therunawayjuiceincident

It was a rock honeycomb.
A honeycomb rock.
Depending on which side you looked at it.

Tiny little creatures hiding in the crevices.
Pointy caps, snub noses, blood stained teeth. Pretty girls in tutus. Boys in knickerbockers.
Red corneas and skeletal wings. Thieves and fiends.
Do gooders and haters. Shining brilliant, flamboyant haters.

They stood there, still, not a single twitch. Not one breath. Mid motion cryogen.

Or….. not?

If you looked closer, if you looked harder, if you took all your attention, compacted it, squeezed it tight and took it to your eyes, your laser beam eyes, and
aimed at one face, one miniature body. In one elfin corner of the rock
Because in all that concentration everything happened. The part where time stood still, while moving incredibly fast. In the time it took a hummingbird to flap its wings.
Happening in a flurry of actions. They would do all they needed to in the blink of an eye and go back to the same position they were caught at.
You would have to slow your heartbeat down. Breathe deep, then breathe deeper, then hold…
till…
till…
till your lungs no longer heard your heart scream.
Till you were as still and as quick as them.
Till you could catch them at their tricks.
That’s when you’d know
That’s when they’d know.
And in that split second knowing they would change their game.
And start a new one.
And you’d have to wait…
and wait…
and wait…
another lifetime
another time..
To catch ‘em.

Open the Lonely Planet. Stare at the map. Fancy a location. Flip the pages. Read about it. Like it. Buy a bus ticket.

I travelled like that once.
Ok, twice.

Three times.

The first time I didn’t have a Lonely Planet, so it was more a map in my head, and a place I thought I wanted to love.
The second time the book was the reason I reached Granada & Seville.
The third time, the book was just a metaphor.

Of all my travels, these three trips were my favourite. Adventures can’t happen when you plan them. Sure, there will be fun and excitement in surgically planned escapes, but to me it all seems a bit pointless if there is no adventure.

I’ve slept in a church, a loft, a garden, a terrace.
Lost my wallet. Again and again.
Missed my train.
Got delayed because of a forest fire.
Never made it to San Sebastian.
Never made it to Figueres.
Met a crack addict hand puppet called Pedro.
Reached Kanyakumari by accident.
Lost my backpack.
Found my backpack.
Got a heatstroke.
Fell in love with Auroville.
Got shooting stars inked on my ankle.
Made a best friend.
Carried my toothbrush in my pocket.
Danced for 19 hours.
Walked for 8.
Pitched a tent for 7 days and slept outside it.
Met lone dancers outside ATM machines, and nasal pen swallowers (Don’t ask)
Hitched a ride with bikers who took me to the top of the world. Almost.

All because I didn’t have a plan.
It’s been…. fun.

Things go wrong. But that’s just part of the ride. Like eating radioactive glowing jalebis from a village fair, getting food poisoning and being sick for the rest of the trip. Or reaching some place and not falling in love with it, or being terribly tired and not being able to find a place to stay because I didn’t pre-book.
In spite of all this, the thrill outweighs the sickness, the non-accommodation, the sheer boredom of knowing my next step.

I read Moby Dick when I was 13 and I knew that it was going to be a favourite forever. It reeked of wanderlust. From it’s first line to it’s last.
Herman Melville, the author of the book said “I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts”. And he did. He sailed forbidden seas, abandoned his ship, lived on an island amongst natives, fell in love, sailed some more and lead an incredibly intrepid life.

Not everyone can have that. We live in much easier times. Hitching a ride on a ship is out of the question, and barbaric coasts just don’t exist anymore. It would be very difficult to get lost. The world has gotten smaller and every known map resides within our phones.
But the trick lies in seeing a sunset worth chasing, getting off the highway, watching the sky explode with orange, finding an Argentinian restaurant down a slope and staying the night at a place you haven’t bothered finding the name of. Because…. you can.
Because it ends up making for a great story. And an even better memory.

To quote my favourite book -
“I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I’ll go to it laughing.”

Time to hitch rides on big boats and live with cannibals!

“I used to make puppy faces when I was much younger.”
“Oh yeah? And when was that?”
“When I was 4.”

That’s the thing about 5 year olds. Just because they’re the size of leprechauns, doesn’t mean they don’t have any wisdom.

Neel retired from making puppy faces because that’s just……. immature.

He now likes to take photographs of bugs. Also videos of family members and people he’s just met.

I’ve spent most of my adult life bullying little children because it’s just so easy. Also because they deserve a little scare every now and then, what with new age parents letting them roam free, mannerless, like talking, rabid badgers.

