AS Vs The Ghost of KrishnaRaju

Note: Not trying to scare you, but the underwritten is based on true incidents.

The ghosts of my house are a depressed lot and I am not talking about “Not interested in food” depressed or “I am not getting enough sleep” depressed. They are, in plain terms, downright suicidal. How do I know that? OK, that’s a pretty interesting story which happened maybe a day or two before. It was a Monday or a Tuesday, I don’t remember which. I got up a bit late, maybe around 11 and somehow decided it was too late for office and definitely a good weather to work from home. How is the weather related to working from home? That’s a different and a pretty long story. Maybe will tell some other time. Coming back to this tale, I went online, checked some mails, send some disparaging mails to my teammates, raised a few vague concerns and obscure questions that I sent to everyone else and with this I had yelled my presence and importance in the office environ. Having taken care of office thus, I Switched on the TV in the living room played some loud music in the bedroom and then went to make some tea.

Now, making tea in my house is a huge task in itself. The kitchen is small enough to ensure that 2 people standing in a side to side position won’t fit but just big enough to fit two people standing back to back. To paint a better picture, imagine two chefs with their butts touching facing the opposite sides and working like crazy on some vegetables and you will gauze the size of the room. Forget the vegetables, for a more delicious picture imagine some lambs or chicken instead. In addition to the space, my kitchen has another issue, absence of wall units to hold all my crockery. So what I, and by I, I mean my maid does is, she stacks all the utensils in piles in the bottom of a “so called” cupboard and to retrieve one I without doubt create a din with clinks and clangs resounding in that tiny kitchen.

This morning was no different. Trying to pull the saucepan from underneath the pressure cooker that was hanging in balance on top of a tumbler, I somehow dislodged some million other plates and then chaos commenced. Suddenly, from behind me I heard this crackle and a growl...

Ghost (In an odd Robin Williams sort of way): “Are you fucking kidding me?” What are you fucking doing at home, this time of the day?

AS: (A little scared, a little puzzled and lot more angry): Who the hell are you and how on the earth did u enter this house?

Ghost: (Puzzled expression): Like always, through the window. And what do you mean by who I am. First Name Krishna, Second name Raju, People call me KrishnaRaju. Don’t you even acknowledge your roommate from the 3^rd dimension?

AS: Roommate? I don’t remember subletting any part of this house. Is it that evil conniving Malik who let you in.

Ghost: No, No… Not your owner. This house was allotted to me by the Ministry of Ghostly affairs. They had told me, this was one of the best ghostly residences they had and I was to be given this for the excellent ghostly services that I had provided them with. They said, just imagine, A bamboo tree, a mango tree in front of that bamboo tree and then other bamboo trees surrounding to make a forest, and I did imagine. A treetop house in the forest was always the dream. How I was I to know that you will come by and make my life hell .I would have preferred sharing space with Jack the ripper rather than a weirdo like you.

AS: Whom are you calling weirdo? You dumb psycho. I don’t care for what ghastly services you were presented this house, but it’s mine. I don’t need to perform kinky services, you weirdo. I pay CASH. I am the present and the future of this house and you can very well go to hell.

(I had never loved the house and I was surprised with the fervor with which I was able to fight with the ghost. The Ghost would have been impressed with my love for the house)

Ghost: Why the hell are you getting worked up? I am not denying it. In the deal that I signed, you are the first owner and I am the second owner. In the beginning I was trying to take care that you were not disturbed and bothered. I definitely didn’t want to break the section 21 of the Ghostly Apparition Act. I didn’t want to scare you and this was before I realized you couldn’t be scared, You were scarier.

AS (Blushing under the compliments levied and mellowing down a bit): OK, OK. But what do we do of our situation. I am not in favor of living in with some old, pale, weird ghost.

Ghost: We ghosts believe in peaceful existence, and when I can tolerate you and your endless guests including that baldy in specs, Why can’t you.

AS: My friends and weird?

Ghost: Don’t let me even start. First, you and your friends come in all states of inebriatedness, if there is such a word. There was this guy whom you referred as rhino? elephant? Or something?

AS: Hippo?

Ghost: Oh, Yes, Hippo. I always knew it was a very big animal. I still remember; I was taking a dump and that guy walks in and pukes right through me. It was night 3 AM, I was getting ready to meet my friends and there he goes Baaaa…. Baaaa…. Whaaa and god only knows all the sounds he made. Still I kept my quite and silently brushed my teeth. While rinsing my mouth I suddenly looked up, and God, The face in the mirror. I still have my ghostly hairs stand up when I visualize those nostrils and the stare. God, Those eyes, those ghostly red eyes.

AS: (Chuckling) Ha Ha… Ya, Hippo can definitely be scary. But what about Gramps, I thought he was pretty nice. He used to sleep early and get up early, like you I assume.

Ghost: Gramps? The bong with specs right? The one who is balding faster than you can say Robi babu. He was no doubt funny, and man, was he scared. When he first came I used to transform myself into different dogs every time and give him chase. You should have seen him run that day. He entered that pink house…

AS: Pink house?

Ghost: The one where that plump girl in the tiny shorts was staying.

AS: (With a wistful voice) Ohh… Ya.

Ghost: So he entered that pink house and stayed there for more than 15 minutes whispering shooo… Shooo … with a face smacked with such fear that even a 2 month old wouldn’t have been scared. I had never laughed so much in my life. But, God, he could be irritating. He used to get up at 5Am in the morning and trim his nose hairs. Then he would comb his non-existent hairs with such care that my girlfriend would be ashamed.

AS (With a mock surprise): You have a bald girlfriend?

Ghost: (Angry but ignoring my jibes and continuing in the same breath): And God, those calls. Starting at 6Am till he left and re-commencing at 8Pm when he came back, till he slept, the endless chatters were un-nerving. I actually went to the psychiatrist when he left, It seemed like Sound itself had walked away from life. It was a void...

AS: Why complain about my friends, You can invite your friends. I have never said no.

Ghost: Don’t even let me start on that one. Invite? Friends to my house? I did once, They came and we were partying outside, when you suddenly felt like singing aloud in the balcony. Some recitation of some god forsaken poetry and my friends ran, ran like no tomorrow. They still hold me responsible for that incident. Some, “Kisi ko de ke dil koi” or something.

AS: Ghalib? That was by Ghalib. Fucker, don’t you realize, Ghalib is god of poetry.

Ghost: I know. It was ghalib whom I had invited to party with Khusro, Meer and some others. Ghalib committed suicide that day. Meer is still in a state of shock. Khusro though composed some riddles out of this but ignores me to this day.

AS: Ghalib died? Again? Because of Me?

Ghost: Ya, Why are you surprised? Ghalib always used to say listening to bad poetry was like whiplashes, imagine what he felt about tuneless singers.

AS: Can dead people die again?

Ghost: It happens here a lot. The world is like composed of different layers, you die, you go to a separate layer, the physical world remains the same but the layers keep on moving and compounding. Ghalib, thanks to you, is a ghost in exponent 2.

AS: In simple words, Ghost squared?

Ghost: Ya something similar.

AS: You complain a lot, Mr. Ghost. Were you always like this? Do you know something called, let’s see, “Adjusting”.

Ghost: Adjusting? Don’t make me laugh. I have changed my life trying to adjust to you but how do I adjust to someone who changes his schedule with the weather. Sorry, Bad comparison. WEATHER IS NOT AS CHANGEABLE AS YOU ARE.

AS: (Smiling sheepishly)

Ghost: AM I KIDDING? AM I TELLING A JOKE HERE? As a ghost I am supposed to roam the nights, But no, you meander through the night, roam through the rooms, doing all you please. Switch on the lights, and when my eyes are getting used to them, switch it off. Random, without thought. Then you switch on the TV and randomly switch channels, when I start to like some channel, BANG, Channel changed.

AS: (Grunts, says nothing)

Ghost: Not only that, you sing in a loud, shrill, unmusical way that even the donkeys of the world find it difficult to appreciate. I am not kidding here, I tried to exchange my apartment with Francis, St Assisi’s donkey and even he said he couldn’t bear your songs. And God, do you snigger. Please tell me what was that book you were reading on Sunday?

AS: (Slowly, whispering): Life and Times of Thunderbolt Kid?

Ghost: Yes, I was with my girlfriend, Doing, you know what. And in the middle of it, I hear this snigger. Ha Ha Hehehe. Man, give me a break.

AS: Hmmmm

Ghost: I took a deep breath and continued doing you know who.

AS: (Eyes wide open, With nervous Frenzy) Voldemort?

Ghost: Idiot, My girlfriend.

AS: Sorry. Forgot. But “You know who” is who must not be named.

Ghost: (Staring angrily)

AS: Sorry. Pray, continue.

Ghost: While I was at it, You again sniggered. My girlfriend was sure you were laughing at us, or at the position we were trying or at her “not very small, but she thinks small” tits or maybe at my ghastly small ghostly dick. But then your chuckle did It man, She peeped from behind that curtains and saw you reading and chuckling aloud. That was it for my sex life. She is now going around with that Chinnappa from the forest. She says the forest makes less noise than you and your house.

AS: You could have got her in the day time; I go to office during that time.

