Pens and a few pennies

Below is a story my friend narrated to me over a few WhatsApp messages. As I reached the end of the story, an appalling realization dawned upon me.
I am sharing the story, in my words, with a similar hope for you:

Owing to a holiday in the United States, my friend had left his Chennai office early one evening. As he had exited his IT park, he had come across a stunted man selling pens. "Sir! Madam! 2 Pens for 10 rupees!" - the man had continued shouting at the top of his voice to a crowd that had cared more about the life inside mobile phones. My friend had passed the pen-seller, feeling bad for the attention he could not get. After some distance, my friend had come across a handicapped man asking for alms. The crowd that had sleep-walked while passing the pen-seller had woken up when it had reached the beggar. Many members had dropped 1 rupee, 2 rupee and 5 rupee coins in the cloth that lay spread before the beggar. Noticing this, my friend had experienced a mix of joy and sadness. Joy that compassion had won over consumerism. Sadness that a man selling pens had lost to a man selling pity.
A month later, my friend had chanced upon the pen-seller again. Overcome by a feeling of justice, he had walked to the pen-seller and had handed him the entire cash that had rested in his wallet - 120 rupees. The pen-seller had looked at my friend with a grateful smile and then, he had handed him 24 pens. My friend had received them and had walked home with a mix of joy and sadness. Joy that he had tilted the natural balance towards a hardworking man. Sadness that he too had always preferred pity over a purchase.

A melody of melancholy

A beautiful brown sparrow rests on my balcony wall
It informs me about the weather across Bangalore
I look at the sky with an eagerness for my namesake
But dark gray clouds loom large
A grateful gesture to all travelers about to tear up
As my cup of coffee turns a companion to the puddles below
The sparrow departs, waving goodbye with its wings...
I think about an old, battered story book and its torn pages
About an unused, armless action figure and its owner's childhood
A rusted, punctured bicycle and the neighboring roads
An untouched school uniform and a regularly used school bag
A non-functional FM radio and homeless radio waves
A box of broken plastic crayons and a father's locked-away accounts ledger
A forgotten wedding album and one of its lucky photos framed on the living room wall
A lonely mango tree, inside a gated community, and its regular visits from the slum kids
A childless mother and an uncared for orphan
I think about all these and I wonder
Which is more melancholic - To miss or to be missed?

The questions children ask

Two weeks ago, I had travelled to Chennai and was returning to Bangalore with my mother on a train. Opposite to us, were seated a mother and her ~5-year-old son. The mother's father had come to the railway station to send off his daughter and grandson. The train was scheduled to leave at 3:35 PM and about 2 minutes before the scheduled time, the grandfather got off the train. He walked back on the platform to reach our compartment and confirmed with his daughter that she had water bottles, biscuit packets, sufficient cash, napkins, her government ID card, and lord Murugan's picture with her. She nodded for every item he mentioned and when asked about sufficient cash, she took out her purse to hand him a thousand rupee note. "Even if not for you, keep this for mom's sake" she said, forcing the thousand rupee note into her father's hand. He accepted it with the guilt of a father and the need of a family man.
"Why are you giving money to grandpa? Does he not have money?" the kid asked his mother, curiously. An awkward silence prevailed in the compartment for a few seconds.
The mother finally broke the silence, answering her kid, "Grandpa had given me a lot of money when I was in school and college. I am just repaying it now. It is always good to return what you borrowed, right?" The grandfather's face put on a forced smile. But the kid seemed convinced with his mother's answer.
"How much money did grandpa give you?" the kid asked his mom, after a minute. The mother's face expressed the helplessness of not being able to give her son a mathematical answer.
Before the mother or grandfather could come up with an answer that would satisfy the kid, he looked at his plastic watch that had spider-man casting his web from the center. He then turned to his mother and asked her with a serious face, "It is already 3:45 PM. Why hasn't the train started yet?" The passengers present in the compartment could not help smiling.

The train started its journey 15 minutes after the scheduled time. The kid's face remained pressed against the window rails for the next hour. And occasionally, he also turned to his mother to pose an interesting question.
"Why do people build houses amid rain water?", "Why don't people become happy when they see a train passing by?", "Why aren't farms and fields seen in cities?", "Why are there so many hotels? Don't all mothers cook food at home?", "Why do people feed crows but not dogs?" were some of the questions I remember now with a smile. As much as I fell in love with the kid's questions, I also felt sad for his mother. How do you explain to a kid that an adult's world is far removed from a child's world? Still, the mother responded to the kid's questions smartly, giving out answers that would not let the kid lose hope on humanity.
"The people who stay in houses amid rain water like to play with paper boats", "The people who see trains passing by are sad because they are not able to travel in trains", "There are people who stay far away from their mothers. These people go to hotels. And sometimes, mothers also need rest, right?" were some of her answers. Science shows that smart parents pave way for smart kids but this interaction between the mother and the kid made me wonder if the opposite also holds true - smart kids pave way for smarter parents.

