...it's only words - Blog

The home that walks

17/3/2020

On the old wooden staircase inside, there is the excited patter of paws. Warm furry bodies throw themselves out of the half open doorway and into the sunlit patch of green where I am lowering myself onto a cane moda. Two handsome Golden Retrievers - with Mocha coffee for fur, and eyes dripping warm chocolate - are suddenly upon us. Gabbar Singh and Bruce Lee - two-third owners of Khanabadosh, the quaint old stone house that we have discovered tucked amidst the pine forests of Mashobra, take guest welcomes very seriously.

After having knocked me into my chair and trying to unsuccessfully climb onto my lap, Gabbar has turned around and is frantically dislodging a big stone lining a flowerbed with bare teeth that he intends to bring me as a gift. Bruce Lee has decided that I am edible. He is chewing up my fingers and briskly moving upwards towards my elbows, his teeth snapping like the infamous turtle. From an upstairs balcony, leans out a pretty woman with a throaty laugh. That’s Geetika Khanna, Army wife and daughter, who decided a few years back that she had had enough of big city lights and left a promising career in one of India’s biggest publishing houses in Delhi, to start a travelling bed and breakfast. One-third owner of Khanabadosh, she is the only one willing to make conversation without sniffing me or chewing me or bringing me rubber balls to throw and so I decide to get my story from her.

Hidden between a cluster of red-roofs, about 10 kilometers ahead of Shimla, Khanabadosh is true to its name (Persian: khana-home; dosh-shoulder which means someone who carries her home on her shoulder). “Every once in a while, the bed and breakfast gets up and moves because it wants to see new places; it wants to experience a new weather, it wants to hear people speaking in a new language, it wants new fruits and veggies growing in its garden, it wants to go around planting some new trees. I think it is almost like a living person and one of its needs is to move,” says Geetika, her voice dreamy.

So every few years, Khanabadosh - and its residents - shrug the dust off their shoulders. They pack their bags, gather their preciously preserved memories, their black and white photographs, their 140-year-old wood bed, their Murakamis with fading covers, the shining Iron Man Finisher medals of a tall and slim Army officer with lean muscles who visits once in a while and hangs them casually behind the library door; and they move. They scout the world for a new place to set roots in. And they then invite their friends to come stay with them and see it too.

The daughter of late Lt Gen and Mrs Khanna, former Vice Chief of the Indian Army, Geetika grew up in Army cantonments. While studying in Delhi, she met Arun Malik, a handsome young Army Captain who had come to participate in the Republic Day parade and dropped by one day just by chance, accompanying a fellow young officer who had come to deliver tuck that Geetika’s mother had sent for her. The two of them fell in love and soon got married.

“The most exciting thing about the Army was moving every few years. The initial few years were great but slowly I couldn’t deal with not doing anything constructive,” says Geetika. “Arun and I both decided that we would work and earn just like everyone else did but Plan B was to eventually give it all up and do what we really wanted to do in life.” In 2014, she was in Bhutan helping Pearson (the publishing house she then worked with) set up a services division, when she lost her mother. “Dad had already passed on in 2007 and now she was gone too. That made me rethink my life. That was the time when Arun quit the Army and I resigned from my job at Pearson. I wanted to move to the hills and Arun wanted to do his running and triathlons. There was so much to do and to experience,” she says. “We couldn’t have done it all had we stuck around. We both quit happily.”

Since, as a couple, Geetika and Arun loved meeting new people and having them over, hosting came naturally to her and she decided to open her house to guests. Initially, she was a little apprehensive about how she would take this intrusion upon her privacy so she tried it for a year in Bhutan. “I set up a small three-bedroom place. It was only when I absolutely fell in love with the idea of living with new people, that I decided to do it for good. I realised I loved connecting with absolute strangers. Often, after some conversation, it would feel as if I had known them for years.” And that was how Khanabadosh evolved and made its second stop at Mashobra in a big stone house that she fell in love with and leased from a local for three years.

Geetika says she is not on any travel sites and very picky about who her guests are. “I need to know who I am hosting. I refuse four out of 10 guests, which is a lot in the industry but then this is not a hotel. It’s my house and the kind of people I get are very different.” She says she gets the discerning traveller who will enter her kitchen and say ‘let me cook a meal for you today’, or people who will want to go with her to the Sunday market to pick up veggies, or will want to participate in the clean up drives Khanabadosh takes up routinely. She has opened her library to locals. They walk in and out of her house. She has added a kids’ section to her library with comics that entice village kids to read. When there is a lot of food left over, Raman, her Man Friday, calls up the village and a picnic table is laid out for the kids who have a garden feast on their way back from school. When Arun plans his running events in Mashobra, the children participate wholeheartedly putting up flags, handing out goody bags and even helping with registrations. “They spread themselves out on the trail and cheer for the runners, even pointing out shorter routes to them,” she smiles.

Geetika says Khanabadosh pays for itself but it is not her bread and butter. She consults with State governments and earns a bit on the side. “Arun is
running triathlons and is mostly in training and it is not a cheap sport. Sometimes he feels he should be earning more but really there is no need. He is doing his races in different parts of the world. I’m absolutely thrilled that he is getting to see new places and we don’t need him to earn money. We have gone past the stage of wanting a big car or a fancy house or diamonds. I have nothing against people who find joy in that but I myself see the futility of it all. I would rather be here or spend that money on travelling to a new place,” she says, as we walk around. She stops to point out a fat white flower that is sleepily opening its eyes to the world. “Oh, look! We have our first tulip,” she whispers and we both stop and watch it in wonder.

As I look at Geetika’s first tulip peeping from behind its green canony of thick long leaves, a calm descends upon me. It's broken by a yelp. Gabbar has knocked down Bruce Lee who had been trying to bite his tail. “Serves you right,” I mutter unsympathetically, rubbing the bruises on my arm. The birds flying in a fascinating formation overhead swoop down as if to take a closer look at me; or maybe the accident victim. The next morning, on a 5 km steep uphill trek to Shali Tibba, the highest peak in the area, as we wait to catch our breath, a giant Himalayan condor swoops down into the valley, just above my head, its haughty head titled into the deep gorge. Its magnificent shadow falls on the bare mountain, sending a cold shiver down my spine. The wind blows my hair into my eyes and I reach for a rubber band to hold it back. On our way back to Khanabadosh, our rickety old small car crosses an apricot tree laden with pretty white blossoms. Under it stand apple cheeked kids with runny noses who are returning from playing Holi, their faces splashed with green and magenta gulaal, happy smiles stretched from ear to ear. I wave to them and they wave back. It’s a perfect moment. One that comes rarely in life. Thank you Khanabadosh. I’m waiting for those story telling sessions around a bonfire and watching to see where you will take me next.

Note: Khanabadosh has done two moves already and is ready to shift again in August. Destination: yet undisclosed.

Mocha coffee spilling onto the lawns Pic: Manoj Rawat

(Left to right) Gabbar Singh, late Sultan and Bruce Lee Pic: Geetika Khanna

Birds on the hill Pic: Geetika Khanna

The fat first tulip Pic: My cellphone

Khanabadosh Pic: Manoj Rawat

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The lie

29/4/2018

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He knew he was dying. The blade had sliced through his left wrist smoothly. Deep red stains were slowly showing up on the faded cotton bedsheet. He looked at his right hand. Similar blots of colour were darkening the sheet there too. His mind was fuzzy with the drug. It clouded his thinking and dulled his responses. Looking up he focused on the chair right in front, his eyes met his wife’s. She was sitting on his son’s study chair, looking straight at him, in her eyes a look of concern mixed with fear. The small blade was in her hand, grey, shiny, evil; it’s gleaming edge covered with a faint red stain. “Viju,” he whispered hoarsely. “Call the driver. Take me to the hospital.” Her eyes were blank. She didn’t seem to understand what he was saying.

Behind her, the window was open, outside he could see Bulli Babu, his faithful sahayak from his bachelor days, digging up a patch of garden. Mastana, their Alsation, was barking. His breath was coming out in gasps now. The dull pain in his wrists was getting sharper. The blood stains were spreading into fat clouds on the pale blue sheets that Viju had recently bought from the Air Force Shop. “Viju,” he called out one more time, “I will die. Take me to the doctor.” Viju looked at him blankly and then at the blade in her hand. Her eyes moved over to the two gold bangles her mother had given her on her last wedding anniversary, the blade still in her hand, she touched them lovingly. Then snapping the blade in two, she started sharpening a pencil with one half of it. The other half she put in her son’s study table drawer. Pencil sharpened to a fine point, she put in in his geometry box, keeping the blade next to it, placing the rubber on it so that it didn’t move.

Then she picked up the phone and dialed the number she had never forgotten. “Hello Amma,” she said hoarsely. “Amma, you have to book your tickets. Today, he tried to put sleeping pills in my tea. He will kill me. Amma help me,” she said. Her light brown eyes were covered with a film of tears. When she put the phone down and lifted her head to face him again, the tears had spilt over and were dropping off her eyelashes. These were the same eyes he had fallen in love with 20 years back. She was looking at him with fear and hatred. “Viju,” he whispered, his breath coming in bursts. He wanted to coax her to help him in the soft tone that she usually listened too but the pain was unbearable. He couldn’t speak anymore. Viju did not take her eyes off his. She picked up his half drunk mug of tea from the bedside. And then smiling the same hesitant smile that his son had too, she got up and left the room, shutting the door firmly behind her.

“Bhaiya, sahab so rahe hain,” he heard her calling out to Babu. “Unko disturb nahi karna. Main Veenu ko tuition se le ke aati hun.” Slipping out of consciousness, Col N Ventakesh heard the car start, then reverse under the porch and leave. He heard the sentry opening and closing the heavy iron gate. He tried to call out but no words left his dry tongue. Finally, he shut his eyes in acceptance. He should not have kept her schizophrenia a secret. The doctor had been warning him it could get dangerous. He had also told him to keep the Alprax out of her reach.

Schizophrenia is a mental disorder that usually appears in late adolescence or early adulthood. Characterized by delusions, hallucinations, and other cognitive difficulties, schizophrenia can often be a lifelong struggle. This story is not based on a real incident or indicative of the illness.

For a real and heartwarming story about the illness, read:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/long_reads/schizophrenia-henry-cockburn-mental-illness-father-son-patrick-art-folkestone-triennial-art-festival-a7940126.html
Caption for top picture: ‘In the distance I could see people looking for me under the night stars with flashlights. There was a dog barking. But I was not afraid because I felt in the care of the tree’ painting by Henry Cockburn who was diagnosed with schizophrenia at age 20.

