The Black Label Man

Krishna Bar is quite an oddity but only for alcoholics like me who can still identify oddities. It’s a dimly lit restaurant in Vile Parle East, quite close to the station. It has backlit glass mosaics of under sea life and also murals of Emperors and fighters who seem to be a cross between the Greeks and the Mughals.

From the moment he walked into the bar, he stuck me as odd. His shirt was not right. It was just too white. He looked like a banker or a currency trader with some multinational firm. The only thing that cast a shadow a doubt was his stubble. Though the banker and currency trader types had started wearing khakhis off late, a stubble was just out of the question.

Actually I was myself a bit of an oddity for Krishna Bar, which catered strictly to lower middle class clerk types. Though I had seen better times, the past decade had not been a part of those better times.

Alright, precisely 11 years ago, I had won the Filmfare award for the best original screenplay but that was 11 years ago and a lot changes in 11 years. What had not changed was the fact that I could pass judgment on a person the instant I saw him. After all, I did go to Doon school, so that gave me a right to be condescending and look down upon just about everyone. The fact that I currently proof read back of pack copy on soap and shampoo labels at a not so happening advertising agency is quite besides the point.

I had just finished a quarter of whiskey. I had long stopped distinguishing between the good, the not so good and the downright putrid. What I drank was purely a question of how much money I had in my pocket. So Red Knight it was these days, though I drank it the same way that I drank single malt in the good old days.

The 'Banker / Currency trader' was sitting alone. Johnny, the bar tender approached him and asked him what he would like to drink. The words that he uttered were pure music to my ears, "Do you have Black Label?” he said.

No he did not say it in Hindi or Marathi. He uttered those words in English.

"You mean McDowell's Black Label?” clarified Johnny.

The man in the white shirt started had at Johnny's name tag and said, "No the one that is named after you."

"Yes sir, Johnnie Walker Black Label, large or a small?"

The man in the white shirt was quite exasperated. “Just get me a whole bottle will you".

I could not help but think what this guy was doing here, among guys who were drinking Gilbey's Green Label and Alcazar Vodka? Anyway, this presented me with the opportunity to drink Black Label. You see I did have a friendly face and was A1 when it came to conversation.

I took a large gulp from my drink, and stared at the White Shirt. Just them he happened to notice that I was looking at him. I picked up my glass and said, "Cheers". He smiled back and mouthed the same. I knew that this was my chance to help him finish his bottle of Scotch. I picked up my glass and walked up to him. "Satyajit Majumdar", I said extending my hand. He shook my hand and looked at me wondering what was it that I wanted.

I read his mind and couldn't help but laugh and sang out, "What was it you wanted...", a not so known Bob Dylan song, not that anyone in Krishna Bar could tell the difference between Bally Sagoo and Bob Dylan.

The White Shirt's response left me astounded. "Tell me again so I know", he completed the lyric that I had started.

"Well, you have me at a loss of words", said I.

"Ranjan, Ranjan Singh", he said and pointed to the vacant chair in front of him.

A moment of uncomfortable silence followed. I drained my glass empty and gently placed it on the table.

Without asking me he picked up the bottle of Black Label and poured me a rather stiff one.

"Thank you", I said

"I must say I find it quite surprising to see someone who can quote Bob Dylan here", he said.

"What's your excuse", said I.

"Just killing some time", he answered. He picked up his glass and it was then that I noticed the odd way in which he picked up his glass. His forefinger did not touch the glass at all.

"What are you saving the forefinger for? The wife or the mistress?” I said knowing that obnoxious statements could be potent ice breakers.

He laughed, "Neither actually, I am saving it for better things", he said.

"Didn't pick you up for one who swung that way", I continued the jibe.

"Aren't you getting a bit too cocky?” he replied coldly.

"Cocky! Pun intended there?” I laughed.

He looked straight at me. For a moment I could not tell what was going though his mind and then he burst out laughing. "You're a funny guy", he said and poured me another drink stiff drink though my glass was not yet empty.

"So what do you do? Ok let me guess, you're an investment banker who lost his job a few days ago. The market crash got you?” I said

"What did you say your name was? Mr. Knowitall?” he jeered.

"Come on, it's just something I do to amuse myself and incidentally that's what I do for a living. I am in the business of knowing people...in advertising you see", the moment I said it I knew that it must have sounded really pompous.

"Advertising! That must be cool. Let's just say, I do what I do to amuse myself", He said coldly.

"That's a good job to have and I must say you must be doing pretty well", I said

"Yeah I am not complaining", he said and picked up his glass again in the same peculiar manner the forefinger pointing at me as though he was going to shoot me with his make believe pistol.

