THE SINGING WELL

There was once a tiny radio.

The elders always called it transistor.

I don’t know why.

Its name was radio!

The radio was tiny but the sound it made was big.

So big, that if it was played in one end of the big house it was in, it could be heard at the other end!

The five sisters in the house loved the radio.

They would all sit together listening to songs while they helped their mother with her chores.

They would memorize the songs and sing along with it.

Sometimes, it would play even while they studied in the light that the kerosene lamps threw on their books.

The radio was their friend and companion.

There were books of course. And children’s magazines.

But if someone asked them who their best friend was, they would all say, RADIO!

There was no TV then. Or telephones.And no electricity.

But no one noticed because their radio was always there for them – to entertain them, to tell them stories from all over the world and to sing them to sleep.

One day after school, when they turned the radio on, it began to cough, stutter and stammer.

Father walked over to the radio and removed its batteries.

It had four huge batteries.

Father put in four new batteries and turned the radio on.

It groaned at first and then began to sing as usual.

“There. Your radio will never stop singing now,” he said.

The girls clapped their hands in glee.

One day, the girls put the radio on the wall of their favourite well.

Their house had three wells but this one was their favourite because they had seen it being dug and

there was a lot of room to run around near this well.

They were playing ball today.

Do you know what happened next?

That’s right.

While the girls were playing, the ball slipped out of a hand and fell on the ground.

But it did not stay there.

It bounced.

The girls looked at the ball with horror as it bounced towards the well.

And before they could stop it, the ball hit the radio and fell into the well.

Splash.

The radio moved and fell sideways into the well too.

SPLASH!

The five girls ran to the well but the radio was nowhere to be seen.

Sadly, they walked back to their big house and stayed indoors for the rest of the day.

That night, father saw them all sad.

They told him about the radio.

Father quietly stood up, opened the big door of the big house and stepped outside.

The girls followed him.

It was a starry night.

They saw their father’s shadow walking towards the well.

“Listen carefully,” father said.

The girls stared at the well and tried to listen.

They could only hear the tadpoles and the crickets.

Father looked at the youngest daughter and asked her to sing her favourite song, the one she had heard on the radio.

She started singing.

The other four sisters joined in.

Father only knew the first few lines but he hummed beautifully for the rest of the song.

Mother looked at them from the kitchen and smiled.

Years have gone by.

The four younger sisters have grown up and work as engineers.

The eldest sister however got the best job.

She became my mom.

And till date, she tells me the beautiful tale of the singing well. 

Instant photo, bees rupya

I have a theory. If you visit the Gateway of India on a Sunday or on a public holiday, you will easily appear in at least a thousand pictures. People click pictures on their phones, smartphones, tablets and cameras both compact and DSLRs. Among those using the DSLR cameras are the 300 odd photographers who'll give you a piece of your memory for twenty rupees a print.

When I last visited the Gateway, I was struck by a thought. These photographers click everyone. No one clicks these photographers. I tell this to M.K. Das, one of the many photographers. He laughs. Quickly, he finds someone to click us. 

With Mr. M.K. Das

I reached the Gateway today, armed with my Nikon Coolpix and a random set of questions, hardly a questionnaire. The objective was to catch these memory-makers in action, talk to them and know who they are.

It wasn't easy to get them talking, especially on a Sunday. Today is when the monument gets the maximum footfalls. A good day for business. I overheard two photographers discussing how there are more locals than tourists today. Not so good a business day then.

Das has been clicking tourists here since '88 when he was twenty. He roars with laughter when I tell him I was born in 1986. An average working day begins at 11 and ends with daylight at 8, the last few frames aided by the yellow beam on the heritage structure. 

With Mr. Tulsi Rai

I talk to Tulsi Rai who's been clicking at the Gateway for 15 years. Where's he from? He takes a bit to respond, Jharkhand. I made a mental note to avoid similar questions at the very beginning of the conversation. Both Mukes (M.K. Das) and I are from the same village in Jharkhand. I tell him about my photographer-clicking spree. He smiles and nods and gets another photographer to click us. Does he do only this? Rai works in a pub sometimes, clicking at their events. He gets a hundred rupees per photo there.

How did he end up here? There were relatives in Bombay. I used to come here with them whenever I visited. Then one day, I just stayed back, Rai says.

Ranjit, sipping tea from a plastic cup approaches me with the usual sales pitch. Bolo sir, instant photo, bees rupya. I tell him I want a picture with him. He shakes his head and says Mein sirf apne biwi ke saath photo khichaata hoon. It was my turn to laugh. I raised my hand for a hi-five but he had the cup in one hand and an umbrella in another. He gave me a fist bump with the umbrella hand.

Babu saw me trying to talk to him into posing for a picture. Ranjit ran. Babu and I chased him and got this one. Win win situation. I got this picture. He did not pose.

Chasing Ranjit

On a good day, Rai says he makes an average of Rs. 450. Paisa kamaane ka apna apna line dhoondhna padta hai. I agree with him. I wish I could find mine. I ask Das if he manages to make a living with this money. Chal jaata hai, he says.

Maqsood came to the city 4-5 months ago after passing his tenth. He has to send money back home in Karimganj, near Silchar in Assam.