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Down Dzuko valley, with a Naga headhunter

4/6/2016

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Mist is seeping into the narrow gulley in fat swirls of dense grey and swallowing mountains in its path. Whatever nonsense they might feed you in romantic novels, it is not a pleasant sight. And certainly not when it’s tracking you 15 kilometers away from civilization in a dark forest that is claustrophobically closing around you. The path gets narrower at every step. Soon I am pushing away coarse leaves that are lashing at my bare arms and slapping me in the face. “I don’t think this guy knows where he is taking us,” I mumble. “Tell him if you dare,” Manoj, my trekking partner (also husband), grins and moves on sending another slap of shoots in my face. Ruprukhrul (which means beloved in Tenyiedie) Kechu our 25 year old Naga guide, good looking, short and slim - in faded jeans, light blue T and rugged jungle boots - has disappeared in the thicket somewhere ahead. Maybe he'll grow on me but at this moment I don’t feel much love for him. I can hear the swish of his dah (kind of sword) slashing at the undergrowth. An Angami tribal from Vishwema village, he has told us that his forefathers were headhunters who would bring back enemy heads as war trophies and hang those outside their hut. I keep my doubts to myself.

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This is our third attempt at Dzuko valley. Since it is 17 km one way; it is a destination for those who dare. It surpasses the Valley of Flowers in its sheer range of wild flowers, it is said; prime amongst them the Dzuko lily that doesn’t grow anywhere else in the world. Attempt one has failed because we can’t get a guide or a car and the area is believed to be a hot bed of NSCN cadres, who have been known to take hostages. We also have no idea if the rest huts in the valley, where trekkers spend the night and get some food, are active. The Nagaland tourism number keeps ringing and no one answers our email. Time is precious since. We waste day one investigating and after getting an assurance that there is peace between the Army and NSCN these days, we zero down on Ramesh Sangma of the puke yellow Maruti Alto and furtive eyes; and Kechu of the steady gaze and headhunter ancestors.

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Day two. Starting by 5.30 am, we drive down to Vishwema village and then up the hill to the start point of the trek, the Alto groaning its way past patches of wet mud and rocks. Soon, it starts to rain. A slow agonizing drizzle falls silently around us. An hour later, Kechu jumps out of the car, eyes narrowed. “Baarish nahi rukega,” he declares, glaring at the clouds. Manoj is ready to give it a try but the ugly mist, the chill and the thought of walking six hours through the jungle drenched to the bone scares the hell out of me. Swallowing my pride, I say I can’t do it. The two men prove they are gentlemen first and give in. Gloomily, we bite into our cheese and cucumber sandwiches and ask Sangma to turn the car back, telling him we shall return next year. We no longer have two days with us.

That evening, after fixing up a taxi that will take us back to Dimapur next morning, Manoj drowns his sorrow in a couple of large Old Monks (I empathise with a gin and lime cordial). We watch a trashy Bollywood film and go to sleep, myself wallowing in some guilt. The next morning I wake up to light falling on my face from a gap in the curtains. Crawling out of bed, I blink in disbelief. Back in my St Anthony's, Agra, school days if Sister Maria Goretti had not drilled the evils of swearing in my head, I could have put a sailor to shame 5 in the morning. The unmentionable-words day has dawned bright and clear. I whisper weather update to the sleeping husband, who growls “we are going back today” and buries his head under the pillow; haunted no doubt by the ghosts of the three large OMs. Throwing my shawl around me, I step out in the crisp morning and watch the villages waking up down below. I am shaken out of my reverie by the tread of familiar feet. Before me stands Groucho Max, scowling darkly at the beautiful sunlit valley. “We can go and come back today itself,” he says, testing me; “25 kilometer chal legi?” I answer with a cold stare. At 8 am, we are in the cramped Alto once again, in same company, with paranthas and alu sabzi in our backpacks.

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This time, the Alto whines to a halt just six kilometers into the winding, rocky route. Yesterday’s rain has caused a big patch of muddy slush and a landslide. Kechu jumps out. His boot sinks into the mud. “Gari nahi jaayega,” he declares. It adds two more kilometers to the trek. Sangma asks Manoj for petrol money, promising us he shall return at 4 pm but he is suspiciously avoiding eye contact. Before I can intercept, Manoj has handed him the entire amount. Sangma turns the car and scoots off happily. “He will never come back now,” I glare at my husband. “Learn to trust people,” he says with a saintly smile. Kechu is already up the hill. Manoj slings his camera bag across his back and starts climbing. “Karna hai toh karna hai,” I recite my mantra for tough times and follow.

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There are rough stone steps cut in the steep 70-degree mountainside; much worse than I thought. The rain moist moss covered stones are slippery and I have to use my hands to pull myself up. Manoj stops by at difficult patches and gives me a hand up. Kechu has transformed into a robot on a programmed mission. Using his dah with practiced ease, he cuts a stick for me and - chivalry dispelled with – moves on, not even bothering to check back if his flock of two has, or has not, been swallowed by the wilderness. He has tucked some foliage behind an ear and from up in the slope I can hear the swish of his dah’s shiny blade and snatches of a folk song he is humming. We have been climbing for nearly an hour (seems like a couple of them though) when the climb abruptly ends. Despite the short drinking and gasping breaks I have taken in between, my heart is pounding in my ears and my T-shirt is moist with sweat. I sit down to steady my shaking knees. “To Dzuko,” says a wooden board pointing out a path that will take us into the gulley that will lead us into the valley. We are now skirting the mountain; to our left is another range; down below a flowing nallah. Its faint rumble carries in the air. Accompanied by the call of the cicadas and the rush of the wind rustling through the dark jungle undergrowth it is the perfect horror story playback to the fog that is reaching out moist hands to smack our bottoms as we hurry away.

The endless walk is rewarded by some beautiful sights of the ranges in startling shades of green. The soot-blackened stumps of trees burnt down by the villagers, who practise jhum cultivation, make interesting patterns. About two hours of walk brings us to the rest camp. The valley is opening out now and there stands a young boy with a rifle. For a panic moment I wonder if he is NSCN. But then he smiles and offers to make us Maggi and tea, all prices double since he has carried rations up. I flop down, ready to accept his tempting offer but the men tell me we have to go down another hour into the valley and grey clouds are drawing. If it starts pouring we will miss what we came for. I start moving, visions of piping hot soupy Maggi dissipating in the breeze. We climb down, cross a wooden bridge, climb up, then down, then up then down and so on and so forth. I’m sure you get the general scheme of things. Just when I decide I cannot walk anymore, gently undulating hills start spreading out before us mesmerising us with their pristine beauty. A stream gurgles across the lush green land, looking like a ribbon of blue from where we stand spellbound. The bamboo is gone; its place taken by shiny green grass. And then comes the moment that has mandolins and sitars playing in mushy movies. A translucent mauve flower is smiling at us in the quiet afternoon. “Juko lily,” whispers Kechu, smiling his very first smile. Manoj falls to him knees and starts changing camera lenses. I forget to close my mouth. The knee shattering climb, the cold, the pain, the itch of grass, the insect bites, the blisters under the feet, the fear of unknown people and places; that magic moment makes us forget all that. “Hello Juko lily,” I say in my mind, bending my head to take a closer look. “Well! Here I am!” Dzuko lily, doesn't hold out him arms like Shahrukh Khan, but that's the attitude. We smile at each other as the sitars play in my mind. I don’t know about him but I am completely bowled over by his drop dead gorgeous looks. With a shake of his petals, Dzuko lily points me towards the green valley. Rising head and shoulders above the sparkling green are more of his breed. Nodding in the breeze, they are blooming in hundreds, every bit as handsome as he is. And mind you! Its not flowering season yet.

We walk closer to the wooden bridge on the stream that is widening before our eyes. Sitting on its wide wooden step, with the wind in our faces and the gurgle of the water for company, we open our lunch. A little beyond, trekkers have set up camp under a huge rock. They are cooking something that is making smoke curl into the air. A gentle faced teenager comes to the stream to get water. He tips his bucket into the water, dodging the stones some old lovers have dropped into the water with their names carved on them. Further away, in the midst of the blooming lilies, a group of pretty local girls is leaping into the air for a photographer's lens. Soaking in the sights for as long as we can, we get up. It is time to go.
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It will take us nearly fours hours to get back; a painful journey for me since I have been dumb enough to not get my faithful old Quechas and am walking in my running shoes. The rocks and bamboo roots shall dig into my feet and the climb down on the slippery mountain shall make the legs tremble. We shall walk three hours and 45 minutes, not daring to take a break because it will start drizzling and the evening will start closing in. At the end of it, I shall marvel at the fitness of the two men with me and raise a toast to human endurance, that made me do so much more than whatI thought I was capable of. And then another one to mankind when I shall find – asleep with mouth open– Ramesh Sangma of the shifty eyes, waiting faithfully at the rendezvous point in his mud splashed Alto. He will tell us that he has been there for 45 minutes, with no cell phone connectivity in the valley. Manoj shall raise an eyebrow at me pointedly. Ignoring him, I shall tumble into the car and sink into a splitting headache plus body ache and fatigue induced coma. I shall emerge from it next morning to find that the rain clouds have finally caught us. There shall be thunder in the sky and loud pelting rain, as if the floodgates of some monstrous river of water have shattered in the sky. From inside the glass window that separates me from angry screaming mother nature, I shall reach out for the flask of hot milky tea that Pinkai, our Naga friend, has so thoughtfully left behind. And there I shall sit down to write this piece before the rain washes away my memories of Dzuko valley.

If you thought I was fibbing about the headhunters; take a look at this picture from Kohima museum. Real human heads (trophies collected by Naga warriors). Taking a head back from war brought fame and glory not only in this world but also in life after death, believed Naga warriors.

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Why remember wars?

8/9/2015

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Lt Col Anant Singh, one of the bravest commanding officers of 1965 who fought and won the Battle of Barki (later taken Prisoner of War along with his entire battalion). Seen in a Pakistani prison, embracing a Pakistani soldier who had served with him before partition. One of the most touching pictures of the war.

Aren’t wars best forgotten? Why write books on them and keep those painful memories alive when we should be embracing peace instead? Let me tell you why, dear reader. Because, in the village of Lakhan Majra, 20 kms from Rohtak, there lives a lonely old man with a paralyzed leg who was once a soldier.