Ghost: I tried that for some days, but do you know how the other ghosts tease me? They call me Call center, Call center. Do I look like a call center employee? I was such a fierce guy in the ghostly affairs department, and now look at me. I have insomnia because you don’t sleep and don’t let me sleep. I can’t eat because you eat outside and all the food items have passed the expiration. I can’t eat anything at the house because of the fear of poisoning myself. I am depressed. I even tried committing suicide once by trying to drown in that overhead tank of yours but then the motor had conked off and there was no water for the next three days.

AS: (Relieved, muttering) Thank heavens. I should remember to thank the owner for not fixing the motor in time.

(Out Aloud)I am sorry Mr. Ghost. I will take care from next time. Next time you get a girl, I will be quite as a mouse.

Ghost: Sorry, I forgot to add because you are such a slob and dirty little pig that the house is teeming with Mouse, Cockroaches, Squirrels, lizards, snakes...

AS: Snakes? Where, Where?

Ghost: That was a figure of speech. Anyways when are you going to office? I have a girl in here.

AS: Girl? You have been talking to me for the last half hour. Is she still here?

Ghost: Fuck!!!

(Poof!!! The Ghost vanishes)

Translating Javed Akhtar's poems

In the middle of the night, tapping away on the laptop, sipping some badly made tea and listening to the verses on you-tube some umpteenth time, has its charms. It has atleast made the insomniac me go crazy on translating those.
I have tried to keep the rythm and meter but any suggestion is welcome.

Film: Zindagi milegi no dobara
Lyrics: Javed Akhtar
Narrator: Farhan Akhtar (Caracter: Imran)
Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3UvuleS7iw

(1)

Pighle neelam sa behta hua yeh sama
Neeli neeli si khamoshiyan
Na kahin hai zameen
Na kahin aasmaan
Sarsarati hui tehniyan, pattiyan
Keh rahi hain ki bas ek tum ho yahan
Sirf main hun meri sansain hain aur meri dhadkanen
Aisi gehraiyan
Aisi tanhaiyan
Aur main, sirf main
Apne hone pe mujhko yakin aa gaya.

Trans:
The moments flow by like molten sapphire
Bluish seem the silences
No sign of land anywhere
No trace of the sky
The rustling of the branches, the crackling of leaves
Whispering that only I exist
It’s me, my breath, my heartbeat.
Depth such as this
Solitude such as this
And me, just me
This makes me believe, I live, I do live.


(2)
Ik baat honton tak hai jo aai nahin
Bas ankhon se hai jhaankti
Tumse kabhi, mujhse kabhi
Kuch lafz hai woh maangti
Jinko pehanke honton tak aa jaaye woh
Aawaaz ki baahon mein bahen daalke ithlaye woh
Lekin jo yeh ek baat hai
Ahsas hi ahsas hai

Khushboo si hai jaise hawa mein tairti
Khushboo jo be-aawaaz hai
Jiska pata tumko bhi hai
Jiski khabar mujhko bhi hai
Duniya se bhi chupta nahin
Yeh jaane kaisa raaz hai

Trans:

Words that almost came to my lips remained unsaid,
Through my eyes it just stared.
Sometimes From me, sometimes from you,
A few phrases of comfort it so desired.
Taking their shape it wanted to be spoken and sung
Embraced by my voice it wanted to sway and be swung
But this small little thing
Is a feeling ... just a feeling

Like a fragrance through air it floats
Fragrance that is without voice
Neither of which you are aware
Nor of which I am mindful.
From the world it is not so hidden
Don't know what's all that secret.

(3)
Jab jab dard ka baadal chaya
Jab hum ka saya lehraya
Jab aansoo palkon tak aaya
Jab yeh tanha dil ghabraya

Humne dil ko yeh samjhaya
Dil aakhir tu kyun rota hai?
Duniya mein yun hi hota hai

Yeh jo gehre sannate hain
Waqt ne sabko hi baante hain
Thoda ghum hai sabka kissa
Thodi dhoop hai sabka hissa
Aankh teri bekaar hi nam hai
Har pal ek naya mausam hai
Kyun tu aise pal khota hai
Dil aakhir tu kyun rota hai

Trans:

Every time the cloud of pain did hover,
Every time the my shadows of hurt did loom,
Every time a tear filled my eyes
Every time my scared heart filled with gloom

I tried convincing my heart
Heart, for what do you cry?
For all that happens in the world,
There are no reasons, just no “Why”.

All the piercing silences like these
Time has distributed amongst all with ease.
A little sadness is everyone's tale.
A little sunshine is everyone's share.
Your eyes are damp for just no reason,
Every second is but a whole new season.
Moments like these, why loose, why?
My heart, why despair? For what do you cry?

(4)

Dilon mein tum apni betabiyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum
Nazar mein khwabon ki bijliyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum
Hawa ke jhokon ke jaise aazad rehno sikho
Tum ek dariya ke jaise lehron mein behna sikho
Har ek lamhe se tum milo khole apni bahen
Har ek pal ek naya sama dekhen yeh nigahen

Jo apni aankhon mein hairaniyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum
Dilon mein tum apni Betaabiyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum

Trans:
If you carry desires in your heart, intense and strong,
Then alive you are.
If in your eyes you carry dreams, mighty as the lightning,
Then alive you are.
Learn to live like these free gentle breezes
Learn to be calm like the lake in stormy waves.
Embrace every moment of your life with arms wide open
May all that your eyes see are dreamy and full of hopin’.

If you carry surprises in your heart, weird and strange
Then you are alive
If you carry desires in your heart, strong and intense,
Then alive you are.

Rilke's The panther

I first heard this poem in a penny Marshal movie called the awakenings, starring De niro and Robin Williams. Williams' narration of the poem, interspersed with the brilliant visuals of the Panther in the Bronx zoo, moved me like it has moved a million before. I was reminded of the othe movie I saw starring Javier Bardem called Mar Adentro or translated in English as 'The Sea inside', where a quadriplegic sits and contemplates dying all day.
Anyways, Without further ado, here is the poem for you:

Tha Panther

From seeing the bars, his seeing is so exhausted
that it no longer holds anything anymore.
To him the world is bars, a hundred thousand
bars, and behind the bars, nothing.

The lithe swinging of that rhythmical easy stride
which circles down to the tiniest hub
is like a dance of energy around a point
in which a great will stands stunned and numb.

Only at times the curtains of the pupil rise
without a sound . . . then a shape enters,
slips though the tightened silence of the shoulders,
reaches the heart, and dies.

An uncanny premonition

Note: The underwritten article is reproduced here from the following site:
http://www.mcsweeneys.net/books/everythingthatrises.contest50.html
Please visit the site for pictures and other information on the article.

Author: Maxim Gorky
Artcle: On a Visit to the Kingdom of Shadows.

Last night I was in the Kingdom of Shadows.

If you only knew how strange it is to be there. It is a world without sound, without colour. Every thing there—the earth, the trees, the people, the water and the air—is dipped in monotonous grey. Grey rays of the sun across the grey sky, grey eyes in grey faces, and the leaves of the trees are ashen grey. It is not life but its shadow, It is not motion but its soundless spectre.

Here I shall try to explain myself, lest I be suspected of madness or indulgence in symbolism. I was at Aumont's and saw Lumière's cinematograph—moving photography. The extraordinary impression it creates is so unique and complex that I doubt my ability to describe it with all its nuances. However, I shall try to convey its fundamentals. When the lights go out in the room in which Lumière's invention is shown, there suddenly appears on the screen a large grey picture, "A Street in Paris"—shadows of a bad engraving. As you gaze at it, you see carriages, buildings and people in various poses, all frozen into immobility.

All this is in grey, and the sky above is also grey—you anticipate nothing new in this all too familiar scene, for you have seen pictures of Paris streets more than once. But suddenly a strange flicker passes through the screen and the picture stirs to life. Carriages coming from somewhere in the perspective of the picture are moving straight at you, into the darkness in which you sit; somewhere from afar people appear and loom larger as they come closer to you; in the foreground children are playing with a dog, bicyclists tear along, and pedestrians cross the street picking their way among the carriages. All this moves, teems with life and, upon approaching the edge of the screen, vanishes somewhere beyond it.

And all this in strange silence where no rumble of the wheels is heard, no sound of footsteps or of speech. Nothing. Not a single note of the intricate symphony that always accompanies the movements of people. Noiselessly, the ashen-grey foliage of the trees sways in the wind, and the grey silhouettes of the people, as though condemned to eternal silence and cruelly punished by being deprived of all the colours of life, glide noiselessly along the grey ground.

Their smiles are lifeless, even though their movements are full of living energy and are so swift as to be almost imperceptible. Their laughter is soundless although you see the muscles contracting in their grey faces. Before you a life is surging, a life deprived of words and shorn of the living spectrum of colours—the grey, the soundless, the bleak and dismal life.

It is terrifying to see, but it is the movement of shadows, only of shadows ... Suddenly something clicks, everything vanishes and a train appears on the screen. It speeds straight at you—watch out!

It seems as though it will plunge into the darkness in which you sit, turning you into a ripped sack full of lacerated flesh and splintered bones, and crushing into dust and into broken fragments this hall and this building, so full of women, wine, music and vice.

But this, too, is but a train of shadows.