Maqsood

He lightens up when I tell him I was in Guwahati and Silchar last year. He lost his father. His maternal uncles work on boats at the Gateway, he says. Is that how he got here? There are more maamas here, photographers. Idhar sab maama hai he says.

What do I do? Das wants to know. I tell him I am a jobless writer. He nods knowingly and says he knew I was ‘something like that’. Apparently my questions gave me away. So you make stories. I nod, somewhat glad that he put it that way.

Many photographers like Fulesh (from Bihar) and Ranjit refused to be photographed. I don't know whether to file that under 'You are afraid of what you don't understand' or ‘the ghosts of past experiences.’

I'm glad some of these people spoke to me. I wish I could ask them more questions. They were busy and I was growing tired of walking in the rain. After spending around three hours clicking and talking with my flashy friends at the Gateway, I left for a late lunch.

P.S: Both Both Das and Rai refused to accept money. They said this is the first time someone thought of clicking them. Isko aap gipht samjho.

Some more clicks from today:

The poor man's bubble bath.

Their equivalent of a 'water-cooler' chat.

Families taking pains to convince their baby to look into the camera and smile.

This is how photographers have fun in their mundane job: Make tourists do stupid poses.

This is how photographers have fun in their mundane job: Make tourists do stupid poses.

Sometimes, they pose too.

The printer that has made 'photography' easy. Apparently, people who used to do 'monkey-business' have now become photographers.

The Grand Taj.

The End.

Pitla Pitla Ping Ping

I regret not clicking the pitla Suhas Deo made (conjured rather, because it was magical) on Saturday at the Indus Paragliding Base Camp at Kamshet. But then, I'm glad I don't have a picture because the picture could never have done justice to the deliciousness the pitla was. I will now try to describe it with all its juiciness intact.

For the uninitiated, pitla is nothing fancy. It's just a paste of gram flour, some onions, tomatoes and salt for taste. The contents of pitla might differ according to the ingredients you use. For example, Mr. Deo surprised the mixture by squeezing half a lemon into it. Rahul Sharma diced the onions and tomatoes and the garlic that I peeled by the thousands.

I must have been sitting outside and staring lovingly at Indrayani when a fragrance beckoned me to the kitchen. I saw Suhas at the stove, stirring a thick yellow paste thicker on medium flame. I could compare it to a lot of yellow things but that would be a misfit when I'm trying to appeal to your appetite here. Food wasn’t off the stove yet so I went back to what I was doing.

After what seemed like a thousand light years, our vegetarian meal of rice, dal makhni, dudhi-dal and pitla was ready for consumption.But Mr. Sharma was yet to add his finishing touches. Deciding that the pitla needed to be greener and creamier, he scooped the creamy top layer off a milk container and hit the pitla with it. For the greens, he grabbed a bunch of struggling coriander, wrung their necks and threw their heads into the kadhai as well.

He was stirring it when I entered and grabbed a plate. I took as much rice as I could and draped it with the dal makhni. On the side, I took the dudhi-dal and then a few blobs of the thick pitla.

My mother says hunger is the best tastemaker. Old wisdom but it wasn’t just the hunger that had made the food so delectable. The two men just knew what they were doing. Maybe their wives make them practice at home, I don't know. The dal makhni was better than what you have at an average restaurant. It wasn’t overcooked or underdone but I thought it would taste better with some more salt and it did. (Note to self: Tu high BP se marega beta.) The dudhi, cooked with its skin, was crunchy and the dal kicked many a protein shake in the perineum.

Fine, i'll tell you about the best part, look at you holding on to every word waiting for me to describe the pitla! It was simply delicious! I had spooned a brave spoonful of it into my mouth and just when it touched my tongue; my eyes closed involuntarily and let my taste buds soak in the taste. The creamy consistency, the sweet bite of the onions, the tiny pricks of green chilies and the fight for soury supremacy between the diced tomatoes and squeezed lemon juice...I know Mr. Deo would want to describe it as 'Sex on Toast' but let me tell you...it was way better. All I can add more is that if you popped some mint right after having this pitla, you would be destroying the amazing aftertaste.

I have had Sindhi kadhi before and it was nice. But many thanks to Suhas and Rahul for the pleasure of pitla. I don't know if Barney Stinson will like Pitla but if he did, he would say it was legen...wait for it...dary!

ELEPHANTS IN KERALA

(This is an unauthorized translation of an article by N.A Naseer in the May 5 issue of Mathrubhoomi Weekly in Malayalam titled Pirakile Aana Chandam. Ever since my father read it out to me, I’ve wanted to translate it into English to help this brilliant story reach out to non-Malayalis. This is that attempt. Hope I do justice to it.)

Creatures that are supposed to be comfortably living in their own habitats fatefully end up in villages and towns. Here, in order to sustain, they find themselves dancing to the tunes of cruel actions and harsh chidings of humans, let alone the sadness, fear, homesickness and grief of being away from family.

(These lines that describe the life and times of elephants in our world are from Matangaleela, a renowned text on Elephant Sciences or Gaja Shashtram).

The unbearable season of festivals and heat is here. Brought to the city by crook, Kerala’s wild elephants are dreadfully walking towards their most hated time of the year.

