The Minutes of a Normal Day

At the string of 8:50 am ,  I close my wardrobes, put the plates into the dishwasher , kiss my son , and put a long step out of the half open door heading to towards west of my apartment. The station crowded with innumerable heads of the The Homo sapiens la mongolians.

At the entrance of the station, there are sounds of announcements and beep sounds of the ticket monitor .Bip, Bip , Bip and in I go, facing the new week in the so called the costliest Cosmopol which is my advised land of Karma. The Tokyo.

On behalf of myself , let me remind you that the daily routine of commuting is a cumbersome herculean task. Of passing across doors that is bound to shut behind , when your legs are not yet in. The women who have long trails of hair , may I remember you to fold them well plaited and put them across your breast . The next station reaches in another 8 minutes and there is no guarantee to your hair. Obviously neither to your leg.

Now the scenes within a well closed air-conditioned compartment is the best part of it. On a train ride from the station Kawasaki to Shinagawa that closes down in 8 minutes. The countless men and women hanging down on hand rails. Some sleeping on the limited number of chairs available lest to the envy of the one's who are standing clinging to the rails. Some of them are so clean and dressed in tight business suits, some so shabbily and gaudily dressed. Some looking like ramp models who just walked into the train directly from the ramp. And some like us, who despite our looks and good attitudes are always sneered upon.

Summers turns out to be severest. An average mongolian or an average dravidian heights to 170 cms in men and atleast 154 cms in women. The desperate author of this content like me who does not go beyond 150 cms from ground parralels to the underarm sweat glands of the average men and women  to the nose on my face. Of women who turn their back towards me , beware of your lustrous and shining hair in summer and those costly fur coats in winter , lest if they get into my nose can generate a sneeze which is far more powerful and can dampen those well-set hair with umpteen bacterias. Back in India we still have women oiling their hairs so that not a single strand is out from the bunch. And hairs sometimes trails down to touch the back. Gosh! The feminity of it. I wish I was a man to admire it.

Now, the turmoil when the station is reached. The sneered upon are stamped upon, the respected are queued by. The late goers behave like marathon runners.There are steps and there are escalators. Let me point it out the readers here that I was bought up in a land where there were not much bigger malls. The shops we buy from in our hometown are all run by small business men who run their own shops for supporting their own family. For a small towner like me who come from
humble landscapes but well-to-do family, escalator is like a step to heaven or rather hell was it ? .

Remember the Tom and Jerry episode, when Tom dreams of climbing an escalator to
heaven and runs desperately down the stairs to earth to escape. That was my first encounter with an escalator untill after a few years I saw them in a mall in the country where my dad was employed. My brother wanted to enter the mall which my dad could not afford to, only to climb the escalators.
And his wish was accepted. I and mother waited outside the mall comteplating complaining arabs, when my dad and brother went up and down the escalators just enough to satisfy my younger siblings baby soul.

Twenty minutes or lesser , the time which takes for me to commute from home to my workplace where I spend the largest part of my active day. On summers when trinklets of sweat trail down, the sip of green tea or pocari sweat does wonders. Yet nothing can compete the fair play which chaaya with sharkara uperi does to my body.

The competence of the sweet lime with ginger against pocari sweat is not a fair game either. The latter fails , and the former succeeds with a bitter sneer of success and the smile of achievement is the motivated curve of happiness on my face.

The tatter and batter of the morning commute again begins at five in the evening and again the next day and it will continue forever.What I will churn during my lifetime will be the effect of the energy endorsed from my fellow community and it will be my pleasure to give unto them the same.

Kani Kanum Neram .... Vishu Kani

Kani Kanum Neram Kamalanethrante....

[Song By Chitra - From the album Kannanam Unni]


This song brings me those nostalgic New year mornings of my childhood when my mom used to wake me up saying "No No Dont open your eyes " and would cover my eyes with her hands. The first sight of the day would be the beautiful Vishu Kani seen early in the morning a few minutes before the Sun God would be awake in our part of the world.

[Vishu Kani Video 2008 - April 14th]




The brightly decorated Pooja room would be lit up by Nilavilakku , the incense of Agarbatis and Karpooram lingering in the air. Smell of fresh fruits, raw rice and sandal wood paste in rose water. The glitter of gold, the purity of the brand new handwoven golden lined cotton Veshti and Mundu and above all the mighty prescence of Lord Krishna. All of them is a treat to the eyes and a good omen to begin a forthcoming New Year full of surprises.

One lesson of life from the stranger on the platform

2004 June 1st One strange morning with a stranger on the platform.

And it goes like this ........



