The Wait

Waiting to go someplace else, waiting, grounded on algorithms and algebra, waiting in lines, waiting for time to make pretty faces, waiting for the fire to burn off our faces, waiting for the sun to rise again, and set, then we wait for night, then we wait for sleep. When will this wait be over? When will we supersede the human form and become pure consciousness? 

One evening with Neha and her family

Neha

Nidhi

I spent the evening with Neha's family in Seergao, a village close to Benaras. People were celebrating the birthday of Sant Ravidas, one of the important saints of Benaras. It was a wonderful evening. At home they fed me Aloo Paratha and Tomato chutney. In their simple home, I saw simple joys. Simple ways of looking at things, simple questions. Simple people going on about their simple lives. Very refreshing!

Be inconsistent,
Shake the norms,
Challenge conventional thinking,
Break rules,
Think harder, think lesser.

Shiva's Chivas

Idea for a film.
Man decides to get drunk and commit suicide in Benaras, Shiva City. Buys a bottle of Chivas. After he downs a few rounds, he walks the gulleys and ghats and ends up having many encounters with strangers. He loses all his money, gets on a boat, meets a pretty Japanese photographer, has dinner on a roof-top restaurant. Every now and then he tends to his hipflask. Life seems worth living again. Next day he quits smoking and drinking and begins learning tai-chi from a French Dhrupad singer. 

Two chai's with Raju

Raju, chai-shop owner, sitting next to me. We are talking about madness. He says "Sab log pagal hai" (everyone is mad), "kuch log paise ke peeche pagal hai, kuch log pyaar ke peeche pagal hai" (some are mad after money, some over love). He says the one who calls another mad is mad himself first. In Benaras madness is everywhere. Its also called Kashi. The land of Kashi and Shiva. The place where dialectics plays trumpets in every street corner, in every cul-de-sac, in every set of eyes. There is madness in the flames burning bodies, madness in the things that make up the surrounding, the light of the sun is mad with glory, the tree is mad about the sky, that's why it looks upwards, treefingers open to receiving the sunlight and transmitting them to us mad people walking the earth. We see the birds fly, mad about the wind, mad about aviation with that certain look in their eyes. Isn't life itself mad? To think how we have two hands, two legs, two nostrils, two ears and the primordial two eyes. Dialectics again. Polar opposites. Like the eight of infinity. Going up the curve, then going down again.

The Ego has landed (020213)

Welcomed with street celebrations, trumpets and trombones, the musicians in red, Iranian vibrations from Israeli man with a Saz, Raju and his pearl-like eyes, the way he laughs, Tommy's wagging tail, jumping claws on thighs, rub on the stomach, colour of the sky at night (first time at night), fireworks in the sky while I sip chai with Raju on Shiva-Ganga swing, the water from the tap, Vishwanath and his nonchalance, the look in his eyes as I stare at his green hoody, timelessness and endlessness, uncertainty and impermanence. This is Benaras city. Welcoming you since 2000 BC, seat number 11, room number 11, eleven eleven, twenty-three hundred hours and eleven minutes on the clock.