While walking amongst fans of Elephant Festivals, it is the hind legs of these creatures that I always notice. The decorations that adorn the front of the elephant do not fancy me. I am reminded of unwilling brides forcefully dressed up and presented for an exhibition without any importance to her wants or wishes (Girls are now known to break their shackles.)

What revelers see are sparkling gold plated decorations that cover the elephant’s forehead and eyes. What they do not see are the wounds on its hind legs caused by the constant irritation of the linked chains, now smeared with ash and turmeric and the agony this causes. Even if they do see this, it probably adds to their beauty.

In Kerala, along with playing instruments of amusement, elephants are always present for religious festivals (this is yet another instance where people of all religions compete amongst each other), why even for inaugurations of serbat shops! It is no secret that the pachyderms are made to walk in the hot sun, made to stand among flaring torches and loud firecrackers with linked chains and threats of deadly weapons. If all this is part of the package called ‘Elephantine Beauty’ (Aana Chandam in Malayalam), then there is something has definitely gone wrong with our mental state. How else do we explain how such a proud and cultured community metes out such cruelty towards these animals?

As days pass by, newspaper pages are filled with sordid stories of the plight of Kerala’s elephants. ‘Elephant lifts priest during mass procession’ (Matrubhoomi, March 31, 2013). The elephant couldn’t move his feet because they was held in place with linked chains or…

Tecchikaatu Ramachandran, an upset elephant killed three women in Perumbavaoor, during the Taipooyam Kaavadi festival. This elephant’s fans association has a wonderful explanation as to why this occurred. Apparently, Ramachandran was upset because he saw a saddle being installed on the back of another elephant and was jealous! Clearly it was not upset because of memories of old tortures, painful blindings (most elephants in Kerala have been willfully blinded. That is yet another cruelty.), strained calves, exhaustion, musth or any other ailment man hadn’t found out about elephants. We personify the elephants with our feelings of jealousy, deceit and arrogance.

It is the era of flex boards everywhere where elephants competitively rub shoulders with politicians and film stars. Flexes bigger than the elephants themselves that say, ‘Here I come’ and ‘He’s Coming’. Don’t be surprised if fans associations claim that elephants got upset because they couldn’t find themselves mentioned in the flexes!

I was travelling through Thrissur – the city of festivals when I walked into this sight. An elephant raising one of his hind legs for the mahout to disembark. There’s nothing special about what I saw. It is commonplace for elephants to bow low or lie down to facilitate ‘passengers’ to climb atop. Why is it that we do not see the tortures the wild animal went through to perform such subservient chores repeatedly?

P. Balan’s documentary film Patinettam Aaana (The Eighteenth Elephant) is about the plight of such elephants. The heart-wrenching scenes of elephants being tortured include one from an Elephant Market in Bihar with elephants lined up in rows like in a cattle market. Apparently 500-700 elephants participate here (It must be remembered that sale of wildlife including elephants is under prohibition since 2004. However, such markets still function.) This particular scene shows an elephant standing ready to be sold but without chains or any such bindings, uncharacteristically still and quiet. Its caretaker stands not too far away. If the elephant as much as moves his head, the man would raise his hand seeing which the elephant would shrink back into its former position. The man has a ‘mazhu’ (a kind of axe) in his hand. Imagine the dreadful horrors he must have been through if this huge docile creature is now afraid of a tiny axe. Every time the sharp instrument cut into it, the flesh and bone animal reduced to an obedient toy in the man’s hands.

Tales of an elephant’s obedience are famous among mahouts and the elephant’s owners. Here, one must not forget all the pain the animals must have undergone to become so docile.

There used to be an elephant in North Paravoor. One who wouldn’t let anyone near it and refused to attend festivals. That’s when a brave mahout entered the scene. He was known to bring every elephant line to toe. Finally, this elephant relented and started going for festivals. Impressed, the businessman who owned the elephant presented the mahout with a gold medal. This mahout happened to speak to a friend of mine who cares for elephants. Apparently, the mahout had said, “For the next festivals, either I won’t be here or the elephant won’t be here.”

The elephant relented yet again. It succumbed to the multiple blows it had received during training.

A lot of moves in weapons training can be attributed to elephants. Why even the Gajavadivu in Kalaripayattu and the weight shifting technique in Chinese Tai-Chi is inspired by an elephant’s gait. To date, elephants are revered as gurus for people who study weapons training, where an elephant’s every movement is equivalent to a thousand techniques.

Our traditional art forms and yoga derive inspiration from the elephant’s movement. Our poets, writers, artists and storytellers continue to be inspired by this giant animal. These artists need to see the atrocities their favourite wild inspiration has to bear.

Somehow we humans believe that we rule over every other living creature in the world. We even have justifications for feeling this way. Elephants don’t need our gods, temples or decorations. To understand what they really need, one must trace back to their roots, the elephants that are treacherously brought to the cities from their wild habitats. Their elation and freedom must be seen to be believed. Rice and palm leaves is not what they really eat. Mutton soup and kashaayam (kadha, medicinal concoction) is not their medicine. The forests are their temples, their gods, their mother and everything else.

As seasons change, they perfectly know what food to have and what to avoid. Research shows that elephants consume 112 plant species. The genetic knowledge to identify and use medicinal herbs is passed through every generation of elephants.