Noiselessly, the locomotive disappears beyond the edge of the screen. The train comes to a stop, and grey figures silently emerge from the cars, soundlessly greet their friends, laugh, walk, run, bustle, and ... are gone. And here is another picture. Three men seated at the table, playing cards. Their faces are tense, their hands move swiftly, The cupidity of the players is betrayed by the trembling fingers and by the twitching of their facial muscles, They play ... Suddenly, they break into laughter, and the waiter who has stopped at their table with beer, laughs too. They laugh until their sides split but not a sound is heard. It seems as if these people have died and their shadows have been condemned to play cards in silence unto eternity. Another picture. A gardener watering flowers. The light grey stream of water, issuing from a hose, breaks into a fine spray ...

This mute, grey life finally begins to disturb and depress you. It seems as though it carries a warning, fraught with a vague but sinister meaning that makes your heart grow faint. You are forgetting where you are. Strange imaginings invade your mind and your consciousness begins to wane and grow dim ...

Besides those pictures I have already mentioned, is featured "The Family Breakfast," an idyll of three. A young couple with its chubby first-born is seated at the breakfast table. The two are so much in love, and are so charming, gay and happy, and the baby is so amusing ...

I am convinced that these pictures will soon be replaced by others of a genre more suited to the general tone of the "Concert Parisien." For example, they will show a picture titled: "As She Undresses," or "Madam at Her Bath," or "A Woman in Stockings." They could also depict a sordid squabble between a husband and wife and serve it to the public under the heading of "The Blessings of Family Life."

Yes, no doubt, this is how it will be done. The bucolic and the idyll could not possibly find their place in Russia's markets thirsting for the piquant and the extravagant. I also could suggest a few themes for development by means of a cinematograph and for the amusement of the market place. For instance: to impale a fashionable parasite upon a picket fence, as is the way of the Turks, photograph him, then show it.

It is not exactly piquant but quite edifying.

The Lament Of A Heart- Ghalib

No foreword or introduction is necessary for the ballad of a broken heart. Ghazals, too think of it, were created only to assuage just this pain, and ghalib's kalaam has more than helped lay lovers in putting words to feeling.
This Ghazal is portrayed brilliantly on Neena Gupta, in Gulzar's teleserial , Mirza Ghalib. The video can be found here: Please traverse to time, 3:30 for the ghazal.

The transliteration and the translation provided below, id from the book, Mirza Ghalib: A biographical scenario by Gulzar.

Transliteration:
Kisi ko deke dil koi navasanj-e-fughan kyun ho?
Na ho jab dil hi seene me, to phir munh me zaban kyun ho?

Yahi hai aazmana toh, satana kis ko kehte hain
adu ke ho liye jab tum, toh mera intihan kyun ho.

Qafas mein mujhe se rudad-e-chaman kehte na dar hamdum
Giri hai jis pe kal bijli, woh mera aashiyan kyun ho.

Wafa kaisi? Kahan ka ishq? jab sar phorna thehra.
To phir, ae sang-dil, tera sang-e aastan kyun ho.

Translation:
By: Gulzar
( A few changes in words is by me, and I accept the mistakes if any)

Why must you lament after you give away your heart?
If the heart is already lost, Why must the tongue wail?

If this your test, What must your torment be?
If you change your allegiance over to my rival, why this trial?

Don't be scared to tell a caged me, the state of the garden
why must the nestle be mine, where a lightning struck last night.

If I need bang my head, talk not of fate, of love.
and why must it be at your threshold, at your petrified heart.

Essence in a mantra.

Original Sanskrit Text:
(Image copied from web)

The mantra, called the Prajna-paramita Hrdaya Sutram (The Heart Sutra) is the key for understaing the essential Buddhist philosophy. The sutra, originally in sanskrit, elucidates suffering and the cause of suffering as objects which itself is without form and momentary.

Listen to the rendetion of the Mantra by western scholars here. The prononciation is not how a vedic or tibetian scholar would do, but the usage of music is pleasant.

Transliteration of the original Sanskrit Sutra:

|| Namah Sarvajnyaya||
arya avalokitesvara bodhisattvo
gambhirayam prajnaparamitayam charyam charamano
vyavalokayati sma pancha skandhah. Tascha svabhavasunyam pasyati sma.

Iha sariputra, rupam sunyata, sunyata eva rupam, rupan na prithak
sunyata, sunyataya na prithak rupam.
yad rupam sa sunyata ya sunyata tad rupam.
evam eva vedana samjna samskara vijnanani.

Iha sariputra sarva dharmah sunyata laksana,
anutpanna, aniruddha amala na avimala na una na paripurnah.

Tasmat sariputra Sunyatayan na rupam,
na vedana, na samjna, na samskara, na vijnanani.
Na chaksuh srotan, na ghrana jihva kaya manansi
Na rupam sabda gandha rasa spastavya dharmah.
Na chaksu dhatuh yavan na manovijnanam dhatuh.

Na vidya na avidya na vidya ksayo, na avidya ksayo
yavan na jara-maranam, na jara-marano ksayo,
na duhkha samudaya nirdoha margah
na jnanam na praptih apraptivena.

Bodhisattvasya prajnaparamitam asritya
viharatya chittavaranah. cittavarana
nasti tvad avasto viparya asti kranto
nistha nirvanaha.

Tryadhva-vyavasthitaah sarvabuddhaah
prajnaaparamitaam aashritya anuttaraam samyak
sambodhim abhisambuddhaah.

Tasmaad jnaatavyo prajnaaparamitaa-mahaamantrah
mahaavidyaa-mantrah anuttara-mantrah asamasama-mantrah,
sarvadukha-prashamanah, satyam amithyatvaat,
prajnaaparamitaayaam ukto mantrah
tadyatha
GATE GATE PARAGATE PARASANGATE BODHI SVAAHA

||Iti prajnaparamita-hridayam samaptam.

Translation in English:
(The translation is attempted line by line, and can be compared with the transliterated sanskrit text copied above.)

|| Greetings to the Omniscent ||
When, holy boddhisattva, Avalokitsvara was in deep thought
contemplating on Transcendental wisdom, he realized the existance of the
five elements, but observed that these were devoid of the essential characteristics.

Here, Sariputra, Form is void and void itself is form. Form is no different
from emptiness, and emptiness is no different from form.
What ever has form is void and whatever is void has form.
And so it is with feeling, conception, volition, and consciousness.

So Sariputra, All things have characteristics of the voidness.
They can neither be created nor they can perish, they are neither defiled nor pure, neither deficient nor complete.

Therefore, Shaariputra, within the voidness, there is no form,
no perception, no conception, no volition, nor consciousness.
Neither is there eye, ear, nose, tongue, body or mind.
Neither is there form, sound, smell, taste, touch nor concepts
Neither is there realm of sight and so forth uptill the realm of non-existence of consciousness.

Neither is there wisdom, nor ignorance, nor extinction of wisdom, nor extinction of ignorance,
and so forth, till we come to the non-existence of old age and death and the non-extinction of old age and death.
Neither is there suffering, cause of suffering, extinction of suffering, nor the path leading to extinction of suffering.
Neither is there wisdom nor acquisition because there is no understanding.

Submitting to the bodhisattva's highest Transcendental Wisdom,
one dwells without any mental hindrance.
Because of the absence of mental hindrance, one is fearless;
freed from all distorted and delusionary thoughts, one achieves Nirvana.

All Buddhas dwelling in the three periods
realize the highest, perfect enlightenment
depending on the Perfection of Transcendent Wisdom.

For this reason, know that the Great Mantra of the perfection of transcendental wisdom
is the Great Wisdom Mantra, the unsurpassed Mantra, the unequalled Mantra.
It obliterates all suffering, and is true and real because it is not false.
It is the mantra proclaimed in the Perfection of transcendental wisdom.
Thus,
Gone, Gone, Gone Completely, Gone forever, Praise to the Buddha.

|| Thus ends the essence of the transcendental Wisdom, Heart Sutra.

Related Sites:
1.Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_Sutra
2. zen: http://www.andrew-may.com/zendynamics/heart.htm
3. Abt Om Mani Padma Hun: http://www.dharma-haven.org/tibetan/meaning-of-om-mani-padme-hung.htm#Mani
4. Buddhism, karmapa's Page: http://www.dharma-haven.org/index.htm

Satvan Ghoda, Suraj ka: A narrative delight

Reviewed: Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda: (The Seventh Horse Of The Sun)
Director: Shyam Benegal
Story: Dharamveer Bharti
Cast: Rajat Kapoor, Raghuveer Yadav, Amrish Puri, Neena Gupta, Rajeshwari Sachdev, Illa Arun, Pallavi Joshi, Lalit Tiwari, K.K.Raina, Ravi Jhankal and others

Some movies dazzle the viewers with a tight gripping story, some with spellbinding performances of the actors and still a few others with brilliant background music, a bit of slick action, great editing and what not, but Suraj ka Satvan Ghoda dazzles with its narration, mind-boggling as it is. I will no doubt effuse with happiness when I start describing the movie and fill buckets with my profuse applaud for a movie directed by Shyam Benegal, accepted as the master craftsman by people from all over and over all strata, so let me at the outset divide the review in two, One for those not initiated to the magic of Benegal and his crew but do want to dip in the pool of brilliance, and the other for those who are a convert. With the previous long statement, longer than most I have ever written without the Microsoft word warning me with green curly wavy lines, Let me rephrase and mention now that Benegal may be brilliant but Dharamveer Bharati is no doubt a genius. The movie is no doubt the filmmaker’s vision but the novelty is only because of brilliance named Dharamveer Bharati.