It has been fifty years since Risaldar Major Daya Chand Rathi (Retd), Sena Medal, shot down Pakistani Patton tanks in the Battle of Asal Uttar as a gunner in C Squadron, 3 Cavalry; yet he still wakes up in the middle of cold winter nights from the throbbing pain in his bullet-scarred legs. Lying awake in the darkness with his eyes shut, the 77 year old hears the rumble of enemy tanks and the boom of machine gun fire. His doctor calls it Gunners Disease but for Rathi it’s a memory trigger that takes him back in time to 1965, when he was a young soldier fighting a war on the Indo-Pak border. Rathi has lost his wife to cancer, he does not have any children and he spends most days just sitting alone in his courtyard reading the local paper. Yet, on those rare days when he limps out of his house, or sits pillion on his nephew's shiny black bullet motorcycles for a trip to town, the villagers always nod at him and say ‘Ram, Ram!’ “Izzat karte hain meri,” he tells me, and that means a lot to him he admits, smiling a toothless smile. They know he is a war hero. We don’t. I chronicle battles so that people like you and me, who Rathi also went to fight for, don’t forget his sacrifice.

I chronicle battles because in Chingar Kalan village, Dasua, a proud 78 years old Sikh soldier with dark piercing eyes, a crisp upturned moustache and a flowing white beard says he suffers the pain of a thousand needles pricking his skin every summer when the temperature rises. Dafadar Vir Singh was so badly burnt when a Cobra missile blew up his tank in the Battle of Phillora that he lost his eyesight for many months. He recounts how he had climbed out of his burning tank with skin, hair and clothes burnt off his body. Screaming in pain with his melting metal kada clinging to his wrist, his body on fire, he had run naked through the fields till he was found and taken to a field hospital. He didn’t expect to live but he did. He now drives a tractor through his fields, his courage evident not just from what he did but from how gracefully he lives with his loss. Do we know his story? Sadly, we don’t.

I chronicle wars because we are completely ignorant of the loss late CQMH Abdul Hamid, Param Vir Chakra’s widow Rasoolan Bibi has lived with these fifty years. The frail and bent old lady in her eighties raised her children alone after September 10, 1965, when her husband was blown up destroying a Pakistani Patton tank from his jeep fitted with an RCL gun. I tell these tales because while the rest of us enjoy our family holidays, we forget that Zarine Mihir Boyce, daughter of late Lt Col Adi Tarapore, Param Vir Chakra, sometimes still grieves for a father who left her when she was 10.

Wars need to be chronicled because they happened; because they are a part of our history. Because men – who were sons, brothers, husbands, father too –decided they were soldiers first. Because, when the call came, they unquestioningly strapped on their boots and put their lives on stake, for a country that belonged not just to them but to us too. We need to feel grateful for the ones who returned and remember the ones who never could. Because that’s the least we can do. We need to do it on both sides of the border. Because, the enemy who died left behind broken families too. We have to tell these stories, to read them, because we need to learn that in wars, nobody wins.

Someone needs to tell these stories because heroes in uniform never do. 1965 is based on war records, war diaries and interviews with war survivors who shared their stories with me with touching humility. I'd like to believe that it's the closest we could have got to the truth. Wars are not celebrated, we only commemorate them. And that is what this book aims to do too. I hope it will be read in the spirit that it was written.

This piece has appeared in the New Indian Express.

Mrs Abdul Hamid receiving his Param Vir Chakra from then President Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan

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Mani, my friend...

24/2/2015

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Mani's iPhone is like a sighted friend for him. Pictures by Naveen Kumar, also former Deccan Herald colleague, who now works with HP but made time for this shoot

Only last night, I finished reading Lights Out, a brutally honest book by my former journalist colleague L Subramani who has written about gradually going blind at 18 from a degenerative retinal disease called Retinitis Pigmentosa; and this morning I have this sudden desperate desire to speak to him. I manage to get his number from a common friend and call hesitatingly; it’s been 10 years and I am sure he has forgotten who I am. “Hi Mani, I’m sure you don’t remember me,” I begin. “Hey Rachna!” he cuts me short, and a smile touches me all the way from Bengaluru. “Of course I remember your voice. I used to like it.”

If I don’t mince words with politically correct phrases; I can tell you bluntly that Mani is completely blind. He wasn’t born that way but that’s how he was when I met him in Deccan Herald; walking around the office with a cane, running into furniture sometimes, cracking jokes, editing reports, sharing coffee when the evening kapi cart came rolling down. Oh yes! Even accidentally sitting on a skinny young intern’s lap once (an incident that alarmed him more than it alarmed her). Tall, broad shouldered, gentle and soft spoken; slightly bent and with a hesitant walk because he was extra careful about not walking into something or someone; that was Mani as I knew him.

A little later into the conversation when I pull his leg about how he couldn’t possibly have recognised my voice after all these years, Mani tells me I’m wrong. “For me, hearing a voice after 10 years is just like seeing an old friend walk down the road is for you. It might have aged a little or acquired a new texture and tone; but unless it has changed drastically, I will recognise it.”

Mani’s story

Read his book and you will know him better than my article can tell you. It’s the amazing story of a kid who faced impending blindness with grit and, more importantly, came out of it with his dreams, his zest for life and his sense of humour intact. At 15, as a young schoolboy who was called four eyes by his classmates because he wore glasses, Mani couldn’t believe what his ophthalmologist told him gently after a routine check up: that he would be going blind slowly. It might happen in a year, or two or more, but it would happen. His mother’s faith in god’s curative powers had Mani being made “to beg for forgiveness and be cured” by astrologers, swamis, god men and even rolling in a wet dhoti at the Kannudaya Nayaki temple of the devi who is believed to be the protector of eyes. Nothing worked. He slowly started having flashes of blindness – sometimes on his way to school; once when he was getting in a cinema hall with his classmates for a film show and a once walking back home from a temple after dark. As his eyesight slowly started failing, Mani underwent a terrible phase. He would see flashes of light and then complete darkness. His vision was blurring. He started losing confidence. He would walk with a stoop, so that if he fell he wouldn’t be hurt so badly; he would go around with knees bent in apprehension, fearing he would bang into something; he would live in constant fear that his eyesight would go completely. “If anyone had told me earlier that blindness would come as a relief, I would have laughed at him. But, at that time, anything seemed better than this hell,” he says, confessing that he welcomed his blindness when it finally claimed him at 18 years of age. And that is where Mani’s book ends; but if you ask me, that is where his real story began.

Zero tech days

Mani tells me that when he started looking for a job, the top option for him was to become a telephone operator in a bank. “It was a popular career for blind people since it gave you a regular salary though there would not be any promotions. For me, it was completely uninspiring.” A chance to edit documents translated into English from Japanese came his way since he knew Japanese, but it was boring too. “My trip in life wasn’t about earning money,” he says. Sports journalism was where his heart was set but the first question editors asked him when he went looking for work was: How will you do it? It was a difficult question to answer but eventually he showed them how.

Right from 1998, when he first went looking for a journalism job, all the way to 2003; Mani worked without any accessible technology. He would sit at tennis matches and ask for the shots to be described to him. “I could hear the ball. And since I had seen tennis in my school days I could visualize the shot when someone said it was a four hand cross court or it was a drop shot, I already knew what these were, and it was easy for me to file reports.” When he started reporting hockey, it was an even bigger challenge. David, who used to report sports for the New Indian Express encouraged him to do it. “He suggested I bring an alarm clock to the game and set it for 45 minutes when the game started. When a goal was scored I would ask the exact time and the number on the jersey of the player who has scored it. Since I knew who was playing at what number, I could file my report easily.”

In the year 2000, Mani started working with Chennaionline.com as a sports reporter and they were paying him well. “I was so rich that I had a chauffeur driven bike. I employed a guy who would drive me around, I would ride pillion; he would also key in my stories,” he laughs heartily. And then came JAWS, which was Mani’s first brush with technology that would change his life forever.

How technology liberated him

Mani had his eyes set on a screen reading software called JAWS that could read out from a computer screen. He asked a friend who owed him Rs 3000 to fix a speaker to his computer. He didn’t have $1300 for JAWS full version and the free demo version he had downloaded would stop working in 40 minutes. Each time,

Mani had to save the work and restart the system to make it work again. Around the same time Shantha Kumar, editor, Deccan Herald, offered him a job. “That was when my brother L Prakash, who worked in Japan, wired me the money to buy the full version.”

Mani’s dream of becoming a journalist had come true. Over the years, technology has been a great liberator. It has made information accessibility and gathering completely free. Gone are the days when he would have to depend on another person to even read a book to him. “I would have to see if they were free, wonder if I was hassling them, and try not to disturb them on a Sunday. Now all that has completely snapped. The internet has put books, magazines, newspapers in the public domain and I can read these on my own. In fact, I recently read Treasure Island, along with my daughter. I got an iPhone copy while she read her paperback,” Mani happily tells me. He uses an iPhone, which is a perfect gadget for the visually handicapped. “It has an inbuilt screen reader. If you go to settings, and chose accessibility, your cell will start reading to you. That’s how I read books on Kindle, or NDTV or newspapers like The Times of India, Economic Times etc.” Another app that Mani swears by is TapTapSee which helps the visually impaired identify objects they encounter in their daily lives and become more independent. Designed specifically with blind people in mind, it allows the user to click quick photos and then describes these accurately. If you take a picture of your dog it will tell you that it’s a big and hairy German Shepherd; if you take a picture of your fridge rack it’ll tell you where the milk is and where the beans are. Mani says he uses it in press conferences; the phone acts like a sighted friend and describes the man sitting at the table. The iPhone even has a KNFB reader. Open the app and it converts the phone into a scanner, so if someone hands Mani a visiting card at a party, his cell reads it out to him right then.

What never changed…

Mani lost his eyesight 24 years back. Sometimes, he says, he has dreams where he is walking down a beautiful green slope and he can see; after he wakes up he remembers it is a scene from a trip he had made to the Sabarimala temple with his uncle many years back that still remains in his memory. “At those moments, dreams and reality merge,” he says wistfully.

“An advantage I have over people who are born blind is that I have images in my mind that I can fit into a framework. I understand what words like wince or blush mean. If I didn’t have these memories, I might have still been technically sound but I couldn’t have been a perceptive writer. But then I could see once and now those people never age in my mind. My mother is 65 now. She often complains that she is getting old, her skin is sagging, there are wrinkles lining her face; but I tell her that for me, she will always be 40, which was how I last saw her,” Mani smiles. “Some things will never change for me.”

