On Spiritual Enlightenment

Graceful porcelain feet garlanded with tiny enchanting bells; a twinkling, mischievous eye lined regally with kohl; the tiniest glimpse of pearly teeth clamped coquettishly on ripened ruby lips; an unblemished naval peeking seductively from behind the curtain of a sari mundhi swaying flirtatiously in the breeze. In describing my visit to Munnar Kerala what first comes to mind is every cliched heroine introduction of Tamil cinema of the early 90s. And like those oft overdone introductions, the allure of Munnar lies in the fact that all we ever see are glimpses, fleeting hints of an incredible beauty which are enough to leave our minds obsessively addled.

Munnar is an ever morphing puzzle: blink once during this cruel cosmic flip book and you will miss a lifetime. The same hilltop shifts from affable gurgling baby robed in splendid golden hues, to pristine spring maiden christened with refreshing dewy mists, to melancholic enigma shrouded in dramatic, swirling cloud banks- all within the span of mere minutes.

No number of pixels can do justice to the beauty of Munnar!

Travelling in Munnar is first and foremost an assault of the senses. The heady, pervasive scent of tea leaves offers a seductive intoxication of the nostrils while the sour twang of roadside green mango, followed promptly by the satisfying burn of chili, enthralls the taste buds. Refreshing sprinkles from the monsoon make fleeting appearances throughout the day, offering gentle caresses persuasive enough to encourage one to lose the umbrella. A cup of lemon tea offers the perfect antidote to the bite of the crisp, clean air, and as its warmth spreads within you, the heavily Malayalam-accented Tamil of the elderly tea-master washes over you in waves, fading seamlessly into the now reassuring pitter-patter of the rain starting up again.

I'm not sure when it will occur to you- I suppose it happens at different times to different people- but assuredly you will have your moment too. That one indescribable feeling, the bittersweet anxiety that comes of being engrossed in a good thing and then coming to the realization that nothing hereafter can ever measure up to this one flawless occurrence. It is that breathtaking instance when one feels the closest one has ever felt to the divine, when everything in the cosmos just seems to make sense. Standing on top of Munnar's Top Station, enveloped by the majesty of the surroundings, I can definitely say that I had one such moment.

Photos credits go to the lovely Archz.      

On Bad Behavior

What is it about being away from home that makes us so boisterously rambunctious? Is it the comfort of anonymity, the unwritten pact for revelers everywhere that what "happens in Vegas stays in Vegas"?

Pretty much sums up how I behaved when we stopped for lunch at the amazing Kumar Mess.

Or is it the thought of being surrounded by loved ones that entices us to let loose; to be as obnoxiously loud and uncouth as possible; to burst inappropriately into boorish laughter at things whose humor is suspect at best, or to bray tunelessly and deafeningly the songs whose lyrics we do not know and yet which we willfully choose to butcher anyway.

Several of the usual suspects surveying the Thirumalainaicker Mahal

What is it about a change in scenery which persuades us to humiliate ourselves on film and in pixels, recording our shame for time immemorial, and on a related note, why do we expressly choose to pull the most unattractive faces and kitschy poses on just such occasions?

Caught in the act: not completely sure why we are shooting the backside of the goat ;)

Can it all be chalked up to the seductions of a sinfully decadent chocolate brownie, or to the welcome respite of a frosty glass of roadside jikarthanda, consumed greedily without a second thought for either waistline or other vastly more unpleasant intestinal consequences.

Never a dull moment in a sleepy temple town.

Whatever the case may be, Madurai 2012 you were AWESOME and here's to Kochi 2013 :)

PS: Photo credits go to my lovely cousins and partners-in-crime Archz and JSat.

On Expression

Here's a post that's been languishing for months in the purgatory that is my drafts folder. Thought it was high time I published.....

