My Unsuccessful Attempt at Winning a Nobel Prize

Based on a True Story

I hereby move a proposal that kids not be taught or told moral stories in school.

Yes. This is not an impulsive proposal, but is the result of careful contemplation over the cause of a catastrophe. This is a firsthand account of how your friendly neighbourhood kid (i.e. me) was the poor victim of the diabolical implications of a moral studies class.

Let me explain.

It was a balmy Sunday morning. And as is the nature of Sunday mornings around the world, the kids loitered around the streets while the adults worshipped their favourite gods. In my house, this happened to be the television. We did not mind, as long as no one disturbed our enlightening discussions with orders to do the homework.

So we loitered around the streets, as Isaac Newton would have said, “diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me”.

The topic of discussion that day was gold. It was an aftermath of the moral studies class of the previous week. You may be wondering what gold had to do with moral studies. I can hear you asking “weren’t the two mutually exclusive?”

They weren’t. And so the discussion went on.

“Mahesh, you eat eggs, right?”

“Ya. Why?”

“Remember what the teacher told us about eggs on Friday?”

“Eggs? I don’t remember.”

“You should start paying attention in class.” I deftly swerved to avoid Mahesh’s punch.

“Remember the Moral Studies class we had on Friday?”

“You mean the time we spent in class instead of playing Volleyball?”
Mahesh had a thing for volleyball. To say that he loved it would be an understatement, but if there was any large spherical object in range, you can expect Mahesh to pick it up with his left hand, swing his right hand like a pendulum and hit it to the farthest possible distance.

“Yes, that. They told us the story about a bird that laid eggs.”

“I thought all birds lay eggs, unless otherwise evolved.”

“Yes, very good. But this one laid golden eggs.”

“Ah. You’re talking about the goose that laid the golden eggs.”

“Oh! So, you remember.”

“Yes, I do. What’s your point?”

“No point as such. I’m just wondering if it’s biologically possible. And if it is, can it be replicated in mammals.”

“Mammals? You mean, like...”

“More specifically, domesticated ungulates.”

“Domesticated what?”

“Cows.” It deserves mention here that Mahesh did not share my proclivity for using biologically correct vocabulary. Neither did he share the proclivity for using the word “proclivity” in everyday conversations, but that’s another story.

“You mean to say that cows could have golden eggs?”

“Not eggs. Cows are mammals. So golden calves.”

“Hmmm...” the thought kept him engaged for a while. It took Lakshmi’s call to bring him out of his reverie.

Lakshmi, dear reader, was a fair, well endowed beautiful female of our neighbourhood. Her lustrous, dark hair was long enough to touch her legs. She was the cynosure of the entire neighbourhood and turned eyes wherever she went. She was also an ungulate, or to put it simply, a cow. And at this point, she called, or rather, mooed.

Mahesh looked at Lakshmi. She belonged to the friendly lady, Gauri, who brought us milk every day. I liked her. Every morning I would run to the gate behind mother. After she gave the half litre of milk to mother, she would fill the small tumbler I carried with me. A pat on the cheek and then she would go. After we encountered milkmen in our Mathematics textbooks, I started wondering if she was making a loss with the milk she was giving me for free. But we digress. Lakshmi was currently, scavenging for food in the neighbourhood, and mooing intermittently.

Mahesh turned to me. “What do you have in mind?” Now, there are guys who would back out of a mission at the slightest hint of risk, like jumping from your terrace to the next one. And there are guys, like Mahesh, who would carry any mission through to the end, even if it meant testing if the road sloped enough for the military uncle’s car to slide down by itself (Turned out it was).

“Alright. You know that Lakshmi has been getting fatter lately, right?”

“Yes.”

“I asked mother. She said that Lakshmi is pregnant and would be giving birth soon. To a calf.”

“Hmmm. And you want to find out if this calf would be golden.”

“Not find out. I want to ensure that it’s golden. Remember reading about the Nobel Prizes? I want to be the youngest to get one.”

“And how do you propose we can ensure this?”

“Ok. I’ve been reading about this. There’s this field called Genetics. This has something to do with a guy named Mendel. He did some experiments with peas. The results say that tall pea plants result in taller offsprings. So, to get a golden calf out of Lakshmi...”

“But Lakshmi isn’t a gold cow.”

Ah! This was the crux of the mission and Mahesh had pointed it out.

“Mahesh! Let’s go back to the story. Was the goose golden? No. Only its eggs were.”

“So, what are you saying?”

“I’m saying that we need to take steps to motivate Lakshmi to have a golden calf.”

He repeated, “But Lakshmi is not a gold cow.”

“Not yet. And that’s where we come in. We can ensure that Lakshmi thinks she is a gold cow and therefore is morally obliged to have a gold calf. I think the positive mental reinforcement can stimulate Lakshmi to make sure that she delivers a golden calf. And when she does...”

“We claim victory! Yaay! I see it now. But... do you think it would work? This positive mental reinforcement, thing?”

“Without a doubt. I’ve been reading up on it. There have been experiments, successful ones, on how positive reinforcement influences behaviour, making the test subjects think that they are better than they actually are and ends up making them actually better. Anyway, you don’t worry about the theory. I’ll take care of it. We need to get to the specifics. Lakshmi needs to begin thinking that she’s a gold cow.”