For the Un-initiated:
(For the people unaware of a gem called Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda)

Fiction: Good movies are supposed to relax the senses.
Fact: Movies should no doubt be enjoyable in addition to challenge the thinking and bringing a social message to the hearts of the viewer.

Says who? Manik Mullah (The sentence being tastefully modified to suit my future ranting)

Without my fancies running abound screaming, Let me start by asserting that Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda is a movie for audiences with matured tastes and let me clarify before any brickbats come my way, I am not being judgmental or being opinionated here, and I think there should be different movies for varied tastes. Coming back to my narrative, the movie is a near accurate adaptation of the novella of the same name by Dr Bharati who tells a simple tale of the clichéd emotions like love and betrayal ranged across a period of seven afternoons. The tales are simple narratives of low middle class families adjoined in miseries in a hot and humid, nameless (Don’t remember the name, If mentioned) town in the Hindi heartland of northern India. All these tales (connected by a common thread with common characters appearing nondescript in a non-chronological random manner) are narrated by an unreliable narrator named Manik Mullah.

When I talk about narration, I should step back a bit. The movie starts in an art gallery with a short man, ordinary looking, nattily dressed in a Safari suit, peering at paintings. He stops in front of a painting with women taking bath and guys rambling around, basically a busy locality of some sort, and suddenly starts with his narrative about a nameless town of some yester years when he was a reticent guy and a friend of a ingenious storyteller named Manik mullah who used to entertain them with impromptu stories with morals (hardly so) drawn out of it.

The stories he churns out are commonplace and have similarity with Sharat Chandra’s Devdas in content, with love and separation as a permanent motif and lust, betrayal, meekness, illicit relationships, amorality and other human emotions thrown in. But describing the movie in terms of only the content of narratives is describing the sea as only a storehouse of water. This is one movie, which I can say has the maximum usage of literary techniques, The unreliable narrator is the mainstay, then the use of Chekov’s gun, author surrogate, foreshadowing, in media res, are just to name a few. In the movie, Manik mullah comments that only a person, who doesn’t have a story to tell needs techniques, maybe this was the author’s point of reminding the viewer to take notice of the paraphernalia attached to the narratives without concentrating on the commonplace unoriginal narrative inspired from the novels of Sharat Chandra and thousand others on the politics and life of a small town.

Without riveting on the story fearing that I may involuntarily divulge information, Let me shift to the acting department. The movie when released in 1994 had some seasoned actors like Amrish Puri, Raghuveer Yadav, Neena Gupta, Pallavi Joshi, K.K.Raina, Lalit Tiwari etc. and newcomers of the Benegal stable, who in no time became the who’s who of art cinema like Rajeshwari Sachdev, Ravi Jhankal and above all Rajit Kapoor to whom the movie no doubt (co-) belongs to. Having read the English translation of the novel, I had a vague picture of Manik mullah sketched and Rajit Kapoor fits in snuggly in that picture of mine and I am confident, in any picture of Manik Mullah. The nuances of the character are so very well portrayed by Rajit that he just transforms into the character displaying hurt with a twitch of his lips, and curling up his eyebrows, anger with a hasty shift of eyes and pain with a prolonged unfocussed look. Rajit Kapoor, primarily a theatre artist has never done it better and sadly will always be remembered as Byomkesh Bakshi and not as Manik Mullah (Not that I hate BB, Just that love MM better). All others have brought life to their characters and have done a commendable job. I want also to commend Amrish Puri, Neena Gupta and Lalit Tiwari for having done a wonderful job with their characters. Amrish Puri, with a crooked grin with hopes of lust marked on his face, when dressing up for the evening, is one of the best moments of Amrish for me, ever.

Coming to Shyam Benegal, applauds don’t seem enough. With a repertoire of films like Ankur, Nishanth, Manthan, Mandi etc., Benegal has proved his caliber and understanding of human pain, time and again. During the course of the movie, the screenplay changes direction, the pace sometimes race ahead and sometimes stall to a deafening silence. The sun outside sometimes is valiant like the afternoon sun while some other time pleasant like the evening. Like the sun, the characters also change colors, with Manik sometimes appearing as a naïve observer, sometimes the oppressed individual and sometimes the oppressor himself. Like the triumvirate of Hindu Mythology, Brahma Vishnu and Mahesh, he has a different role in each of the story. This I may have to take up in a separate thread for the fear of proving spoilers here. The camera movements are pleasant without induced jerks and the visuals are pleasantly placed as well without urgency.

The usage of music is one, which I would so love to describe. There is just one song, “Yeh Shaame, Yeh Sab Ki Sab Shaame ”, which is a romantic song shot with Lily (Manik’s second lover) and Manik and shot in the outdoors describing the afternoons spent together. The only other song is a folk song (Hindora, if am not wrong) sung by Neena Gupta that pierces the heart with a non-indulgent music hanging around while the loud high-pitched voice takes over. The background music is used intelligently enhancing the sketch on the celluloid and creating a human picture.

The movie should be seen without expectations and with a pinch of salt and best viewed at a time when the mind is relaxed and receptive to ideas that keep churning out like the nectar and the poison inter-twined like the first ever churning of the sea by the good and the evil combined.

For the Believers:
(People who have seen and love Suraj ka Satvan Ghoda)

Caution: Spoilers Ahead

At the outset let me set the agenda correct, the following is an interpretation of the movie according to my understanding and I take full blame or credit for the same. I would love to discuss if there is any point, someone take offense to.

For me the key to the movie lies in the title, “The seventh horse of the sun” and like the movie there can be multiple meanings to the same and all of these may be the correct explanation to it. Similar in trying to understand the meaning of life, each Individual on seeing the movie may have a different interpretation and if it suits the character of the view that’s the truth. Let me voice my varied interpretations, May be the sun is life and the seven horses together pull the existence, sometimes these horses race ahead and sometimes slow down to a standstill describing the ups and downs in life. The seventh horse, which is the slowest horse, makes everyone else slows down as it is the weakest as well but that, like Manik said, is the horse of future that later will decide the course that life would take. If we look at the movie, may be the master narrator played by Raghuveer Yadav, is a taking a biographic dig contemplating that the weakling like him, mostly snubbed and hardly given importance became a writer while fibbers and storytellers like Manik Mullah just faded away. Maybe the movie is about potential and the lack of rising to it. Manik Mullah with his impromptu story telling could have reached the level of his ideals like Flaubert, Maupassant and Chekov but in the end he failed to rise to the potential.

The second interpretation is based on the key word “Weak Horse”. Maybe the movie is about the lack of strength in character of Manik Mullah. In the first story, he is a naïve teen who enjoys the company of the childish Jamuna but fails to stand up for her. He also portrays himself as the blameless child with Jamuna taking over the primary role in their relationship. In the second romance between him and Lily, he floats over the border between friendship and romance and again fails to take a stand when Lily is forced to get married to a guy she hardly knew. In the third romance of his, Manik as a narrator, comes out as a lover forsaking his love and sacrificing it, at the alter of social correctness. From a character with a halo, he transforms to having shades of gray and finally being a villain in the piece. Like discussed earlier, Manik plays each of the triumvirate of Hindu mythology in the stories. In the first, he is the progenitor of Jamuna’s desire to continue living, in the second, he the preserver of Lily’s chastity and in the third he is the destroyer of Satti’s hopes and ambitions.

The third interpretation stems from Manik’s statement that the seventh horse is the horse of future, which holds all dreams and desires and visions that stories are made of. For me the movie was for literature what “The Dreamers” is for movies. So maybe the author (Raghuveer Yadav) intended to provide a clue to Manik Mullah being a figment of his imagination after all. All the characters cease to suffer anymore and become fictional ones and the visions that Shyam saw reminiscent of Dante’s Divine comedy all becomes lifeless visions.

This leads me to the most interesting part of the movie, the convergence of reality and fiction. The movie begins with the surmise that Manik was a storyteller par excellence, his existence never in doubt. The story begins with Jamuna as a sweet love story without much value then takes up the social context on Shyam’s mentioning dowry system as an social evil. The third story takes up Maheshwar Dalal (Amrish Puri’s Character) and talks of filial oppression and amorality in lower middle class families. While the first two stories had ended in a happy ending the third does a U-Turn to end with a violent death. The fourth story again meanders on the border of love and separation with the mood generally light and the last story begins with a violent surmise of a quick shot of Satti interspersed with lazy medium shots and end with a death and introspection. The viewer now is led to believe that Manik is a fibber who can create impromptu stories and dazzle listeners but all these fizzle out when Manik is made to face Satti with the listeners in tandem. At this point, the question is put forward as what was real? Was Manik real and everything else just fibbing, if so, then what of Sati? Or was it that all the stories were true and Manik was telling stories of his life, strange, as it may seem? The other possibility could have been that Manik himself was fictitious and thus the smile in Raghuveer Yadav’s face when he says, He became a writer. The smile may be symbolism of the viewers intelligently fooled and thus dazzled.