Half an hour later, an old man stopped at our compartment asking for alms. The mother did not mind the old man and looked out the window. The kid could not understand this. "Why are you not giving money to him?", he asked his mother. An awkward silence prevailed in the compartment for a few seconds. The mother then took a ten rupee note from her purse and handed it over to the old man. "Why isn't anyone else giving money to him?" the kid raised a question, looking at us. An awkward silence, again. Slowly, the passengers fetched 2 rupee and 5 rupee coins from their wallets and handed it over to the old man. The old man looked at the kid and joined his hands in worship, shouting, "Live long, my lord". The kid smiled and waved goodbye to him. "Why did he call me a lord?" the kid asked his mother after the old man had left. The mother smiled and replied, "Maybe because he knew your name is Ishwar."
After ten minutes, an old lady stopped at our compartment asking for alms. All the passengers turned to look at the kid. He was looking at the old lady with a widespread smile on his face. A few minutes later, the old lady passed our compartment, shouting, "Live long, my lords".

For the remainder of the train journey, the kid continued his questions and a few of us continued our compassionate acts. Like how Carl Sagan had said, "We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers", our compartment grew significant through the journey by the kid's questions.

I fall into a coma.

Money times money is money squared
Money times data too is money squared
I am terrified of the square in squared
It is a prison for passion
When it should be imprisoning poverty
The walls are windowless
Not different from our cars that honk away beggars
Shoo! Shoo! Shoo! Faces in plight are like houseflies
Poor housefly! It has 360 degree vision
Amazing humans! Our vision is focused
Money times money is money squared.

Math and meth keep some men happy, according to the statistics
And the trend line goes on a rapid rise
The target just got taller
What beverage does the corporate brain drink?
Smarter and smarter it gets
Without satisfaction
'Enough' and 'equality' are endangered species
Can somebody tell me the population of white tigers?
I just boarded the statistics bandwagon
Does the white tiger treat the white peacock as its equal?
Which is more beautiful? Which puts a smile on others faces?
Oh you dangerous Darwin! Look at what you have done
Dystopia's day is around though survival of the fittest keeps surviving its end
The pie chart has just two categories
Oh you sad storyteller! They are not good and bad
The small chunk is bad and the larger chunk is worse
Am I talking about the earth?
But isn't the earth flat? 
Just wait for a 100 memes and 1000 re-tweets - the earth will become flat
Science stands no chance before social media
Please! Do 'Like' this poem!

"May I help you?"
Who's that quoting Shakespeare?
"Dude! You don't know even this?! (Sara)Haha"
Now, that's my boy
Let me introduce him, or rather his opinions
Introversion - Inability
Compassion and care - Cut the crap
Humility - Head back to your hometown
Love - LOL
My boy is a proud programmer!
Who pines for poets anymore?
For (i=1; i++; i > Poets)
My boy loves his machine
It is very obedient
Unlike some people who have to be understood
Try {relationships} - Catch {reasoning}
Isn't man-machine interaction easier?
Can somebody tell me the rise in percentage 
Of man-machine interactions over the last 5 years?
The statistical evidence is arriving in a blood-red Mercedes Benz
I love the logo, and even the car
I decide to buy it for my boy, and I begin my computer code
If ( desire = Mercedes Benz )
My fingers continue birthing variables
And invariably, I fall into a coma. 

A writer's voice

More often than not, I find talks by writers to be interesting. Be it the can-potentially-change-an-artist's-approach-towards-creativity TED talk 1 and TED talk 2 by Elizabeth Gilbert, or the can-potentially-prepare-an-artist-for-an-unexpected-future talks by JK Rowling and Neil Gaiman. 
An important reason for this can be attributed to the choice of words by the writers. And also the choice of their thoughts. 
Unlike in many professions, a writer is required to think for a living. A single social issue or a single historical fact is subjected to multiple arguments and counter-arguments inside a writer's head. From this trove of diverse thoughts, a writer gets to comfortably choose a viewpoint to present to the audience. As a result of which, my beginning statement. 

I experienced this last weekend when I attended the 6th edition of the Bangalore Literature festival. One of the talks I was looking forward to - 'The writer's role in speaking out' by Paul Zacharia - offered me more than I had expected. 
Paul began his talk by pointing out the characteristics of a good writer. The most important characteristic, according to Paul, was that a writer remained a reformed man inside himself, free from the forces trying to control his thoughts. He then listed and elaborated on some of the thought-control devices prevalent in our society. Religion. Caste. Political parties. Media. 
"I fear the media more than a politician today. We can hold the politician accountable at least once in five years but not the media", he said. And he made a brief mention about a short story he had written earlier, about a robot that could identify the truth and lies in a newspaper. I imagined the state of some newspapers and news channels if they were to be scrutinized by a similarly designed supercomputer, and I could not help feeling sorry. 