The object of all this discussion was quietly munching on the movie poster of “GoldenEye”. It was the re-release and dubbed version of the James Bond movie. Lakshmi had eaten the “Eye” and Pierce Brosnan was on the verge of entering her digestive tract. The two “00”s and the word “Golden” were hanging from her mouth. We took at as a divine sign that a Nobel Prize was in our destiny.

Mahesh got to work. He went about finding ways to procure the key ingredient for the mission. Gold paint.

A day later we had twenty tins of paint at our disposal. I was all admiration for Mahesh. In fact, in retrospect, I think Mahesh would have made a good Supply Chain manager for Apple. I asked him where he got it from.

“You know the place where they sell doors? On our way to school?”

I knew the place. We had once planned to play a game of dominoes by pushing one door and letting the entire chain fall. It didn’t come to pass, but Mahesh had taken the paint they use for door handles.

“It was smooth. Those tins were just sitting there and these fellows were busy sawing wood. I asked twice if I could take them. They didn’t respond. I took the silence as approval and brought them all.”

It was a small victory. I patted him on the back. The mission still lay ahead. We had to wait for the right moment. This came the following Friday. There was the temple festival and all the people went to pull the temple car. I wanted to too, but mother said that I was too small and would get trampled in the crowd. Suited me fine, I had the morning all to Lakshmi and myself. She stood in the shed, munching on dry hay. The shed was dark and slightly musty. It was smelling all cow. We decided to brave the smell.

The bucket they used to give her water was lying by the side. Mahesh and I arrived on the scene. I had brought a brush which my father used to dust off old furniture. Mahesh brought the gold tins with him. They were waiting like eager jewels staring at you from glass cases. We didn’t make them wait. One after the other, they all came out and the paint was poured into the bucket. The gooey coagulate was diluted with water. Lakshmi was calmly watching what was happening. It was quiet all around. Even if Lakshmi mooed, nobody would know. The sounds from the temple were loud enough.

Mahesh took a stick from the shed. Lakshmi opened one eye. He put the stick into the bucket. She relaxed and continued to chew the hay. The stick turned round and round as the glittering gold paint swallowed water and grew thinner. I added water whenever Mahesh asked me to. He seemed quite experienced in this sort of stuff. When he was satisfied that the mixture had reached the right texture, he asked me to bring the brush.

“Do you want to give her the hay or do you want to paint her?”

Lakshmi had strong legs, but not sharp teeth. I chose the hay.

“Thought so. That’s alright. I’ll paint her. Just keep feeding her and rub her forehead from time to time.”

This was a problem. Lakshmi had horns. They were not that sharp, still, one has one’s fears. But I did not complain.

I picked up a handful of hay and brought it to Lakshmi’s mouth. She opened it nonchalantly. She was used to being treated like royalty. I was a little startled as I felt her warm tongue on my fingers. Mahesh glared at me from where he sat. I dug in. I was not going to let him down.

He dipped the brush into the bucket. It came out, its black bristles glistening with gold. With his left hand running through the vibrations on Lakshmi’s stomach, he began to paint her body. He started with the spine. He kept talking, to cover his nerves I think, as he painted. He said if you paint the upper body, the paint would drip down to the legs and you wouldn’t have to touch them. I was done with the hay I had in hand and bent down to pick up some more, all the while not breaking eye contact with Lakshmi.

In ten minutes, Mahesh was done with the left side. He picked up the stool and the bucket and moved to the right. The shed was dark, but if any light had shined on her, Lakshmi would be shining like midday sun. Another ten minutes, another handful of hay, and Lakshmi was glowing. Mahesh wiped the sweat off his brow. The brushwork was done.

“It’s not done yet.” He dropped the brush and delicately dipped his right hand into the bucket. “I can’t put the brush on her face. The bristles may hurt her eyes. He took the hay from me. He fed her while gently rubbing the paint on her face. I took a walk around Lakshmi. The paint was cascading from her back onto her legs, covering her in gold. I had to admit, Mahesh was a master painter.

“Mahesh”

“Sshhhh. What?” He asked in a hushed tone. I sprang back as Lakshmi raised her leg slightly.

“Her tail.”

He had forgotten about her tail. He raised his hand and signalled that he’ll take care of it.

Lakshmi’s face was also golden by now. I wonder if she knew. The big eyes certainly couldn’t see that close. If she squinted a little bit, maybe she would know that her dark nose was surrounded by gold, providing a great contrast. Mahesh pointed the hay at me and I took it. Lakshmi opened her eyes to notice the change of guard. He collected the paint from his palm to his fingers and did a swish. The paint flowed down Lakshmi’s tail, covering her dark hair in gold. She was now a golden goddess.

Our job was done. The temple car would also be covered in similar gold paint, we thought. It was time to leave. Mahesh fished out something from his bag. A big mirror. He turned to me, “Didn’t you say this required positive mental reinforcement? How would Lakshmi know about her golden nature?” He put the mirror in front of her as I stood beaming at him. We packed up all residual signs of our presence, paint tins, brush etc. A silent high-five. Lakshmi would have a golden calf, and we’d stake our claim to the Nobel Prize once the calf was out. Not a word until then.
We exited in silence but victorious. The weekend would be spent in remarkable glory.

Or so we thought.