Today as a day it was a glum, dull day. In the morning I felt a foul spirit rise within me as I woke up. Despite having slept sound. I felt that the day is not mine. A dread lay before me, of what I cannot think nor decide. The previous day I had seen a nightmare, a wild one, the kind I often used to see when I was a child when I slept alone. Of someone being killed, of misery and frightening deceit. Of hideous happenings, of running wild to save myself from being tortured．But there I was not grown up. I was still a child, a child quite lonely, scared of darkness, companionless．I now remember why I loved Jane Eyre the novel so much when I read it at the age of 10 or 12. Because I thought I was much like the character, lonely and desolate. But when I grew up to youth, I forgot the story but remembered that it was the best novel I read. Probably at that time I got only a faint idea of the outline of the novel because I was too young to analyze and understand the character. Now I understand. And as wise as I am I wished to overcome the pressures and undefined thoughts and nightmares out of my day to make it as pleasant as I can.

I read my novel without speech or much of interruption from his side．Yet I know that certain times if he lets me read a book peacefully its not because he does not have anything to converse with me, its because there are weird discussions going on within his brain, of varied topics, of mixed emotions, of subjects that makes little or no sense to him, of things he does not understand or wants to accomplish. Of brain waves that are trying to reach a peak that it cannot reach, of things he would like to tell me, of opinions that he would or have liked to raise. But speech falters, communication lags and what has to be told is not often told but confusions added to the listener. So at such times he never spoke but spoke to himself. And remained silent dissolved in his own thoughts of analysis where he had power and he was the master. I knew this but most often it annoyed me because it thwarted my lively spirit and made me dull and lonely.

Now all this preface of feelings and emotions and nightmares and daydreams is not all that I have to talk about. But this preface was important because I analyzed these things most often, I understood the state of affairs and I accepted it the way it is. Some times with deep dissatisfaction, some times with a state of no-opinion. I regretted the inner struggle. I ascertained that it is female nature and sometimes smiled myself at the domestic complaints that I often make. When such matters passed my mind and on such a day did this incident happen.

We were early that day for work and I as I mentioned was in a foul mood. I saw he looked at me then and there to start a conversation but I was busy reading, reading in the bus, and reading on the platform. And abruptly an old lady interrupted the scene by asking if we know her native language. When we said yes she surprised us even more by asking him if he is fine. Both of us surprised as we were just assumed that she was a garrulous lady trying to start a conversation with foreigners. But she enquired about his health and told him that he looks a little unhealthy. She then continued talking about things, something about, things are now no more beautiful in Japan, the war has destroyed it all and the like. We half understood her. Then she noticed the tilak on his head and asked if we were Indians. When we said yes she offered a mint packet from her bag. She offered it to me. Generally I am a kind of a person who would have taken it known for the fact that we were not in strange place but in a public place with this lady and she seemed quite harmless. But strangely I refused saying no thanks but politely and told her that we do not eat mint. She looked a little offended for us to refuse what she offered and slightly withdrew herself. We lied that it is forbidden for us to eat mint and we apologized. She went back to her seat excusing herself. After about 10 seconds when we decided that she must be either too garrulous or may be insane. She once again presented herself before us and showed her accessory attached to her purse. It was a Japanese cat figurine. I understood she was trying to amuse us to bring the cheeriness back to our face which though I tried but would not appear on my face today. She again returned back to her chair pledging that this is going to be all. She is no more going to disturb us anymore. She excused and she left, bowing in courtesy. She must have been old lady but well dressed more precisely to say overdressed. As I little noticed though of what she wore but I saw she wore a bonnet and wore dark red lipstick. Again about 5 seconds she returned back to us. She came towards me and told me I am kind of a person who likes to learn. I thought I misunderstood her saying that she assumed I am a college student. So I refused and said no I am not. Probably she got a hint that we do not understand her language well.
About then the red-train had come and she jogged towards her chair quickly to collect her umbrella. She got in along with us into the train. And speaking to me she told (again we understood only partially) that he is a kind of a person who strives hard, works hard but may be not able to produce the desired results but he still strives hard. She again spoke of beautiful things saying that there are very little beautiful things in the world nowadays. It is important for a man to be happy to be healthy. Men and women of the world try to buy beautiful things to keep them happy. Through material possessions they try to make themselves happy and she mocked them. For a man who has to be happy has to see beautiful things everyday. She stated that I am a beautiful girl and I should remain so to keep him pleasant. As he cannot be healthy and happy if don’t live to exist, an effort is required from my part so to keep myself happy and healthy.　We soon arrived the station and departed from her saying good bye. Before we left her she apologized for being too talkative as she is an old soul aged 56. We departed and I reflected. It was as though she knew what was going on in our minds before she came to us, as if she read our minds. She was there to remove our stiffness and relax our souls to render more attention, care and love to each other. I shivered as I shiver when I pray to God, at the thought of being watched by the divine soul not rendering our duties to the right direction. She sent me thoughts that felt she was meant to relieve us of our impressions, the wrong impressions of each other. To seek love and tenderness in each other and remove the drops of hatred that fills our lungs. It may one day choke us out. And HE saved us or at least tried to save us and averted us to the right paths.