My Hero - Part One

Year 1996.

I am a fan of suspense, I play Karvanti Daba-Aispais (something I have never understood the etymology of) and Chor-Police among other games. The latter being my favourite. I love suspense stories, I am fascinated by ghosts and all things supernatural. I rejoice listening to sci-fi stories and controversies such as the Bermuda Triangle and the Philadelphia Experiment from my father. I am a subscriber of Champak, a huge fan of the Mahabharata. I love my G.I. Joes and build houses with Lego, and when I don't want to conquer another planet or eat Pomfret Fry with an alien, I want to be the new-age Arjun and roam around Mumbai discussing my ideas with Krishna in a chariot. 

21st February. 

An Optonica TV is an attention-grabber of the time, and a cable connection is an elite serving on that unusual afternoon. A man, whose name I was told was Ravi Shastri, is shouting with an uncanny aggression. Lara is the word he utters the most. There's Harsha, a young, suave speaker who commands the English language with fascinating authority. And Sunil Gavaskar, who cannot stop talking about India and their chances of winning the cup. There are people at my place. We and some guests. Maybe some passersby too. 

India were playing their first big game in the world cup they were hosting. "We are bowling first," said my father to me. The idea was to get Brian Lara, who had created a world record a couple of years ago, early. And somehow, someone, as Lara nicked one to Nayan Mongia, did the job. Lara was out for 2. And I screamed like a maniac, the eight year old kid that I was. West Indies were bowled out for a meager 173. And India were set to win the match. During the break, people discussed how the match was still not over. How a certain Courtney Walsh and the gigantic, accurate and fearsome Ambrose could clean us up. Then came out two men. Both short. Both looking simple in light blue. But that's it. That was the only similarity between them. From that moment for the next hour or so, both in the commentary box and in my house, and of course in the growling crowds in the stadium, what was audible was "Sachin". To me, all this was still unfathomable, however exciting. 

He did not have a surname beyond the commentary box. He was just Sachin, or even Tendlya to some around me. And he was flicking length balls, well-pitched, on the off-stump or maybe just wandering about middle and leg by two fearsome fast bowlers with an ease that I would walk back from school with. He played a cover-drive off the back foot that was at worst spectacular and at best divine. That was followed by a glorious shot towards mid-wicket where he simply rolled his wrists over the ball. His bat lacked a sponsor sticker, it was an unblocked view of timber that created shapes I was to take many years to learn about. Whenever his bat ordered the ball to kiss the fence, the world looked to be on steroids. Tony Greg was openly jubilant in the commentary box, the street outside my house featured some boisterous Marathi. And "Masta! Shot!" my father would remark when Sachin attacked the ball. Although Sachin was run out for 70, India won that match rather comfortably. And I had seen magic - at least a few tricks - at an early age. 

27th February

A similar afternoon. The buzz is bigger. The task is tougher. And the match is a monster. India are playing Australia about 25 kilometers away from my house. Australia have batted first. And with the sublime form that Mark Waugh has been in, he has smacked a fantastic 126 to set India a devilish target of 259. 259 of that time is about 330 of today. People are disenchanted. And their only hope is padding up in the Garware pavilion. 

Over the last week, I have learnt as much as I could about the game and the man called Sachin Tendulkar, or rather Sachin. I am a fan in the making. And with all the excitement that an eight year old is gifted with, I am hooked to the TV that's crowded with remarks from both the inside and the outside of it. I watch on. 

India are off to a horrible start. Jadeja gets out cheaply, Kambli goes for a duck. McGrath has bowled three maiden overs, Damien Fleming has claimed the wickets. India are 17 for 2 after 8 overs. Sachin has been calm so far. Azhar is calmer at the other end. Then suddenly, something happens. Something absolutely amazing. The ninth over - McGrath's fifth - changes it all. First ball. Sachin rocks back, takes the aerial route, and slaps one towards the mid-wicket boundary. Third ball. Sachin pulls, this time along the ground, the ball hurries into the square leg boundary. Sixth ball is over-pitched, outside off, there is no chance Sachin would miss that. The ball travels through the covers like a bullet. But bullets kill, this brought hopes alive.

