Visions around me

Mandovi serenely flowing

A hoary tree at Campal

A wee sun bird toiling at its nest (Spotted outside my window in my garden)

Three different pictures taken at different places make me come alive with the vision that surrounds and uplifts me. I feel glad to be able to partake in the beauty that without any effort is presented to my sight.

Storing beauty

To what length would one go for storing beauty. By beauty I mean a beautiful sight which one can pass by for a few minutes, a beauty that is literally fleeting for one cannot afford the time and speed, a beauty that is beyond words . . .

Storing beauty for later use

When my friend Gitanjali told me not to miss the Dudhsagar Falls en-route to Goa while on the Chennai Vasco Express, I was elated. She told me that the train would pass by the Falls somewhere around 10 o'clock in the morning. My husband and I took our places near the door at around 9. 15 am. Why you would wonder. If one has to store beauty, one has to have a firm place (before everyone else comes and occupies the narrow entry!). And what did we do? Every sight that the train passed by was splendid. There was even a station called Castlerock which sounded very quaint and English, I thought. The station itself was a page out of misty  and dewy vision. The place was very cool and green and a poet would have strung beautiful verse almost after sighting that wee station. From the station onwards, there were many tiny falls, tunnels and lovely landscapes at regular intervals.

By the time the train pulled out of Castlerock, people steadily started congregating near the doors of the train. One peek outside revealed cameras in many forms - mobiles, digital, SLRs, DSLRs and so on. By then we were rooted to that entrance for almost two hours. Our legs were aching and so were our hands. People were positioned (and so were we), carefully holding on to the rails and balancing so that they wouldn't slip out of the train. Many tried to stand very close to us putting us in peril of losing balance. Some smart charlies also tried to place their hands with cameras on our shoulders.

Finally the much awaited water body appeared in full form and beauty. Cameras clicked, interjections uttered and breaths still . . . Frantically beauty was being stored in memories and cameras. How long can one store beauty, I wondered - in the mind as well as the picture. And how does beauty work within us, I reflected. Can I see water the same way again after Dudhsagar or can I see dudh (milk) in the same manner without going back to those few minutes of witnessing that powerful force falling from a great height. What would people standing beside me remember Dudhsagar long after they have uploaded the pictures on facebook and showed them glowing with pride to their friends and relatives. Would they still be amazed at the Falls when they travel the same route or would they brush past the falls and utter, 'Ah, I saw it the last time I passed by. Nothing more' or would they stand rooted like the first time and exclaim cliched interjections. Would they suffer the pain and challenge patience again. Not quite. Would I? Of course. Over and over the same scene provides different perspectives and each time we are a different being. Right? The Susan of today will not be the one of yesterday or tomorrow.

As I write this post, the beautiful pitter-patter of the rain coerces me to complete this post and hurry to the window. Glad to be writing again after a month.

Love and beauty to you, dear readers. Until the next time - smile.

What have you been doing lately?

Images: The blogger's own

Clothes, shame and civilisation

While reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude, the character of Remedios the Beauty, had always intrigued and fascinated me. Despite the fact that in the novel, she is considered as someone who is not mentally stable, her rejection of clothes and beauty had always remained in my mind. She is a very beautiful girl and many men in the novel are absolutely smitten by her. But she has no sense of all that. She is always in her own make-belief world.

Clothes and beauty, many times go hand-in-hand. This had been the truth for women alone but now even men are catching up with it. I vividly remember one scene where Remedios was bathing and a man breaks the tiles and jumps into the bathroom. Remedios is quite unshaken by him and softly inquires whether he had hurt himself. She is unaware of her nakedness and shame. I thought that was wonderful. To be in a state where nothing matters.

I think civilisation's greatest invention was clothes and now this is infused with brands and other things. The western civilisation has contributed so much to this facade of hiding beauty and showing bits and pieces of it to titillate the human senses. If all of us were like Remedios it would have made things simple, I reckon.

Clevage, legs -- all flesh and parts of the body are elevated to soaring levels by media and fashion moguls. Women in India, for a long time never wore any upper garment. It was not shameful. It was the culture. This changed after missionaries started coming and talking of sin. For many the ONLY sin is that which concerns the body. True. But I feel so much space is devoted to the body, again just flesh.

The concept of shame which started in Eden has developed zillion-fold today. I am no spokesperson for the nudists but I see that as a movement like many others. And I know that it will never succeed as long as the media and fashion houses are thriving. Isn't there something higher which could occupy our present-world other than clothes and shame.

I guess I am thinking too much and rambling. If you can build coherence, blessed are you :)

Image courtesy: Internet