I met Neel for the first time today. I heard him from afar, in his high pitched voice asking for the camera. When he got closer, he walked up and said “Hi!”, so I struck up a conversation. Asked him if he came to his fathers permaculture farm often, he said yes he did, because he liked his time here. Then he started to tell me about some bug. There were other people around, but somehow I knew that I was going to spend a lot of my time discussing insects.

Everything fascinated him. He wanted to go see his turtle, Oogway, then he couldn’t find his snail, Scratch, then he plucked and ate some leaves which he loved because they were ‘the perfect kind of sour’. He also narrated a story about a dog getting hit by a van, in great detail, but with very little sadness. He was a man in control of his emotions.

It was a perfect day. It had just finished raining, the sun was out, we all walked around the farm, Neel was being trailed by Optimus, his dog, speaking incessantly, sometimes to us, sometimes to Optimus, asking him to “Move that ass, come on shake it.” with a sharp “NEEL! watch it!!” from his father. After a while we got some chai, sat in the sun, discussed the world ending, the interglacial period, which in turn bored Neel, so he took off. I found him a little later, during lunch, when he decided to take videos of everyone in the room, while giving a constant commentary. He also told me that he was a genius. I had to take his word for it.

Then ……… . . someone gave him chocolate.

I could solve the worlds energy crisis if I could just put down what happens to hyperactive kids on sugar, in a formula.
There was lots of loud singing,
A leaping swan-like dance
An interview on a camera which was handed to me
Warp speed running
Watching bits of an animated movie while talking over it
Asking my name again and again
Asking me if it meant I had lice
My opinion on torn stickers
More running
More filming of books, shelves, and lots of himself with “This is Neel, and I’m standing next to…”.

All at the same time.

Eventually, like all drugs, the sugar wore off.
It was also time for me to leave. I didn’t really want to. I wanted to stay back and dunk him in a cask of honey, sit back and get entertained. Or just put a string on his head and hang him in my car.
But I chose to stay civil and say goodbye.
We high-fived, low-fived, then I bent down to give him a hug and realised just how tiny he was.
I don’t know when I’m going to see Neel again. I don’t know if I’m going to see Neel again. But I’m pretty sure he’s running around with my heart in tow.

Goa in July is magical. It’s painfully green & new, and when you’re smack in the middle of it, everything feels right with the world. What amps it up is a chance encounter with a curious, bug eyed boy, in search of ….. everything. And afraid of nothing.

Here’s to slugs and snails and puppy dog tails!

Every time I go to Matunga hunting for food, I have an adventure.
And by every time I mean twice.
The first time I was with 3 women who refused to ask for directions but cackled a lot. We didn’t even need a car. We could have just made our way on some broomsticks. Anyway, that is not a story I want to tell right now.
This story is Matunga version 2.0
Subtle, south Indian, laced with gunpowder.

Cafe Madras opened in 1940.
I moved to Bombay in 1998 and it took me 14 years to make my way to the place which serves the best Udipi food in the city.
Now, Bandra to Matunga isn’t the most scenic of routes. Infact it is the polar opposite of anything even remotely scenic. I kept imagining giant metal scorpions taking over the road and killing us all.
Maybe it was the heat.
Anyway, once in Matunga, Bombay’s old world beauty takes complete control of all senses. Big houses surrounded by even bigger trees, smooth roads, ayurvedic medical supply centres, sunlight trickling in through dense greenery, camouflaging the 34 degrees, a random cow, some breeze, people hanging out in their balconies. It’s a picture postcard aching to happen.

