Twilight in September

Subramaniam is Vegetarian by choice and by upbringing (in equal measure). Unlike the ‘egg plant’ that he is detests due to its sheer lack of solidity and nausea inducing properties, meat is neither something that he detested as a form of food nor was it one which he endorsed or wished to eat. So, he was at ease while his friends gorged on ‘mutton kheema’ and ‘chicken shawarma’ while he simply enjoyed the delights of a bland and satiating ‘paneer Frankie’. It was well into September and past ‘Ganesh Chaturti,’ when epiphany struck him, but more on that later.

Ganesh Chaturti, was a celebration that he enjoyed in his childhood and one which he now grew irritated off due to its remarkable traffic halting qualities. And despite his love for the monsoon and its showers, he scratched his head in utter disbelief as the weather each day reminded him of Mumbai in vintage August and not the sporadically wet and mundane September that he knew off. A month that disguised itself into the monsoon records of the weatherman much like its successor October marked the onset of winter for the same weatherman, while in reality it heralded the onset of Timbuktu-esc humidity and accompanying discomfort. His friends continued to mock him for both his food habits and the weather of his city. He indulged in the banter because he realised the redundancy of pursuing an argument. Long ago he lamented that there wasn’t one Madras and Madarasi language but four distinct states and languages in South India, but it fell on deaf ears. He realised then that some of them were a genetic abnormality; of human beings with a considerable strain of the Neanderthal.

Ah! We must get back to the epiphany that dawned on him. He quoted from Ajay Devgn (the spelling is right!), “Aata Majhi Satakli!”

His was a peculiar predicament; the jack of all trades, beliefs and actions. In a little time span of nearly a quarter of a century he had managed to change his field of interest or vocation thrice. So while originally he was besotted by engineering, the love of all parents Tamizh (read Tamil) he was now well on his way to being the social researcher. But he did not know how to operate an I-pad or repair a broken radio or television set. At the same time he couldn’t quite comprehend Marx or Amartya Sen, and was neither left nor right of centre. You see this was compounded by the fact that he grew up as the lonely, introverted and fat-kid in life. And while he could not induce pity and warmth from of the opposite sex, he did not exercise or play any sport or have any musical or vocal talents. As a good friend of his once astutely observed, “Subbu, You try to be a stud but look like a geek. You look like a geek but don’t possess any modicum of knowledge or intelligence to be one.”

If this was not proof enough of the two faced mask that he wore through life, we will explore more. While the entire city and country fanatically cheered and worshipped a (crotch adjusting) sportsman called Sachin Tendulkar, he admired the determined and elegant Rahul Dravid. He could watch a Masala movie flick but only for so long till he started to grimace. But he could not at the same time like the post-modernist screw with your head endings of movies such as “The girl in yellow boots” or “A clockwork orange”. And if you thought that this left him only with cult movies in the urban sphere, think again. He liked the awesomeness of ‘Gunda’ but did not understand the phenomenon or the cult following behind ‘Michael Madan Kamarajan’ and nor did he find ‘Andaaz Apna Apna’ rib tickling. He was born and brought up in a city that some unabashedly abuse as cold, damp and noisy, and one which some proclaim with equal fervour as the liveliest and most spirited in the country. He had not yet learnt to converse in Marathi beyond a few lines that would get him past the ticket conductor or a government official. And he could not read or write Tamizh (yes for the last time it is not tamil and you have to roll the tongue and contort it into a syllable)

He was the kind of confused Tam-bhram who put the ‘Vibhooti’ across his forehead in the morning of an exam because he did not wish to incur the wrath and the look of confusion from the being who gave him birth, who continued to love him to a fault and who perfected the art of the filter coffee. The moment he stepped out of the house he rubbed off the ‘ash’ he was confused enough in life without having to explain to himself why he also wore simultaneously a pair of Indian manufactured denims, and a Vietnam made t-shirt titled ‘kappa’. The t-shirt also happened to be inexplicably black throughout, but for the prominent yellow coloured logo made up of a nude couple sitting with their backs to each other. And in some small measure he did not wear the ‘vibhooti’ because he wanted to be devoid of any outwardly religious symbol. At the same time the ‘holy thread’ hung across his torso and a pair or red strings were tied to his right wrist, that owed their presence to his family’s customs and to those that care for him, respectively. In this debate of traditions, custom or clothing it did not bother him that so many around believe in or do not believe in that guy (or girl) upstairs. God, to him is as abstract and as real as Schrödinger’s cat; both alive and dead at any instant of time.

So this was and is his peculiar predicament; of a pseudo Tamizhan, a pseudo Mumbaikar, a pseudo-atheist, a pseudo-iconoclast, a pseudo-engineer, a pseudo-leftist, and a psuedo everything, all at the same time. It is a sort of quarter life identity crisis that engulfed him, but one which he was unperturbed by. He munched on his Frankie, felt the drizzle of the overstaying rain, soaked in a breath of polluted air and relaxed in the company around him. His priorities in life were always clear to him; to get sufficiently satiating food, to get laid, to occasionally indulge in a few vices (accepted by society) and to eventually achieve world peace, and while he is at it to eradicate poverty and hunger.