This will not be another post on an "Open Letter to a Dehli Boy". Countless arguments and rebuttals, some more eloquent and thoughtful than others, have already been exhausted on the subject, judging by the viral nature of the article in question on Twitter, Facebook etc. My purpose in this post is to explore the nature of the responsibility we as bloggers have in exercising our right to publish our views, uncensored, on a very public platform. While I cannot condone the devisive and violently hostile tone of "Open Letter," let me be the first to admit that I understand the author's misguided attempt to vent some very obvious pent-up frustration.

When I first started blogging, I envisioned the blogosphere as a sort of virtual pen pal world, a platform for me to send out my anonymous message in a bottle and receive some affirmation back, that I was not the only one in this world to be thinking these thoughts, feeling this way. From all the comment threads of the numerous blogs I religiously read, I really saw blogging as an engine to meet like-minded people, each of us struggling and encouraging one another to keep at our craft, feeling the power of our words finally reaching an audience. There was a relief in the anonymity and the lack of face to face contact, making it so much easier to say the things that should be said but are often too delicate to say in person.

In the end, it seems that this very anonymity, with its concurrent lack of accountability, is the very pitfall of blogging as a platform for expression. When does honesty traverse the boundary into intolerance, racism and bigotry?

My own struggles with blogging do not answer such lofty questions, but they do bring up other issues that have been weighing on my mind. In generating content for this blog I realize that my style has often been wavering and indecisive, one post hardly ever related to the other. Although at some point, I seriously considered making this spot a venue for my fiction, the common denominator I seem to have settled on instead is my own life. I realized early on in my writing career that if you cannot be honest about yourself, laying yourself out uncensored on the page, vulnerable to criticism, you cannot expect to write convincingly about another. Personally, I believe this is why the fiction of most budding writers is so juvenile; the stories can be nothing other than contrived when the author has not breathed his life blood into his creation, the pages themselves a reflection of his own soul.

Which brings me back to my current dilemma, one faced by countless bloggers before my time and one sure to plague those who will come for years after. Where do we draw the line for what we make public on the internet? Some of the posts I have written are incredibly raw, literally demons wrested from my subconscious from some darker time in my life, spewed violently out on the internet for everyone to witness the depths of my vulnerability. Though everything I wrote is an earnest depiction of what I was feeling at that time and I have absolutely no regrets on what I have published to date, as with every other human being, my views on the issues may have changed with the healing hand of time.

Is it just that I am still judged on a remark I made years earlier, etched indelibly in html as perpetual evidence of my guilt? Is it right that people exploit my candor, assuming that they know everything about me on the basis of a few posts about my life, selected admittedly with a deliberately editorial hand and often stylistically embellished to appeal to my audience? Am I compelled to edit my thoughts for fear of this judgement, or worse yet should I sacrifice my art on the altar of acceptance? I did do this for a time on this blog, a dark time when blinded by the allure of page views and adoring comments, I succumbed to the pressure to sacrifice my artistic integrity, choosing breezy topics sure to earn a few laughs over the thoughts I truly felt the urge to pen.

My answer to the queries voiced above is an emphatic NO!!!!! across the board. I think I have finally gathered the courage to say that I will continue to pen my thoughts, uncensored and sans apology. After all, there will always be things that need to be said but go on unheard because we are too afraid to say them. I hope by my example that I can encourage others to lift up their voices and shout with pride, albeit with tolerance and respect for the views of others.

I'm Back

Hi all. I wish I had something witty to say to mark this momentous occasion, but in a move completely out of character, I'm going to keep it brief (yeah right!!!). First of all, my biggest apologies to those precious few of you who keep up with this space. As an avid blog reader myself I empathize with your disgust when you refresh that blog page and discover for the umpteenth time that the last post is still from September '09. Having said that, I think its high time I clear out these cobwebs and get back to spamming your blogger feeds. I hope I have the stamina to make a significant dent in the posting since this upcoming summer will probably be the last chunk of free time I will get for the rest of my life. So wish me luck since who knows when we will meet again.