Whatever the case maybe, I believe the movie is a cornerstone of art-house movies, that similar to Rashomon and Ek din achanak brought narrative techniques to world cinema. I adore the movie with the reference to Devdas, with narratives taking shape with change in landscape. The cow in the beginning of the first scene, the knife in the fifth. The reference to Devsena in the 4th story when challenged by a friend and so on.

The movie should be watched and relished for one self. I saw the movie first as a kid, twelve years may be and I didn’t understand a bit. Each time I saw it, I added a little bit to it and today after 4-5 viewings my movie is far from complete. And all the afternoons I spent watching this movie, sing to me:
“ Yeh Shaame, Sab Ki Sab Shaame, Kya inka koi Arth nahin,
Ghabra ke jab inhe yaad kiya, kya un shaamon ka arth nahin “

Two for 'Zafar'

We have heard of valiant warrior poets, poet kings with the smile of eros and the body of adonis, but imagine a 60 year old prince becoming the king. With his four queens tucked along and unkept princes running around, the king, with his toothy grin and bent back, must have been an ugly sight. But what the public would have failed to see was his heart which no longer was a mughal but had turned Hindustani like the man that the king was.

Bahadur shah may have been no doubt a Mughal but Zafar was an Indian.
The following two poems by Zafar is a proof of that.

Title: Lagta Nahin Hai Dil Mera
Poet: Bahadur Shah Zafar
Performer: Mohd rafi.
Film: Lal Quila

Lagta Nahin Hai Dil Mera Ujde Dayaar Mein
Kiski Bani Hai Aalam-E-Napaydaar Mein

Dayar - City; Aalam-e-Napaidar - The Mortal World

Keh Do In Hasraton Se Kahin Aur Ja Basein
Itni Jageh Kahan Hai Dil-E-Daagdar Mein

Hasraton: Fancies/desires Dil-e-Daagdaar - Sorrowful Heart

Umr-E-Daraaz Mang Kar Laye The Chaar Din
Do Aarzoo Mein Kat Gaye Do Intezaar Mein
Umr-e-Daraz - Long Life

Kitna Hai Badnaseeb zafar Dafan Ke Liye
Do Gaz Zameen Bhi Na Mili Kuch-E-Yaar Mein

Dafn - Burial; Koo-e-Yaar - Land of the Beloved

Translation:

My heart is so very unhappy on this barren earth,
But who has ever been contended on this mortal hearth

Please ask my fancies to go dwell some place else
There remains no room enough in this sorrow filled heart

I had requested a long life all of four days
Two have passed pining and two spent in the wait

How ill-fated is zafar that for his own burial
Two yards of land was not fated in the land of his beloved.


Title: Na Kisi Ki Aankh Ka Noor Hoon
Poet: Bahadur Shah Zafar
Performed : Mohd Rafi
Film: Lal Quila

Na kisi ki aankh ka noor hoon, na kisi ke dil ka qaraar hoon
Jo kisi ke kaam na aa sake main wo ek musht-e-Gubaar hoon

Qaraar: Ease, Satisfaction; Noor: Light; Musht: The fist/—a blow with the clenched fist/—a handful/—a few; Gubaar: Dirt/Dust

Na to main kisi ka habib hoon, no to main kisi ka raqeeb hoon
Jo bigad gaya wo naseeb hoon, jo ujaad gaya wo dayaar hoon

habib: beloved; raqeeb: enemy; naseeb: fate; dayaar= place

Mera rang-roop bigad gaya, mera yaar mujh se bichhad gaya
Jo chaman fizaan mein ujad gaya main usi ki fasl-e-bahaar hoon

chaman: garden; fizaan: environment; fasl: yield,harvest; bahaar: bloom, beuty, glory;

Paye faatehaa koi aaye kyun, koi chaar phool chadhaaye kyun
Koi aake shammaa jalaye kyun, main wo bekasi ka mazaar hoon

Fateh:Aperture, Conquest, Opening, Sucess, Victory; shamaa: lamp,candle; bekasi: despair; Mazaar: Mausoleum, Shrine, Tomb, Grave

I am drunk

I dont consider myself a confirmed alchoholic, but I couldnt help falling in love with the poem, the moment I heard it for the first time. The pen of Meer and the silken voice of Chaya Ganguly combine uplifting the listening hearts to an ethereal plane, that can only be experienced and never spoken of. I will not attempt an clumsy translation here and will leave the reader with his own imagination and just an handout of meanings for some of the words I deemed difficult.

Lyrics: Meer Taqi Meer
Performer: Chaya Ganguli

Video:


yaaron mujhe muaaf rakho, main nashe mein hoon
ab jaam do to khali hi do, main nashe mein hoon (1)

Muaaf: Pardon, Forgve
Nasha: Addiction, Arrogance, Intoxication, Pride
Jaam: Goblet, Wineglass

ya haathon-haath lo mujhe maanind-e-jaam-e-mai
ya thodi door saath chalo, main nashe mein hoon (2)

Haathon-Haath: Hand in Hand
Maanind: Just As, Like, Similar To, Same As
Jaam-e-Mai: Glass filled with wine

maazoor hoon jo paa’on mera betaraah pare
tum sar-garaaN to mujhse na ho main nashe mein hoon (3)

Maazoor: Helpless
Paa’on: Feet, Legs
Betaraah: Unsteady
Garaan: Heavy Difficult
sar-GaraaN: Annoyed

naazuk mizaaj aap, qayaamat hain mir-ji
joon sheesha mere munh na lago, main nashe mein hoon (4)

Naazuk: Brittle, Delicate, Fragile, Light, Slender, Thin
Mizaaj: Mixture, Temperament, Humor, Pride, Nature, State Of Being
Qayaamat: Apocalypse, Resurrection, Judgement Day, Tumult
Mir: A reference to the poet, Meer Taqi Meer

ik aik furt-e-daur mein yoon hi mujhay bhi do
jaam-e-sharaab pur na karo, main nashe mein hoon (5)

Furt: Intense, Hurried
Daur: Age, Course, Cycle, Era, Orbit, Period, Phase, Race, Reign, Revolving
Furt-e-Daur: Intense Rounds
Pur: Full, Complete, Laden

masti se darhami hai meri guftagoo ke beech
jo chaaho tum bhi mujh ko kaho, main nashe mein hoon (6)

Masti: Lust, Intoxication
Dar-ham: Intermixed, confused, confounded, jumbled, angry:
Guftagoo: Conversation, Discourse, Speech, Talk

bhaagi namaaz-e-jum’a to jaati nahin hai kuchh
chalta hoon main bhi tak to raho, main nashe mein hoon. (7)

Baaghi: Enemy, Rebel
Namaaz: Prayer
Jum’a: The day of the congregation’; Friday (on which day Musalmans assemble to pray at the great mosque); a collection (of things), a handful
Tak: Up to, Until

kya janey keh gaya hoon nashe mein khabar nahin
mera na kuchh khayaal karo, main nashe mein hoon (8)

Khabar: Account, Awareness, Information, Knowledge, News, Notice, Report, Rumor, Watchfulness
Khayaal: Care, Imagination, Judgement, Opinion, Respect, Remember, Thought, Whim

gham se zara najaat mili bekhudi mein aaj
ab mera intazaar karo, main nashe main hoon (9)

Najaat: Freedom (From), Salvation
Be-khudi: Being besides Oneself, Intoxication, Rapture, Senseless
Intazaar: Await, Expectation, Lurch, Waiting (Anxiously)

Note: The performance of Chaya Ganguli is till verse 5.

In the praise of the Lord:

-
Mere banay ki baat na poocho:

Note: This Qawwali sung for the first time in the twelfth century, written by Amir Khusro, is a song in the praise of Prophet Muhammad. The poet imagines the prophet as a bridegroom and himself as the lover and bride. The gist of Sufi with the oneness of the man and the lord, is evident and the perhaps the key of this poem.

Like any other sufi or baul music, this qawwali can be best enjoyed when singing along and clapping to the tune of the harmonium.

