Bonjour, Bonsoir, and Seriously Starstruck on the Promenade

SwatKat and I headed for a half day to Pondicherry. It was purely official, much in contrast to my usual Pondy sojourns-she was receiving her carte de sejour (I don't even know if it's the correct one but I just had to use that phrase somewhere). At this moment she is in the process of fulfilling her most heartfelt dream: Paris.

So, we set forth enveloped in a sort of afternoon calmness. The AC temperature was just right. Someone else was driving. Her mum was chaperoning us. The drive was smooth, the snacks just adequate enough, and Pondy was before us even before we knew it.


Ahhh Pondy in August, Pondy in the evening, Pondy in the breeze and amidst clouds and amidst a sense of bliss both around and within. There was just something in the air. Something I had experienced only once before here, during my first (conscious) visit to the town-the relaxed vibe, the living history in the colonial facades, and the sea, oh the glorious sea. And since SwatKat was looking at these things properly for the first time, I saw them all anew as well.

Passepartout (heh!) in her hand, her gorgeously addictive DSLR in mine, we prepared ourselves to wander. After drooling over three cuddling puppies on the pavement, I was determined to show her the famed cafe, the one with the impeccable service (Refer previous post 'December '10-January '11 Part One: Funny').

A bunch of tourists popped out of a cab in front of us. The group included one tall friendly looking young man whom I exchanged a vague smile with. After walking ten steps, SwatKat squeals and informs me that that was Kunal Kapoor.

Now everyone who's seen Rang De Basanti has crushed on (guilty as charged) the handsome and talented actor who plays a sensitive, sweet artist. Some straight boys I know too. But there's more to Kunal Kapoor in my perspective. From what I've seen and read, he seems to me the Real Thing-humble and genuine. I also heard he flies planes. So, he's cool. But not just for that. My serious obsession has been with the song 'Chinnamma Chilkamma'. As you know, I'm half-Telugu and fully uninitiated with Andhra music save a few ancient songs my father makes me seek out and of course the power-packed, masaledaar 'Ringa Ringa' (NOT the Hindi version). But 'Chinnamma Chilkamma' introduced me to the coolness of (half my) roots. It has verve. It has attitude. It has SWAG. And thus embodies the very essence of my ideal item number in my head. The kind I want to dance to on my birthday in my drawing room to scores of imaginary screaming fans. And my Mum.

So naturally the performer in said song is one to be saluted, fake badness and all.

Anyway, back to Pondicherry. SwatKat and I are walking about near the rocky beach, on the pavement, she trying to convince me that that was Kunal Kapoor and I, without my glasses, insisting on sure proof. When one wanders without glasses, one routinely waves at the wrong people or ignores the right ones. (Bipasha Basu shares this syndrome-the non-glasses wearing. She believes in imagining people to be more beautiful than they actually are. So, I'm in good company). Hence, I was for a moment doubtful that we would have gone and said "Hi, Kunal" to Ishant Sharma or something. (Not that they really look alike, but you know what I mean).

After a lot of pacing and debating (and some intermittent photo taking. The boardwalk looked BREATHTAKING-all golden hued and glorious) we found our feet shifting towards where Kunal Kapoor was. He was finally standing alone and not surrounded by the gang of all hep, cool, totally intimidating people. Mumbling a few hellos, me going "We're fans", we got our picture taken (by his considerate friend). We had a conversation, er, okay, four deep meaningful lines, about the weather, Pondy, his reason for being there, his hair, etc. Whew.

The picture has turned out pretty sad. He's not smiling, my eyes are closed, SwatKat could look better. But it's not about that.

When your heart wants to do something and your mind goes "Umm...Ah...Well..You see...", just go do it. Stop thinking sometimes. You could lose a moment.

The service was great at the cafe. Amazing. SwatKat took a million brilliant pictures of me and I was in photo heaven too-her, the yellow walls, the sea, snap, snap, snap. The ride back was one of high-ness, heartfelt conversation, lots of music-fueled discussions and bittersweet feelings of saying goodbye to someone you've grown addicted to because they jump into your reclusive life and fill it with noise, nonsense, beauty and love, love, simple love.

The height of achievement would be to look over your shoulder at the end of each day and simply say, "I lived". You squeezed the honey or the lemon juice out of the big mixed up fruit that is life. You maximised it. Your hair wasn't perfect but you danced. You made a big red balloon of your heart and set it free to fly across the blue skies. Now. Now. Only now matters. No regrets of the past and only hopes from future.

So I'll tell Kunal Kapoor about my fondness for 'Chinnamma Chilkamma' next time. Heehee.