What followed was one episode of epic thulping. When the elders returned from the temple festival in the afternoon, smeared in turmeric and vermillion, they found a peaceful pair of kids watching TV. All hell broke loose as Gauri came running to our house. She did not come to our house in the evenings. So, when I saw her at the gate, I knew something was wrong. I slyly slithered towards the backdoor, jumped to the sunshade and from there to the terrace and crossed over to Mahesh’s place. He was not at home. I had no choice but to return. My silent retreat was blocked by father guarding the backdoor. I couldn’t quite read his face. Anger, surprise, pride, it was all mixed up.

Mother spoke, “What are you still looking at him for? Move. You! What did you do to Lakshmi?”

“Lakshmi! I... I didn’t do anything. What happened to her?”

“I will tell you what happened to her.”

At this point, my right ear was rudely yanked out of its comfortable socket. I still maintain that my right ear is slightly longer than my left because of the trauma of that day.

A thrashing was to follow. In between, I could hear Gauri asking my parents to stop. She said it wasn’t that big a thing and she’ll take care of it. She came just to inform, not complain. Mother relented. I looked at Gauri sympathetically. She pulled my cheeks and gave me a peck.

“You! It’s people like you who have ruined him. You pamper him so much that he goes around thinking that the entire world is his playground. All this mischief has to stop. Gauri! He will come over tomorrow and clean Lakshmi. You don’t have to do anything.” Mother was staring sternly at me. Father knew that things had cooled down and went back to his newspaper.

I went over the next day and saw Gauri scrubbing the paint from Lakshmi’s back. The water tank near the shed was empty. She smiled when she saw me, Gauri did, not Lakshmi. I merrily went to her. She gave me a tumbler of milk to drink as she finished scrubbing the rest of the paint.

I do not know to this day how when Gauri met her golden cow, her first guess was that I had done it. Perhaps my reputation in the neighbourhood was bad, owing to previous track record. As a true friend, I accepted full responsibility for the incident. Mahesh was sorry and grateful that I hadn’t snitched on him. It was my idea actually, so it was ok. What happened to the calf, you ask? Well, it was a male calf, born in pure white. When mother pointed this out to me, I argued that it was because they had scrubbed the paint off Lakshmi and removed the mirror too.

In between the thrashing that followed, I blamed her for denying me a shot at the Nobel Prize, a deserved honor that continues to elude me.

And yes, I hereby propose that kids not be taught or told moral stories in school.

Ya Niznayu

"Ya Niznayu”

The words any student of Russian dreads. In a language class, when confronted with a swirling vortex of chaos unfurling in front of his eyes, a student tries to sort what he comes across. Almost like Dorothy (the girl who met the Wizard of Oz), the student tries to group a cow and a table together. “They both have four legs after all” he reasons. Sometimes, even under such broad parameters, a few (read, a lot many) things don’t fall under any grouping. It is then, that he questions his teacher. The question is a single word. “Why”, a word teachers love hearing because it gives them the opportunity to say,

“Ya Niznayu”

Before you, my dear reader, decides to skip this post because you don’t understand the abovementioned phrase, let me tell you, “Ya Nizhnayu” means “I don’t know”. When your teacher tells you that she doesn’t know why something is the way it is, boss, you’re in big trouble. Upon further prodding by a determined student, which I would like you to believe I was, she would go into a solemn silence. You know, like when Google does when you put in too many keywords and the server doesn’t know which one of the keywords is, to borrow a journalistic phrase, truly “key”. But then, the awkward silence would be followed by something even more dreadful.

“It is tradition.”

When you’re learning something, you don’t want to be told that you should or should not do something because it’s tradition. Even if it’s told to you in a Russian accent. For instance, how would it have been if someone had told young Galileo Galilee that it was not tradition to throw heavy objects from the top of a tower that is already leaning? Or to Einstein that it’s tradition to have the presentation of breakthrough science preceded by a haircut? You get the point.

A language that has six cases, each of which is more confusing than the previous one, and three genders (including for objects like house and door), which are determined not by any scientific principle of gender determination, but by seeing if the word ends in a consonant or a vowel, and three ways of indicating singular and plural, if you add to this, the “Chemical X” of tradition, you get the linguistic equivalent of an extremely tantrumatic Uranium 235 nucleus, that upon gentle prodding by a “Ya Niznayu” sets off a chain reaction, leading to chaos, confusion and the intellectual equivalent of a nuclear catastrophe.

The Russian language has a copious vocabulary that is constantly enriched, in a way not too different from how the memory cards of our phones have multiple copies of the same photo because we forwarded it to multiple recipients. Yes, not only are there several words to say something, each word is also conjugated and declinated based on the case, number and gender, thus giving birth to a vast universe with constantly morphing organisms. In fact, a word in a sentence is like a highly reactive chlorine atom caught in an organic chemistry equation. Its status changes continuously, based on its interaction with other words.

As I write this, I see around me a cluster of personal pronouns that, like a school of amoeba are changing shape faster than I can perceive. The inner optimist in me sees this as an advantage. If the language is spoken fast enough, I assure myself, people will still get what is being told, without being able to point out the flaws in it. Yes, that’s it. Winning strategy, right here. I’m going to use this weekend to find the guy who gave the voice for the memorable “Mutual funds are subject to...” And request him to give me lessons.