Album: Rung
Genre: Qawwali
Poet/Lyrics: Amir Khusrau
Performer: Manzoor Niazi & Troupe

Mere banay ki baat na poocho mera bana haryala hai
Mere banay ki baat na poocho mera bana haryala hai
(haryala: Fresh/Green)

Mere banay ki baat na poocho mera bana haryala hai
Khusrave khooban sarwari aalam taj e shafaa'at wala hai

(sarwari : Leadership; aalam: world/universe/beauty; Taj: Crown/Tiara; Shafaaat: Mediation, )

Manmohan bohot tere he daikhe, aisa to dekha na bhala banna
Donon jagat ko loot ke baitha phir bhi bhola bhala hai

Us pe nazar jab jam jaati hai, phir nahi jajta koi nazar mein
Jis ne nazar paayi hai oonchi, bus japta usiki mala hai

Husn ke charchay uske dam se, ronaq e aalam uske qadam se
Noor ke saanchay mein qudrat ne usko kuch aisa dhala hai

(husn:beauty; Noor: Bright/Light; Saancha: Mould; dhala:Mould)

Nabi waali sub uske barati, kis mein uski baat hai aati
Kaamil mera raj dulhara, sub se Alfaaz o aala hai

(Nabi: A Prophet; Waali: Chief/Governor; Kaamil: Absolute/Complete/Learned; Aala: Best/greatest; Alfaaz: Words;)

A Qawwali for the heart

-
Khabar-e-tahiiyyur-e-ishq sun


Khabar-e-tahiiyyur-e-ishq sun, na junoon raha na pari rahi
na to tuu rahaa, na to main rahaa, jo rahi so be-khabari rahi
(Khabar: report; tahiiyyur-e-ishq: wonders of love; junoon : frenzy/furor; pari : fairy/fantasy, be-khabari: unawareness)

Listen to the wonders of love, neither the furor nor the fancy remain
Neither you nor I exist, but a deadly unawareness is all that remain


sha’h-e-be-khudi ne ata kiya mujhe ab libas-e-barahnagi
na Khirad ki bakhyaagiri rahi, na junoon ki parda-dari rahi

(sha’h : grace; be-Khudii : ecstasy; Ata: Benefaction/Concession; libaas : dress; barahnagi: nakedness; Khirad: intellect; bakhyaagiri: stitching; parda-dari: veil)

The grace of ecstasy has adorned me with the cloths of nakedness
Neither intellect nor a stitch on me, only the veil of hysteria remain

chali simt-e-ghaib se ek hawa ke chaman surur ka jal gaya
magar ek shakh-e-nihal-e-Gham jise dil kahen so hari rahi

(simt-e-Ghaib : from the unknown; hawa: breeze/wind; chaman : garden; surur : intoxication; shaaKh-e-nihaal-e-Gham : a branch nurtured by pain; hari : green)

From the land of unknown blows a breeze, that burns the garden of intoxication,
But of all that is green, is a branch nurtured by pain, called the heart, remain

nazar-e-taghaful-e-yaar ka, gila kis zubaan se karun bayaan
ki sharaab-e-sad-qadhe arzuu, Khum-e-dil men thi so bhari rahi

(nazar-e-taGhaaful-e-yaar : heedless glances of the beloved; gilaa : complain; bayaan : explain; sharaab-e-sad-qadhe aarzuu : hundred cups of wine of desire; Khum : decanter; bharii : filled)

In which words should I complain of the heedless glances of my beloved?
When the hundred cups desire filled in the decanter called heart remain.

woh ajab ghadi thi main jis ghadi liya dars nuskha-e-ishq ka
ki kitab aql ki taaq par, jo dhari thi yun hi dhari rahi

(ajab:strange; ghadi : moment; dars : class; nuskha-e-ishq : lessons of love; taaq : shelf; aql:intellect)

Those were strange times when I had taken the lessons of love,
On the shelf that it had lain before, the book of intellect still remain

tere josh-e-hairat-e-husn ka asar is qadar se ayaan hua
ke na aaine main jila rahi, na pari ki jalwa-gari rahi

(josh : passion; hairat : bewilderment; husn : beauty; ayaan : obvious; Jila: Luster; Jalvaa-garii: Manifestation )

The passion of bewilderment of your beauty has become obvious
Neither the mirror remains lustrous nor the displays of fancy remain.

Kiya Khaak aatish-e-ishq ne dil-e-be-navaa-e-”Siraj” ko
na Khatar raha, na hazar raha, magar ek be-Khatari rahi

(Khaak : ashes; aatish-e-ishq: fire of love; dil-e-be-navaa-e-”Siraj” : desolate heart of Siraj; Khatar : fear; hazar : care; be-Khatari : fearlessness)

The fire of love has reduced the desolate heart of Siraj to ashes
Neither fear nor care exist, But a feeling of fearlessness remain.

Lyrcis: Siraj Aurangabadi
Album : Rung
Performed by: Munshi Raziuddin & Troupe

The Perpetual Wound: Part 2-Dekalog:

(There may be spoilers ahead, but Decalogue is not about some plot, not about the visuals, not about the music but just the feel. It is like you are a silent narrator who observes without judging, maybe like the angels in “City of Angels”, being there but not involved.)

Let me set matters straight, Decalogue is not a movie in a conventional sense. It’s a series of ten separate one hour features knitted together with the thread of human suffering. Kieślowski, along with Piesiewicz, visualized this feature as his personal homage to the Ten Commandments passed on to Moses by the creator whom we so lovingly call with the three letter name, god. But the series is not a biblical account of the ten commandments it is more of a study of the various emotions that bring about grief, a rambling with the commandments as backdrop, placed just as a guide while the director and his crew paint a picture of a desolate society where each of these commandments are transgressed with a brutal candor.

The commandments are pretty straightforward but in Kieślowski’s hand it becomes something utterly profound and deep. You shall not worship other gods (Part 1) translates to a story of a father who looses his son in a freak incident at the lake. His crime, he built a computer that could predict when the ice would melt but like any device controlled by man, it can err and it did, making the son drown in the icy waters of the lake. The movie is about the guilt of a man and grief of a father on his only child's loss. The final scene with the father tumbling over the candles in the church, and the wax spilled over the virgin Mary’s eyes was poignant and tastefully done. Similar in taste is the second part (Not take god’s name in vain) about an old, grumpy doctor who observes disdainfully at a woman in his apartment whose husband is his patient and is in comma for long. The woman wants an opinion to whether her husband shall survive so that she can decide whether to keep the baby whose father is her husband’s best friend. This choice is the cause for her anxiety, her grief. She loves her husband, no doubt about it, but she wants the baby as well. It is the doctor’s answer that would make her decide and that forms the crux of this plot, the doctor being asked to play god, taking god’s name in vain.
Grief takes multiple facets in these series where people lie, kill, feel jealous, and feel roused. They get angry, they have incestuous feelings, some kidnap their kid sister and some don’t trust their brothers, they in a it create a plethora of alternative plots showcasing human folly and the resultant pain.

The fifth part, which was developed later into a full-length movie “A short film about killing”, is a take on capital punishment, with the director drawing parallels to the crime that of the killing of a cab driver to that of the punishment, society hanging the twenty one year old murderer. The movie begins brilliantly with images of some poisoned cockroaches feasting on some rotten bread. The scene moves to a dead rat, may be killed by some random cat, and then cuts to a cat hanging from the noose and boys running away with a jolly abandon. The central idea of the movie, the opposition to capital punishment, is emphasized at that particular point, Kieślowski with his violent portrayal of the act of murder and an equally despicable depiction of the hanging inside the jail barracks, likens the two and questions the morality of the acts. The sixth part, which was also developed as “A short film about love”, questions the morality in the act of love and ponders about lust and the inter-relation between the two. The movie about a small kid who spies on her beautiful neighbor is humiliated sexually by her when she finds out and he attempts to take his own life. Loneliness stands out in this feature, as well as in the previous one, as a precursor to grief, with the bleak white background, an tottering old woman and some chilling music, adding to the silent grief of all the characters, making it so very profound. This movie also shows how a perfect movie even if copied scene by scene doesn’t produce the same effect sans it soul. For the un-initiated this was copied into the disastrous “Ek choti si love story” which reduced the plot to a sleazy soft porn.

The genius of the director is shown in the seventh feature, which showcases the commandment, “thou shall not steal”. In the hands of any ordinary artist, it may have been just a clichéd enactment of a thief repenting or the like but Kieślowski makes it a bewitching performance of a young daughter who kidnaps her ‘sister’ who in reality is her daughter. The daughter(the one who kidnaps), who looks and seems eccentric, is dominated by her strong willed mother who has made the world convince that her grand daughter is actually her daughter. At that point, the viewer is wonderfully unsure of who the commandment applies to, the mother or the daughter. The fourth feature, (Thou shall respect your parents) is more shocking and brilliantly disturbing. It begins with a young pretty girl drenching an older man, may be in his forties and then the older man taking his revenge in a playful way. The keen eye can no doubt mark a spark of love and maybe a speck of sexual tension, and then suddenly out of the blue, he is introduced as the father. As the story progresses, the young lady discovers a letter in her father’s desk from her long dead mother where she mentions that, her father is actually not his birth father and all the repressed emotions suddenly comes to the hilt, swinging destructively to break their relationship. Both these features talk about grief resulting from deep-rooted passions pent up in human souls.

Guilt is an exciting vice which when comes to the surface produces a fascinating plethora of emotions. The Eight feature is about a professor of ethics who comes face to face with her past in the shape of an visiting professor who as a child was betrayed to the Nazis by the same professor. This unlikely interaction lays all their past ghosts to rest and give both a chance to survive with their trust in humanity rekindled.

The Ninth feature is about jealousy, it is about one man who, after having multiple partners, turns impotent one fine day and he requests his wife to find a lover. His wife responds that sex is just an act that she always found cumbersome but then she does take a lover. The husband, in spite of his previous statements, becomes jealous and starts spying on his wife who breaks up with him when she founds that out and he leaps over a bridge to end it all. Confused, but that is Kieślowski for you, betrayal here is two ways, the wife betrayed the trust by taking a lover, the husband betrayed her trust by questioning her love and his own faith. This feature draws a thin line and underlines the difference between love and the act of love. Dakalog three is about a cab driver who leaves his family during Christmas to help an ex lover search for his current partner. The entire feature has a sublime desire glowing in the background with the underlined tension between the ex lovers. Both the features showcase the difficulty in letting go, the grief and pain that is associated with every cease in an relationship.

