Nirvana Lounge

She sits by the window,
Head in hand,
Lost in her mystic Wonderland
Where fairies fly free, Across the sky
And a beanstalk stretches,
A million feet high.

In a world where true love is a wish away, she'll laugh and tease and play all day...now hoping, now dreaming, now smiling and scheming...then sing and dance as if time were all hers and here to stay.

Midnight hour creeps upon her, anxiety sweating down her neck. Her courage strangulated; creeper-like grip of fear choking her breath. Joys she'd known, dull and seem to fade away. She must now forget these, conceal her smiles, consume her pain.

With stairs winding, the day long gone, darkness is blinding, she carries on. One glass slipper fallen, the other worn tight, the way ahead is the one in sight. And so onward she must go...pained at the thought, but no angst will show. This is no fairytale, she knows...the curse of her choice this is. Deal with it, she must, blow by blow.

But when the lights are cool and dim,
And the sky is fringed with a starry trim
She sits by the window
Head in hand
Lost again in her mystic
Wonderland.

(Pic: Don Bell Artist Studio)

This is a befitting tribute to all us nice guys.

The nice guys that finish last, that never become more than friends, that endure hours of whining and bitching about what assholes guys are, while disproving the very point. This is dedicated to those guys who always provide a shoulder to lean on but restrain themselves to tentative hugs, those guys who hold open doors and give reassuring pats on the back and sit patiently outside the changing room at department stores.

This is in honor of the guys that obligingly reiterate how cute/beautiful/smart/funny/sexy their female friends are at the appropriate moment, because they know most girls need that litany of support. This is in honor of the guys with open minds, with laid-back attitudes, with honest concern. This is in honor of the guys who respect a girl’s every facet, from her privacy to her theology to her clothing style.

This is for the guys who escort their drunk, bewildered female friends back from parties and never take advantage once they’re at her door, for the guys who accompany girls to bars as buffers against the rest of the creepy male population, for the guys who know a girl is fishing for compliments but give them out anyway, for the guys who always play by the rules in a game where the rules favor cheaters, for the guys who are accredited as boyfriend material but somehow don’t end up being boyfriends, for all the nice guys who are overlooked, underestimated, and unappreciated, for all the nice guys who are manipulated, misled, and unjustly abandoned, this is for you.

This is for that time she left 40 urgent messages on your cell phone, and when you called her back, she spent three hours painstakingly dissecting two sentences her boyfriend said to her over dinner. And even though you thought her boyfriend was a chump and a jerk, you assured her that it was all ok and she shouldn’t worry about it.

This is for that time she interrupted the best scoring spree you’d ever orchestrated in a good game of tennis to rant about a rumor that romantically linked her and the guy she thinks is the most repulsive person in the world. And even though you thought it was immature and you had nothing against the guy, you paused the game for two hours and helped her concoct a counter-rumor to spread around the floor. This is also for that time she didn’t have a date, so after numerous vows that there was nothing “serious” between the two of you, she dragged you to a party where you knew nobody, the beer was awful, and she flirted shamelessly with you, justifying each fit of reckless teasing by announcing to everyone: “oh, but we’re just friends!” And even though you were invited purely as a symbolic warm body for her ego, you went anyways. Because you’re nice like that!

I know now for a fact that nice guys don’t often get credit where credit is due. And perhaps more disturbing, is the fact that women are just plain illogical when it comes to nice guys!

Many of them claim they just want to date a nice guy, but when presented with such a specimen, they say irrational, confusing things such as “oh, he’s too nice to date” or “he would be a good boyfriend but he’s not for me” or “he already puts up with so much from me, I couldn’t possibly ask him out!” or the most frustrating of all: “no, it would ruin our friendship.” Yet, they continue to lament the lack of datable men in the world, and they expect their too-nice-to-date male friends to sympathize and apologize for the men that are jerks.