Yercaud

Yercaud, with friends, was to me all about loungy days spent cuddled up under quilts in my friend Princess's getaway home. Watching hours and hours of my (former) classmates's closet addiction-Korean soaps and movies. I am now a veteran of the over the top drama and high school romance of 'Boys over Flowers'. Yercaud was also all about food-proper scheduled nourishing homecooked meals that I (who are utterly accustomed to eating dinner out a minimum of three days a week or no dinner at all) found extreme hard work. Yes, unwinding was the theme of this holiday. The treks, the late night girlie conversations, the drives up and down silver lanes that seemed to vanish into misty oblivion, the endless photographs taken-all these fringed around the central activity of a lot of eat, sleep and not-so-well-deserved R 'n' R time.


An initial group of 8 of us began the getaway-from-it-all at our friend's colonial age home nestled within a sprawling estate. The sloping roofs of her house, the lived-in and personalised rooms of her and her family all added to the irreplicable hillstation charm that I've always romanticised about. The group later waned to four of us in Princess's gorgeous place-dreamily pretty with delicate curtains, cosy beds, pampering with food, and endless time and space. That's when it began raining. And we left the modern world behind. No TV, no phone battery, no electricity. Slowly my camera battery died out too. We preserved the laptop charge for intermittent midnight doses of Gu Jun Pyo's badboy attractiveness in 'Boys over Flowers'.


You know about my cravings for rain, right? Yercaud was a scene out of 'Raavan', the mist engulfing the quiet quaint hilltop town into poetry and mystery. I just HAD to take a solitary walk with an umbrella. How you perceive a place varies dramatically based on the presence of company or not. Maybe by myself I'd have some poetic, brilliant flashes of original thought. I wanted to figure out what my real perceptions were of this dreamlike setting at a time in my life free from errands or activities. My thoughts should be profound, not racked by longing for anything more because this was exactly what I'd been dreaming of for the longest time.

Or maybe that wasn't the point. Silence was easy and it just became me, like the Starsailor song.

Familiar Stranger

There is something to be said about learning to tolerate your own company. I'm one of those not sooo social people (oft called self-absorbed by PEOPLE WHO DON'T KNOW WHAT THE TERM MEANS. You know who you are, K). I guess you could say being an only child I'm not so influenced or dependent on other people for entertainment. Of course, as with everything else I've learnt in 22 years, life makes you contradict yourself. Repeatedly. Case in point: I tend to avoid clubs/pubs/excessive smoke-filled and claustrophobic spaces. My idea of socialising involves a long drive, conversation and excessive laughter. But 3 days after my birthday? I found myself totally sober, dancing like a maniac (I LOVE to dance) with my undergrad buddies in a packed disco. My eyes closed, an imaginary spotlight on my head and a sense of absolute abandonment. Innocent, spontaneous fun. Of course, Sean Kingston helped.

So, when I used to say I love being alone and self-sufficient, it was ironic because secretly I envied huge families especially those with many siblings ( I always always wanted a big brother and my dream came true in the form of this amaaaazzziiing human being whom I call Bunny. The fact that he now has a girlfriend, Sunshine whom I absolutely adore makes my own constructed family picture complete) I basically came to the conclusion that you shouldn't say you hate something or someone because you will end up doing exactly that with exactly them. Life is unpredictable and beautifully so.

Well, anyway, recently I was put to the test. I have become addicted to human company thanks to my delightfully demanding friends. I felt as if I would drown in my own thoughts if left alone for a second. But I was put in a situation where my friends all went home and I was supposed to wait for my Mum at a certain shop. Sleep-deprived and wandering mind, it was just me and my car in a parking lot.

The thoughts came, like arrows from different directions but I stayed put. My music was in my ears, soothing me into the semi-conscious delirium that I know so well. But my mind was still awake, valiant against the onslaught of self-doubt, unfulfilled yesterdays and uncertain tomorrows. The window was down, I was alone ( a girl!) in an unknown place. But I didn't care.

Khaled's voice soared like the only way Khaled's ('Hada Raykoum') voice can. I listened. I focused on the outlines of an olive green plant reaching toward the bland, colourless sky. I focused on that sky, so unyielding, impenetrable, that mute witness. I fell asleep, arms folded, seat kicked back, regardless of the world.

In between the contradictions, in betweent the extremities, I meet myself, an ever-changing familiar stranger. Someone I don't know very well and I don't think I'll ever know. Someone I can fall in love with intensely and immensely and someone I could completely abandon if I found someone else.

And after years of pushing and pulling, struggles beneath the skin, I have finally encountered someone I can tolerate. Someone I can live with.

Solitary stroller