Gold Blossoms

The heat is unbearable. Oppressive and dry. Out of the blue, a storm arrives. All the window panes rattle. The wind searing the skin of those foolish enough or compelled to be outdoors. Windows rattle. Dust seeps in through cracks and under doors and covers everything in dust. Visibility is reduced to a few metres or less.
Everyone who can is indoors. Those outdoors look barely human. Turned zombie like. I wonder if I am where I am, in Gurgaon or in some desert. Could well be but for the trees. How they blossom. Yellow, getting progressively brighter till almost golden. Baby green leaves peep out here and there. How is it possible. God alone knows. Such a sight for sore eyes.

Get cool quick schemes

I am running out of words to describe how hot it is. Outdoors, my skin feels like its being broiled. And when I return home, no matter how early or late, as soon as I enter, I can feel the heat weigh down on me. I have little recourse but to switch on the air conditioner for longer than I intend to. Am dreading the electricity bill.

This was a long weekend, with Monday a holiday for Budh Purnima. And for the first time, I was not really looking forward to it. Office with its central air-conditioning seemed such a better alternative!

We decided to see a movie on Sunday so that we could spend the afternoon – the hottest part of the day away from our hot apartment. And so we did, even though it meant dragging oneself off after a heavy Sunday lunch at 4pm to go to the nearest cinema hall, some 15 minutes away. We returned home at 9.30 after spending a pleasant evening watching a movie and a sumptuous meal. The enitre area was very dark. But we weren’t really worried. We have a big inverter and till date, there never has been an all night power cut.

I decided to check on my plants –a nightly routine, when I saw my neigbour sitting on her terrace fanning herself with a hand fan. She told me that the power had been coming and going since 4pm, a good 6 hours or so. There seems to be some grid failure. And as a result, her inverters too were running low on charge. I rushed indoors to tell A and we decided to switch off the fans and sit out in the verandah, which we did till, the mosquitoes drove us indoors. Inside the heat was too stifling. We opened every single window and door in the hope of cajoling in some of the coolness outside but the bed was really warm. Little of the coolness came in. Instead the mosquitoes did, and in hordes. The power came on and we ran to shut every door and window and switch on the AC. And just as we are about to retire in relief, the power went off. Again we opened the doors and the windows and so on and so forth.

A decided on an old Delhi trick – sprinkling the mattresses with water and laying down on it. Even the lazy swishing of the fan made the room much cooler. I had never heard of a thing like this and was understandably very reluctant. A lay down on his side of the bed, oohing and aahing about how wonderful it was and that sort of convinced me to try the same. That gave us some relief. We both kept mugs of water next to the bed and kept sprinkling more water on to the bed.

We have been trying all sorts of get cool quick schemes including drinking gallons of liquid and nimbu pani and eating light lunches, filling up buckets, before the water in the overhead tank gets too hot), keeping the shades drawn etc. And now I am nice and cool, having hit upon the ultimate cool idea….have sneaked off to office, citing work!

Meanwhile, the bunch of people working on the transformer thingy (bang opposite our house) has swelled in numbers. They have been at it since early morning and yet, no sign of power. And I have a guest coming to visit me this evening…

A Rainy Day

Rain means different things at different times. At times welcome, at time destructive, at times a pleasure and a nuisance at others. Monsoons this year in West Bengal seem to have continued into august, september and now October. Inquire why and more often than not, the answer will be: Ma durga's* agomon(arrival) this year, is on a boat. This means rains. And how. In fact, it has been raining incessantly since yesterday and continues even as I write. Large parts of Calcutta is waterlogged.

* The goddess durga's festival is in a few days time. This 9 day pageant (with fantastic lighting, exotic pandals and enormous crowds thronging to see them) is the chief festival of the bengalis.

Most of us are stuck indoors, an unofficial rainy day, making the most of it, ringing up relatives and friends to gleefully discuss how much of which road is under water. Its lapping at our door step; the pond has over flown onto the road etc.