Mumbai shone. I was jumping on and around my bed. "Sachin, Sachin," I howled. Then came Shane Warne, another of the most talked-about young cricketers of the time, I had heard, and zoom! Up went Sachin, straight over the bowler's head. This was four. Sachin Tendulkar was on a rampage. The 22-year old was an exhibition of unearthly talent. A kind Jahangir Art Gallery was jealous of. A kind Prithvi Theatre had never staged. Wankhede was leaking art. There was reckless aggression in Sachin's batting, an ability to take on any challenge the game might bring him. At the same time, his technique, timing, balance, poise were such that they might have got an Englishman of the 1930's writing him a eulogy. 

To me, he looked like a man who represented the ability of my country that rested on the world map like an insecurity. Indians either looked up to the first world, were obsequious with them, or totally dismissed them as part of some inexplicable xenophobia. But here was a man taking on the people such as Glen McGrath, Shane Warne - the best in the world - seeing them eye to eye. Establishing his, his country's superiority over them in a fair battle. My city, my country, my family, the watchman of my school, our milkman, our fruit-seller, my teacher, everyone was backing him. And how he deserved every bit of it!

It was an electrifying night. Wankhede was lit in floodlights for the first time, and the man Mumbai loved the most was glittering like a neutron star. Everything Sachin did was an event. Even the odd bad shot - one that almost got him - was followed by a "Ganbati Bappa Morya" by the crowds. People were literally praying for him. Maybe I did too. My father, who wouldn't easily be in awe of people, too, was watching this man with phenomenal joy. My mother, who has never been much of a Cricket fan, occasionally came into the room, looked at the TV, smiled and went away. My grandparents had an idea that something absolutely thrilling was happening in the other room. 

Sachin continued. He had scored virtually all the runs that India had scored, and it was evident in the 2-3 hours that I had watched of him that without him, Indian batting was like Butter Chicken without the chicken. He went on to score a 90 in that game before dancing carelessly down to a wide ball from Mark Waugh only to get stumped by the astute Ian Healy. When he got out, I was in the greatest extent of depression an eight year old boy could be in. The whole stadium went silent. My father uttered a dejected "Aai ga!" and shortly lit a cigarette. Me and my father did not talk to each other for the next ten minutes at least. 

India went on to lose the match. I was disheartened, the could-have-beens started crowding my young mind, little did I know about the ifs of life then! I followed India and Sachin right through the tournament and for years there after, but that day, an eight year old had found his hero - a fascination that would last as long as he does. 

(To be continued...)

   










  

Alibaug

I owe you a prawn-shaped poem,
Alibaug, and I will serve it to you
on a sand-sprinkled plate – sticky
and smelly and at best reflecting
the mild light of the retiring evening
that rambles over ice cream candies -
melting quickly like a teenaged heart - and
over the beach where breath is damp and
towards footprints that are structureless
like rain drops on windowpanes, fondles with
the bare legs of the woman who is unfolding
herself like a short story, and scrambles
for the night through the sudden and
unusual density of pine trees like that
of one-room houses in central Bombay, to arrive
injured and humid at the back of the hotel room
where whiskey has just begun to flow like a river
to some long-lost love via rare verses
of fifteen-year old songs that
have faded from our memory,
only gradually, like the skyline
of Bombay from the Mandawa ferry, 
sketching us a portrait, painted
in colours that the clouds throw up
as they clash with celestial sorrows.

The Puller of Mumbai

Who is the best puller of the cricket ball in Mumbai? Without a doubt, it’s Ricky Ponting. His pulls are breathtaking and they come to him as naturally as sleep comes to some of us. His drive through the covers is no less picturesque than a rain-trodden July evening at Bandstand. And every time a ball is bowled to him, his unique back-lift exudes a natural hunger for runs. Ricky Ponting is a very, very special player, and he is in Mumbai right now.

Ponting’s talent was evident in the flings that he had at the crease in the ‘96 World Cup as a 21 year old. And although a star-studded Australian line up of the day would not allow this flaring young man to steal the limelight away, the scrutinous cricket fan had immediately seen something special in the boy. Ponting has come a long way from there, going on to become one of the legends of the modern game.