I catch myself thinking of elephants that eat rice and rotting pam leaves. Devoid of sweat glands, how do they manage to stand in the scalding sun? Fully grown elephants can see clearly up to 30-50 metres away. It’s their sense of hearing and smell that they use adeptly. Mahouts destroy the right eye of their elephants, apparently to keep them from getting frightened with moving vehicles and to avoid any fracas.

Elephants are known to communicate with each other using infrasonic waves that we humans can’t hear. Catherine Penn, a researcher studying African elephants has proven that elephants can hear sounds that the human ear is not designed to access.

Once I was sitting in the verandah of a camp shed at the Mudumalai Wildlife Research Centre. A tusker stood quietly not too far away. Suddenly, without any warning, he charged straight towards the camp shed. The reason was even more surprising. He had charged at the vibrations caused by a phone kept in silent mode inside the shed! Who knows how many more secrets the wildlife has in store for us?

It is in front of these creatures with such sensitive hearing capacities that we beat the drums wildly for hours, burst never-ending rows of firecrackers and scream and shout in festive exhilaration. It is not obedience. It is the torture they fear.

Wild elephants cover a distance of up to 40 kilometers a day. When activists accused people of making elephants walk on hot, tarred roads, there were cases and discussions. It resulted in elephants being whizzed from one place to another in trucks and lorries. This gave elephant owners the opportunity to take their elephants to multiple festivals and hike their earnings. This is destroying this gentle creature’s health system. Remember that there were reports of elephants being forced to participate in running races.

Elephants are known to take many naps while travelling long distances through forests, especially when the summer sun is ripe. I remember seeing a female elephant standing guard to three sleeping ones – a tusker, another female and a baby elephant. She stood facing the open end of the forest with acute alertness. Makes me wonder how long ago it must’ve been that the elephants in town slept as well.

The sight of elephants drinking tap water with their trunks reminds me of the ecstasy the elephants must feel when spending hours lazing around in open water bodies in the woods. Elephants just love rivers and lakes. They just can’t have enough of them. It breaks my heart to see these shade-loving creatures walk on hot roads uncomplainingly. The shadows of the forest have probably receded to glimpses of memory.

Not that travelling in trucks is any less exhausting. Elephants walking backwards to alight from the trucks, shaking and pausing with fright is a common sight during festival times. Elephants falling off speeding trucks and dying are mere newspaper articles for us. 

 

I know someone who once touched a wild elephant. Wounded or tired wild elephants usually end up outside this particular house in the forest. It’s a refuge for elephants suffering from gun wounds, where they are treated, fed and sent off back to the forest. One such wild elephant once turned up with a mouth burnt with a firecracker. It took some time but was nursed back to health. It has so happened that every elephant that comes that way knows this person by his smell. If one can befriend elephants without aggressive chidings and torturous instruments, why are the wild elephants in Kerala being subjected to such inhumane grief?

There is no such thing as ‘Naat-aana’ (domestic elephant or literally ‘village elephant’). Every elephant is a wild elephant. I wonder how many more people are interested in forcing these wild elephants into become ‘village elephants’. Why does such a cruel culture exist for Kerala alone?

Even in the forest, it is us humans who are cause for grief for the elephants. Globally, 50 acres of rainforests are being felled by the minute. When forests become sparse, wild creatures venture out to comparatively denser outskirts. We have elephant ‘experts’ and wildlife officers who claim that elephants will swim across inundated forest corridors when the dam on Chalakudi River is raised. Another lucrative lure is the hefty insurance kitty that owners will get when an elephant dies, hand in glove with unscrupulous veterinarians. Everyone has their own benefits charted out.

An elderly gentleman, on seeing a picture of wild elephants, once asked, “What will we do with the elephants that are now stuck here among humans?” His friend, beside him said, “They’ll be sent home. Even if they die, they will be better off dying in their own homes rather than here with all this suffering.”

Why can’t we give them a free retirement home like they have in Srilanka? Some place with an abundant water body? They are sick of putting up with this act and can’t take it anymore.

What must an old tusker think when he walks on burning hot tarred roads? Does he think of his past in the green forests where he grew up? The tiny streams of water? Or the lazing around in water bodies and then the dusting of black earth? Does he think of his lovers and his escapades with them? Those rare medicinal herbs that grow just once a year in the forest? Yummy fruits? The bright light of the full moon?

Where am I now? Languages, I don’t comprehend, people I don’t understand, cities, sounds and shrieks…I can’t take these any more. How much longer do I have to stand here? There’s someone on my back…it hurts. I wish someone would remove this mask off my face. I wish someone would let me move my legs freely or let me lean on something.

Every pain will have to be borne at the same time.

My friends…the ones I lost in the forest that fateful day…I was distracted by the female elephant when the ground suddenly gave way and I fell into some hole with quite an impact. My legs were hurt, I wouldn’t stand up and get out. I could hear her shrieking outside the hole along with other elephants.

Pooram 2013

While my photographer friends would click the decorate fronts of elephants, I would spend most of my time behind them. I would cringe at every infected wound on the hind legs…

Every attempt at beautifying the front of the elephant will have a wound on its hind legs that will tell its story.

The bling on the front didn’t attract me at all. I kept thinking how uncomfortable those must be in this heat. The elephants were just standing there lifelessly, silently bearing wounds seeping blood, wounds with pus oozing out, deep wounds that were tried to camouflaged with turmeric or ash, wounds that would expose flesh and iron chains eating into fleshy wounds that would never heal.