Mama(ma's older brother) is the first to ring up and gives a gleeful account of the state of waterlogging, which roads to avoid etc, all from the safe confines of his first floor apartment.

Next rings Dinesh, our driver. Waist-deep water. Ashbo? (shall I come).

2 of my friends were to drop in this afternoon. The first cant risk it the pond have overflown onto the road. The second stays far away and can't obviously make it.

- 'Ok, We'll eat up all the kebab R was going to grill this afternoon'.

- 'Kebabs? Isn't there a metro station close to your place? I shall give it a try!'

A rainy day automatically means 'Khichudi' for most Bengalis: Khichdi accompanied by a host of fries (fish fry, fried brinjal, vegetables fritters).
So we have a very cozy, happy-family cooking session - Ma, R and me. Baba will chip in with his critical comments during lunch (my parents have been married for 36 years and yet during each lunch, without fail, baba will have some direction or the other to give about the cooking).

I am lucky enough to savour it all. No plodding through ankle/knee/waist deep water running errands or rushing to work. I look out of the window, the palm tree now grown to a giant size, its frond nodding just under our 5th floor window. Calcutta looks so fresh, nice and washed and I can see the Hooghly Bridge and its cables clearly, the dome of the Victoria Memorial, the lightening exaggerated by our windows of frosted glass.

Normally the tap-tap of raindrops on shutters, against panes, the rushing sound of the palm fronds, lulls me to sleep when an ominous plop wakes me up. Our roof is leaking at places where there is a ceiling fan or a light fixture.

I look up and see the yellow pail hung from a 'S' from the ceiling next to the ceiling fan. This simple but effective idea which collects all the water and prevents a short circuit is a brainwave of my engineer dad who is happiest tinkering around the apartment and I suspect when things break down, as they frequently do, so that he can fix them.

But it keeps me wide wide awake for fear of the pail getting to heavy and flying off the 'S' and crashing into the rotating blades and onto our heads (the bed is just underneath).

Le printemps

Another lovely spring day. I have been watching the transformation with amazement. From the stark (but beautiful) winter, to the fresh new blossoming all around.

Sitting on my sofa, in winter, I could barely see the treetops, bare and brown through the windows in my apartment. One day, I thought the trees look taller and a softer newer brown. Then nodes appeared on the tips, these burst into small multicoloured leaves and then came the flowers. The leaves on trees grew a bit thicker each day and each morning I would find the bareness a little more covered. Now I can barely see the large diocese building behind them.

By the roadside, the big trees are putting on their clothing bit by bit. Some are already covered, others are half covered and a few still bare. Somehow all of the trees are looking so happy when at it! Like they are throwing their heads back and spreading their arms after a deep sleep!

And what colours. Am constantly surprised at the range of it. A small tree bursting with tight white blossoms. Another pink one. And what shades of green. I can’t get enough of it. I stroll down neighbours’ lawns gazing at them and yet taking care not to loiter! They are very private and I don’t think would kindly to a stranger staring. Day before yesterday, on a long walk I spied this marvellous house, a bit outside the town, standing all by itself. Surrounded by an amazing array of trees, all different shapes and colours. On second thoughts, the house itself was an ordinary one. But peeping out between those trees made it look wonderful. I caught myself thinking jealously about the lucky denizens of the house. A little later I passed a marvellous tiny garden outside a very nondescript house in a road filled with similar boring houses. But the owner had done wonders in that tiny place not more than 10 square feet. I had to pretend to tie my shoes laces to get a good look at it!!

So it is spring. And so what? The big deal is that I happened to spend my teenage in the deserts of the middle east and thereafter in Calcutta where perhaps a few stubborn trees still exist despite the best intentions otherwise of the pollution. And the fact that there is no spring over there. Summer and a mild winter! Not so, here.

I am making the most of it knowing that this change will not stop here. It will keep on and as spring gives way to summer, these will be replaced by the heavier greens of summer.

Meanwhile, I keep checking out the greenery, the neighbours lawns and gardens! I keep thinking that one day the people will get together and report this skulking foreigner, circling our houses and staring at our gardens!!