His career has been a spectacular mountain. His batting is a spotless star. His captaincy has been a notorious yet famous child. And with supreme reputation, he has come to a city that has given the world some of its finest batsmen. How does Mumbai treat its new captain? He is a legend all right, but it’s still a tricky question. Especially when he is someone who, although briefly and statistically, came close to Mumbai’s cricketing god and at one point openly went around the world as the primary rival of Indian cricket. Another lingering question is the tough choice between his showmanship and utility. Does Ponting actually fit into the current scheme of things or is it only his legend that has earned him the new role? There has been much debate about this. And some matches into the season, most of his critics have been proven right. He hasn’t done much with the bat. Yes, whatever he has scored has looked graceful but IPL and T20 are not those arty-type blokes. They lack aesthetic sense. They crave for power, they want big hits and sixes. They want something mind-staggering happening at every moment. And a 38 year old may not be able to deliver that.

Ponting’s glorified opening partnership with Sachin Tendulkar has not lived up to the hype either. And that’s been another area of concern for him. Does he walk out to bat with the intention of outscoring Sachin Tendulkar? Is he quietly competing with his new partner who is also his oldest rival? Well, honestly, I don’t think so. He is too experienced a cricketer to think like that. But at the same time I don’t doubt the fact that all this must have poked him time and again as he set out on his little walk across cricket in Mumbai.

Mumbai accepts everyone. It always does. That’s what makes it the great, ruined city that it is. Ponting is a cricketing legend and there is no doubt that Mumbai has already accepted him wholeheartedly. Now the challenges are for him to take up. The fans are for him to earn. And the point is for him to prove.

As far as I am concerned, Ricky Ponting has always been one of my favourite players to watch from the times when he was an almost nobody. And my love for Mumbai is sometimes jealous of my love for cricket which makes the unwitting Mumbaikar in Ponting all the more interesting. Mumbai will undoubtedly fascinate him for one reason or the other. I can confidently say that about my city. On one moment, it might blatantly remind him, just by making him glance at his new opening partner, why he could never be the best batsman in the world. On the next, an indulgent stare into Marine Drive might help him forget all of that and teach him to accept life as it comes.  

Julia

Fondled by the E-minor

of a Gibson guitar

Residues of laughter, particles of old air

The rain is measured and gentle,

drizzling down

The wine is a minute older

The meat, a tad colder

Julia is dreaming, awake.

The Jack London book

that she never read

angers through the violin

which is intent on outdoing the guitar

at least once before everything ends, while

July’s fragrance mingles with

the soggy biscuits in the unheeded packets,

the exterior reduces to an insipid story.

Julia wakes up, and

looks at the old wall clock -

a stack of silences collapses

like a pack of cards.

Nights collide with each other, and days

tear the sun apart to scream:

“Julia, Julia, wake up, Julia;

Julia, Julia, wake up, Julia!”

The wall clock checks

the sequence of her memory.

Julia has skipped a long minute,

or maybe a diminutive lifetime.

By the Sea

The sea bounces off the rough edges of the rocks

A mild breeze unsettles hime-cuts and mohawks

The afternoon aspires to be an evening

The sun has roasted the long footpath

Sudden as his hand mounts

On her expectant shoulder like ethereal comfort

And two birds fly into the depth of the sky

A cone of ice cream slips over her lips

And draws across them an abstract line of a thick brown

Ocean drops spattered on the dying afternoon

Watery patterns on the endless film of the sky

Between the two of them sways a young joy, steam-bathed

In the moment evaporating above the humble cutting chai 

The Valentine

In a typically chirpy gift shop somewhere near the centre of the city, on an afternoon that habitually celebrated the dullness of a middle-aged sun, was a lady who looked to be anything but in a hurry. Her body, combating against the extra fat that time had been forcing upon it; her mascara, covering the sour truth of age that had climbed up to her face; and her walk - that perfectly aimless walk of a wanderer – suggested that she was a woman evidently uncomfortable with being in her mid-thirties.

The shop was crowded with youngsters, typically teenagers, for it was the Valentine’s Day of the year. Yes, that dubious day of life when the frustration of being single in more than half the youth and that of being otherwise in the rest are both emphatically pronounced, rather cruelly invoked from deep within, by a plethora of gifts and greeting cards that are exchanged in an attempt to celebrate the most abstruse and abused word in the English language – love. The young energies were enviable nonetheless; and their excitement, which had its roots in their characteristic immaturity, had furnished the place, although momentarily, with a lively buzz that only youth could produce.

