snapshots of my imagination

in between life, a whole lot of different things happen. some good, some less good, some fun, some more fictitious than others; all along a journey of volition, compunction or coercion.

but many of life’s most intriguing punctuations are those momentary encounters; fleeting exchanges or magical occasions which our imagination will not even invent. they happen, and when they are past we cannot be certain of their veracity.

it was warm, closer to sweltering, well past the noon hour and the sun was at its highest summer ferocity. the locals had done what locals do: retired for a regenerative siesta. dogs searched out sparse patches of shelter as the insane roamed the streets.

i was alone in the celestial gardens and fountains and trees and shade of a city as old as caesar, and i was as far from home as i was faint with thirst.

at that moment, a little boy and his sister appeared with a glass of ice cold water; they had been watching me. they were as beautiful as the water was pure.

they laughed with me, and disappeared. but not before they left with me with a smile to remember forever. it was not an apparition, my thirst had evaporated.

photograph: a boy & his sister. parque maria luisa, sevilla, spain, july, 1984.

give us this day our daily bread... or roti

india is many things to many people. countless wisdom mongers and scholars have helped paint the indian canvass in myriad hues to varying degrees of usefulness: the mystical; the magical; the geological; the anthropological; the incomprehensible; the theatrical and tantric; the scatological; and the apparent primordial seduction and profundity of it all. and so on, and so forth.

but, if there’s anything that really connects the dots, it has be the subcontinentals’ entrepreneurial free spirit fused with an insatiable appetite. indians love their food almost as much as their unrepressed urge to express an opinion. indians also love to turn a trick for a quick buck. nothing wrong with this at all; food and commerce, the twin pillars of modern civilization.

india is a lot of people. over a billion plus of them. and generally speaking, most of them are doing something or going somewhere, purposefully or otherwise, most of the time. an indian’s average day is punctuated by rote, ritual and routine. they are veritable creatures of instinctive habit, productively or otherwise.

but contrary to popular belief, indians are also a disciplined lot, focused and determined. they are clear about wanting to get some place and are constantly on the move. unfortunately, their karmic induced life-journeys have many pot holes, temptations, and real or imagined distractions. the seductive lure of a roadside chai and a love of food begs an opportunity to halt and engage in idle chat while gratifying the rumbling stomach and quenching an endless thirst.

at the lowest rungs of the gastronomical chain are the smallest units of culinary service providers. men on bicycles with flimsy plastic cup-lets offering syrupy sweet tea, flavored with a hint of cardamom from a stainless steel dispenser strapped to the rear of his vehicle. or, a vendor frying savories in a vat of boiling oil on a street corner under a tree. this is micro entrepreneurship at it’s smallest; human productivity and service at its best.

a sickle, a few straws and a mobile push cart is all the equipment needed by an ingenious vendor of tender coconuts. the product is as refreshing as it is safe as it is therapeutic. from all manner of rudimentary mobile sustenance, subsequent rungs of food chain offerings take on a look of greater permanence: small stalls one stage below the culinary evolutionary stepping stone to what we now call a restaurant.

these are the way stations of an indian life, indispensable to an endless cycle of life and rebirth and frustratingly disruptive to an organized mind with defined goals and objectives.

the only paradox i see in this equation is the marriage of unfettered risk with the reinforcement of the familiar: indians are most willing to take a punt on making a buck; yet, are notoriously unadventurous eaters.

photographs: the ubiquitous fixed & mobile food stalls and non-alcoholic cool bars which predominate the landscape of any indian city's thoroughfares. TTK road, chennai, the erstwhile madras, india, august 13th, 2009.