It is merciless people that I saw there. How else do you explain how they tolerate such cruelty meted out to a living creature? I have a name for this pitiful sight. ‘Áana chandam’ or elephantine beauty.

They were standing in extreme heat while I wrote this. People cheering away merrily. I wandered about looking for a shade to stand under and felt exhausted and thirsty. I was after the elephants all day since 6 in the morning up to 3 in the afternoon without having even a drop of water. My clothes and camera felt burning hot. When finally, I would reach the room and collapse in my bed, friends would arrive saying, ‘Look they are delivering the elephants in trucks.’ I would run again, with camera in hand, ready to click.

That night, every time I shut my eyes, their wounds flashed in front of me. Pained unbearably, I walked towards them at night alone, without my camera.

It is only when you see them in their own habitat that you realize that they can’t stand in the sun for more than ten minutes, let alone six or twelve hours.

We have laws. But we continue to prove all of them to be useless with every celebration when we exhibit these creatures in linked chains.

This is the land of all cultures, it is the land where leaders of all cultures get together every now and then and this is the ‘çulture’ they help sustain.

A little child who watched the elephant walking in linked chains was heard asking his father, “Dad, won’t that hurt him?”

The wooden platforms tied to the backs of the elephants add to their misfortune. An elephant that is made to carry three persons normally is made to carry four persons when he’s fitted with the platform, the fourth person to hold the platform in place. The elephant will only be thankful if the platform is not placed, it will be less uncomfortable.

Thiruvambadi Ramachandran, the elephant who was under treatment for his satiated trunk apparently wanted to participate in this pooram and wanted to seat people on his back. His body, tired from the exertion of the last three festivals had in fact aggravated after this festival. People said, the 52 year old just wanted to have the wooden machan on his back.

The elephant Thiruvambadi Sivasundar has to his claim ‘Lord of Beauty’ a biography complete with song and dance sequences. This DVD was published and distributed among other elephants. Someone commented saying, “So the elephants will take the DVD home and watch it, right?”

Like many others, Sivasundar too was trapped in a hole when he walked in the forest as a calf with his mother.

An elephant was allegedly offended that he was not at the centre of the procession and didn’t get enough attention. The mahout took him away and made him stand in a corner, away from the celebrations. That’s a lucky elephant! He didn’t have to bear the loud noises and heat like the others.

These are all manifestations of seeing an elephant not as a wild creature but as a personification of itself. Why poke all our thoughts and wishes into a helpless animal is what I find myself wondering about. When will we learn to see an elephant as an elephant? The wild elephants in Kerala might have just one thought – satisfying food, freedom from the linked chains, mating calls and the never ending forest that had held him close.

After arranging them in rows for the pooram, the mahouts rest with the stick and the whip in front of the elephant. These are apparently the naughty trouble-making types. It hurts to hear things like this. Can we bear to think of our children or even relatives standing in the hot sun with their feet bound? If they move it bit, would you call it ‘trouble-making’?

I saw two elephants made to stand in the sun. Mahouts, some barefoot, skipped, stood on one leg and pranced about the hot road in the elephants’ shadows. Some put up their feet on the elephant’s leg one by one to escape from the heat. Yet another one folded a newspaper manifold and stood on it. Imagine the situation of the elephants. I heard someone saying, “Move these elephants. There’ll be trouble.”

So then they were made to walk towards Paramekaavu on scorching tarred roads. They were then hosed down with water. They should’ve at least let them stand in shade for some time before they did that. With no shade whatsoever, these huge creatures where then made to stand still, lifelessly in the sun.

Sheltered by umbrellas, caps and towels, the crowd admired the ‘Gaja-veeras’ (elephant heroes) standing in the heat. Yet again, my clothes and camera burned making me want to seek solace in shade.

Humiliated and punished for no fault of theirs…this is 'aana chandam'.

Special squads were employed to control the elephants, in case any untoward incidents should arise. They were armed with tranquilizer shots, chains, ropes and sticks. What an irony. What is this – a festival or a war?

Why the false bravado if you know that the creature is this dangerous? How much common sense does it take to see that an elephant is a wild creature? Does it take more proof than the fact that it is still ‘troublesome’ after spending 10 – 50 years with them?

While the heat is getting unbearable, while people seek medical help for sunstrokes, while pets collapse out of sheer exhaustion, these shade loving creatures are forcefully captured, beaten up badly and are being made to dance to our tunes. Do we care to think of its mental state when we see an elephant pass us by?

There’s a man in Thrissur who’s said to be sympathetic to every wild elephant that arrives in town. V.K Venkatachalam is his name but is fondly called ‘Venkdy Maash’. A teacher who protests against the way elephants are treated and doesn’t fear to go to court to meet his demands. He doesn’t step out much. Threats and attacks await him. He’s even banned from certain ‘pooram’ places.

When he expressed his concern about the elephants in Palakkad’s Manampully kaavu in 1997, he was accosted by some men who threatened him and demanded his camera. It was only after the police intervened that he was let go. Maash’s fight to end cruelty towards elephants has now reached the Supreme Court. His well-wishers from Thrissur and all over bring him news about the whereabouts of captive elephants nearby. (Speaking to him in 2004, he told me that he’s just received news of an unruly female elephant in Kollam that had killed one and injured three.)