As a parallel thought, I recall the TED talk by renowned journalist Christiane Amanpour. When asked the question - What would be the one idea she would want to plant in the minds of the audience gathered - she replied, "..really be careful where you get your information from; really take responsibility for what you read, listen to and watch..."
This seems to be of utmost importance now, especially after 'fake news' has been declared as the 'Word of the year' for 2017.

****

My visit to the Bangalore Literature festival, after Paul's talk, only turned happier owing to the wide range of books that were on display. One of the books I purchased from the extremely-harmful-to-your-wallet collection was Perumal Murugan's Songs of a Coward. The book is a collection of poems written by the writer, during the difficult period in his life, following the ban on his book Madhorubhagan/One Part Woman. 
As I traveled across the different poems in his book, it saddened me that a writer had to be silenced because the society had not matured enough to agree to disagree. 

It is as imperative to stand up for the right voice as much as it is to suppress the noise. Else, we might reach a future where many writers are forced to command their pens, as Perumal Murugan does in one of his poems. 

I have commanded my pen
that the ink-drip from its ball-tip
shall happen henceforth
only for signatures
accounts and 
journal entries.

As the Diwalis get quieter...

I have never been a huge fan of bursting firecrackers. I have always been governed by the notion that the soul of the Vodafone-advertisement-pug resided in every cracker that I set fire to, and so, every cracker would fly towards me and burst beside my body, showering affection and ash powder. 
I also felt very uncomfortable taking a walk on Diwali days because it made me pity the heroes of the games 'Temple Run' and 'Subway Surfers'. 
A lit firecracker there. Run left. A lit firecracker here. Run right. A small girl is about to light up a 100-wala. Run straight.  

But over the last few days, I have been setting out on uncomfortable walks of a different nature. 
The streets and the apartments around my house, in Bangalore, present a sight that would be any photographer's delight. The houses and their balconies have been lined up with lamps and little light bulbs. 
But it has been a very silent Diwali.
And, strangely, a part of me misses the non-stop noise of cracker after cracker after cracker. A part of me misses becoming a 'Subway Surfer' hero on the streets. A part of me misses the sight of colorful pieces of paper crowding the road.
I hear the adult in me saying that this might be the way to celebrate Diwali, going forward. For the sake of noise pollution. For the sake of the environment. For the sake of the street-sweepers.
But the part of me that wants a noisy Diwali recalls my mother's childhood stories, which she keeps narrating every Diwali with uncontrollable joy.
"From a week prior to the Diwali day, we would start bursting crackers. There would be intense competition between my house and the neighboring houses. Your uncle and I would be the representatives from my house. Every evening, we would ensure that we burst more crackers than the surrounding houses. The number of pieces of paper that lay outside our houses were the measure of our might. And we would never let my father or grandfather sweep the pieces away. Even if they did the cleaning when we were asleep, we would gather the paper pieces from the garbage and disperse them all around the house. Winning the Diwali-cracker-contest meant a lot."

I ask myself - Why the fondness for crackers when I am not exactly a fan?
My mind seems to be behaving like a college student on his farewell day, not wanting to leave the professor who had scolded him the most through his college years.

As I ponder upon the reasons for the reduction in the magnitude of bursting firecrackers, something which I had seen even in Chennai during my college years, I cannot resist the thought that my parents' generation had had a simpler taste in life. 
For them, going to the movie theater had been an event. For them, going to the restaurant had been an event. For them, bursting crackers had been an event. 
They seem to have led their lives listening more to their hearts than to their brains.
Which reminded me of the debate topic in the special talk show shown on Sun TV yesterday.
Which attains more importance in a home? Intelligence or love?
One of the speakers narrated a beautiful story to argue why she considered love to be the winner.
An old couple is seated on a park bench. The wife suffers from a memory disorder. She forgets her husband's identity every 20 minutes. But the husband remains seated beside her, holding her hand, and explaining every 20 minutes who he is. Why would the husband do this? Because he had had the smartest wife? Or because he had had the woman who had loved him the most?

I smiled after I heard this story. And I smiled now after I typed the story. 
I reread the entire piece above. I realize that most of it has come from the heart and very little from the brain. 
Maybe I belong more to my parents' generation. Or maybe I am just emotionally charged in the middle of a quiet Diwali.

A chore of compassion...

She entered the house after a long day at office. As she switched on the kitchen light, her eyes fell upon the kitchen sink. There lay a heap of unwashed utensils from morning. "Poor Rangamma! How exhausted would she be after all the work?" she pitied the maid about to arrive in 15 minutes, and she started washing the utensils.