L Subramani is a senior sub editor with the Deccan Herald. He was affected with Retinitis Pigmentosa at 15 and had to experience gradual loss of vision in three years that left him totally blind. He is currently involved in setting up a support system for patients who experience progressive or sudden vision loss. A part of his book proceeds go there. You can buy book here: http://bit.ly/1lVtnM1

Message from Mani: If you are someone who needs personal help to cope with blindness, a little friendly chat about things that bother you or just an ear to listen to your fears and frustrations, please don't hesitate to get in touch. I've been through that and I can help. Just leave your questions and if you don't want to give your name, that's fine.

Contact Mani at: lsubramani.visa@gmail.com
Read his blog here: http://www.lsubramani.com
You can see the published story here: http://yourstory.com/2015/02/technology-helping-visually-impaired/

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Beating the big C Cancer is just another disease, say survivors

4/12/2014

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Every person battling cancer is a survivor, because every day is a fight against a disease that is trying to get you down. Each one of them fights not just the rapidly multiplying cancer cells but also excruciating pain, the discomfort of chemo and radiation, fears of losing their fertility, their hair, their nails, their life and, more than all this, terrible anxiety about whether their loved ones will have to manage without them. What cancer survivors Tarun, Tanweer and Nidhi have in common is that all three of them carry on their cell phones and/or Facebook pictures with shaved heads. Tanweer says these are battle scars, which should be worn with pride. These are reminders of just how beautiful life is and just how hard they fought to get theirs back. Their brave stories are a lesson not just to other cancer patients but also the rest of us who think life has been unfair to us.

Tarun Jacob, 34
24-year-old Dr Tarun Jacob was walking past the X ray department of CMC Vellore when he remembered the slip he had been carrying in his pocket for more than 10 days. A bad cough had been troubling him lately; so much so that he had even been asked by the senior surgeon to leave a surgery he was assisting with and not come back till he got it fixed. He had also lost about 16 kilos of weight but had blamed it on the grilling medical college schedule. He popped in and got an X ray taken. “When I saw the digital image, my heart stopped. There was a huge tumour compressing my lungs and airway. That had been causing my cough.” In the corridor he ran into a radiology post graduate who reassured him saying it was probably tuberculosis. The CT scan and biopsy proved Tarun had non Hodgkin’s lymphoma. There was a fast growing tumour in his chest; he was in the middle of his MS and his wife (he had married his college sweetheart) was three months pregnant. Tarun was a State level basketball player, he didn’t drink or smoke, he had been his college sports secretary, he was a handsome, fit guy driving around on his bullet, having a good time in life. Did he ask himself: Why me? “I believe that’s a question not worth asking,” says Tarun. “If you ask me what was the best thing that ever happened to me I’ll say my malignancy. Though my wife doesn’t agree; she feels it’s meeting her,” he laughs.

Tarun’s dad told him that “Tarun” meant gift from god and he was leaving Tarun in god’s hands. “I got all my strength from god,” he says. He got admitted and started undergoing treatment. He also started writing a blog - a day to day account of his fight against cancer; what his mind and body were going through. “Absolute strangers reached out to me; people I didn’t think would even care wanted to help me; I made so many chemo buddies.” Other cancer survivors started writing to Tarun; he still writes to as many as 40 of them. Amongst these was a chemo buddy who died, but his wife has now become a family friend.

It has been 10 years. Tarun is now a paediatric surgeon at CMC Vellore. He smiles and laughs a lot. On his cell, he keeps pictures of his chemo days when all his hair had fallen off. He makes it a point to show these to the kids who come to him, unwell and undergoing painful treatments, with veins burnt down from chemo. Tarun puts lines into their hearts so that the drug can be put right in, he jokes with them and gives them and their parents hope and courage with his personal example.

Cancer hasn’t changed Tarun’s life much. He and his wife travel a lot, they drive around on his bike, they have even been holding medical camps in places like Lahaul and Spiti “I know my cancer can return, I know my heart is at a little higher risk of heart attack so I take precautions; I exercise, I’ve cut down on fats, but other than that I have not made any lifestyle changes. I had my second kid after my chemo, despite the fact that it is supposed to interfere with sperm generation. And I’ve put all this on my blog since I want cancer patients and their families to know,” he says.

Tarun’s message to others fighting cancer is: “Staring death in the face is not a good experience but it doesn’t mean you walk away a loser. You can also walk away a victor.”

You can reach Tarun at http://tarun jacob.blogspot.com

Tanweer Alam, 37

Tanweer was 30, with a promising career, a lovely wife and an adorable kid when a recurring low grade fever sent him to the hospital. It was diagnosed as tuberculosis. When the treatment didn’t seem to work at all, he went for a recheck up. He says he was prepared for something bad; but even then, the diagnosis came as a jolt – he had non Hodgkin’s lymphoma - a form of blood cancer. His chances of survival were fifty-fifty. “When you get something like that you have no option but to face it bravely,” says Tanweer very matter of factly. “So I told myself that fifty percent was a good chance”.

He started treatment. He also started reading up and researching his disease on the net. He remembers how he would have a laptop next to him even on his hospital bed. “In fact, at one point I had read up on it so much that I felt I knew more about the disease than the junior doctor who came to look me up,” he smiles. It helped that no one in his family over reacted – they continued being their usual selves with him. His wife and mother were a constant source of strength. He says his faith in science was so much that he was willing to do anything his doctor said. “I trusted my treatment protocol so completely that had it required me to drink poison, I would have done that too”. Tanweer says he would like to tell cancer patients that cancer is a disease largely conquered by science. Proven and time tested treatment is the only option so don’t waste time by going in for alternative therapies. There is only one treatment and it’s not easy, he says. “You lose your hair, your nails fall off, the steroids you are given make you put on weight, you get depressed and miserable; but stay focused and walk the path. That is the only way”. The treatment was painful and also very expensive. At one time he was taking injections that cost Rs 1.5 lakh each and he had to get four of them. Tanweer says he was surprised by how many people, some of them complete strangers, came forward to help him. They helped him to source expensive medicines, gave him moral support and made him feel stronger. Tanweer has been free of cancer for seven years but he still treasures photos taken when the chemo had made him lose all his hair. The effects of cancer treatment should be worn proudly like battle scars, he says. He was featured on CNN IBN as a citizen journalist and writes a blog. He can be reached at baawara@gmail.com

Nidhi Siddhartha Choudhary, 31
Delicately framed with high cheekbones, large eyes and a wide smile; Nidhi, 31, looks much younger. As she goes about sourcing material for the indo-western apparel exhibition she plans to hold shortly, it’s difficult to imagine that she fought a rare brain tumour five years back. It was a fight where she endured radiation that made hair fall out in tufts from her head till she decided to get it all shaved off; chemo that made her veins swell up painfully; and a surgically planted port in her chest that made her stifle a scream every time an injection was given through it. Cancer changed a lot of things in her life but what it could not change was her never say die spirit. “I was always a happy go lucky person; if anything, the cancer made me more positive,” she says.

Nidhi was 25 and married for three years to IIM Ahmedabad graduate Siddhartha Choudhary (they had fallen in love when she was studying psychology at LD Arts College), when she woke up one day to incessant vomiting. She thought it was because of viral fever and ignored it. Some time later, while playing Scrabble with her husband, she flung her head back to laugh when she was again overcome by a bout of dizziness followed by vomiting. She went to a general physician who prescribed drugs for vertigo. “I felt I was getting better when I noticed one day that while walking I was veering towards the left,” she says. She blamed it on her shoes. A few months later, she noticed she was getting double vision. “I got seriously worried when buying material I realized that I was not being able to comprehend the prints. That was when I felt there was something wrong, not with my eyes but with my brain.” The very next day she went to a neurosurgeon who prescribed an MRI. The results showed a tumour in her brain. The biopsy proved it was malignant. She had Medullo Blastoma, a form of brain tumour common in kids. Within ten days, she was operated upon. The surgery was followed by radio and chemotherapy.

Nidhi says she will never forget the cold radiology room where she had to lie on her face with her head in a claustrophobic mask for the radiation; or the chemo that burnt her veins and made them swell up so much that once she cried and made her husband take her back home without getting it done. “We returned the next day because I wanted to live and knew I couldn’t take any chances”. It is a painful narrative of how Nidhi had to get a port put in her chest so that the drug could be injected straight in and how nursing carelessness got her septicemia soon after her last chemo was done. She lost her hair and her strength to walk and became wheelchair bound. However, after the treatment ended she slowly found her strength and health back. Nidhi walks now though stairs are still a problem. She and her husband travel a lot and enjoy exploring new places. “My husband left his job to be by my side for that one year of treatment. He was my source of strength,” she smiles. It has been five years now and Nidhi is once again preparing to have the indo western apparel exhibition she had to postpone when cancer first struck her. She is looking for a venue in Hyderabad where she is now based. Her message to others battling cancer is: “Don’t be afraid, treat it like any other disease. Have the will to come out of it.” You may reach Nidhi at nidhi.choudhary@gmail.com

Usha Krishnaswamy
In the 20 something Xavier’s Dance Studio troupe that recently performed in Bengaluru, there was one girl almost twice as old. Yet her smile was as radiant and her moves almost as fluid. That was cancer survivor Usha Krishnaswamy. Usha was 38 and teaching in a Noida school when she felt a small lump in her breast. “The previous day another teacher had been saying in the staff room she had found a lump in her breast and I thought I should check too,” she says. When the biopsy showed it as malignant, Usha was shattered. “I felt cancer meant death and I had two small boys.” However, being an Army wife she believed that if life dealt you a problem, it just had to be faced. That was what she did. She would get admitted in the hospital on Saturday, undergo her chemo, rest on Sunday and return to school on Monday. She got herself a nice wig from Dubai. Very few people knew about her cancer. Three and a half years later the cancer returned. The routine check up she had gone for showed a lymph node enlargement at the thorax. The FNAC showed it was malignant. She had to undergo 30 sittings of radiotherapy followed by chemo. It was also a time when she had to set up house in a new posting, put the boys in a new school and travel to Bangalore every month for her treatment. “I became like an elephant thanks to the steroids, my hair fell off but in spite of that I used to participate in all the ladies meets, fashion shows, plays, I would sing and compere programs etc; I got another wig made from Berkowitts and again, most people who met me did not even know that I was fighting cancer.” Usha has been free of cancer for more than 10 years now. She says the fear that it might return is always there. She makes and exports beautiful hand painted chiffon and crepe saris and other apparel. She has traveled the world and does jazz classes. “I recently come back from a trip to Boston where my son is doing his PhD from MIT. I paint, I sing, I dance. Cancer taught me to value life more. Life is so precious, she says, I keep telling people, do whatever you want to and do it now.”