Feature ten is about obsession, it is about two brothers who obsess over completing their dad’s stamp collection and in the process loose much more, one even his kidney. Bordering on comedy, this feature showcases filial differences and grief resulting from lack of trust.

The movie is a must watch with all its nuances, each beat necessary and every moment priceless. Developed primarily for ten different directors to direct, Kieślowski just couldn’t let go, like his characters he suffered from the grief of parting from his stories and he made each of them with different cinematographers trying to change the look and how he succeeded is for all to see.

There is one character that appears in each of his feature, just looking with a peering glance, not judging just observing, not a participant in the stories developing around him. There Kieślowski got us into the film, we are that man watching a movie not judging the characters but judging ourselves, hoping to become better, sometimes successful, sometimes without success. But the important thing is to at the least “try”.

Part 3: Grief from Bereavement

The perpetual wound : Part I

‘The pain of love is the pain of being alive; it is the perpetual wound’

I don’t remember when I heard of Maureen Duffy for the first time, even her name doesn’t register much, her times and work mean nothing to me, but this statement has remained engraved in me somewhere and peeps out with a smile, whenever I see some random movie with grief marking a character, with the old “I had told you so” smug look. You think it’s crazy that I imagine about words smiling and jeering, poking and pestering, please don’t, I am normal with some loony fascination with books and movies. But this blog is not about Maureen Duffy or “The words”, Sartre or otherwise, this blog is about grief and how movies have showcased this singular emotion in movie after movie, across time, space and language.
Grief is a potent weapon, an all-powerful one, with the power to decimate the million of opposition ahead, the power to annihilate the all-exhuming soul of one, the power to eradicate humanity as a whole. I remember watching a frail old woman spewing venom, literally spitting on the soldiers who had killed her son, destroyed her land, and made her desolate. But as promised, am not presenting an essay on grief, its about some of the movies which try to address the issue, not that it provides a solution, there cannot be any, but it shows people suffer from grief and their personal salvation and redemption.

Now that my resolve is made, my fingers dirtied, eyes twitching, brains (check the plural) racing, my mind is giving up. Coming so far I realize, I am without a structure, without any ideas of narration, without content and the more I think I am getting scared of the brick bats. Grief because of bereavement in itself can fill books, how on the earth, can I stop describing the tears of a mother who has just lost her teenaged child just because my self-imposed thousand word restriction is over. How different is this loss from that of an unmarried mother who had an abortion and is watching her four months fetus through a six inch thick glass vessel. The dead fetus, unmindful of her mother’s stare, swimming in the smelly formaldehyde, mistaking it for the womb that it was swimming in before, may have a different story altogether. If I can write about the story of that unwanted fetus, I would find myself in a completely different world linked just by the river of grief.

But this is a story I wish to tell; maybe this has to be in multiple parts covering the various types and movies that can soothe the abrasion and bring peace. Movies do have that alleviating effect; making you a voyeuristic stranger, letting you peep into the lives of others, create an impression of the omnipotent and omniscient god that we so long to become. I just hope these selections of movies help some random reader in coming to terms with their own individual ghost.

I have a self-imposed limit that I diligently follow, mostly unsuccessfully. So maybe it will be one movie in this first part and the following parts will cover all the types of grief, from bereavement to the empty nest syndrome, from trauma to the much-trivialized break ups. In accordance to my restriction, maybe will just review this one movie that is an amalgamation of all emotions fused together by a master craftsman who sadly is no more. And it is he, the Krzysztof Kieślowski that I dedicate this blog to, the man who maybe understood pain.

Part 2: Review of Movie Dekalog

With her eyes:

Note:
This qawali sung by Aziz ahmed kahan Warsi is a cornerstone and a must hear for any qawal enthusiast. After realizing my incompetence at translating the master poetry, I take my leave by handing over the untranslated lyrics and a guide to urdu dictionary.
Do listen to Warsi singing this, and you will realize why Qawali intoxicates and makes it follower sway with rythm, with just some tabla and some claps.

Yeh Kisne Nigahon se (Qawali)

Yeh kisne nigahon se sagar pilaye,
Khudi par meri bekhudee banke chaye. (1)

Khabardar aye dil, Mecca me adab hai,
Kahin baadahnoshi pe dhabba na aaye. (2)

Kai baar ubhre, kai baar doobe
Kai baar toofan ke chakkar me aaye (3)

Kisi ki mohabbat ne aisa duboya
Bahut koshishein ki ubharne na paye. (4)

Mohabbat woh kya jisme khuddariyan ho
Ibadat woh kya jisme pabandiyan ho (5)

Hakikat me zaheer wohi bandagi hai
jahan sar jhuke aastan jhuk jaaye (6)

kai baar sahil se takrai kashti
kai baar takrake sahil pe aaye (7)

Talasho talab me woh lazzat mili hai
Dua kar raha hun ke manzil na aaye. (8)

Meanings: Urdu to English
Please use : http://www.geocities.com/urdudict/ for translating Urdu to English). Some FAQ meanings have been noted below:

Verse 1.
Be-khudee: Being besides Oneself, Intoxication, Rapture, Senseless
Verse 2.
Adab: Courtsey
Baadah noshi: Jollification, Festivity, Celebration
Verse 3.
Ubharna: Emerge, Jut
Verse 4.
Ibaadat: Prayers, Devotion
Khuddaarii: Self-Respect
Paa band : Restricted
5.
Verse 6.
Zaheer: Ally, Associate, Assistant
Aastaan: Abode, Threshold
Bandagi: Devotion, Worship, Service
Verse 7.
Sahil: river
Kashti: Boat
Verse 8.
Talaash: Look For, Inquiry, Search, Quest, Zetetic
Talab: Demand, Desire, Inquiry, Need, Pursuit, Quest, Request, Search, Want, Wish, Yen
Lazzat: Taste, Deliciousness, Joy, Pleasurable Experience, Relish, Pleasure Enjoyment, Flavour
Duaa: Blessing, Prayer, Wish

Oh Sweet Stranger!

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The song Aami Chini go is a playful ode to a beautiful stranger, the mood of the song vacillating sometimes between a longing moan to sometimes a mischievous banter. The movie based on Rabindranath's story called “The Broken Nest” deals with an urban matured relationship sneakingly born out of loneliness and admiration.

Translator’s Note:
1. My Bengali is not as strong as I wish it to be and some of the words are translated after battering the brains of few of my Bengali friends.
2.I have changed the last lines of the song from the film to the original as composed by Rabindranath.
The last lines of the movie had the words:
"Aami chini go chini tomare
O bou thakuraani"
Which can be translated as:
“ I know you, know you lady
O my lovely sister in law.”

Film: Charulata
Director: Satyajit Ray
Music Director: Rabindranath Tagore (Satyajit Ray)
Singer: Kishore Kumar
Actors: Madhavi Mukherjee & Soumitra Chaterjee

Song:

Aami chini go chini tomare o go videshini
Tumi thaako shindhu paare o go videshini
O go videshini

Dekhechhi sharodo prateh tomay
Dekhechhi madhobi raate tomay
Dekhechhi hridi majhare
O go videshini

Aami aakashe paatia kaan
Sunechhi sunechhi tomari gaan
Aami tomarey sopechhi praan
O go videshini

Bhubono bhramia sheshe
Aami eshechhi nutono deshe
Aami atithi tomari daare
O go videshini

Aami chini go chini tomare
O go videshini

Translation:

I know you ma'am, lady from a land so very far
You live across the sea, o fair stranger from afar.

Have seen you on those dewy autumn mornings
Seen you in the honeyed moonlit evenings
Have seen you in the middle of my heart
O sweet stranger from afar.

I did turn my ears to the sky
And heard you sing, so sweet, so coy
Am offering my soul to you
O sweet stranger from afar.

After wandering around the lonesome earth
Have arrived haggard at a strange new hearth
I am but a guest at your feet
O sweet stranger from afar.

I know you, know you lady
O the sweet stranger.

To view the wondrous clip, Please click to view Aami Chini go from Charulata

Despair and the Refrigerator

(This blog has been published before as a winning review in the "dearcinema" site, link :http://dearcinema.com/requiem-for-a-dream-despair-and-the-refrigerator/)

Author's Note: I don’t write many reviews but sometimes when you shaken to the core, you need to write. This post is about the magnificent "Requiem for a dream".

It was inevitable, the refrigerator will always remind me of the terrors of drug abuse but then I am not complaining. Narcotics remain one of the most abusive scare that is galling human society today and it was an honorable effort from Aronofsky, with the Russian name and the Brooklyn background, to portray the desperation and simple ambitions gone wrong of the characters first created by the incomparable Herbert Selby of the ‘Last exit to Brooklyn’ fame. Selby is known to paint a bleak picture of desperation with the characters wanting the simple pleasures of life, sometimes to look thinner, sometimes to be appreciated. A little dream of a little house filled with pleasures and a picture of happiness around. Nothing that is unattainable right but then in Selby’s world the small dreams turn into a nightmare before even they ripen and a requiem is written before even they have their five minutes of happiness. But me, branding it depressing and demoralizing and absolutely disturbing, doesn’t stop me from absolutely idolizing it and this movie generally marches into my list of the top ten movies with its sad requiem played all over.