Sorry, guys, girls like that are beyond my ability to fathom. I can’t figure out why the connection breaks down between what they say (I want a nice guy!) and what they do (I’m going to sleep with this complete ass now!). But one thing I can do, is say that the nice-guy-finishes-last phenomenon doesn’t last forever. There are definitely many girls who grow out of that train of thought and realize they should be dating the nice guys, not taking them for granted. The tricky part is finding those girls, and even trickier, finding the ones that are single.

So, until those girls are found, I propose a toast to all us nice guys. You know who you are, and I know you’re sick of hearing yourself described as ubiquitously nice. But the truth of the matter is, the world needs our patience in the department store, our holding open of doors, our party escorting services, our propensity to be a sucker for a pretty smile. For all the crazy, inane, absurd things we tolerate, for all the situations where we are the faceless, nameless hero, my accolades, my acknowledgement, and my gratitude go out to you. Boy, we sure do have credibility in society, and our well deserved vindication is coming. Hum honge kaamyaab - tra la la - hum honge kamyaab...ek din... ;-)

More on Kolkata...

Preeti sent this across to me, knowing fully well how much of a Calcutta hangover I am still nursing, almost a month since I visited the place. Looks like I'm not the only guy to come away enamoured of the city.

A nice piece this, succulent with the flavours of all things warmly Kolkata. :) and apt sequel to my take on Calcutta in the piece on 'Oh Calcutta!'

Vir Sanghvi on Calcutta...

Most modern Indian cities strive to rise above ethnicity. Tell anybody who lives in Bombay that he lives in a Maharashtrian city and (unless of course, you are speaking to Bal Thackeray) he will take immediate offence. We are cosmopolitan, he will say indigenously. Tell a Delhiwalla that his is a Punjabi city (which, in many ways, it is) and he will respond with much self-righteous nonsense about being the nation's capital, about the international composition of the city's elite etc. And tell a Bangalorean that he lives in a Kannadiga city and you'll get lots of techno-gaff about the internet revolution and about how Bangalore is even more cosmopolitan than Bombay.

But, the only way to understand what Calcutta is about is recognize that the city is essentially Bengali. What's more, no Bengali minds you saying that. Rather, he is proud of the fact. Calcutta's strengths and weaknesses mirror those of the Bengali character. It has the drawbacks: the sudden passions, the cheerful chaos, the utter contempt for mere commerce, the fiery response to the smallest provocation. And it has the strengths (actually, I think of the drawbacks as strengths in their own way). Calcutta embodies the Bengali love of culture; the triumph of intellectualism over greed; the complete transparency of all emotions, the disdain with which hypocrisy and insincerity are treated; the warmth of genuine humanity; and the supremacy of emotion over all other aspects of human existence.

That's why Calcutta is not for everyone. You want your cities clean and green; stick to Delhi. You want your cities, rich and impersonal; go to Bombay. You want them high-tech and full of draught beer; Bangalore's your place. But if you want a city with a soul: come to Calcutta.

When I look back on the years I've spent in Calcutta - and I come back so many times each year that I often feel I've never been away - I don't remember the things that people remember about cities. When I think of London, I think of the vast open spaces of Hyde Park. When I think of New York, I think of the frenzy of Times Square. When I think of Tokyo, I think of the bright lights of Shinjiku. And when I think of Paris, I think of the Champs Elysee. But when I think of Calcutta, I never think of any one place. I don't focus on the greenery of the maidan, the beauty of the Victoria Memorial, the bustle of Burra Bazar or the splendour of the new Howrah 'Bridge'. I think of people. Because, finally, a city is more than bricks and mortars, street lights and tarred roads. A city is the sum of its people. And who can ever forget - or replicate - the people of Calcutta?