Srinivasan Krishnan
Srinivasan Krishnan is on his way to Leh and planning to take a high altitude trek to Goecha La, Sikkim, this summer. The keen mountaineer had testicular cancer when he was 33. “I was the secretary of Explorers and Adventurers, which is an old trekking club in Mumbai, when I got a fever that just wasn’t going away,” he explains. A general physician referred him to a radiologist since he seemed to have a swelling in one testicle. They discovered that he had second grade testicular cancer which was spreading. After an orchiectomy and three sittings of chemotherapy, Srinivasan was ready to face life once again. “My onchologist introduced me to Lance Armstrong and I latched on to him as an anchor. My wife Charlaine was my pillar of support,” he says. To celebrate his fight with cancer, Srinivasan went on a trek to Prabhatgarh near Mumbai with a close friend egging him on. “I took twice as much time to walk and couldn’t finish the trek because I would keep vomiting, but it was my way of saying I’m fine now”. He has climbed Prabhatgarh many times since then and continues to take treks to the Sahyadaris and the Himalayas. “I used to take life for granted. Cancer was like a wake up call to pay respect to life. It taught me to live life to the fullest.”

Kartikeya Misra
IIT Kanpur graduate Kartikeya Misra had lost his father to cancer of the oesophagus and his mother to rectal cancer when – after a year of excruciating pain, stomach cramps and bleeding - he was diagnosed with intestinal cancer. He says he had thought about it so much that it was almost as if he had wished the cancer upon himself. “I had been in class 12th when my father died and it had left with a lot of bitterness. When I was diagnosed as a cancer patient, my son was just five. One of my biggest worries was how would he manage,” he says. When Kartikeya first learnt of his cancer and when he had a relapse some time later, his biggest question was: Why me? He says he will never forget what a junior doctor told him. “He said cancer was like an accident, it could happen to anyone.” When he had a relapse, the same doctor told him that if you have an accident once it doesn’t mean you couldn’t have another one. “His words were life changing for me,” Kartikeya says.

Kartikeya had intestinal cancer at the C2 stage where the survival rate is very low. People usually don’t live beyond five years, he says, though his doctor did not tell him that. “He just told me to enjoy life and not think about the ailment”. As Kartikeya moved from one week to another he realized that there was life even between two chemos. “I would get my chemo done on Saturday or Sunday. The same evening I would hop onto a train and go to different parts of the country for the Training of Trainer (ToT) courses conducted by the government for trainers of various Administrative Training Institutes. I would return on the weekend for another round of chemo.” His dedication to work gave him a ranking of four out of about 250 trainers and he was even sent on a trip to three foreign countries. “Here I had been waiting to die on my bed some time back and suddenly I was doing foreign travel,” he grins. Kartikeya says cancer taught him that life was beautiful and that it is never over till it is finally over. He has written a book titled ‘There is life after cancer’. His son, then 10, was his first reader and he says he is really proud of that. He can be reached at kartikeya_msr@yahoo.co.in

Sunitha Tati
Film maker Sunitha Tati, was 31 and had just moved to India from the US when she felt a lump in her breast during a self examination. When the lumpectomy and following biopsy showed it as malignant she was shocked. For six months she tried alternate medicine like homeopathy and hormone therapy but when the pathology report showed that in this period her cancer had infected her lymph nodes, and that she might not survive beyond six months, her parents insisted she should go in for allopathy. Six cycles of chemo and 28 cycles of radiation had Sunita crawling to the toilet. “The radiation was targeted directly into my breast and back. Those wounds kept bleeding for nine months, my veins turned black, I suffered a rib fracture, my hair fell, I had no eyebrows and through all this I kept working 24x7. That was my only support, my reason to wake up and look forward to each day,” she says. It has been 13 years. Sunitha gives talks about her disease, she is a founding member of the Support Cancer Foundation, she has brought our books on survivor stories and has started Guru Films, her own production house. She says she looks at cancer as an opportunity to work towards a better lifestyle where you eat better, you exercise and you nurture relationships. “The joy of being a cancer survivor is that you wake up every morning knowing what a gift life is,” she says.

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Spiti

25/9/2014

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Top down: Little Tsering carries her brother on her back in Mudh village; a kid giving me his Facebook ID so that I can send him a friend request, in the Harappa like Nako village; the crumbling Dhankar gompa, amongst the 100 most endangered monuments in the world

Nearly 500 km from Chandigarh, deep into the Spiti valley - named after the glittering river that snakes its way in silvery strips down below where the brown barren mountains end; there is a place called Kaza. And that is where I am when I start writing this piece (in my mind) from a home stay called Sakya Lodge.
There’s a pleasant chill in the air that is giving me goosebumps and making me reach for my sweater. The snow covered mountains have come so close that it seems as if I can reach out and feel them. I can’t, of course. We writers like to imagine shamelessly. It’s all a little surreal since I'm still reliving the experience of Mudh - a night and a day spent in a tiny village of 192 people, surrounded by pea fields where apple cheeked women work tirelessly, some with babies unstrapped from their backs, cut off from civilization by massive glaciers that have crawled onto the road and happy, in spite of – or maybe - because of it.
We have only just reached and while the room is being prepared, I soak in the flutter of the blue and green prayer flags dispelling chants into the air at 11,300 feet and look at the poplar trees where sparrows are chirruping some fascinating bird song. It's been a long time since I saw any sparrows since we have managed to wipe them out of our big city lives completely. A noisy bunch of fellow tourists is playing cards down the corridor. "Ma'am, would you like to see a card trick?" I turn to find a young guy with hair that reminds me of the matted furred hill dogs we have been meeting enroute. I wouldn't. But he opens a deck, and asks me to pick a card and then push it back in. He makes me shuffle them and then pulls one out. "Your card." I give him a disgusted smile. Looking shattered, he waves the card in the air. “Then this is your card”. I gape in disbelief. The card he is holding has shapeshifted into the one I had picked. His face breaks into a “gotcha” grin.
Sangram, the 25-year-old travelling magician, who I later discover, is also a singer and an established lawyer, is just one of the fascinating people we meet on our Spiti road trip. As we cross clusters of pink Sia blossoms, frozen streams, melting glaciers and mountains, that are crumbling to pay the price for dams being built; we realize that the pleasure of the journey increases as the other tourists get left behind. Slowly, we wind our way up the brown mountains, overlooking the Spiti river that snakes across the arid land down below glistening in the evening sun.
Some of the most interesting people I’ve met in my life are compulsive travelers. Or maybe it works the other way round. In Kaza, we meet Sangram and his travelling photographer friend who regales us with accounts of his cross country tractor trip that took him from Chandigarh to Kanya Kumari. We also make friends with Tsering Bodh, the owner of our home stay, a Delhi University graduate who has renounced big city life and come back to his two horse town to spend the best years of his life. Tsering spends his evenings with his guests who tend to converge post sunset in his dining room cum lounge cum entertainment area. He suggests food – dishes like the spicy meat shaptak; gets those interested a bottle of chang, or even arak – the local drink; manages to find me a picture book on Spiti and its folklore that he has helped author; and when Tanu and I want to shop, even hands us a torch and sends us down a shortcut to the market. When we get back, we appreciatively smell the steaming hot momos and thukpa. Tsering is right where we left him. Around him are scattered a couple of computers with internet; a book rack of fascinating literature, some dining tables and a long sofa. This is where we sprawl late evening listening to Sangram strumming his guitar and belting out romantic Himachali folk songs while sipping chang and setting our tongues on fire with the spicy shaptak.
Key
The next morning, the six of us - two couples and two pre teens - lug backpacks, mufflers, caps and jackets out of Sakya Lodge and find our way to our taxi – a ramshackle Innova with a complicated seating arrangement – two, plus two, plus three. The kids holler in dismay. They had been promised the back seat with the privacy to play nonstop computer games but now one grown up shall also be sandwiched between them, spoiling their fun completely. Puneet the fight pilot gallantly volunteers to squeeze himself in, his extensive experience of flying cramped Jaguars coming in good stead. The kids grumble in displeasure as he takes out his iPad and gleefully starts giving them classes in spoken German. The rest of us whip out our dark glasses and lean our heads back on our seats letting the scenery distract us completely from the third degree torture going on behind.
Surrounded by folds of brown mountains, seven km from Kaza, sits the Key monastery on a rising hill. It rests on it as if carved out of the brown rocks. At 4166 meters the ancient Buddhist monastery is considered one of the largest centers of learning for llamas. We walk up the curved path. It’s old walls are covered with paintings and murals. Established in the 11th century, Key houses a large number of Buddhist monks and nuns and has not just survived earthquakes and a fire; but also attacks by the Mongols, Dogras and Sikhs; all of which have left scars on its walls. The repeated destruction that these invasions and calamities caused led to a lot of rebuilding in Key; and this has resulted in a haphazard growth that makes the monastery look like a heap of matchboxes piled one on top of the other. This adds a fascinating character to it though making it look more like a war scarred fort than a place of worship. The monastery accommodates nearly 250 monks, who reside within the sacred walls in winter, and stay during the summer with their families, mostly working in the fields. We find the young smiling llamas busy preparing for a festival. They offer us some sweet tea and give us a tour of the monastery. Standing at the topmost point of Key we watch the twisted river flowing down below even as swallows dip and float in playful patterns around us, maybe in a bid to impress the fighter pilot, who rams on his dark glasses and struts off to the car, unimpressed. Manoj and I hang around and cheer the birds, trying to make up for his snooty behaviour.
Kibber
Driving further on we take our dust covered, creaking Innova to Kibber, 18 km from Kaza. Located at a height of 4205 m, Kibber used to be the highest inhabited village in the world with its own polling station during elections, but now it has lost out to Komic, where we plan to go the next day. It has however not lost any of its allure. Parking a little beyond the village, we climb out of the car even as the wind howls threats in our ears. We soak in the ethereal beauty of the cluster of huts scattered before us, typical small Tibetan box houses which are best suited for earthquake prone areas. Whitewashed and glowing softly in the dusk, the flat roofed houses are piled up with twigs and dried branches that lend them a fascinating architectural ambience. The branches serve as both cushion and insulation in the cold winter months when snow falls.
For the villagers, agriculture is the main source of livelihood. Mostly they grow potatoes. Home stays are available in Kibber and the tiny village is perfect for those who want to go far away from all things, all sounds urban and live in silence feeling the cold mountain air on their face while watching yaks meditate and prayer flags flutter in the breeze.
Komic
The next day we drive to Komic. The attractions are: a population of just about 100, crystal clear air that zips right down to your lungs, the fame of now being the highest inhabited village in the world at 4,550 metres; and above all this, the fascinating journey. To reach there we have to cross the Sea of Tethys or where it must have raged once upon a time. As the car climbs further up, we cross a herd of Blue sheep who continue to graze nonchalantly, completely ignoring our presence. Spiti is a living museum for geologists and is known as the ‘Fossil Park of the World’. Remnants of the ancient Sea of Tethys can still be seen in the Spiti valley, which is regarded as the most fossil rich area in the world. Tsering has already told us that we can hunt for garnate rocks there and the kids are planning to make a big fortune by selling those. The windswept heights scare some of the travelers (read Tanu) who refuses to budge from the warmed interiors of the car while the rest of us make a quick trip to the quaint monastery with our teeth clattering in the cold and run right back. We frantically recall the driver who is sipping hot tea standing with the locals, fearlessly gossiping in the chill. Smiling at our plight; he downs it in one last long sip and comes back to rescue us from death by freezing.
Langza
On our way back to Kaza we cross Langza, where just about 20 huts sit on a hillside. Laid out in front are some sparkling green fields where the farmers have grown peas. A farmer is ploughing his fields using a pair of slow lumbering why-are-you-making-us-work Yaks. A towering statue of the seated Buddha is keeping meditative watch from the top of the hill. We step out of the car for a few minutes, the wind is cold and unforgiving here too. Wrapping our mufflers tighter around our necks we jump back in and head for the comfort of our home stay fantasizing about hot thukpa and momos.
Dhankar gompa
One of the most unforgettable sights of Spiti is the first view of Dhankar gompa. Sitting on a barren mountain, it almost appears to be a part of its crumbling façade - fragile and precariously balanced; as if it has been carved out of the rocks. A notice tells us that the monastery is under threat of collapse and we are going in at our own risk. Two lamas live there. As the narrow mud track turns and leads to the monastery it seems as if we are stepping into a dream. Situated at an elevation of 3,894 meters, the gompa is spectacularly positioned on a 1000 foot high spur overlooking the confluence of the Pin and the Spiti rivers. Dhang means cliff, and kar or khar means fort hence Dhankar means fort on a cliff. Local history says that Dhankar was the traditional capital of the Spiti kingdom during the 17th century and has some features dating back to the 12th century. The crumbling gompa is one of the 100 most endangered monuments in this world and restoration work is underway. Those who dare to climb up its dark narrow stairs despite safety warnings (Puneet and Manoj) can see that the statue of Vairochana which shows four complete figures of Buddha seated back to back. Those who don't do photoshoots on the steps leading up to it.