Venkdy Maash’s guts have inspired many more who are not afraid to take elephant cruelty cases to court.

If people take a moment to ponder about the number of unruly elephants and related incidents, they will begin to ask if it is all worth it? ‘Why this cruelty?’ will be the question to ask.

YEAR	NO. OF UNRULY ELEPHANTS	NO. OF DEAD ELEPHANTS
2008-09	274	72
2009-10	310	79
2010-11	516	94
2011-12	816	96
2013	692	10

2013 hasn’t ended but 4 mahouts, 3 women and a passerby have died. So many have been seriously injured or have died in these many years. What hurts elephants doesn’t really hurt us. In all, 415 have died in Kerala so far. We have 361 of them left. How long will these last the cruelty? How will we hold up our ‘culture’ when Kerala’s elephants all die?

People used to talk about mahouts and their sorry life and the love elephant owners have for their elephants. I was still on the elephants’ side. I kept thinking about their freedom and their current situation.

I spoke to a few young mahouts. They hadn’t become mahouts because they didn’t get any other job. They loved to be known as the brave young men who could control a mighty elephant.

I saw mahouts sleeping beside the elephant’s feet. People would admire the mahout for making such a huge creature stand without moving. It would take a small move to do away with the mahout but it wouldn’t move a bit. After all, it went through a lot of grief to be this disciplined.

The elephant stands with its weight shifting between his front legs and his hind legs, which can be seen if you observe it for some time. That’s because of the years of torture we’ve brought down upon them. Elephants made to stand in rows for the pooram can often be seen leaning on to the elephant next to them, at least for some time.

Elephants that get hurt in the forest heal quickly whereas the condition of elephants in cities is deplorable. It doesn’t take a wound to get infected, thanks to the bad food, lack of its medicines herbs, unbearable heat and lack of exercise.

No sooner does the mahout place the stick on the front leg than the elephant quickly bows. This is not devotion but because of the fear that has been instilled in it.

I’ve never seen an elephant in the forest eat palm leaves. We don’t even have palms in our forests. It is only because of dire need that they manage with palm leaves. How much paper would we need to write enough about cruelty towards elephants? A lot of people raise their voices every day from all parts of Kerala wanting to know if there will be an end to this. That is something we need to decide.

Dear readers, we can now end this cruelty. Every elephant that landed in Kerala will only have heartbreaking memories. We must tell our kids that what we see in Kerala are grieving elephants and not ‘Aana Chandam’. We need to show them elephants walking freely inside the forest. It is only then that such cruel fashions will end. It will be pathetic to continue destroying their homes and capturing their kind. Show them some mercy. Every elephant in Kerala holds the memory of a forest close at heart. 

10 reasons why we badly need a good 'Ghost Who Walks' film

When I was in Class VI, everyone around me was talking about what to become when you grow up. A lot of them wanted to become doctors and engineers. I guess I was a bit looney then as I am now because I was the only one who wanted to become Phantom – the Ghost Who Walks (but only those times when I didn’t want to become Tipu Sultan). While I did like Superman and Batman and He-Man later on it was for the Phantom that I would still vote to be my childhood hero no. 1.

We’ve all seen the crap the Man of Steel film is. Here are 10 reasons why a good film on the Ghost Who Walks is the need of the hour:

HE’S THE KNOWN NEMESIS OF ALL POACHERS

You can’t just go to the forest and claim something as your own! That’s one thing the Phantom drills into the heads of poachers with his skull ring, be it an evil forest guard or foreign smugglers…he’ll take them to task.

HE TEACHES YOU TO RESPECT WILDLIFE AND THE FOREST

– Phantom’s holiday home/ farm house is an enchanting island called Eden where carnivores and herbivores live together in harmony. It is almost as if the Phantom messed with their food chain. I am suddenly not so sure that is a good thing to do. But he does make you believe in it for some time.

HE TELLS YOU THAT DOLPHINS ARE REALLY FRIENDLY CREATURES

When the young Phantom’s girlfriend comes visiting, they all go surfing with their pet dolphins called Solomon and Nefertiti! 

HE’S REALLY FIT

Even though you’ve never seen him work out, you know that he’s just a man with amazing physical capabilities when you see him bash a gang of goons with his speed and adeptness at firing his two revolvers. He hardly ever needs to use more than two shots at a time. Superman is from another world where the average man is stronger. Batman makes use of technology. Spiderman is lucky to be bitten by a radioactive spider. But this guy is a normal human being who has trained himself to be this fast-moving lean-mean-machine. I think I would readily hit the gym if he gave me tips.

HE LIVES OFF THE GRID, #LikeABoss

The Phantom lives in a Skull Cave deep inside the forest, the one his forefathers built and he just maintains, albeit professionally. He grows his own food and lives off forest produce. He doesn’t use electricity but depends on huge candles. We don’t know much about the plumbing system in the Skull Cave but it’s not difficult to conjure a place to attend nature’s calls when you are in the forest! 100% off-grid and environment friendly living!

HE’S A GOOD SAMARITAN

For generations, he has helped people in need and has never wanted anything in return. He does call on people when he needs them to help others.

