Diwali and My Sweet Lord

Its been a fortnight since Diwali and even by Indian standards of punctuality, I'm fashionably late in writing about it. Yet I will do it in a bid to satisfy the insatiable demand of my enthralled readers. After the 'White Diwalis' in Connecticut in the last two years, I was determined to make this one in London count. Before I could place my shameless self-invitation phone calls to the relatives I had unearthed, manna dropped from the heaven above. Pradeep Uncle and Meera Aunty requested the pleasure of my august company for the festival. It is noteworthy that Pradeep Uncle is a doctor by profession but because of his interdisciplinary knowledge and his constant claims to lack of recognition, has been gifted a car with the number plate VIDWAN (Knowledgable one) by his gracious wife. Of couse, she herself can make a legitimate claim to the car itself, being a professor of Development Economics at University of London.

After long discussions ranging from the distinction between spirituality and religiosity, Amartya Sen and Meghnad Desai's views (thats the kind of exciting stuff Development Economists' discuss!), the differences between US and UK, we got down to the business of the day - thanking Goddess Laxmi for her magnamity (American Express giving me a credit definitely counts). With divinity satisfied, it was time for us mortals to feed ourselved. Apart from the scrumptious dinner on the table, what I was looking forward to were the roshogollas. Now these were the authentic ones which I had 'fished out' - from Brick Lane (subject of the the Monica Ali novel by the same name), a street famous for its Bangladeshi restaurants and fortutiously located 2 blocks from my residence. A Bihari belch later, we got to my favourite bit of the evening - lighting the rockets and bombs after 3 years. Of course, so much as uttering those words would probably land you at Guantanamo Bay if you're in the US, explaining why yours truly was deprived of 'having a blast' during those Diwalis. For the environmentalists out there, it would be comforting to know that these fireworks were remarkably less polluting than our Indian variety. Before you ask, they were Chinese.

After a contended nights' sleep, and a round of garden cricket with the other Apratim (son of Pradeep Uncle and Meera Aunty), we went to this ISKON temple called Bhaktivedanta Manor today morning. The bizzare juxtaposition in its name is explained by the fact that this was a manor owned by George Harrison of the Beatles' fame. After his dabblings with the Sitar, Pt Ravi Shankar, Krishna and everything Indian, he decided to donate this sprawling property to the ISKON group. The fields on either side of the pathway leading to the temple is populated by cows idly grazing about without a care in the world. In a true homage to Krishna and the Yadav clan, the same cows are milked for the prashad given out at the temple. The temple itself is a well organised affair with many Gujarati women voluntarily contributing their cooking skills in the preparation of food given to everyone. I'm not a man given to hyperbole in matters related to food, yet I have to recommend this food to any hungry college students out there. Like all good blog entries end, I found myself resolutely hitting the road to home after the hearty meal. Or wait, there is an epilogue to the story: I found this George Harrison song dedicated to Krishna called 'My Sweet Lord' with pretty corny lyrics - Give it a hear if you can...

http://www.krishnatemple.com/manor/harrison.shtm

Sack Parliament Protest

Sunday night, my flatmate and I were cleaning dishes when I suddenly noticed a red cup with Karl Marx's visage printed on it. "Brendan, are you a Marxist?", I quizzed him. Brendan, wearing a Rage Against the Machine t-shirt replied, "No mate, but I am sort of radical - interested in the revolution, you know. In fact, if you are as well, come by ... there is this huge protest outside the Parliament tomorrow." Now, being the sort who labels his political views on Facebook as Left-liberal, I decided it was my primary duty to protest. But protest what, I quietly asked him. "The War, old chap, what else?" pat came Brendan's reply.

So there I was, protesting outside the British Parliament the next day, well attired for the occasion in a Che Guevara t-shirt (Lets not get into the irony of commodification of the poor guy as part of capitalist production) with Brendan in tow. Correction, we were watching the protest because we arrived late and this whole demonstration was already encircled by the police. Now, I must mention here that there seemed to be five times the number of fluorescent jacket wearing policemen than punks with fluorescent colored hair engaging in the protest. The situation's seriousness was done no favours by Chinese tourists who were merrily clicking away pictures on their mobile phones, digital cameras and whatever new Chinese device which takes pictures. Yet, in the midst of all this absurdity which would have done Beckett and Camus proud, was some startling imagery. Baby clothes with blood stains on them hung on a line. A black man covered in a black sheet, with his duct tape sealing his mouth. A huge banner which said, "100,000 Iraqis murdered by us" (or US, if you're virulently anti-American). And an Iraqi man speaking to those who cared to listen about how his country had been devastated.