"Why do you pick up your glass that way? Trust me you'll get a much better grip if you just use that forefinger too", I said.

"I have a pretty good grasp, even without my forefinger and how I hold my glass should not make any difference to you", he seemed a bit irritated.

I was quite tipsy by now. He poured me another drink.

"OK why don't you guess what it is that I do? Let me give you a clue, my forefinger plays a huge role in what I do", he said.

"You are a cricket umpire. You raise that finger and out goes an aspiring young batsman or a has been or a wannabe at Shivaji Park or Cross Maidan", I was most pleased with being so articulate.

"Impressive but not correct", he said and smiled and poured me another drink.

"You're, you're, you're a gig gigolo and impotent gigolo sho all you have left as tool of the trade are your fingers", I laughed.

He laughed loudly.

"Professhional...kite flyer?", I slurred.

I was now seeing double and the bottle in front of us was almost empty. I knew I had to be heading home now. So I drained my glass and without asking him emptied the rest of the bottle and finished the drink that I had poured myself in one quick gulp. I tired to get up but felt dizzy so I thought I''d just sit for a while.

"Spuriush stuff....made in Ulhashnagaar I think", I said.

"It tasted alright to me, maybe you should not drink so fast", I vaguely heard him say.

From the corner of my eye, I could see one dada / state corporator type walk in and being given the full treatment by the waiters. Even the owner of Krishna Bar had come up and was personally attending to him. My head was spinning. The white shirt in front of me was looking even whiter than before.

The marble top of the table felt cold against my cheek. And I was suddenly woken up by a loud noise. My head throbbed as I looked up and saw blood oozing out of the dada / state corporator's head. The chair in front of me was empty. I thought I saw the guy in the white shirt look at me and point his forefinger at me just as he walked out of the glass door which had a dolphin painted on it.

Ranjit - painter and sweet boy

Buddha Bar (Copyright CK)

A nation celebrates

The GGC cup is a football tournament that is played amongst the Gulf countries i.e. Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait.

UAE won the GCC cup yesterday.

To set the context right, UAE has a population of nearly 7 million of which 70% i.e. 5 million are expatriates namely Indians, Pakistanis Philipinos,other Arabs. This leaves only 2 million Local Arabs of which nearly 60% are below 25 years of age.

UAE as a nation does not have too many occassions (leave aside religious festivals, which anyway are not specific to the nation per se) when they can come together as a nation and celebrate. The biggest 'festival' is in fact the Dubai Shopping Festival.

So can you imagine what would happen when a nation dominated by youth (most of whom incidentally have cars and more money than you and I can imagine) decides to celebrate - absolute chaos on the streets but a sight to see all the same.

Out they came in their Pathfinders, Patrols, Land Cruisers, Camry's etc....blasting their horns in a cacophanous frenzy and all I could do was smile and say, "Mabrook".

Ninna knows Magic

Ninna and the Monster

Ninna dances

ninna snores

A short Exposition on Non Verbal Communication in 4 slides

Autorickshaw rides in Mumbai

The din of noises
The drone of the city
Zero in on you
And pin you down
A constant reminder
Of where you are
What you are doing
And what you are doing it for

Today

Loss

I was on my way to a meeting. The taxi driver got a call. he proceed to talk in a slow tome for sometime. He finished and silence prevailed. I looked up to see that he was looking at me. "Maine kisi ko bhi is baar Eid pe phone nahin kiya. Mere Walid guzar gaye ek mahine pahle to ham gam mein kisi se baat nahin karna chahte".

"I am sorry, dukh hua jaan kar", I said but the gravity of what he had said did not strike me. He proceeded to tell me about his father.

"Bahut accha aadmi tha woh, haamre Peshawar mein Baap bacchon se zyada pyar nahin dikhata par hamara walid aisa nahin tha. Jab ham chota sa tha tab hi woh yahan UAE aa gaya par jab bhi chutti pe aata tha so hamare saath bahut khelta tha. Jab ham bada hua to unko bola ki ab tum wapas aa jao hum UAE ja ke kam karega. Hamara pagar hai 1400 dihram aur ham 400 mein apna guzara chalata tha aur baki sab ghar bhejta tha. Abhi hamko kuch accha nahin lagta"

I didn't know what to say. It was time for me to get off. I weakly said, "Main apka dukh samajh sakta hun, thoda time beetne do, sab thik ho jayega".

Thank you was all he said.

Signature Pathan

"Aur bhai bolo, kya naya hai", asked the Pathan driver.

His looks were uncharateristic of most Pathans as he was clean shaven. He had cunning grey eyes and I mistook him for an Arab who could speak Hindi.

