometimes a beautiful thing to happen. 

But then again its not a thing. Which i can keep inside an almirah or Sandook  whenever i want to and take it out and spend time with it while I along with others become busy loosing our senses. It would have been great that way though. 

I don't want to wake them up. 

I don't want to wake anybody up. 

Not even myself.

In other 15 minutes or so, my grandparents living near the river will get up and go for a dip. 

Wish i could just dip in the sea nearby for ever. 

And washed all my sins including my existence. 

I can't even see the sun from here. Just the sunlight. Hope i can see it soon.

i don't know what to believe right now.

A 50 year old man saying love is a test of time.

And 23 year old man saying love fades away. And it is mortal. Just like us. Worse than us. 

I'm scared to believe at the moment.

I should shut my laptop now. Can't afford to wake them up.

Sleep is beautiful indeed.  

Out of all the things romantic

So all of a sudden in all this nonsense, I'm reminded of some visuals from a movie i loved watching as a kid. I just could not remember the name. I remember there was a boy who sketched really well. He sketched some fishes in his small sketchbook. There was an old man who dies in the end. And a beautiful mansion where i always dreamed of living in. Thats all i could recall from the film. And the fact that the boy and the girl kissed while drinking water from the same fountain tap. Every time. While i was going through a facebook page about movie quotes and all, i came across this image with Bob DeNiro and Ethan Hawke in it. A movie named GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

























Now this my friends happened after ages. This is the film/movie we are talking about here. Ethan
Hawke, DeNiro, Gwyneth Paltrow and Anne Bancroft as the lady who messes things up but who happened to be my favorite character in the movie at the time i watched it on Star Movies with my family when i was 6 or 7 years old. I read the reviews on imdb recently and turned out that the movie dint do really well. But who cares. My mystery got solved. I found my film. A dreamfilm rather. Something which defined the features of romance and fantasy for me when i was a young kid. And something i forgot the essence of over the period of these few years spent in character building and education.

Well, another movie which played all the romantic chords in my heart this year was Dedh Ishquia. Whether it was the old school romance factor in it, the light each time Madhuri Dixit entered the frame or the urdu shayari which was spoiled by the english subtitles in the theater or simply the fact that it had the typical adaa and style straight from the states of northern provinces or Uttar Pradesh, more specifically the Lucknow and its nearby areas made the movie hopelessly and helplessly romantic for me. Yes the story was quite loose. And an unsatisfactory ending. Something which can be said for romance as well. It has no ending. It has it's own chapters and phases and stages. Like the seven ones they mentioned in the movie. In all, it reminded me of the times when i used to take a bus to travel in old Pune city area while listening to Ghulam Ali Saahab on my phone or the times when i traveled on a cycle rickshaw in chandni chowk New Delhi every time i had to go to Khalsa Brothers to buy my half yearly supplies of Art material and all that back in school days. Yes this is exactly how the whole movie looked like to me. This warm yellow light is always flattering. Isn't it?

All this leads me to the point. The time i visited Lucknow last December and fell in love with the city all over again. Had the best Litti-Chokhha and the best chaat. Something which is so rare to find where i currently live. Of course where i live has some other amazing things to offer, but roots are roots. And love makes you splurge and indulge in all the things u can. So December winters, christmas time, great food and amazing people, i made a trip to Bada Imambara and then the BHOOL BHULAIYA inside. Pictures, well beautiful.

Yes! and it's amazing!

Our Guide

The persian hall, the largest hall to constructed without pillars in Asia

Hazrat Ganj Market. Best Chikan fabric and Chaat. 

 outside BNA, Lucknow, U get the best Litti chokhaa, a typical bihari/UP dish which is crucial to our culture for 15 bucks a plate. Well. You don't get it anywhere else specially down south. And even if you do the taste isn't as authentic as it should be. 

So. Just go to Lucknow and live the romance in whatever you do. Shop, eat or just take a walk along the old Awadhi architecture.