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2020: Virus Woes and Much More

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  WHAT makes a good year? Happiness? Fulfilment? Success? There could be much more than that. May be, its pessimism that has made a good year this time around. Pessimism isn’t bad after all, or I would want to believe so, for once. A year wrapped in pandemic woes of a global scale is what we have had in 2020. Life in 2020 has been nothing more than a 20-over cricket match whose outcome may not be known even when the succeeding year gets into its midway path. And yet, hope reigns supreme, pinned on a vaccine that might even be left bamboozled by the sheer failure of it. No one knows if the vaccine would work. A couple or more of first triers have been taken ill, paving the way for pessimism to creep in. Will the vaccine work or not, may well be left to be dealt within the scientific domain, but for lesser earthlings like you and I, Year 2020 has been a year of possibilities. Think about it, and you would realise that we had scores of opportunities that slithered into our laps and mind
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The Man I Never Would Want to Bid Goodbye

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I suppose, in the end, the whole of life becomes an act of letting go, but what always hurts the most is not taking a moment to say goodbye.  (Life of Pi) Year 2003. When Vishal Bharadwaj made Maqbool, I never even had the slightest knowledge on who this bearded young man sharing screen space with Pankaj Kapur, Naseeruddin Shah and Om Puri, was. Though I was watching the film then for Shah, Kapoor, and Puri, it was this man who sneaked into my heart and made it his home. He never ever left. This man, I knew as the credits rolled, was named Irrfan Khan.   Maqbool was indeed a revelation. Three ace actors, a talented actress (Tabu), and then this young man who would rule supreme in the years that followed, made Maqbool the best among all Bharadwaj ventures - for me, that is. Maqbool wasn’t his first work onscreen, I realised later. The role made me crave for more from him, I began looking for more on him, and he soon started displaying himself as someone I had not
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And Then, The Cashew Tree Shed a Dozen Leaves

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The courtyard that once regaled in our antics has fallen mute. Thorny bush and fallen twigs now hold the space to ransom. No laughter, no rejoicing, as the house in the middle draws a deep breath as I walk towards it. The disappointment, I gather, is due to the fact that it is just I, not We, that walk towards the house that have seen four footsteps run in and out in unison, for long. I stop. The terrace above beholds, beckons. The terrace I would never want to climb on to! The elevated platform, just a flight of steps above the ground where we once planted tapioca stumps and bowled against with tennis balls. The cursed space where he lay lifeless! A call away lay, as if breathing her last, the pond that let us swim into her womb. The post-harvest paddy fields where we shed all teen inhibitions to sprint, jump, dive, climb, swim and fight, shed tears as I look yonder. For, they all had expected Us - both of Us together   - to have come calling. But then, it is jus
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The Making of an Actor

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ACTORS are not born. They evolve. They experiment with their choice of scripts. They delve deep into the conscience of the character they are chosen to play. They are mavericks when it comes to the learning process. They play around with the character in a bid to lure the character’s soul to themselves. They perfect the art. They behave. They evolve. This is what Suraj Venjaramoodu too has done with the Joselet Joseph-Jean Markose script while getting into the skin of Plachottil Kuttan Pillai. And, right from the word go, we don’t see any trace of Suraj Venjaramoodu.  Kuttanpillayude Sivarathri, Jean Markose’s second outing as director, is technically a flick that runs less than two hours on screen. Watching Kuttan Pillai for these couple of hours is like diving into unfamiliar waters. The recent slew of characters Suraj has played on screen vouch for the potential he holds. With characters in films like Perariyathavar (for which he won a National award), Varnyathil Aashanka
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A Father’s Mind

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CLOSE to two decades ago, a postal envelope came looking for me at my Mumbai home. The envelope was handed over to me by the postman, and curiosity made me open it in a jiffy. Out came the manuscript of a poem in Malayalam, a few lines penned in blue fountain ink.  Amused, I looked for the address again, wondering if the postman delivered it at the wrong door. The address was indeed mine, and I tried to find out the name of poet who had sent it to me who had no inkling whatsoever as to what verse looked like! Worse, I couldn’t recognise the name that preferred to stay hidden in the form of a signature beneath the poem. After much investigation, I managed to decipher the name, and yes it was the retired gentleman, an acquaintance who my father had great regards for. I had learnt from my parents that he had this habit of writing poetry, and that he nursed a passion for words. The piece of paper with a smattering of chaste Malayalam finely crafted in blue fountain pen ink tran
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The Day Saffron Ceased Being a Hue

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WHILE in school, we had a teacher who was assigned the task of teaching us Hindi, the national language. Even before he had been appointed in our school, this teacher was so popular with the students who hailed from his hometown. The hype was so huge that we, I included, looked forward to being taught by this gentleman. He came, we saw and listened to him, and soon he was successful in conquering the hearts of many of us kids. However, that was not to be in my case. Though this teacher was to teach us the national language, he went a huge leap further and started narrating tales from history whenever he had a chance. History had been one of my favourite subjects, simply because my dad was also a history teacher. History, contrary to general belief, was not a boring topic to explore. That’s what I had learnt during conversations on the subject with my dad.  History was more about facts to me, than fiction. All recorded by famed historians from across the world, in fact.
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Forget the Bear Hug and the Eulogies, Here’s What Makes Me Adore a PM on Tour

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MORE than two-decades-plus-a-little-over-6-years ago, as I sat down in the entrance examination hall that would pick 21 candidates who would, for the ensuing two years, learn the ins and outs of journalism, I had no idea as to whether I would get myself enrolled for the same. For, journalism was nothing more than The Hindu, Sportstar, Frontline and the Illustrated Weekly of India to me till then. These four publications were more than the world to me, who hailed from one of the remotest, godforsaken corners of Tamil Nadu. Having born in the cusp of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, known otherwise as Kanya Kumari district, I inherited a mother tongue that was alien to the Tamil brethren who went to school with me. Malayalam was the spoken tongue at home, while the nuns-run convent school I went to, made sure I spoke, dreamt, and imagined things, only in English. The convent school, manned by the women in Christianity’s divine robes, taught me how important English was, and will be,
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