tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15036503521975786512024-03-13T13:44:15.135-07:00Random thoughts from a war diaryChinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1503650352197578651.post-83809031000304812002011-08-10T22:09:00.000-07:002012-05-29T17:47:25.037-07:00Untitled<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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i sit rocking in my chair</div>
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<br /></div>
it is old and worn, <br />
<br />
and does not rock quite as it should<br />
<br />
dreams and chores struggle for my limited attention<br />
<br />
when suddenly, cutting through all that, a smell rather than a sight <br />
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<br /></div>
captures my thoughts<br />
<br />
it is the smell of horse<br />
<br />
rich and rancid<br />
<br />
common, everyday for me, yet compelling<br />
<br />
powerful enough to transfix me<br />
<br />
hold me to that moment<br />
<br />
----<br />
<br />
----<br />
<br />
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the rain is like a wild, fearsome creature in these parts</div>
<br />
we do not like to call it our climate<br />
<br />
nor can we call it an aberration<br />
<br />
for it is an ever present force<br />
<br />
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restless, and wild</div>
<br />
it gouges out huge chunks from our roofs<br />
<br />
and hammers inexplicable holes into the ground<br />
<br />
turns salt and sugar into indistinguishable pastes<br />
<br />
and makes the house the sole refuge of the ants<br />
<br />
the earthworms and termites</div>Chinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1503650352197578651.post-27188098015488456122010-08-28T04:23:00.001-07:002012-05-29T17:50:52.461-07:00Time<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The little girl gazed deep into her mirror<br />
Suddenly, it slipped from her fingers<br />
And in the time it took to shatter on the wooden floor<br />
She had already aged<br />
And a million images of a snow white figure<br />
Bled from every shard</div>Chinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1503650352197578651.post-37773637775079218712010-08-25T00:05:00.000-07:002010-12-23T08:03:59.639-08:00LegacyCircle circle in the sand<br />
Hand in hand we spin again<br />
The game is simple<br />
To stay on feet<br />
Follow patterns intricate deep<br />
In the sand and shore below<br />
<br />
The first to fall is out of course!<br />
Loss of fervour, loss of faith<br />
The second to falter was no good<br />
His eyes had always looked to east<br />
Glittering strangely, they had no code<br />
<br />
Let's spin in silence<br />
Spin in faith<br />
God is in the motion here<br />
Break and it will be lost<br />
It's hell to stop and think again<br />
<br />
Spinning is a duty love<br />
A legacy from mother to child<br />
Can't you see the pattern woven?<br />
Perfection in every skein and vein<br />
<br />
Patterns in the sand so fixed<br />
That even spinning feet can't change<br />
Fit into deepened darkened grooves<br />
It's all there, it's being done againChinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1503650352197578651.post-56996322624288039972010-08-22T06:00:00.000-07:002010-08-25T12:15:01.451-07:00Ode to a Development ConsultantYour come with fancy degrees for sure<br />
Harvard Kennedy<br />
Princeton Wilson<br />
Georgetown, Syracuse and Yale<br />
<br />
You drive in SUVs through ghettos<br />
Camera flashes, notebooks crinkle<br />
Photographs for exhibitions<br />
To show what all you have seen<br />
This wretched country you have been<br />
<br />
You stand before a poor man's house<br />
Children, people tumble out<br />
Stand before you with folded hands<br />
They don't love you<br />
They just know, this is where the money is<br />
Cotton prints are a beacon<br />
Mark you out for who you are<br />
<br />
And in the soft, dusty evenings you gather<br />
In fine hotels and drink champagne<br />
Blow kisses, and talk and talk<br />
Do you compare hungry babies?<br />
Size of misery you have seen?<br />
<br />
Chips of yam and wine of palm<br />
Drunk on a floating island calm<br />
Feet in spa, arms in ocean<br />
Dancing, desserts on the house<br />
<br />
You love this job, it gives you money<br />
Lets you meet men of power<br />
Politicians, businessmen<br />
Those very same who rob this land<br />
For years untold and do again<br />
<br />
Governments love you<br />
And why not!<br />
You spin the wheel of fortune and<br />
Hand out money, line their nests<br />
With your money for the half dead<br />
<br />
If you lived in a village<br />
In a hamlet, then you'd know<br />
There is no such 'power sharing'<br />
No such grassroot, no consensus<br />
All we have are landed goons<br />
Who grab and grab, all they canChinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1503650352197578651.post-2678975616544602602008-11-27T08:23:00.000-08:002008-11-27T08:28:07.146-08:00Tintern Abbey<p><span><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">...And I have felt</span></span></p><p><span><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">A presence that disturbs me with the joy</span></span></p><p><span><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime</span></span></p><p><span><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">Of something far more deeply interfused</span></span></p><p><span><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,</span></span></p><p><span><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">And the round ocean and the living air...</span></span></p><p><a href="http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Poetry/WordsworthTinternAbbey.htm">http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Poetry/WordsworthTinternAbbey.htm</a></p><p></p>Chinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1503650352197578651.post-3321811983558847592008-07-27T08:15:00.000-07:002010-08-28T03:34:03.526-07:00Assam wanderings: Kaziranga<strong>Aranya and Wildcrest</strong><br />