See you until then.

To you, Trichy

It is starting to sink in. The last weekend spent at home before I leave for Russia. When you’re on the road at night with your windows open, the cold, harsh breeze slaps on your face. It is stopped briefly if another, larger vehicle overtakes you. I have often seen Trichy as the larger vehicle shielding me briefly while I recovered. A place where I could stop spinning like a wind vane in a storm and get my bearings right. A place where Time stopped briefly, so I could catch my breath and continue running. This break, however, seems like the calm before I start running a marathon. I do not know when the next break is.

It is time I counted my blessings. This is not the post of a soon-to-be NRI looking back at his years of idyllic bliss. This is not an attempt at melodrama. This is not even to tell people how happy an upbringing I have had or how better my city is than yours. No. None of that. This is for me to go back to in moments of need. This is the emotional equivalent of saving for a rainy day. In moments of loneliness, in moments of desolation, when the ground I stand on seems no longer interested in bearing the burden of my existence, I intend to go back to this and tell myself how blessed I have been. It is, in all respects, a personal diary. It is a record of the bad days I don’t want to forget and the good ones that I do want to remember. Having spent all my childhood in one town and most of it in one locality, the memories are linear and fresh. Random, lingering images throw me back to a memory in which the image was the backdrop. The signboard rooted firmly and manured regularly by goat droppings reminds me of the days I waited for the school bus. It still stands right opposite the bus stop. 

The white curtain with an image of Lord Ganesha shielded the east facing Xerox shop from the morning sun. Yellowed, and patched at places, Ganesha continues to protect the students making photocopies inside. It reminds me of the day I first met a teacher outside the school premises and was so excited that I yelled “Good Evening, Sir”, much to the amusement of the Xerox shop guy. Outside the shop, Ganesha watched as my teacher told me sternly that I was not required to wish him outside school premises and definitely not in that loud tone. As I stand across the road, Ganesha asks me if I still get the urge to wish my teachers if I come across them. I smile. I wonder if Ganesha will still be around the next time I come.

The lane I used to walk on to go to my school in 5^th Standard is now a paved road. The newest house and the only one to have a switch on the compound wall for its calling bell is now faded. Its mint coat resembles a palette of Copper Chloride. The calling bell switch has been disabled after a torrent of rain shortcircuited the wiring. I can no longer ring the bell and run away before the occupants come. I wonder what kids walking on the road do to keep themselves entertained. Have they also bought into the newer means of entertainment that keeps your head bowed and down? I don’t know. I partially relive the joy by pressing the now disabled switch, knowing that nothing would happen. The old man who is walking in the balcony of the house next door points me to the “To Let” board hanging from the porch and asks me if I’m interested. I shake my head and walk on.

Further down the lane is another house. We used to call it “Azhugachi Veedu”. A literal translation would be “House of Tears”. In a comic book fuelled alliterative binge, we renamed the house to “Crying Castle”. The family that lived there had an autistic child. Autism is a common household word today, thanks to the many movies on developmental disorders. But back then, we, including the elders, said the kid in the house was mad. “Mentally retarded”, the more posh among us said. Every day, as we walked to school, the kid would be in the verandah, bawling at us as we passed by. Not that he had anything against us. He was just bawling and we happened to pass by. I can no longer see or hear him.

I look back to see if the old man is still around. I see him getting out of his house and locking the gate. He now wears a white shirt over his vest. I walk towards him, and point to the house.

“For Sale, too”, he tells me.

“Do you happen to know the boy who used to live here?”

 He puts a finger to his temple and makes a circular motion, a universal sign for someone who has lost their mind. I nod my head.

 “Didn’t you know? He died. It’s been 9 years. The family moved to the US. The house has been on sale ever since.”

He sees the shock on my face. He reads the expression right and the reason wrong.

 “Yes, I know. Shocking, right? That a house in this locality doesn’t find buyers? Now, that one was put on sale 2 weeks ago. It has 5 parties interested. The seller is holding out for a better price. But this one, people seem to think this one is cursed. Nobody wants to buy this. I am the local broker, you know. If you’re interested in buying a property, fresh or built, you can call me.”

He hands me his card. Another man who has found a way to make money out of freely available information. I take the card and walk towards the main road.

The building of a smaller school in the neighborhood has given way to a pharmacy chain. There goes the backdrop of the day I stood for an hour in the sun waiting for the school bus to take me to my 8^th Standard Zoology Practical examination. The school bus that never came. Typical of a schoolboy, my trouser pocket had a Rs.5 coin, for a crisis. I ran all the way back home, got money from my mother and took an auto to school. It did not occur to me that had I waited at the bus stop, a public bus would have dropped me 300 meters from school for Rs.3. I managed to reach on time. The practical examination had me examine the head of a cockroach and identify its mouth parts, maxilla, mandibles etc. and then make a diagrammatic representation (if cockroaches had courts, I’d be sued for misrepresentation).

How much of a town depends on its constituents? The roads, the buildings, the traffic intersections, the oddly clashing early morning bell sounds of the temple and the cycles of the milkman and newspaper guy, the inhabitants who bring life to the town in festival and flood.