Through the ranges of the racks, where the greeting cards were placed, was walking at her own pace the woman. She journeyed through the greeting cards, not caring the least she could for them. Love you forever, Without you I am nothing, You and I are a world in its own, You are the kiss of my heart were some of the lines on the greeting cards that most uselessly portrayed affection. All the gifts - the coffee mugs, the perfumes, and most poignantly the greeting cards - that she once received in bundles were conspiring to send her on a sordid nostalgic journey that she refused to embark on. What remained with her after a bit of angst and a personal rebellion of the most ordinary kind, however, was the pain which happened to be the truest part of the afternoon.

She would be an attractive woman back in the day. Her beauty was acknowledged by the opposite sex as frequently as the sunrise, if not more. She had become a festival in herself – one that many attend. An ego was the most natural byproduct of this process, and she had developed one as big as the size of Jupiter. Men were like visitors to her. For as long as she remained at the peak of her beauty, she attached no permanence with her relationships. Some of her relationships lasted shorter than what it takes for a lousy song to get on your nerves; some others were longer but as placid in essence as the water in a lake. She slept with many men, flirted with even more. Attention was an addictive drug that she kept craving for. Nothing did she love as much as her body, not even herself for that matter, and everything that she did remained skin-deep for almost a decade.

Yes, she had had her time. Days as bright as the sun itself and nights as mystifying as mystery could be – she had had her time. But all that after all was the past. She was now in her mid-thirties; the number of men in her life had been on the decline. Her age was an incongruity in the gift shop like the Christmas card that was being sold on the Valentine’s Day. She was walking around the place to battle the subtle threat of being alone on a Valentine’s Day for the first time in the last fifteen years.

However, she remained collected through the implicit yet caustic attack of memory as if having developed a robust internal resistance that only failures could equip you with. But the moment she saw that greeting card – the faint green card with a message that read “Some things are better left unsaid” – she was taken aback. She stared at it for a couple of minutes, then reached out to it, and then picked it up from the shelf as if it were always hers.

“How much would this cost?” She asked the attendant.

“50 rupees, madam”

“Could you gift-pack it for me?” asked the woman.

“Sure madam. In a moment. That would cost you 10 rupees more.”

“Not an issue. Please do it.” She said.

“We also have other cards, madam. The blue one is particularly lovely. And the red, heart-shaped one is the latest arrival.”

“No, thank you. I am good.” She said quickly, picked up the greeting card, and went home, leaving the world behind and alone on the Valentine’s Day.

She reached home and went straight to the gallery with some coffee and the greeting card, expressionless like a stone. It was a quaint Shivaji Park house. The gallery faced a plethora of people. Apart from upwards, wherever she looked, all she could see was people. It was around 5 O’clock by then. And she preferred the sky to look into to the bundles of people she would find nothing in common with. The taming sun and the woman shared something intimate for a while. Coffee was a constant indulgence to her. Cigarettes were accompaniments. A soliloquy or a conversation with the sun, whatever it was, took some time on her. And then, sudden as an epiphany, came out the tears that wet her cheeks. Maybe she opened up. To herself, that is, but she did and delivered the result of an introspection that she was pregnant with for years and years together.

The greeting card was open and wet by now. She got up and went hurriedly to the store-room where among broken tubs, old tables, and deteriorated chairs was a drawer that seemed to have only a past. Although a metallic rod peeled her skin off once or twice, her search stopped only at a letter and a photograph which were buried under thick layers of dust that only incessant negligence could create.

Some things are better left unsaid, read the letter. The picture showed two faces – happy, young, and innocent. She dwelled on them for a while and reached the telephone. The number she had dialed was unavailable. She tried again. Unavailable still. She dialed another number.

“Hello, how are you?” the man asked.

“Good. How about you?” she said. “Sam, I need HIS number. Do you have it?”

“HIS? Whose?” asked Sam.

“Sam, HIS!” she said.

“Oh, I..I’m sorry but I’m not too sure,” he said. “I have not spoken to him in a long time.”

“Oh, all right, Sam,” the woman said. “Thank you anyway. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Sure, take care,” he said and hung up.