HE LOVES DOGS

They say judge a man by how he treats his lesser creatures. You know he loves his dog (or should we say wolf?) Devil. We need more of these animal loving superheroes, don’t you think?

HE USES AN ECO-FRIENDLY MODE OF TRANSPORT

As a kid, when I started to school, I wanted to switch to something faster. There was no way I was getting a bike but I would’ve loved a horse. Phantom gets around so splendidly on his steed – Hero. The only exhaust it probably exhausts is the dung which is awesome manure.

HE’S PROBABLY AN AUDIO ENGINEER OF SOME KIND

Knowing well that mobiles won’t have network in the Deep Woods, Phantom set up the dependable and fast Jungle Drums that are used to send and receive messages. Based on the Morse Code, you think?

HE UNDERSTANDS PEACE

They say that ever since the Phantom, the tribes inside the forest haven’t fought each other. The Wambesi and the Llongo have learnt to mind their ways. Often they come together for the healthy inter-tribe Olympics, which also acts as a brilliant place for show of pride and power. Everything else is good with the Ghost Who Walks around.  Unlike the society then, Phantom made sure that slavery was abolished and that no discrimination took place based on race or colour of skin. He himself has a lot of dark-skinned friends. 

 What I do not understand is why the Pygmy Poison people are called ‘Bandar’. Was that Harbhajan Singh’s idea?

They tried making a Phantom film in 2010 but it looks so tacky! If they can make the Dark Knight look slick and sexy, what did Phantom do wrong? A Phantom film will at least have some take home message, something that the yawny Man of Steel lacked.

Just some snuff

Muttashan used to snuff, or do snuff or whatever is the expression for sniffing powdered tobacco into your nostrils, waiting for it and then legendarily sneezing multiple times, loud enough to scare the crows off the coconut tree tops.

Muttashan is what I refer to my grandfather as. As a child, I would see among his closest possessions, a sharp pen knife, a long chequered kerchief (one corner of which he would tuck into the front of his mundu, leaving the rest to hang listlessly, also probably weighed down by all the mucus in it!) and two tiny plastic bottles – one with a red cap, the other with a green one. I remember that he used to sneeze many times during the day but never made the mental connection between those bottles and the incessant sneezing.

I asked my mom because moms were Google.com before Google.com came into being. By the power vested in them to become your mother, they know everything. She said it is ‘mooki podi’, or literally ‘nose powder’.

I wasn’t much of a fussy or the tantrum-throwing kind but I was denied a trial of this exciting ‘nose powder’ when I asked for it once, albeit meekly.

Now, years later, I got a cousin to buy me some snuff, just to know what it feels like. My mother, still Google, strictly forbade it. My cousin still managed to get me a packet (I thought was small but which is going to last me an eternity) of snuff.

 

Muttashan would carefully tap some powder onto his palm, close the bottle, then pinch some powder between his index finger and his thumb, hold it inside his nostrils one by one and sniff.

I emulated him from memory. I took a pinch from the packet, held it to my nostrils and snorted. The thing went straight to the back of my nose, met the back of my tongue and somehow said hullo to my throat. The insides of my nasal tract burned like it does when you step into an unwashed-for-days public urinal. Now this is definitely what a bad habit feels like.

Some online forum tells me that I probably did it wrong. Snuff is closer to sniff than it is to snort.

I tried the sniff.

I hated it. I have no idea why Muttashan subjected his respiratory system to this for decades. The last time I met him, he said he stopped doing it two years ago. Good for him.

I am also a little dejected. I had resented to find online, a snuff bullet – a carry capsule for the powder that lets you inhale controlled amounts of snuff at the tweak of a tiny knob. I had planned to show it off and snuff away while the rest tarred off their lungs with smoke. 

The fancy-ass snuff bullets I wanted to buy online.

So anyway, no more powdered tobacco for my nose. However, I have discovered that I like sneezing. It clears my head and propels unwanted stuff out of the system.

To induce this sneezing, I find myself hooked to this product called ‘Chhikni’. It is powdered eucalyptus or Nilgiri leaves, or so they say.

It’s yummy!

The bottle of Chhikni with the name scraped off inadvertently. Most of us have this habit of disrobing bottles of their labels.  

Would you live in a micro apartment?

Mumbai is an expensive city. While the cost of living is on a steady hike, it looks as if the price of real estate and the cost of transportation are on some kind of hallucinogen.

Let’s get practical. The stock of fossil fuels the world has is fast depleting. Those with money will continue to buy their share and more at whatever price, thus raising the average cost. Minimum fare for public transport and the price for all other commodities will subsequently rise.

Coming back to real estate. Till as long as people with money continue to buy property for the available rates, the rates will just remain skyrocketing. This is not even accounting for the demands for black money and things like that. There are people, newly married couples, buying 2,3 BHKs for a couple of crores.

Does a 20-something young couple need that much space? Hell, if you’ve grown up in such luxury and can still afford to replicate that, you are welcome to suit yourself.

I definitely don’t. My fiancee corroborates. Allow me to propose to you the idea of micro living or living with less.