How much does a town lose when each of this changes or disappears? Are towns Ships of Theseus with newer parts constantly replacing the older ones of their bodies? If so, how much does the town have to lose for it to no longer be even remotely related to what it started out as and be identified as a new one? Would my departure be another short-lived blimp in the town’s lifetime or the proverbial last straw that takes away from my town its identity?

Vanity dictates I settle for the latter. After all, it is a small town. How unimportant could I be? That’s the best part about small towns. Everyone is important. Everybody knows everybody else. The families, the fights, the dreams, the disappointments, right down to the kind of rheumatoid arthritis the uncle in the third lane is suffering from. Everything is known, everything is discussed threadbare. Stories are woven, like peacock feathers hidden in textbooks, with the expectation of newer plot elements in each time the book is opened.

The other good part about small towns is that they’re, well, small. If you were to attempt an “Around the Town before lunchtime” voyage, you would very well be home before lunchtime. Phineas Fogg, the London bred adventurer, never understood the concept of small towns and went around the world. But we digress. You may be delayed by the appearance of a vaguely familiar uncle who you last remember running away from because your sixer went straight through his window. But fret not. In a small town,  the uncle would not only take you home for lunch, his wife would also try to add to her collection of gossip by showering you with questions faster than the idlis can stop you from answering them.

Trichy is a special kind of small town. Like most towns along the Kaveri river, it’s also a temple town. The Rockfort temple, Thiruvanaikovil temple and the peerless Srirangam temple ring its periphery. What this means for the small town Phineas Fogg is that there is abundant supply of food. You simply hop from temple to temple. From the delicious Sakkara Pongal that can bless you with diabetes and cholesterol with just one helping, to the creamy Thayir Sadham, this town gives you all. Pardon the gastronomic indulgence. But that comprises most of my childhood in this town.

I grew up in this town. When people refer to the townsfolk, oddly called Trichyites, they refer to me as well. At least, that’s how I want to feel. But I’ve not been a part of this town for a few years now. In and out, in ever widening circles of spiraling distance. A few years in Chennai and then a few in Delhi. Now, the spiral is widening again. I’m leaving the country. The town is gradually loosening its soil around my feet. May be I’m a liability now. Very unwanted. The truth is I’ve known it for a while. I’ve felt it more than known it.

In the time between two visits, your hometown, like a child, grows and changes face. You enter it, like a parent who has missed out on the child's upbringing and tries hard to catch up. The child has changed and so have you. Neither can recognize the other. And yet you try to connect, to embrace. But the city does not. It knows. You will now merely come and go like an occasional bout of flu. And like the flu, you are tolerated, not welcome.

Every time I return, the town has shown me a changed face. Well, maybe not at the first glance, but to those who have grown with it, even the slightest differences are a stark contrast. We tried discussing these changes, Trichy and I, but the discussion went nowhere. I know my place now. I no longer have a rightful claim. I merely plead, for the town to hold my spot, and not have me replaced in its ship. I do not know if it will.

I bend down to kiss the soil one last time before my feathers are spread. Dear Trichy, if I pass your skies, I ask only this much of you. Offer me a smile, a smile of recognition. When I show you off to my friends, do not be aloof. Do not pretend to not know me, nothing would devastate me more.

A Girl, a Mother and Geopolitics

“Jack! Here, hold Sophie.”

The distinct accent of the young couple with the baby told flight attendant Victoria Yu that they were Australian. She knew from experience that Australians were regulars on this flight. They were mostly affluent tourists returning home after a holiday in Europe.

She checked the flight manifest. Over two-thirds of the passengers in the flight were from the Netherlands. This was natural considering that MH 71 was a scheduled flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lampur. She also made a mental note that there were three infants on board, one of them in her section.

This was important. Passengers traveling with infants needed to be seated such that the other passengers did not complain. Tired travelers were not expected to be tolerant of babies.

Victoria would be attending to the passengers in Business Class. She was one of the senior attendants on board and was in fact among the most experienced attendants in Malaysia Airlines. She had joined as a young flight attendant ten years ago and had slowly grown up the ranks. She was also three months pregnant and was about to go on parental leave next week.

Victoria adjusted the upper part of her uniform, her kebaya on top of her stomach. Her lithe frame ensured that her baby bump did not protrude too much.

She inspected the business class section. The Australian couple was occupying the first row of seats on her left hand side. The baby was now back with her mother who had finally settled down.

 “What an adorable girl! She must be 2 years old”, Victoria thought. The afternoon sun was shining through the windows and bouncing off the girl’s golden hair. “Sophie”, her father said when Victoria asked the girl for her name. Victoria asked the couple if they wanted something. They did not. They were busy trying to put Sophie to sleep.

Victoria returned to the entrance. There was a rush of passengers entering the aircraft and the attendants at the front were having a hard time distributing enough smiles. Based on the manifest, her section would accommodate a Dutch Senator and a handful of old doctors. It was going to be an interesting flight.

Victoria walked back to her station. She had made the mandatory checks. Seatbelts fastened, tray tables and seats upright. She also performed the flight safety demo to the passengers and suppressed a smile when she got to the part where she mentioned that a passenger should secure his own oxygen mask before trying to assist someone.

As she finished her demo, she looked at the rows of eyes looking at her. Some bored, some without an alternative and some, not looking at her but lost in their displays. Sophie was drifting in and out of sleep and her mother was throwing cautious glances around the cabin. Victoria looked at Sophie. She looked angelic. Victoria’s right hand instinctively ran over her stomach. She quickly adjusted her kebaya and sat down at her station and fastened her seatbelt.