Spiti has many others attractions. Nako, the exotic village that has come up around an etherally beautiful lake, and Tabo, where an ancient monastery has grown roots and mingled with the lives of the people who live in and around it, are two more places that we visit in Spiti that leave us with a lifetime of beautiful memories. Eventually, the holiday is over and we reluctantly make our way back to more populated Himachal where weekend travelers are crowding the hills of Shimla. Vehicles are parked on the roads in unending rows and what must have been beautiful green slopes at one time are now coated with an ugly mass of cement – hotels, resorts, shops, guest houses et al. Shimla is being suffocated to death and my plea to you dear reader is don’t go there and make it worse for her. We pick up boxes of cherries from the roadside and drive back into the heat of Chandigarh where we go straight to the railway station and find our way to the train. I sit in the Shatabdi Express chair car staring at the lukewarm cup of tea and samosa staring back at me for some time and then close my eyes to both.
In my mind, I have returned to the Spiti valley where the sparrows chirp and fill the air with the crisp flutter of their wings, where the mountain rivers - the Sutlej, the Pin, the Spiti - languidly trail their own paths and the cold wind whispers to the barren hills. Gentle conversations in Tibetan carried by the breeze all the way from Kaza bazaar waft around me even as I sit with my feet tucked under me on that uncomfortable AC chair car. Just a day back, about 500 km away from me, the barren mountain brown and gravelly, had intercepted the sun which rose despite everything and warmed my back with its pale yellow early morning rays. Fondly, I remember how I had sat on a chair pulled into the lawn, when i had first started writing this piece in my mind; listening to the songs the sparrows had left unfinished. Spiti, I shall see you again one day soon, I promise myself. Those songs need to be completed in my ear.

Stay options: Kaza: Sakya Abode; cell: 9418556213; Rs 3500 for couple, meals included; Kibber: Thiely Home Stay; cell: 9418841713; Rs 600 per person, meals included; Langza: Tanzin Home Stay; 01906-200363; Rs 600 per person, meals included; Komic: Kunga Home Stay; 01906-200050; Rs 600 per person, meals included. For bookings and travel arrangements contact Lara Tsering at Spiti Valley Tours; 9418537689

This piece will appear in the Discover India, October issue
Pictures: Manoj Rawat

Komic: One of the highest inhabited villages in the world

A little girl waits for her mother to finish working in the pea fields at Mudh

View from the top of Key gompa

Children climbing up to the village from down below where the glacier meets the river at Mudh

Nako

Brothers going to school in Tabo village which has come up around an old monastery

Photographer trying to please his subjects

Sia blossoms, the only spurt of colour you see in the Spiti valley, besides the prayer flags and the beads the women wear. Siachen the glacier is named after them.

Prayer flags that depict the four colours of nature: White for air, blue for water, red for the earth and yellow for sunlight

Satellite TV has reached villages that tourists still haven't

Masks on sale outside Tabo monastery

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Lest we forget...

25/4/2014

33 Comments

Mr Girdhari Lal Batra, Vikram's father; and below my plane lands at Kangra Airport flanked by the Dhauladhar ranges

March 2014
Delhi-Bhatinda Intercity Express, Chair Car

The kid with the runny nose is rummaging in the plastic magazine holder attached to the seat in front. I reach over his head to pull the curtain against the sunlight streaming in through the glass. He has only recently displaced me from my window seat by bawling “khidki ke paas baithunga” and this Christopher Columbus of the kid world now seems to have made a discovery. In his chubby hand he victoriously holds a tiny packet. “Chocolate flavoured you-know-whats. Dotted, Ribbed, Flavoured,” it says. I do a mental double take. Yes! It is what I suspect it is. Alarmed by the services Indian Railways seems to have started offering travelers; I am quick to cash in on this opportunity to get back my rightful place. Nudging his fat mother, I tell her, “iske haath mein gandi cheez hai”. I have just finished tapping “ta dhin dhin dha” on the armrest when the volcano erupts. Mom lets out a shocked “Hai Ram!” and tugs at the packet which kid is trying to rip open with his teeth, mumbling, “meethi faunf” (he lisps). Mom whacks him one and drags the screaming midget to Daddy who snoozes one row away. To make her case stronger she carries along the piece of incriminating evidence. I quickly reclaim my seat and rest my head on the cheap Rexene, watching the yellow mustard fields zip past. Ah! Sweet revenge!

Let not my cheap shenanigans distract you from the nobility of my purpose. I am on my way to Bhatinda from where the kind and caring Brigadier Ajith will give me his Number 1 Gypsy which will take me to village Chehlanwali where retired Subedar Kala of 4 Mech lives. He is the last survivor of the war fought with the Chinese at Bumla. He fought besides the late Subedar Joginder Singh, PVC, in 1962, and later brought his ashes home. He has promised to tell me Joginder Sahab’s story and is the one who will tell me how Joginder Sahab charged like a lion with his bayonet when all his bullets had finished and was finally shot by the Chinese.
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The biggest problem I faced writing this book of essays on the 21 Param Vir Chakra award winners of independent India was that most of them were dead. And it's not easy writing a story about a dead stranger. But as I began tracing their lives through friends and families and soldiers who knew them and fought by their side, these names started getting familiar. They started walking in and out of my head and leaving footprints on my psyche by the tread of their DMS boots. They started interrupting my conversations and stepping over my thoughts as I slept. As the days passed, they got even more familiar. Taking me by the elbow, they started coaxing me to come see the hills they had climbed, the roads they had walked, the girls they had loved. They made me stand outside houses they had lived in, and had me knocking at the doors, asking to be let in. In other words, they started behaving like old friends; who take you for granted because they know they own a part of your heart.

Vikram (Capt Vikram Batra) – yes, we were now on first name terms - who died saving another man in the heights of Kargil, made me book a Spice jet flight to Kangra. As I stood on the runway looking at the snow covered Dhauladhar ranges glowing orange in the morning light and wrapped my muffler tighter around my neck, I thought he must have grown up seeing these mountains every day. Already, it seemed as if I knew him better. Outside the airport, fragrant white roses bloomed and my cousin Sandeep waited for me in his spanking new Scorpio and snazzy Ray Bans. He had taken a day off (he is a serving colonel) and insisted on driving me two hours to Bandla gaon (Vikram’s village) because, he said, “Didi! For me, going to his house is like doing a pilgrimage”. The roses followed us all the way to the bright yellow bordered Vikram Batra Bhawan and then stopped and bloomed outside while we walked in to where Vikram’s portrait hung on a sitting room wall and his dad sat before it, wrapped in a soft pashmina shawl. I later found his girlfriend teaching in a school in Chandigarh. With a wry smile in her voice she told me how she could never convince herself to get married even though it had been nearly 15 years since he died. She told me that her heart still misses a beat when the phone rings at 7.30 pm on a Sunday, which was the time when he would call her every week before he went to fight the war from which he never returned.