The woman ran through her telephone diary. Halted at a few names, tried to link them to someone and then kept going ahead. She dialed a number as if she had found something useful.

“Hello?” the voice on the other side said.

“Puja? Hi, how have you been?” said she.

“Hey, I am good. Long time! How have you been?” Puja asked.

“Good good. Listen, I need a favour,” said the woman.

“Yes? Tell me,” said Puja.

“Do you have HIS number or any way to contact HIM?” she asked anxiously.

“Hey! Are you all right? You want to speak to HIM? - Now?” asked Puja.

“Well Puja, yes! I have my reasons. Do you have his number?” said the woman.

“I am really sorry, lady. But I don’t even know if he is in the country. To be honest, I don’t know if he is alive. None of us have heard of him, you know. Not in the last eight years. Not after he left everything behind and went to Italy,” said Puja. “Not once did he come back. Not once did we hear anything about him. I thought you’d be the only person who could find out but you didn’t care enough back then, did you? ” she completed.

A loquacious silence prevailed.

“Bye Puja. I will have to talk to you later,” said the woman.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you, sweetheart. It’s just the truth. You asked for it,” said Puja.

“I am sure. I understand. Let me call you back anyway. I need to be alone,” the woman said. “Take care.”

She hung up and looked out the window, dejected. She glanced downstairs from the gallery in an optimistic attempt to spot the man she was looking for in the crowd. He was the only one who understood her. She found many faces familiar. They looked ordinary and bastard-like as all the other men she had dated and flirted and slept with. She wanted to abuse them, blame them for being the bastards they had always been to her, blame them for the state she was in at that time. “Skin-hungry vultures!” she screamed to nobody’s bother and broke down under the temperate sun. She felt used, forsaken and trivialized. She thought as if a fifteen-year old vacation was over and she had come back home. This was her home. Shivaji Park. The crowd. This is where she grew up. This is where she established an identity. The faint memories of being a lovely, caring girl were reflected by the sun light on the old tapestries that were tattooed over the walls. The only man she did not – could not – think negatively of was HIM. And the guilt of having betrayed him back in the day, ruthlessly walking over his face to a specious lifestyle was enlarged inside her body like a monster sent out to destroy her.

Nonetheless, she did collect herself a while later. After all, she had seen thirty-five summers and none had gone away without teaching her a lesson or two. She did collect herself indeed. Changed her clothes; got all the make-up off her face; left her hair open; did not look into the mirror once before venturing out of her house. Not a fancy purse, not those high-heeled shoes, a greeting card – the greeting card – and some cash were all that she carried.

She took a taxi to Worli. Just off the Haji Ali circle, towards café Noorani, inside a lane was HIS house – a house she had so many memories of togetherness, truth, and comfort in. She sped up to the place as if chasing a twenty-five year-old self. There stood a building.

“How about Shanti Niketan, bhai sahab?” she asked at a shop nearby. “Where is the house?”

“Shanti Niketan, madam? That house was reconstructed. Now it’s a building,” said the shopkeeper pointing towards the structure. “It’s been five-six years to that.”

“Oh,” said the woman, losing whatever tiny bit of hope she was left with. “All right. Thank you.”

She walked towards Haji Ali and stood next to the Haji Ali juice centre. The dargah in the middle of the sea was a distant spectacle.

She stared into it addictively before starting to write on the greeting card.

Hi, I am sorry. I am genuinely sorry. I know I am late – eight years are a little too late for things to be any better – but I have realized that you were my only HIM. Happy Valentine’s Day, my love! You are my Valentine.

She took a taxi to Dadar but stopped somewhere in Worli near a post-box – a post-box HE would drop letters to her at. She dropped the greeting card in it without writing any address on the envelope. She did not know of any, of course. It was her 35th Valentine’s Day. Never before had she been gifted an epiphany; never before had she felt so true to herself; and never before had she spent the following night alone on a Valentine’s Day, bombarding herself with ifs and what-ifs, wiping her cheeks every once in a while standing above a crowd she could never relate to.

She lit a candle on the table, switched all the other lights off. Reflected on the walls now, superimposed on a photo-frame, was a picture that the two of them made. The two of them - an ageless mirror-image of an aging woman and the shadow of a photograph that was blank as most love stories in the city were – together celebrated the Valentine’s day.