<br />
That was the day I walked barefoot in a tea garden! It all started with Baidik getting all charged up and bullying me and Mate into accompanying him to Kaziranga, before he left for the kaalapaani of PwCites- Dhaka. Mate had been working in those dull heavy months in Assam with the Department of Tourism and managed to get us rooms cheap in Aranya, a government lodge.<br />
<br />
Came the designated day…and in the absence of both the manager and the resident project manager, we sneaked out of office early, around midday on a Friday. Our carriage was waiting at the guesthouse and we all clambered into it with a growing sense of excitement, Mate looking very touristy in a cap and a red tee.<br />
<br />
And so we proceeded, accompanied by the most horrific choice of Hindi music ever- courtesy Baidik :)<br />
<br />
We got there late and had little more to do than go and admire the neighbouring Wild Crest Lodge hotel- a beautiful oaken- wooden- antiquey furniture place. On the way, Baidik chose (as usual) to frighten me with his ghost stories. The setting was eerie enough…Kaziranga had no lights for miles and Wildcrest was off the road, so we turned into bumpy side paths. There were thick bamboo groves on either side and in the moonlight, the trees all shone white.<br />
<br />
<strong>Maruti Van, no Jeep</strong><br />
Next day we got up at 6 AM to catch the elephant safari… to our amusement (and to some extent concern!!), our haati was called ‘Maruti Van’ as he walked (lumbered- trotted- cantered) at a most un-elephant-like pace. He was a pachyderm with the soul of a mustang.<br />
<br />
Our ‘van’ took us around a designated circuit in the park…and to our delight; we spotted several rhinos, deer (and rabbits!). All this was done and over with in an hour after which we started to scratch our heads! It was only 8 AM, and we wanted to do so much more on our little adventure away from dusty, dirty, tired Guwahati. There was a jeep safari that some of our fellow tourists were planning to take- but we were not keen on it at all as we had seen quite a few rhinos already and Kaziranga’s terrain wasn’t beautiful or varied enough to merit a parikrama.<br />
<br />
<strong>Frost’s woods</strong><br />
<br />
It was then that a fellow tourist mentioned that there were these beautiful tea and rubber estates only a little while away and that we could go look at them. We jumped at the idea and went on to see a rubber estate that was on the slopes of a hill.<br />
<br />
And what entered our minds as we wandered deep into the forest were the lines from Frost’s poem, ‘The woods are lovely, dark and deep’. We wandered deep into those woods and took some wonderful pictures that to my grief I seem to have lost!<br />
<br />
<strong>Adivasi encounters over tea</strong><br />
<br />
Our next destination was a huge tea garden owned by Tata tea. None of us had ever been to a tea garden before and excitement levels were naturally high at the thought of what we would see. We expected to be stopped at the entrance of the estate, but to our delight, no one bothered with us at all and we drove in for a while till he hit a dead end.<br />
<br />
Badik then decided that it would be tremendous fun to walk through the garden- at least till we were stopped. Our shoes were still wet from the river party so we walked in barefoot (and unarmed!). With shoulder high tea bushes on either side of the narrow mud paths- it felt like a walk through a labyrinth with green leafy walls.<br />
<br />
The path was smooth and with cool dry mud forming the topmost layer, we didn’t cut our feet at all as feared. Every now and then the path was intersected by a broad deep drain that was overlaid with a narrow bamboo pole- the only way of getting across! When we came across the first of these Fear Factor type challenges, we eyed the drain and the bamboo nervously! Who we wondered would pull the shortest straw! I think it was Mate who got down to it first and walked the tightrope successfully. Baidik followed next and I brought up the rear very bravely.<br />
<br />
Having conquered our first dragon, we were to run into another! We sighted a group of women adivasi tea workers some way off. They were walking in our direction and Baidik thought they would make a quaint photo. He asked them if it was ok for us to click a pic…and to his horror and fright, the woman he spoke to, waved a sickle in his face and said something angrily! The whole group gave us equally angry looks and we decided to turn back and return to our car…for we remembered in time that the adivasis had been rebelling in Guwahati that very month! Mate still managed to click a pic of the group.<br />
<br />
<strong>Tezpur and the road home</strong><br />
<br />
On our way home, we decided to go via Tezpur which is a place of great historic importance. The drive to the city was beautiful, but the city itself was very disappointing- there was nothing to see and after eating some sorry looking biscuits in a local bakery, we decided to head home.Chinmayeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17006552498519837903noreply@blogger.com2