Imagine a 300 sq. ft. flat. (A lot of ‘houses’ for the LIG or the Low Income Group that the MHADA builds are only as big as 225 sq. ft which often houses four and more members. (At the same time, unlike the elephant in the fridge joke). Don’t worry, you can also imagine an in-house toilet and a bathroom. The only other wall inside the apartment is mobile, which means it has a set of wheels at the top and bottom, by which you can move it from one of the room to the other. If you need more of the living room, push the mobile wall to the far end. If you need an extra room, keep the wall in the centre and put a mattress or an inflatable air bed there. Voila, spare bedroom! One side is obviously the kitchenette, with just enough to feed the two or an occasional four. I’ll bet that’s more space than you’ll need.

You are probably struggling to come up with disadvantages of a micro house but I would exhort you to push them aside while I tell you about the positives of living with less:

LESS SPACE TO COOL/LIGHT-UP

It’s only 300 sq. ft. which means it won’t cost you much to cool the entire space, if you want to. You won’t need more than a couple of CFL lights to light it up either. Moreover, green building techniques also suggest walls made of double-layered, durable fibre-glass that let in all the sunlight you’ll need during the day. All you need then are good blinds. You don’t want people on the road watching you have sex, but don’t let anything I say come between you and your kinks.

NO SPACE TO HORDE

You know you only have so much space which makes you think, “Do I really need this stuff?” which is good because you have more room for life and can also save money for that pending Ladakh trip!

And most importantly, which I’m the happiest about –

LESS SPACE TO CLEAN

I can imagine a lot of future fights with my wife about who’ll wash the dishes and who’ll clean the house with both of us wanting to do the latter.

I have a question for you. Given a chance, would you like to live in a micro apartment in Mumbai?

I flew

Last weekend, I flew.

With a huge nylon wing tied to a cushioned bucket I sat in.

I did not have to do much.

My seat was attached to a pilot’s belly.

I told him I felt like a baby kangaroo.

I knew I was going to fly when I got to the base camp.

But I wasn’t really thinking about it much.

I was with a friend and his friends

And I was looking forward to spending time with them.

Strangely, I had for company

two business journalists, a market researcher and an entrepreneur.

My phone; switched off, was in my bag. My bag with its mouth open was in Sheesh Mahal.

A hurried lunch later, we left for the flying zone

and waited in the sun for the angry winds to simmer down,

armed with nothing else but bottles of water and some senses of humour.

Even birds don’t fly in winds like that.

They just sit and chillax somewhere.

Except for the vultures there. With huge wings,

those guys can do whatever they want.

I’m just glad they didn’t vomit acid on or around anyone that day.

Guess they are used to flying humans by now.

So anyway, when we were ready to fly,

the instructor asked who’ll be the first one to fly.

Now, I’m learning to raise hands at every given opportunity, especially for when someone says ‘Hands up!’

So the instructor, Yogi shook confident hands with me.

Then he told me that we’ll have to run a bit before the wind can meet us.

Meanwhile, the assistants buckled and strapped me everywhere.

Yogi said, ‘Right after we take off, sit into the cushioned bucket.’

We took off and I sat back and relaxed.

What I saw next, blew my mind.

I would be a loser if I mentioned Farmville here.

But I saw tiny matchbox-sized farms and G.I.Joe-sized people

and trees that look like dummies from an architect’s model building.

I couldn’t believe I was flying.

It’s like being in an open aeroplane. You are flying but with the wind in your face.

If I didn’t wear the helmet, my hair would be in my mouth.

But what the instructor said next put my balls in my mouth. He asked if I would like some acrobatics.

I thought I was brave and said yes. After all, I must try new things, right?

I suddenly remembered why I hated that particular ride in Esselworld.

My stomach felt that familiar premonition you feel before you dispense a projectile vomit.

I don’t remember screaming but those down apparently heard me.

With eyes shut tight, I told Yogi that I had had enough of the sommersaults.

Just flying was enough of an accomplishment for me.

We hummed some songs and tried to whistle.

It’s difficult to whistle with wind trying to force its way into your mouth

(try doing that at the train door sometime).

Soon enough, Yogi says,

‘Right before we land, try to stand up on your feet.’

And I did just that and landed on the ground like a falling cat.

This smile on my face on a photo someone clicked of me when I landed, I want to see more of those.

I clicked some of the others flying higher, faster, sommersaulting and playing with the wind.

Friend is going to take a flying course. Not me though.

I like the view from the road better, from my cycle.

One thing I do want to learn is how to swim.

What do I tell you about the sexy Indrayani  River?

She takes you in and keeps you in.

Talk to her, talk to yourself or talk to the tiny biting fish.

Talk to your companions or talk to the humming water purifier.

Talk to the birds or that crow as big as a cat.

The river won’t talk back. She’ll write to you instead.

In waves. In a language you will not understand as a city-slicker.

Make time for her and maybe she’ll teach you to read her mind.

But tell her what you are thinking and she will listen to you with calm.

You can hear her even more clearly if you put your head underwater.

The water tickles and enters your ears like jelly earphones

And then she giggles and gurgles inside your ear.

Come here if you want to fly.

Come here if you want to swim.

Come here if all you want to do is lie in the water all day.

Come here if you are a boy who wants to bajao the scenes, baba.

I don’t know what my reason is but I am definitely going back there

Because as someone famously said on the Whatsapp Group after the trip,

‘Ýou can check out any time you like but you can never leave.’