I cannot speak enough about the movie and the plot. The plot is simplistic with four main protagonists each having their small sweet desires sugarcoated with niggling ambitions but then as in life nothing turns up as expected. An old mother, Sara, played brilliantly by the amazing Ellen Burstyn, residing in downtown Brooklyn spends all the time in front of the television or sunning in front of the old dilapidated building with the other old ladies. Her only ambition is to be able to fit into the old red dress that she wore for her son’s graduation and appear in a television program that she obsesses over. The son, Harry played by Jared Letto, wants to open a boutique with his designer girlfriend Marion (the beautiful Jennifer Connelly). To get the money and partly satisfy his and his friends’ heroin addiction, he enters into a drug dealership with Tyrone (Marlon Wayans). Sara starts taking prescription drugs from a seedy doctor to get thinner and fit into the red dress. As summer transcends into fall, their condition starts becoming precarious and they descend further into gloom and despair. The movie spans across winter and our main protagonists have become hopeless in their desperate attempts to redeem themselves. Without spoiling your watch by going into further details, I will leave you guys here with the story and digress to the cast and the crew.

The actors are simply brilliant, no two thoughts about that. Ellen Burstyn, who has won the academy awards, acting in Scorsese’s ‘Alice doesn’t live here any more’ is brilliant as Sara the neurotic but loving mother who dreams of her son getting a good job and settling down with some beautiful girl. Jared Letto and Marlon Wayans are great with their restrain and controlled performances, sometimes high on drugs, some other times down with life. But I have to speak for Jennifer Connelly, she is brilliant as the sweet girl dreaming of a happy family but with her life culminating as a prostitute pimping her body and aspirations for dirty old men for a little heroin and some dollars.

Darren Aronofsky is brilliant, one of the greatest young directors working in Hollywood. His brilliance is stamped all over the film. The narration is crisp and keeps one engaged, the camera is voyeuristic and follows the protagonists around with short shots, the mood is somber and he keeps up the despair and by the end it becomes so strong that you can literally touch it with your heart. The editing is simply mind-blowing, I have never seen a better-edited movie and I fail to understand why it was overlooked for a nomination. The sequence towards the end, in which all the four protagonists’ life run interweaved with the devilish soul stirring music piece, is the best intense moment that I have ever seen and its etched in my mind for a long, long time I think. This brings me to the music and I cannot but adulate Clint Mansell for the immortal music that he has provided.

I can go on and on about the little scenes strewn all over that affected me, and anyone who has seen this movie. Remember the scene with Sara and the refrigerator where she hallucinates that the refrigerator is moving forward to eat her and then the walls of her house tumble down with the actors of the television including herself, who she imagines being on TV take over and jeer her for being fat. I was touched by that scene when she mumbles, “Am an old woman” and at the fact that she was jeering herself for being miserable. Then there was the terrifying scream of Marion inside the bathtub with bubbles floating around. I even found the opening sequence funny, Tyron and Harry dragging the television to the used store and selling it for some easy money. But the last twenty minutes take the cake, they disturb the mind to the core and the intensity of the visuals are enough to leave you in a state of suspended animation and wide disbelief for days to come.

One of my friends, who was a regular user of marijuana stopped smoking on seeing the movie and another called me at four AM in the morning complaining of sleepless nights. That’s what a good movie can do to you; make you think about it forever. For anyone who wasn’t watched the movie please do watch it, There can be nothing better than being shaken to the core, once, every time.

Rating: 10/10

Advices if watching on DVD:
· Watch it preferably in the night just before you sleep in a closed room and ALONE.
· Please Watch it one sitting and without telephone or anything else bothering you.

The Ballad from Nischindpur:

Have you ever looked at a painting and become suddenly happy, Have you ever felt the mad rushes of some tiny molecules gush away from various parts of the body that you had learnt to identify in your long forgotten biology classes and flood your heart with a kind of happiness and pleasure that can only be experienced and never dared described? Remember those lines from American Beauty, where Rickey describes the white carry-bag floating in air and ends his monologue by saying “ Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world I feel like I can't take it, like my heart's going to cave in.” That’s what I echoed on seeing the wonderful Pather Panchali by the master craftsman, Satyajit Ray. I had read BibhutiBhushan Bandopadhya’s book of the same name not too long before I had seen the movie and had been pleasantly amazed and touched by the innocence of the characters and deeply moved by the heart rendering rustic surroundings that was the keystone around which the story revolved. Having said this, Let me also say that all the beauty in that book hadn’t prepared me enough for the beauty that the movie hurled at me and I was left gaping at the screen with a happy goofy smile smacked across my face and with my hands holding my heart in sheer happiness. Seems ludicrous isn’t it, but then Pather Panchali is a movie which you just have to see to be a fan of.

Pather Panchali is a director’s movie, where the visuals of the countryside with the meandering roads and the lush fields, the calm waters of the village pond and the disturbing loud chug of the distant train creates an atmosphere which reassures the viewer of the greatness of the director with each of its frame. The movie, like the other Italian neo-realist movies of that time uses non-actors as the main protagonists and portrays the common placed miseries and the little aspirations and desires of people whom we may have come across but never turned and looked when they passed by. Satyajit Ray with his sensitivities which no doubt would have made Tagore proud, captures just that, villagers toiling hard to make the ends meet without loosing hope, stricken with poverty but remaining honest, hungry yet remaining proud. The visuals are enchanting and the music like the flowing river and blowing wind make you sway with them in a pace that’s leisurely racy.

The story is minimalist about a poor Brahmin family in a far off village lost somewhere in the desolate lands of the poverty stricken countryside of Bengal. The head of the family, a middle-aged man named Harihar Ray played by a theater actor named Kanu Banerjee is astounding as a poor man but always hopeful for good things to happen in life. He dreams of being a writer, writing play and dance dramas (palas, a concept which sadly is now obsolete). Karuna Banerjee, who was the director’s friend and had never acted before, plays Harihar’s wife Sarbojaya. She is the perfect housewife with little dreams for her husband, for her daughter and her little son. Like she says in the kitchen, “we will have food twice a day, Durga will get married, Apu will grow up and have a job, what else is required” and to this Harihar answers, “Hobe, Hobe” (It will happen with God’s grace). This scene, with the innocence of the characters and the plight of the people, totally moved me; the important thing being, these people were not portrayed as heroes but as pawns in the hands of fate battling poverty, fighting an war which may have been already lost but still not loosing hope and their head.
Apu (Subir Banerjee) and Durga (Uma Dasgupta) are their children and they are the ones who steal the show with their innocent acting portraying sometimes desire, sometimes an understanding that maybe is the result of their poverty. Durga as a character is amazing, she steals fruits from the near by orchard, which once had belonged to their family, and gives it to her grand aunt, an wizened old woman, who though is ninety and an widow loves the good things in life, a little more chilly, some more salt. She loves her kid brother Apu and acts as a sister, mother and friend and all rolled into one. Apu the central character of the story is a young boy of eight who is a wide-eyed sensitive kid and a favorite of his mother and sister alike. He waits near the door waiting for the sweet-vendor to pass by, and looks longingly at it when he does. This now brings me to Indrin Thakur, an old lady of around eighty years old, played by Chunibala who marvels with her performance. It is surprising to note that, she was found by Satyajit Ray near a brothel, where she was living as a destitute after having been a theater artist long time back. She with her ease and effortless acting is the best thing in the movie and brings her character to life. Her reciting “Hari, take me to the other world” and narrating the ghost stories to the children remain the high points and the sequences I will always carry with me.

Any review of this movie without mentioning the fabulous cinematography and the amazing art direction is seer blasphemy. The cinematography by the first timer Subrata Mitra is mind blowing, the camera had never been more inconspicuous yet so much in notice. The sequences where the kids follow the sweet-vendor followed by a dirty street mongrel, and their reflection visible on the water, is simply stupefying. The sequence in which Apu and Durga see the train for the first time is brilliant, tall grasses with the color of the sky merging with the tip of the grasses, and then the black smoke in the background with the loud chugs of the approaching trains. The art direction by Bansi Chandragupta is accurate, I have been to villages and have visited households with the similar economic background and haven’t yet found any fallacy in the household goods they portrayed. The obscenely huge trunks of feeble materials, the small brass containers, Chunibala’s torn blanket with funny squarish patterns and Sarbojaya’s sari with the thick black borders decorated with beetle leaf shaped embroidery, all of these lend a feeling of completeness and creates together a picture that is astoundingly profound and stimulating for the soul.

The music by Pandit Ravi Shankar, in simple words is just great. He deserves all accolades and with this only score is deserving of all the fame and venerations he is attributed with. The sequence towards the end when Sarbojaya gives a heart shattering news to Harihar, the dialogues are muted and music takes over rapidly adding to the pathos that the visuals and the story had already generated. The background music of Pather Panchali truly does what music is supposed to do, complement the story.

After my lengthy tributes I think it is redundant to say that I thought Pather Panchali to be one of the best movies ever made in the history of cinema. This movie along with Aparajito and Apur Sansar remains the best that Indian cinema has given the world. Calling Pather Panchali “A Movie” may be an insult to the brilliance of Satyajit Ray; this is a painting on celluloid, a song of the road, the ballad from the every place Nischindpur.