It was Yudhishtar’s idea that we come here for lunch. We walked up to Cafe Madras and were asked to wait our turn for a table and just as we were being seated Yudhishtar had to make a call, so I figured I’d go ahead anyway.
Cafe Madras is always packed, so everyone has to share tables. I was taken to a table and seated in front of a gentleman who was slaying the waiter verbally. He must have been about 80. Wearing a blue t-shirt, a green hat and a scowl. I didn’t look at him directly but I was listening to every word he was saying. The waiter hadn’t got him a spoon in time and now, from the sound of it, he had to die for his mistake. I sat there, diving my head into the menu, avoiding eye contact and judging furiously. Yudhishtar finished his phone call and joined me. He looked at blue t-shirt, then at me, gave me a big smile and sat down. I guess he knew.
We didn’t take too much time deciding what we wanted to eat. Two of everything usually works. The food came and it was nothing short of spectacular. Making good sambar is an art. Making good sambar in Bombay is a miracle. And the sambar I ate that day? Miraculous.
We were midway through our meal when our table sharing companion asked for coffee. At this point he also looked up straight at us and Yudhishtar decided to be polite and make some conversation.
“Do you come here often?”
“Yes. I do.” he said with a smile, which threw me off.
“Oh ok. So you must really like the food.”
“I like their coffee. They make great filter coffee”
“Oh yeah? How long have you been coming here for?”
“Since my college days. Sometimes I come here twice a day.”
I couldn’t just sit there and stare, so I added my bit
“This is my first time here.”
He turned to look at me and said that I should probably meet him when I come to Cafe Madras for the 100th time. I said I would look for him when I did.
That was it. The ice was broken. We spoke. A lot. Usual stuff. Bombay, food, weather. He finished his coffee and said he had to head home. We said goodbye and he left. Yudhishtar and I went on to have a discussion about whether drinking lassi right before coffee would make us spontaneously explode. We hadn’t really come to a conclusion when I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was Mr. Rege. “Julie…”
I said “Yes?” He said “Tell me, when you come back for the 100th time, will this fellow be tagging along?” and there was a quick wink. I burst into a smile and then put on a serious face and told him that I would make sure that I got rid of Yudhishtar when I returned, to which Yudhishtar nodded furiously. And then Mr.Rege was gone. I don’t think I stopped smiling for a while. I had done a super job of judging a book by it’s cover when Mr. Rege was channeling Mr. Hyde a while back. And why not?! I had no idea that he’d been coming to this place since before most of the staff had been born, that Cafe Madras was as much a part of his everyday life as it was of the owners, that he did have a right to lose his cool if he so pleased…. and also because he wore a green hat.

Mr. Rege lit up my afternoon. That’s the beauty of accidental meetings. They sneak up on you when you least expect them, like most good things in life, and they leave you with high resolution memories. I don’t know how long it’s going to take me to go to Cafe Madras a hundred times, but I do know that I’m going there for lunch tomorrow. And I’m going to keep my fingers crossed.

I once had to make a cross section of an ant hill for a science project in class 4.
So I didnt make it. Instead I had my mom spend all her time in 24 hours working with mud, cardboard and wire to make something so realistic that it’s stayed with me all these years.

I moved to Bombay 14 years ago.
I hated it.
It rained all the time, there were people everywhere, there were no roads, it was filthy.

I was used to just the opposite.
I had had a cocooned life in air force stations, mostly in the middle of nowhere with a school bus fetching me from my doorstep to the school and back.

Bombay had trains.
Hollowed out metal tubes, full of people, hurtling down post apocalyptic railroads with a soundtrack from hell
I could see my life flash before my eyes. Everyday.

I don’t know when it was that I started to fall in love with this city. I’ve been denying it that love for a very long time. I didn’t want to like it because I had conditioned myself to the thought that it sucked.

Last night I finished work at 5 am in madh island.
I had an hour long drive back home. After pulling an all nighter there is very little that can make me happy.
I got into my car and as I drove out of the studio I saw the moon. I could almost touch it. And pluck it. And spread it on a slice of bread. And eat it. It looked…. delectable.
It looked like all it needed was a little string to be a perfect perennial cheese balloon.
There was also the fog…. and the empty roads… and the threat of a sunrise.
The drive back home was spectacular.
That’s when it really hit me how much I like this city.

There is so much you can do in Bombay that you can’t do elsewhere. Yes, other cities are fantastic too, but right now, this is my fantastic. So I’m going to deny other cities their gloating, at least until I finish writing this.

Nowhere else can I go to Asian chemist at any unearthly hour and discuss with the chemist which granola bar is best for 3 am, have people give me detailed directions to Lamington road smack in the middle of motherless traffic, wear tiny shorts and other ridiculous clothes in dava bazaar and have no one pass a single lewd comment while Psingh and I go looking for a human heart replica (don’t ask), go to Leopolds, be able to walk next to the sea (swamp during low tide), live next to all my friends, hate Andheri with all my might, watch a three car pile up and have no one beat each other up, have a bilingual conversation with a policeman because he won’t speak Hindi and I don’t know any Marathi, have worli seaface make me appreciate the rain.

If you could hover above this city, be out of earshot and watch everything, it’d be like looking at a cross section of an ant hill.

Comfort in chaos.

And no matter how far I shoot myself out into the world I know I’ll ricochet back to Bom.
14 years in this city. The best kinda life sentence I could ask for.

You only live forever and millions of times.

One of my favourite people said that to me not too long ago.
And it took my breath away.

I keep thinking I’ll go back to Bhuj.
It’s the first place I have memory of.
The dry heat, the dust, no sign of winter, the beach, jellyfish…

I haven’t made it back yet.