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For the handsome Lt Arun Khetarpal, who refused to abandon his burning tank Fama Gusta even when he was told to save his own life in the 71 war, I stood under a black umbrella knocking at the door to his mother’s beautiful Delhi farmhouse on a rain splashed morning. I was let into the tastefully done up sitting room, where she was wheeled in in a cotton nightie, a friendly lab wagging its fat tail by her side. She had just come out of a surgery, her hair was cut really short and she whispered his name so gently that it appeared as if he was in deep sleep and she did not want to wake him up. All this while Arun stood there in his uniform, tall and handsome, hands resting on his hips, a smile playing on his lips, and watched us from a photograph on his mother’s bedroom wall. Mrs Khetarpal died shortly after I interviewed her and those who love her believe that she is now sitting somewhere with Arun, making up for all the time he left her alone. I still remember the pride in her voice when she had told me how she let Arun go for the war with the words: “Don’t come back a coward. Fight like a tiger.” That was exactly what he had done. She was the one who had opened the door to the postman 44 years back and received the telegram that said: Deeply regret to inform your son IC 25067 Second Liut Khetarpal reportedly killed in action sixteenth December. Please accept sincere condolences.
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The fragile Poornima Thapa, who works in Pune and is writing a book on her father – the legendary late Major Dhan Singh Thapa, PVC, was the one who told met how her father defended a small post called Sirijap near Pangong Tso (lake) in Ladakh which the Chinese attacked in 1962. Nearly every soldier of his company was killed and the post was set on fire by incendiary bombs but Maj Thapa continued to fight with his khukri even when he ran out of bullets. He was given up as dead and awarded the PVC posthumously. A few months later he was found alive. He had been taken Prisoner of War and had suffered torture at the hands of the Chinese but he could finally return to his family who had already conducted all the rituals of his death. “My father never liked to talk about those days. It must have been humiliating for him,” she told me.

When I came back home from my travels, these stories kept me awake till the early hours of the morning, cups of coffee got cold on my bedside, and I typed out my essays with a quilt drawn to my knees, table lamp turned so that its light did not spill beyond my keyboard. My fingers learnt to move almost as softly as Mrs Khetarpal’s voice so that the sound of the tapping keys would not disturb the one who slept. Who had to wear a uniform and go to work the next day.

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This story began one evening when I was walking down the Mall in Ferozepur cantonment where kids raced bicycles and red poppies bloomed by the roadside. Looking up, I caught the eye of the late Company Havildar Major Abdul Hamid, PVC, of 4 Grenadiers who was killed in 1965 while blowing up the seventh Pakistani Patton tank from his RCL gun in the Khemkaran sector. He was watching me from a laminated poster on the roadside. I had been offered my first book contract and was feeling a little giddy from happiness. Looking up, I declared: “I am going to write your story Abdul Hamid.” He did not respond but Manoj, my husband, who had been walking by my side, trying not to trample any flowers, smiled and stepped off the sidewalk; and broke into a jog gesturing to me to meet him end of the road. That was a year back.

Last week, I met him there. Abdul Hamid’s was the last story I wrote. So technically, it is the end of the road that took me past yellow fields of mustard and golden wheat ripening in the sun. It took me beyond the Sela pass in Tawang where an entire lake freezes over in the winter and to Bumla where Subedar Joginder Singh died fighting with a bayonet in a war where soldiers lacked everything except courage. It took me to Sirijap in Ladakh where Maj Dhan Singh Thapa sliced necks off with his khukri and it took me all the way to freezing Rezang La in Chushul where 13 Kumaon’s Major Shaitan Singh and his men (113 in all) were brutally massacred by the Chinese who outnumbered them completely. They died following orders that said: You will fight till the last man and the last bullet. When 13 Kumaon sent me a list of Rezang La martyrs, it ran into three pages on my laptop and made my eyes wet.

The bodies of these soldiers were discovered three months later by a Ladakhi shepherd. They had frozen in the cold in their moment of death. They still had guns in their hands. Not one of them had tried to run away. I met two Rezang La survivors, both 73 now. They recounted how a grievously injured Maj Shaitan ordered them to leave him behind since he would only lessen their chances of survival. I can’t share with you these stories just yet but one day I hope I’ll be able to put a book in your hands. Till then, this blog will have to suffice as a tribute to the brave soldiers who died fighting and to their families who have lived with loss all their lives and yet been generous enough to share with me what they still have –memories of those dead heroes.

Jind, a railway station right out of a period film. Pic taken from the train to Bhatinda

Subedar Kala who told me the brave story of Subedar Joginder who died in the 1962 war

The ladies of Sub Kala's pind who insisted that I would have to share their lunch: Rotti todo ji

(Left to right) Rezang La survivors Subedar Ram Chander, who carried Maj Shaitan when he was injured; and Naik Nihal Singh, who had both arms smashed by machine gun fire but managed to walk back to Company Headquarters

Maj Rama Raghoba Rane, one of the very few who lived to wear the PVC on his shirt front.

That's Arun at the National Defence Academy

Lt General Tindy Sharma, who is in his 90s, told me about his brother Major Somnath Sharma (portrait on the wall) or Somi, who was independent India's first PVC

Company Havildar Major Abdul Hamid as I saw him on a poster in Ferozepur for three years

With the ladies of Kala Sahab's pind in gaon Chehlanwali

The kid

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Republic Day madness with the woman who turns fifty this year

26/1/2014

Rachna and Richa with their new friends Tanu and Neha

“At 7 am on a cold, foggy January morning you want me to sit in an auto with you and go to India Gate. Are you mad?” I ask her. The answer is: Yes. She turns fifty this May (which is probably why she is getting senile) and on my best (though completely cracked) friend Richa Verma’s “Fifty things to do before I’m 50” list is watching the Republic Day parade from Rajpath, with her own eyes (read: spectacles). “You won’t live to see your fiftieth birthday,” I warn her but she is undeterred. And so, the chilly morning of January 26, 2014, sees the two of us at Gopinath Bazaar, trying to find an auto to Ashok Road. We don’t. Which is probably why I survive to write this. And that my friend is how this story begins.

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Flashback:

26 January, 2014, 6.30 am

I lie buried in my mink blanket, nursing a piping hot cup of tea made by the happy husband who has wriggled out of the suicidal we-will-go-and-watch-republic-day plan with the excuse that he has a flag hoisting ceremony at the workplace; and also (hoarse whisper….) the crazy woman is my best friend and not his. I’m hoping she won’t show up, but the whiney tain-tain-tain of her car coming to a noisy stop outside the house, warns me that the lunatic has arrived. Yo baby! She yodels, swinging a packet of food under my nose. “Alu ke parantha made by Baburam (her man Friday). Kitna maza aayega”. She orders me out of my warm bed, makes me put on multiple layers of clothes and takes on Manoj’s offer of dropping us at the nearest auto stand. Meanwhile, since the net says cell phones are not allowed, she has jotted down important cell nos and shoved one copy in my trouser pocket and another one in hers. Lest we get lost. Later we find out cell phones (that we so obediently left at home) are being allowed but cell phones are 20 kilometers away by now and anyways what better way can there be to live in the moment. With the distinct possibility of death by being trampled under stampeding feet looming in the air.

Still pondering over nasty Whatsapp messages from a cousin who has very poetically said: “All the best Rasna, bas bheed mein mat phansna,” I peer glumly into the fog, and heave a sigh of relief since there are zero autos in sight. Which probably means we can go back home to the garam rajai. No! It doesn’t. Richa has spotted a taxi and, a brief and curt monetary negotiation follows. (It goes something like this: Gruff voiced fat, wrapped-in-mufflers taxi driver: Teen sau rupaye. Shivering Richa (squeakily): NAHI do sau, warna ham dusri taxi le lenge. Gruff voice: Dusri taxi nahi hai. Teen sau laasht (sound of gear changing). Richa: Theek hai bhaiyaji! ) We jump out of one car and into another, waving to the gleeful husband who drives off with a jaunty am-I-glad-I’m-not-coming-with-you salute. “Well begun is half done,” Richa grins happily and pulls out an alu ka parantha from her goody bag and breaking it into two equals, hands over one piece to me. We pull our caps lower over our faces and munch on the paranthas silently. Looking out of the window, I catch sight of a fat white man who is running on the sidewalk in his vest and a tiny pair of shorts with a bunch of giggling chappal wearing street kids following him in the freezing cold. “Wunnerful isn’t he,” Richa mumbles thru a mouthful of her second parantha, enticing me by waving the other half under my nose. I shake my head in a curt no, marveling at the different breeds of lunatics around me that morning.

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The taxi driver takes us to Gyarah Murthy, from where we are directed to Ashok Road from where we are further directed to the Palika Bazaar parking in Connaught Place. A friendly cop tells us a Park and Ride service is being run from there. Reluctantly I pull myself out of the warm taxi and bravely face the full blast of Dilli ki sardi. A cop is directing people to a waiting green bus that will take us to our destination. It is filling up fast and I turn around to ask the habitual slow walker Richa to move faster only to find that she is nowhere to be seen. I scan the road in panic, wondering if she has passed out in the cold. She hasn’t. Like a phoenix that rises from the flames, or a Bipasha Basu that emerges from the waves of the sea in Dhoom 2, she rises from the fog holding two plastic cups of steaming tea. She is simultaneous quoting some deep mathematics while waving a Rs 500 note in the roadside chaiwalla’s face. I grab a cup from her, bring out a crumpled Rs 20 from my baik paakait and hand it to the vendor, shoving her towards the waiting bus. Voila! Where once stood a pretty green bus, there now stands, well, nothing. “We missed it because of you,” I glare at her. “Koi baat nahi, dusri aa jayegi,” she says, slurping her tea noisily. “Hah! Not in this life,” I smirk nastily and look up to find through the mist another identical green bus cruising to a stop right in front of us. I eat humble pie under her I-told-you-so withering look. We flash our invitation card and climb aboard. It takes us past the sights of Connaught Place and deposits us near the National Archives, from where unending queues of people in scarves and monkey caps and mufflers and boots and big jackets are moving towards India Gate lawns.

We join one and start moving with it. In her big jacket, cap and muffler Richa is looking like a waddling Emperor Penguin and I guess so am I since I’m identically dressed but I can’t see myself so I don’t bother with that. A frumpy sweatered man with a baby who, other than the paternal role, looks like a side kick to some Mumbai don, is following me like a shadow. It has been a long time since I was in a crowd so I spend a few minutes trying to figure out if he is being fresh or is just insecure about missing a step. I look at Richa for emotional support. “Kitna pyaara baccha hai, thand mein le aaye ise” she has struck up a conversation with him. I glare darkly at her trying to signal some don’t-talk-to-weird-men intelligence in her direction, but she is already discussing the weather with him. Turns out she has won him over completely, and now we have a friend who hovers over us and chivalrously tells other peopals to make way for “laadis log.”