The Captain was on the microphone.

“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome onboard Flight MH 71 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lampur. We are currently third in line for take-off and are expected to be in the air in approximately seven minutes time. We ask that you please fasten your seatbelts at this time and secure all baggage underneath your seat or in the overhead compartments. We also ask that your seats and table trays are in the upright position for take-off. Please turn off all personal electronic devices, including laptops and cell phones. Smoking is prohibited for the duration of the flight. Thank you for choosing Malaysia Airlines. Enjoy your flight.”

Victoria heaved a sigh. These would be the last few minutes of relaxation she would get this afternoon. She had duties to perform as soon as the flight went up in the air and the “Fasten Seatbelt” sign was turned off.  To serve food and beverages, to help aged passengers with their seatbelts and to sell airline merchandise to uninterested passengers. The aircraft was now taxiing down the runway. It picked up speed and took off. In a few minutes, the Captain was back on the microphone.

“Good afternoon, ladies and gentleman.This is your Captain speaking. We are currently cruising at an altitude of 30,000 feet at an airspeed of 400 miles per hour. We’re flying over Germany. The cabin crew will be coming around in about twenty minutes to offer you a light lunch and a drink, and the inflight movie will begin shortly after that. I'll talk to you again before we reach our destination. Until then, sit back, relax and enjoy the rest of the flight.”

Victoria drew the curtains of the Attendant’s section and powdered her face. She pulled out the meal trolley. Food that had been prepared almost half a day earlier and served with “Made Fresh!” stickers on it. Not that the passengers would know. Their sinuses were clogged and taste buds numbed due to the change in air pressure. She began serving vegetarian and non-vegetarian meals based on passenger request. Sophie was now asleep and her parents took a vegetarian meal each. She lodged the meal trolley in place and picked a handful of bottles to serve water to all those who had summoned her.

The relatively smaller size of the business class meant that Victoria had fewer requests. In a little over an hour, she was back to her station for a brief break. Time passed. Victoria was resting. The flight was now flying over Poland and the dull drone of the engines was faintly audible. She knew that the pilots must have had their meals, the pilot and co-pilot eating different meals to minimize the risk of food poisoning.

Although she knew them both professionally, the pilot was a close friend. They had both started at Malaysia Airlines around the same time and had grown together. He had built a reputation for being a crisis handler. She felt safe traveling in his flight.

Victoria was jolted awake by the sound of crying. Yes, it was Sophie. She was up and for some reason, unhappy. Her parents were trying to pacify her with offers alternating between chocolate and her father’s hair. She preferred the latter at the moment and was channeling her frustration onto it. Her mother feared that if not pacified soon, Sophie was going to make her father bald.

Victoria strode to the seat. The mother looked at her apologetically. The other passengers were beginning to throw disturbed glances in her direction. Some pushed their earplugs deeper inside and tried to get back to sleep. The Senator was smiling cautiously. One of the doctors was looking at Sophie with admiration.

Victoria knew this had to be sorted out fast. She looked at the mother and then at the father. They were trying their best. She went to her cabin and returned with a trinket the airline was selling as a souvenir. She tried to distract Sophie by waving it in front of her face. Sophie took it from her, looked at it closely, and threw it on her father. Obviously, he was responsible for whatever was bothering her. She turned around on her father’s lap, jabbed at the seat in front and started a fresh spurt of crying.

Victoria saw what the problem was. Sophie was pointing to the display. One of the movies on the inflight entertainment was a movie about a baby. The baby on screen was climbing skyscrapers, playing with gorillas, and giving his kidnappers a hard time. And all poor Sophie could do was sit on her mother’s lap and look at it while clouds were speeding past her. No wonder she was agitated. The noise was bothering other passengers. Victoria did not know what to do. She felt the aircraft gently rise. She knew what was happening. The pilot was doing a “Step climb”. He was gaining altitude and flying to thinner airspace in order to save fuel. As the flight burnt more and more fuel and got lighter, it was more economical to fly higher to reduce air resistance. Not many of the passengers would notice or know the importance of it. The passengers here would notice it even less with all their attention now focused on a bawling Sophie.

It was not only the passengers who were ignorant. So was Victoria. She did not know that the flight could not have flown at a lesser altitude even if the pilots had wanted. The flight had entered Ukraine airspace at 32,000 feet and was slowly ascending to 35,000 feet. Since July 14, the airspace above this part of Ukraine was closed below 32,000 feet for all aircraft. The unrest on the ground that necessitated these restrictions made the turbulence of the skies look far less menacing.

Sophie continued to cry completely ignoring all the effort that was on to calm her down. The bright afternoon sun that was making the pilots wear their sunglasses was peeping in through the few open windows of business class. Sophie pointed outside through one of the open windows. Victoria’a attention was drawn to it.

It was then that they all felt it. The aircraft started shaking. The seatbelt sign was back on. Victoria instructed that the passengers return to their seats, and waited for the Captain’s announcement. It came a moment later.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we are now crossing a pocket of turbulence. Please return…”

He never completed that line. The aircraft started shaking more and more violently. It got hotter and hotter. And before any of the passengers could fish out a tissue to wipe their sweat, there was a blinding flash of light and it felt like the aircraft was speared through its abdomen and was being roasted on a coal pit. And all of this occurred within seconds.