"Bas saal badal gaya hai, aur to sab same hai", I said, a bit unnerved by his gaze. Something told me to be wary of him.

"Kya bolta hai tum yaar, saal badal gaya, aadmi badal gaya, zamana badal gaya, mausam badal gaya aur tum bolta hai kuch nahin badala". he said eloquently.

"Tum kahan ka rahne wala hai", the confusion about whether he was Arab or Pathan was still not resolved in my mind.

"Hum hai Jungli Pathan", he laughed

"Jungli Pathan??', I was surprised.

"Haan hum Jungli ilake se aya hai, sab humse darta hai", he clarified.

"Accha ye to batao, ki Pathan itna acchi gadi kaise chalate hain", I tried to change the topic of conversation.

"Kyon mazak karta hai, Pathan kuch aur kar hi nahin sakta, agar padhne to milta to gadi to nahin chalata", he seemed a bit sad. "Kitna accha hota ki agar humko bhi padhna ata aur hum office mein baidhta aur koyi sundar se secretary aati kagaz le kar aur hum us par din bhar sign karta...kagaz pe, secretary pe nahin", he smiled.

I got out of the cab and chuckled for a good 15 minutes, much to the amuzement of passers by.

Adam, Andrew, Anshuman & Parul

Adam Gilchrist scored the second fastet hundred test today. As a hapless Andrew Filntoff watched him flay Harmison, Monty and Hoggard all over the WACA. And Anshuman could enjoy the match because Parul likes Flintoff.
Later on in the day when India played South Africa, Anshuman could watch the match again as Parul had not realised that it was a different match all together.

Some people who I didn’t think of for a very long time but I’ll never forget

Ashith Sinha – For lending me ‘The Nashville Skyline’
Lavneet Gyani – For saying, “You like Bob Dylan!”
Deepa Parekh - For asking me to explain how the aperture of a camera works.
Ajay Katiyar - For telling me, “You are a damn good batsman, you have all the shots in the book as I walked in to bat and just smiling when I got out LBW first ball”.
The stranger – who asked me of I was you from Sri Lanka and then walked away without saying a word when I said no.
And the many more whom I cannot think of right now.

With thanks to Shankar Raman

It’s impossible to be indifferent to Jazz.
Can you be indifferent to a roller coaster?
Or to the rain
Interrupted by thunder
To continue its rhythm once again
Can you here yourself say,
That was nice
And by now you’re thinking again of the
Cacophony of life
And now I have your attention again
And just in case you did not realize
That was quite seamless.

Sweet Home Alabama

Why would a man from Nagpur,
A boy from Delhi
Or a girl from Bangalore
For that matter,
Like Sweet Home Alabama.
Is it the words ‘sweet home’
Or maybe the term ‘skies so blue’
Do they know who Muscles Shultz was?
Perhaps it’s just the melody
Combined with the knowledge of a tragedy
Of a few young men who died young

Outline for a classic

A hero who doesn't quite know that he is a hero (Neo, Frodo, Arjuna, Luke Skywalker).
A mentor who shows him the way (Morpheus, Gandalf, Krishna, Obi Wan Kenobi, Yoda).
The hero still doesn't beleive.
The world his threatened by Dark Forces (Mr.Smith,Sauron,Duryodhan)
The mentor shows the hero the way ("Find purpose the means will follow", "Now do you believe?').
The hero tries though still doesn't believe (Bhainchod bas kar daal - "Don't think of the result, just do it").
Throw in a support cast - a woman who loves the hero whom the hero loves too, A woman who loves the hero but the hero doesn't love her, An ally who is jealous of the hero and conspires against him but later realises his folly, 2-3 best friend types, A special best friend who sticks with the hero right till the end whom the hero doubts a little on occassion, 2-3 just plain evil types.
The hero meets the dark lord and the two fight, the dark lord tries to win over the hero to his side, the hero is conflicted, the hero remembers something that his now dead mentor has told him. The hero gets his shit together and kills the dark lord.

The End

Head cold

The best way to get rid of a head cold is to step out of it.

Literati

7 letter words
Down or across
A mind conditioned
Not to cross that lucky number

A limitation, in fact
Isn't it?
The misery of winning
After you find that
The game didn't count

The Broad vs The Specific

It's strange that when you are looking for something specific, you generally tend to miss out on the broader picture. Happens to me all the time. Specially when I walk around with my mind full of muddled up thoughts (deliberating on them or just plain simple thinking of them without any deliberation), when suddenly I overwhelmed by a sunset, a full moon or just the pleasant breeze.
Wonder if there is a way to observe and absorb it all.