I have a feeling that when I do go back I’ll see what I saw then. Regardless of change, or people not being there.
Nostalgia is a powerful weapon.

We leave a trail behind us
You can’t really see it…. but it’s there.
Hiding in un-named dimensions.

Tattoos of memories. Etched gently on your mind.

And the best bit is that you don’t even know when you’re making it happen.
It’s usually not spectacular.
But it sticks. Like a Bon Iver song.

A regular day. Maybe too hot/cold. Not perfect.
Someone says something. You hear a tune on the radio. Have a conversation. Walk out of a meeting. Go make coffee.
Some part of you becomes so aware of the moment that it gets stored away. Only to be found later. Again. And again…… and again.

And so, you leave a trail, through which you live forever…. and millions of times.

“Do you want a granola bar?”
“No.”
“It’s really good.”
“No.”
“It’s protein.”
“No.”
“Do you want an ice-breaker?”
“No. Why are you trying to palm shit off to me?”
“I don’t know man. It’s a two hour wait. Might as well have a picnic.”

Airport conversations with Manish.
I hate granola bars.
It’s sweetened sawdust.

“Do you want to come outside?”
“No. Because you can’t go outside…. We’ve cleared security. They won’t let us out.”
“They will.”
“No. They won’t.”
“Yes.They will.”
“100 bucks says you can’t go out.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.”

I lost a 100 bucks today. Manish is inhaling pollution.

Over the last 3 days I’ve spent a collective 11 hours waiting at airports. And I’m not even done yet.
All the flights are delayed. It’s like they’re infected. One diseased aircraft bit another and now they all need rabies shots.

But the good thing, the minimalist silver lining to waiting at airports is that you have a lot of time for introspection. I mean, even if there is company, the conversation usually trickles down to icebreakers and someone or the other goes for a walk…. to introspect. It’s a default setting.
I kinda like it.
So alone, with so many people around in a very contained environment, hunting for green tea. Like tree hugging, health conscious zombies.

I probably like it more than others because I can hear aircrafts take off and land. I spent my entire childhood listening to afterburners come on. It’s home. Even though there is nothing supersonic about domestic airports.

Two missed weddings, 6 brilliant hours with my parents, Red Hot Chilli Peppers’ – I’m With You, one ticket refund, face time with Manish, a stellar, rubbish conversation with Memz, lots of terrible herbal tea, and of course dealing with existential issues whenever my ADD decided not to kick in. What’s not to like?!

Clearly I look at the glass as half full.
For the other half, I’m hoping someone comes up with teleportation soon. And gags all the people making announcements at airports.

I had to move apartments. Again.

And this time it wasn’t because I had been kicked out by a landlord who looked like he belonged on Tatooine. Or because my apartment was actually an enclosed swimming pool during the monsoon, but just because ‘I felt like it.’ I should have just run really fast into a wall, headfirst, when I felt the ‘I feel like it’ feeling come on. But I didn’t.
I’m undamaged and hiding in a room full of dust, while an army of Akil’s men attempt to fix my apartment.

It was awesome yesterday. Because I was still in Goa, and my mother, who is actually McGyver, had moved all my stuff from apartment A to apartment B. And by the time I swung by, everything had been taken care of and I was handed a pink milkshake by Dhruv. How could this be painful?
Well, for starters, my mom took a flight out of Bombay today and realisation hit me like a truck with no headlights.

Boxes.
So. Many. Boxes.
Somuchjunk.

I could just set it on fire and no one would ever know.
I’m not fond of soot, so I decided to brave this one through. But not before making about a dozen calls to different brokers to try and find out property rates in Bandra, so that after this, I never have to move again. Ever.
Ever.

Anyway, after having several delusions of grandeur about doing ‘this to the living room’ and ‘putting that painting over there’, I’m just going to be glad once they’ve managed to fix the a/c and change some bulbs. That’s all I want of them. And of my life. Some fresh air and some light. You don’t really need much more.

I was just taken to the living room and told “Madam, I think your tv is broken”.
My tv is broken.
It’s not coming on.
Who the hell needs a television anyway.
Especially when the person telling you this is about six and a half feet tall with a mullet.
I wanted to hold his collar and tell him “My tv can’t be broken, because if it is, I’ll have to do the same to your face. P.s – the Beastie Boys called, they want their hair back….. bitch!”.
Instead I smiled and asked him if he wanted some water and he said he’ll get a mechanic the next day. Because my tv is also a car.
Mechanic.
Death.

So yeah, live on the street. Don’t ever move apartments. And if you do, make sure the packers and movers are smaller than you so that you can punch them.