Well! The laadis log reach the point beyond which you can’t take food and Richa plonks parantha no 3 in my hand. “Quick, eat it. Let’s not waste food,” she says. I revolt telling her I shan’t, I’m worried and I’m not hungry. “OK, give it here,” she says in disapproval and starts taking big bites from it. “Stop! You’ll get sick,” I tell her but she is refusing to waste food. I save her from death by overeating by snatching the food packet from her and thrusting it into the hands of a bemused policeman. “Please bhaiya inhe khaa lena, Mummy ne kitne pyar se banwaye hain,” she directs a parting emotional punch at him. After a brisk walk of about a kilometer, with Richa taking on the role of traffic police by directing people noisily: “Bhaisaab, ladies ko nikalne dijiye. “Panic mat kariye, abhi parade mein bahut time hai,” we get close to destination 26. Both of us are repeatedly asking cops on duty where enclosure no 24 no is; luckily I happen to glance at the invitation card and find that it is for enclosure 19 and not 24. And there it is, right in front of us.

Leaving aside a scary public toilet experience where a floating piece of yellow you-don’t-want-to-know-what puts me off dhoklas for the rest of my life; being subjected to a rather too intimate body search by a female cop who I eye suspiciously for her leanings, and emerging into the stand to find myself submerged in a sea of people, all of who are taller than me; the experience is, well (cough, cough) novel. We walk up and down enclosure no 19 and cannot find a single chair vacant or even a single place from where we can even stand and see Rajpath where the parade will come marching down in about 45 minutes. All we can see are sweaters and more sweaters and fathers with toddlers on their shoulders and bwaysfrands and galsfrands. I turn to Richa in disappointment only to find her smiling like a sage who has recently attained nirvana. “Remember! Journeys matter, destinations don’t” she says. “Let’s go to Coffee House and have breakfast. This was an experience to cherish. We came as the Aam aadmi. Next time we’ll try and get VIP passes.”

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No, the story doesn’t end there. While I and a few others like me are moping around in the crowd of people planning to go back home, the portly Inspector Shri Niwas Rajora of the Delhi Police has pity on us and moving the chairs back a bit, makes place for a few rows of people to sit down. The row of “laadis log” is right up front. We plonk on the ground and believe it or not, watch the entire parade from right up front, after a cheer has been raised for a blushing Shri Niwas jee. Sitting with the crowd we crack jokes on the Chief Minister, asking if a man in a muffler is sitting around somewhere. We cheer for the President’s bodyguards and their handsome horses with plaited tails, we get on first name terms with stealth aircrafts and missiles, we wave to VIP log in shiny black cars and women dancing in the colourful tableaux. We cheer for balloons unfurling Tricolours in the air, we gape at the daredevil acrobatics of the motorcyclists and the fighter planes and stand together to sing “Jana-Gana-Mana-Adhinayaka, Jaya He; Bharata-Bhagya-Vidhata” matching off key notes with other off key fellow citizens. Yes, we feel patriotic. This time it is a win for the aam aadmi. Or aam laadis log, if you please. But I’m not sure if I’ll survive 49 more wishes of the best friend who is slowly going bonkers.

Picture courtesy: Thank you to our new fellow patriotic Indian friend Neha who we met in the laadis log row at the parade. After a brief faux pas when she called Richa auntie and immediately apologized, she repented further by handing her cell phone to us to take pictures and then was kind enough to Whatsapp images to my number. Neha, THANKS!

The Delhi tableau

An unhappy citizen

The camel contingent

Selfie

Our hero: Inspector Shri Niwas Rajora of the Delhi police who could not tire of asking (mostly male) people: Kyun TV nahi hai tumhare ghar mein. Uspe nahin dekh sakte the parade. Yahan aana jaruri tha?

A rare moment: The stress of being an aam aadmi gets to Richa

Inspector Rajora with female fans

Yo baby! It's the big bday year

The star (bores) of TV 2013

30/12/2013

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Despite the rotten eggs we’ve been chucking at them year after year, television channels continued to bombard our bedrooms with unbearable nonsense in 2013 as well. The serials were absolute rubbish which is why we didn’t watch them at all. The reality shows were fake and scripted so we’re not wasting time reviewing those either. That leaves us with news and interviews. And, sorry to say this, but these guys didn't exactly delight us with their wit and wisdom either.

Therefore, ladies and gentlemen, for your vicious reading pleasure, we shall be honouring the star bores of television 2013 with the UMUP awards (you made us puke). Here goes the honour roll:

Makeup monster of the year: Barkha Dutt

She introduced us to weird shades of lipsticks, strange hair styles and smudged eyes that often brimmed over with tears (a sudden Radiagate memory perhaps that made the finger shake and poke the stuff right in?)
After haunting the ridges of Kargil and hobnobbing with soldiers going to war, for some time Barkha went for the no makeup look which actually worked for her. But alas! Like most other women anchors, she soon discovered the evil of foundations, smudgy eyeliners, lip liners and their ilk and went completely berserk painting herself a brand new (though equally scary) face. Apparently noone's telling her where the brush stops where makeup is concerned. Barkha, unless you are giving a Kathakali dance recital, you don't use the entire contents of a bottle/tube in one sitting.

Runners up: Chain se sona hai toh bhaag jao...

Giving Barkha stiff competition in the scary face and dark eyes department was the anchor of Sansani (yes, “chain se sona hai toh jag jao”). With his flashing kohl rimmed eyes, strange hair and equally weird wardrobe, the bearded monster finished a close second, despite notching extra points for voice modulation and revolting screen presence.

Better luck next time: Sagarika Ghosh

With her absolutely rotten collection of saris and touching loyalty to the gali ka darzi who has been cutting sleeves off her mommy's ill fitting blouses for her show after show.

Rotten ham (not to let resemblances confuse you with pig): Arnab Goswani

Or-knob go-get-‘em Goswami hammed every other news anchor into oblivion by getting so angry with guests that he stopped short only of flinging studio furniture at them. Raving, ranting and ferociously wagging his eyebrows to express his anger, Or-knob this year took the pants and eardrums off political leaders, debauch journalists, holy men with unholy libidos and bully nations. It's common knowledge now that when the city sleeps Superjourno flies overhead and with his glasses glinting in the moonlight, zips into open windows to pick up CAG reports, copies of FIRs and other incriminating evidence. He then accosts guilty parties with these papers in the Times Now studio while harshly lambasting them in Dolby surround sound.

Slimiest smirk: Rajat Sharma

Rajat- India TV- Sharma out smirked everybody else in the business by an inch and a half. Right from NaMo to Sanjay Dutt to participants in the Big Boss house, he bestowed his super smirk on them all. Bound by a commitment made to himself that he will continue to host Aap ki Adalat till the universe ends (though not by India TV news flashes, where it happens a few times each year), he refuses to take off his dark suits and ugly glasses, speak through tightly clenched teeth and pollute the environment with his I-know-awful-secrets-about-you smile even on other shows like Big Boss.

Main har saal laut ke aaunga award: Karan Johar

K Jo returned with yet another round of coffee, a black leather couch and a brand new red piano. The guests, alas, were the same old fuddy duddies of Bollywood who turned up in their designer clothes and fake smiles vying for the same old goody hamper. K Jo cut himself blazers from shiny blue and maroon velvet upholstery that made holes in our eyes so that we didn't notice the age lines deepening around his (and his guests') eyes.

Odd(ly) dressed couple: Mr and Mrs Aamir Khan
Aamir Khan appeared on the Karan Johar show in pants that ended at ankles and closely followed the shape of his calves making us wonder if he had borrowed wifey Kiran’s leggings. Kiran contributed to bringing the award home by turning up in her hideous glasses and a body hugging frilly blouse that hadn’t made up its mind about whether it wanted to be a shirt or a frock.

Fashion icon of the year: Arvind Kejriwal

This startling new entrant on national television stole the show, Delhi elections and people’s hearts by thumbing his nose at all fashion rules. Designers like Rohit Bal and Ravi Bajaj reached for their smelling salts as he boldly redefined natty gentlemen dressing. Not only did he wear his yellow toed woolen socks with his old sandals; he also appeared on TV sporting half shirts with sleeves brushing the elbows, shapeless sweaters, and topis pulled down over woolen mufflers wrapped around his ears. The Fashion Icon of television award goes to AK for leading by example and telling the Indian aam aadmi: Doston, wear what you want, use mufflers to stay warm, don’t give a damn for the Congress party, the BJP and fashion designers, and, above all, don’t tolerate corruption. May his tribe multiply!

Making the ladies swoon: Anil Kapoor

Known more for his hairy chest than his histrionics, Anil Kapoor made a surprise TV debut, showing us what a well maintained 56 year old could look like. He gave hope to senior citizens and sent men on either side of 40 waddling to the gym. His deep voice, his dark stubble, his trigger happy agent Jai Singh Rathod with the I-don’t-smile demeanor made female hearts beat faster than ever before. 24 was one serial that had pace and panache and if you just wanted to waste time with the remote in hand, drooling over Kapoor was not so bad a way to do it. It also ended with the 24th edition leaving lovelorn aunties sighing over their unrequited love for the kick ass Kapoor. The good news is they can wipe their tears; the grapevine says there shall be a Season 2. Sigh!

Quick rise in television: Kapil Sharma

Kapil Sharma won a few seasons on Sony’s Comedy Circus and then got his own show to host on Colours. With a talented bunch of supporting actors, some seriously funny wisecracks and the irrepressible sher sprouting Siddhu ji; his show registered a phenomenal rise on TRP charts and had almost every film star with a release to promote sitting on his couch dodging red lipsticked kisses from Ali Asgar as the sneaker-clad, Patiala-salwared, boozard dadi. However, with a set lost to fire, the talented Sunil Grover making a controversial exit and jokes dying down, the show needs to pull up its socks or else it could see the quickest fall on television as well.

Thank you for nothing TV 2013. Keep up the rotten work. This year too please help us pick dinner leftovers from our teeth in sheer boredom, poke fingers in our noses for lack of anything better to do and pull our quilts over our heads and go to sleep. Happy New Year!

Disclaimer: The writer stopped watching television a few years back and writes TV reviews only to vent out her frustrations.

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Rachna Bisht Rawat is a full time mom and part time writer. She is married to an Army officer whose work takes the family to some of the most interesting corners of India.

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