Yes, this was laughable compared to the crowd of a million which took to the London streets on 16 February, 2003 with slogans like 'Make Tea, Not War'. But this was also a sheer indictment of how run-of-the-mill, mundane and normal the War has become. The death toll in Iraq, Darfur and Lebanon competes (and often loses out) for inch and eyeball space with stock market indices on TV news channels. But who cares - leave it to seminars on World Peace in Washington to solve our problems. Maybe the 40 odd teenagers protesting outside the British parliament would not solve the world's protracted conflicts, but at least they remind us that there is something drastically wronf with it. While the rest of us stand outside the circle (literally and metaphorically) and write blog entries about them.

Photographs: http://www.flickr.com/photos/james_2005/265301770/in/set-72157594320314605/

Sunday Bazaar at Liverpool Street

So this Sunday morning, I was taking a random stroll down Bishopsgate. I would love to call it a morning jog, but self deception has its limits and in this particular activity, very precisely mathematical speed limits within which my locomotion did not qualify. Not to digress further (slightly ironic - that phrase - since I am about to describe its exact opposite), I spotted what looked like a motley cluster of stalls in the normally staid and dignified Middlesex Street. Strolling towards the stalls, my ears began to detect the intoxicating strains of regga combining with boisterous beats of Bhangra (I wonder if the mix has been tried at any nightclub yet). Intrigued, I delved further into a concentration of humanity (that motley cluster bit was just my foggy morning vision I suppose) comparable to the stifling crowds in the bylanes of Chandni Chowk. The cause for such dhakkam - dhukki soon became obvious - a temporary Sunday haat had magically sprouted on the same street which was the preserve of bored investment bankers in dark suits, downing pints in bars which lined the street, every other day of the week.

Strangely enough, the same dark suits were being sold for the price of those same pints in front of the same bars today! Okay, the bit about the same price as pints was my imagination - but you get the idea. Salesmen advertising consisted of nuggets like, "Suits for 10 pounds, suits for 10 pounds...This is not the stuff you get from India and China. This is designer stuff, straight from Bangladesh!". Moving further, I realised there were shirts, jeans, kurtis, skirts, shoes, belts, football jerseys, London memorabilia, jewellery, electronics, mobile phones, bed sheets - all up for sale at a small fraction of the loot which is branded 'Sale' at Marks & Spencer. Not to mention the atmosphere of this global marketplace - Rastafarian types exhibiting their eponymous hats under a huge cannabis poster, Egyptian movie DVDs being sold under the watchful gaze of a stern looking Nasser portrait, Jodhpuri chappals being haggled for alongside Italian shoes, Gujarati lehengas being sold cheek to jowl with bohemian skirts. If anything deserves that hackneyed term, 'free market', this was it. And I was loving it! (contrary to what perceptive readers might believe, that last bit is not an example of subliminal advertising for a certain food corporation which I will henceforth refer to as McShit).

At the end of a good two hours and 2 pounds spent in the Bazaar (for those wondering, I bought a shirt which said "When I read about the evils of drinking, I stopped ... reading!"). Realising that morning had glided into noon, I decided that it was high time I started my assignment from the spectacularly hair-raising subject of Econometrics. Bidding good-bye (a temporary one, that is - I'm sure I'll be there next week), I trudged off towards my Hall thinking about a potential correlation between jogging and shopping...

London Diaries

Bumming around has an uncanny knack of popping existentialist questions in your head - After wading in the sublime, Who am I? Does my Life have any meaning? I soon found myself gasping for breath with the inane, Will I get into grad school? Do I know if I want to go to grad school? Do I know what I do know is not incorrect information? I decided there have to be better time-killing methods than this. Then it flashed across my mind - my BLOG!!! It has been a while since I satiated the desires of its readers - at last count, it consisted of a bored yours truly - with my profound insights on life, the universe and everything else. So here it is, a revamped avtar which shall document my meaningless meanderings through the streets of London...