When I first came to live here, I was told that the city would grow on me. What nobody told me was that the city would change my life. It was in Calcutta that I learnt about true warmth; about simple human decency; about love and friendship; about emotions and caring; about truth and honesty. I learnt other things too. Coming from Bombay as I did, it was a revelation to live in a city where people judged each other on the things that really mattered; where they recognized that being rich did not make you a better person - in fact, it might have the opposite effect. I learnt also that if life is about more than just money, it is about the things that other cities ignore; about culture, about ideas, about art, and about passion. In Bombay, a man with a relatively low income will salt some of it away for the day when he gets a stock market tip. In Calcutta, a man with exactly the same income will not know the difference between a debenture and a dividend. But he will spend his money on the things that matter. Each morning, he will read at least two newspapers and develop sharply etched views on the state of the world. Each evening, there will be fresh (ideally, fresh-water or river) fish on his table. His children will be encouraged to learn to dance or sing. His family will appreciate the power of poetry. And for him, religion and culture will be in inextricably bound together.

Ah religion! Tell outsiders about the importance of Puja in Calcutta and they'll scoff. Don't be silly, they'll say. Puja is a religious festival. And Bengal has voted for the CPM since 1977. How can godless Bengal be so hung up on a religions festival? I never know how to explain them that to a Bengali, religion consists of much more than shouting Jai Shri Ram or pulling down somebody's mosque. It has little to do with meaningless ritual or sinister political activity.

The essence of Puja is that all the passions of Bengal converge: emotion, culture, the love of life, the warmth of being together, the joy of celebration, the pride in artistic ex-pression and yes, the cult of the goddess. It may be about religion. But is about much more than just worship. In which other part of India would small, not particularly well-off localities, vie with each other to produce the best pandals? Where else could puja pandals go beyond religion to draw inspiration from everything else? In the years I lived in Calcutta, the pandals featured Amitabh Bachchan, Princes Diana and even Saddam Hussain! Where else would children cry with the sheer emotional power of Dashimi, upset that the Goddess had left their homes? Where else would the whole city gooseflesh when the dhakis first begin to beat their drums? Which other Indian festival - in any part of the country - is so much about food, about going from one roadside stall to another, following your nose as it trails the smells of cooking? To understand Puja, you must understand Calcutta. And to understand Calcutta, you must understand the Bengali. It's not easy.

Certainly, you can't do it till you come and live here, till you let Calcutta suffuse your being, invade your bloodstream and steal your soul. But once you have, you'll love Calcutta forever. Wherever you go, a bit of Calcutta will go with you. I know, because it's happened to me. And every Puja, I am overcome by the magic of Bengal. It's a feeling that'll never go away.

Sanghvi is the editor of The Hindustan Times

There’s nothing like an emotional high of re-establishing contact with ole’ pals who you’ve completely lost touch with. More so especially, if these are pals who’ve had considerable influence on your growth as an individual; pals, who in no small measure, have helped you come into your own over your growing years. It’s another matter then, ironic as it were, that as you came into your own, you also chose to go it that way, from then on, gradually having lost touch with your once close friends. It happens with all of us all the time as we battle the dilemma of ‘how much of ourselves and how many of our relationships to leave behind, as we move forward’

Aahhh…the story of life!

And then when- many summers down the line, when fate, guised in the name of Orkut, surreptitiously destined that you ‘network’ across six degrees of separation along each other’s path - you discover that, irrespective of the chasm of time between your last meeting and this one, the bridge of ‘connect’ still holds just as strong, the feeling of bonding becomes all the more intense. Engulfed by a tsunami of sweeping memories coming at large over you, you are surged in the nostalgic sea of time, almost drenched to you weather-beaten bones before you are washed miles ashore into the present – the now. The time to act is now, you realize!

It’s a defining moment in the history of that friendship from then on; almost like a milestone erected in the direction of its forward course. Wiser in retrospect now, you know this time over that you want to do all it takes in your ambit to nurture and nourish these bonds for good, silently expecting nonetheless that your efforts are equally reciprocated.

And with the dawn of that feeling begins a whole new chapter that is freshly inked on the pages of that long-lost forgotten book.

The more I delve into seeking the design behind such happy chance findings, the more I am convinced that life does give us all a second chance - and if not a new beginning, at least a whole new direction - with the people who’ve meant a lot to you - to make good the elapsed passages of lost time; the karmic principle of eternal hope in, and continuity across all creation, if you may!