The caged air was now rapidly escaping the pressurized cabin through the rear of the aircraft that had been ripped apart. The Captain pleaded for order while his seat struggled to break free. But his voice never left him. The forces of physics conspired with each other to rip and burn the aircraft at the same time. The seatbelts had firmly bound the passengers to their seats. So the air which they had breathed until now, sucked them out with the seats, into its realm.

As she clutched tight onto the row of seats she was standing next to, Victoria felt herself being pulled with it. Reflexively, she pushed her stomach away from the seat and tried to hold onto the walls of the aircraft. It gave her another five seconds. The Senator was long gone. The doctors also departed one after the other. Her hand grip was failing. The last thing Victoria saw was the smile on Sophie’s face as her seat was ripped off its harness. The last thought she had was Sophie would have loved the rollercoaster ride in Kuala Lampur. 

Friendships and Farewells

Farewell, the Greek gift of friendship,
A knife slicing through hearts.
Farewell, a rehearsal, before the final fall,
And journey in the hearse.
The grim reaper’s girdle, thrown upon
Unsuspecting skywalkers, dragging them to earth,
For the reaper to reap his harvest of Time.
For the storm of separation to come by and scatter,
What days of dreams had taken to build.
In the eternally branching Tree of Time,
We lived, as birds on bonding branches.
Friends of a feather, we rejected feathers,
For fear that flying might fall out in farewell.
Ambition, competition and the illusion of success,
Strike us as apples from the tree,
And yet the firm roots of gravity, keep us, strong in memories.

The Uncrowned Son

“Devavrata!”

His tired eyes opened slowly. Normally, he would have just pretended to be asleep or unconscious. But he knew this voice. The only voice that called him by that name anymore. He wondered if he had imagined the voice in his desperation to talk to her. He wanted to think so. As much as he wanted to talk to her, he wished she were not here now.

“Devavrata!”

No. It was not his imagination. She was heading this way. His heart cried out loud. He could handle the pain that was flowing all through his body, but not this. She should not see him in this condition. She may not take it. Ah! Delusions. Mere delusions. He had no idea what was in store.

He tilted his neck painfully in the direction of the voice. A cloud of mist was taking shape as she floated on it towards him. Here was the mother of all rivers, the mother who washed all life forms of their sins. And, his mother too.

“What are you doing here, Devavrata?” she asked quite indignantly.

“Mathey!” he addressed her as he had always done.

“Is this what has become of the mighty warrior, the undefeated bulwark that was supposed to protect Hastinapur?”

He lowered his eyes in shame. Of course. Indifferent as always. There had been times when he had wondered if she was really the one who had given birth to him. But then, she had also wanted to drown him the minute he left her womb. What mother would do that, Karmic calculations be damned? But she had done that. Not once. Not twice. Seven times. He was to have been the eighth.

He wondered if it would have been better to have just gone then? Out of this miserable world back to where he belonged. He was after all, Prabhas, the light of shining dawn. One of the eight Vasus, the elemental gods. Driven by a moment’s greed he had stolen Vashishta’s cow and had been cursed to be born on Earth. The Vasus had entrusted Ganga with the task of giving them birth and quickly ending their mortal lives so they could avoid the misery of mortal living and go back to their world.

But Prabhas had not been so fortunate. His father had stopped Ganga from what he saw as paedocide. And Ganga had taken her eighth child with her. Prabhas had become Devavrata. His mother had taken him to the Preceptors of the Devas and Asuras who taught him the science of politics. In a rare exception, Parasurama had taught a Kshatriya the martial arts. A childhood unparalleled, thought Devavrata.

“But all of that for what?” Ganga interrupted his thoughts. “So you could just throw away what was rightfully yours?”

“Mathey?” Devavrata did not understand her anger. He knew that she had never been the loving mother. She was always the stolid, stoic guardian who wanted him to learn everything that was required for kingship. Hastinapur needed a successor. Pratipa had tweaked the tradition established by the revered Bharata. Instead of choosing the one most worthy as the next ruler, Pratipa had declared that his son Shantanu was the most worthy one. The best way to restore the old tradition without discrediting Shantanu would have been to make his son truly the most worthy one. And Ganga had seen to that. When Devavrata had finished his education, she handed him over to Shantanu informing him that there was none more qualified than Devavrata to become king. He had equal panache for governance and warfare. Hastinapur will remember him as the greatest ruler it had, she told Shantanu.

 Devavrata now remembered that she had not shed a single tear when she parted that day. Despite her cold demeanor, she had been the only family he had had and now she was gone. All through his life, in moments of sadness and anguish, he would go by the riverside and let her waters calm him. He still considered it a soothing experience.

“I wanted this city to realize its true greatness under your rule. I did not want my tardiness in drowning you to lead to your suffering. I ensured that you got the best of education. With your pedigree, you could have had such an exalted life.”

“But did he not?” he asked himself. Did the world not know him to be the finest warrior?  Did the Gods not bless him? Did they not give him the epithet of Bheeshma, the one of terrible vows? Did he not protect the throne of Hastinapur as was his sworn duty? Even when it seemed that the kingdom had no king, did the wolves not stay at bay, because his bow was still strung? Did he not take care of generations of the Kuru household?

“Yes. All that and much more. But you’ve also brought that household to the bloodiest war this country has known. You have led the house to be divided against itself and are responsible for this gory fratricide.”

“Mathey! But I tried everything I could to prevent this!”

“Oh! Don’t give me that. May be your paean writers can gulp that down. Not me. I know the numerous ways in which you have failed this kingdom and its people, Devavrata. When you gave up your inheritance to the throne, not only did you make your father happy, but you also threw away all the efforts I had made, as your mother, to educate you. Of what use was all that training when you were nothing but a caretaker?”

“Did I not have a duty to my father? Do the scriptures not say that? Did my guru Parashurama not do exactly that?”

“Parashurama is a Brahmin. His primary duty is to his household, unlike yours. Your duty was to protect the kingdom and its people, in which you have obviously failed. Just look around you. Does this place look like a kingdom well governed?”

“But I took a vow to serve anyone who sits on the throne after my father. I have merely been true to my word, Mathey!”

“Wasn’t it also part of the vow to ensure the right person sat on the throne?”

“Yes. And I have seen to it that the eldest and most eligible member of the Kuru clan has always occupied the throne. And I have been faithful to that throne.”

“No, you haven’t. If bloodline is the only thing that is important, you know that you’re the last surviving member of the Kuru bloodline. Pandu and Dhritarashtra carry Satyavati’s bloodline through Vyasa, not Kuru’s. But that is irrelevant. Your illustrious ancestor, Bharata, declared that bloodline was of no importance. He did not crown any of his nine sons as he believed that they were not eligible to rule. He considered it a crime against his people if he foisted on them a ruler merely based on lineage. But you, Devavrata, have failed him too. What if your father’s sons died without an heir? Even despite your pompous promise to not ascend the throne, Hastinapur was not devoid of brave, wise men who could have become rulers. Your duty as a caretaker to the throne would have been to advise anyone who was king, not to ensure that a particular family continued to rule.”

“But I made a promise to that fisherman, Satyavati’s father that her family would rule. How could I not keep my word?”

“Did you not make a promise to the people of Hastinapur that you would protect their interests? What is a promise to one man worth, if you reneged on a promise made to the entire rajya? You may have done the right thing by stopping the blind Dhritarashtra from becoming king. But what of Pandu? Did you not know that he was weak of heart and would never survive long enough? Why did you reject the wise Vidura? Because he was born to a maid? Well, Devavrata, Bharata would hang his head in shame if he was there. He crowned a commoner as his successor for the simple reason that the boy was brave and righteous. And did you think that the kingdom would praise you as the true successor to the noble Bharata? Ah! What vanity, Devavrata!”

At this, Devavrata said nothing. He knew what she said was right. He had been too loyal to the family and forgotten about the welfare of the state. He hung his head in shame.

 

But Ganga had no intention to stop. “What happened to your sense of duty when the kingdom was divided into two between brothers? Where were you when a ruler was gambling away his kingdom and people as if they were all his?  Should you not have intervened and said that as a ruler, Yudhishtra was the protector of his people and not the owner? Ignore the fact that Draupadi was the kula vadhu. Consider her to be an ordinary citizen. Where was your duty to Hastinapur when she was harassed in the open court? And what if she was gambled away by her husband? Were you not obliged as the protector to the throne to prevent its reputation from being tainted? And here. This war. Would Duryodhana have had the heart to fight it if you had decided that the best interests of the rajya lay in Yudhishtira becoming the ruler? And what did you do? Make another pompous oath. That you will kill ten thousand soldiers a day but will not kill the Pandavas. What kind of loyalty is that? No, Devavrata. Look around you. This war won’t last long. I don’t have to tell you how it is going to end. You know it by now. You have been disloyal to everyone. You have been disloyal to Dhritarashtra by not stopping his son from this war. You have been disloyal to Duryodhana in revealing to the Pandavas the means to defeat you.  And most of all, you have been disloyal to the people of this great rajya. How many of them have fallen on this battlefield? Hear, Devavrata. Hear. Hear the voices that cry out in pain as vultures and hyenas strip the living flesh from their dying bodies. Hear the earth grumble like a hungry stomach as it digests the sins of those that have fallen. And even before this stops, Devavrata, you will hear the wails of the womensfolk from the city. It will no longer be Hastinapur, Devavrata. The city of elephants is dead. It is merely the city of the widows and the orphaned. The happiness you brought your father and the blessings he gave you may very well take you back home to the Vasus. But remember, Devavrata. You will not be forgiven. Do not think that your deeds will bring you respect and glory. If you wish to use the remainder of your miserable life to atone for your sins, I suggest you start now.”

Saying thus, she seemingly disappeared in the shadows of the night. Devavrata could not close his eyes. He could hear the cries of fallen soldiers, at least ten thousand fallen at his own hands. He had indeed failed them. He thought he saw the moon and the stars hide themselves behind the clouds. They did not want to taint themselves by seeing him. The soil was considering continuing its support to him. To him, it seemed that even the arrows that passed through his body were trying hard to extricate themselves from him. And for the first time in his long life, Devavrata, Bheeshma of the terrible vows, cried.