We need to talk about: Kabir Singh

I have a confession to make. When I first saw the trailer for Kabir Singh a couple of months ago, a part of me was looking forward to watching it. It looked gritty; had a tortured, self-obsessed character as the main protagonist, and it was being played by Shahid Kapoor- an actor whose body of work has not been as lame as that of your average Bollywood star. 

And then I watched it. 

I was first horrified by it, and then nauseated by the actor and director's attempts to justify it. Nothing they say in its defense can take away from the fact that to my mind this film is (spoiler alert!) unmitigated trash. 

Never mind the fact that it is entirely superfluous (it's common knowledge by now that the film is a frame by frame replica of the original Telugu version); what's truly devastating about it is that if someone were to hypothetically set out to intentionally make the worst possible film for women in our country at this point in our history- Kabir Singh might be it. 

That might sound needlessly hyperbolic, but let's be clear: India in 2019 is not exactly one of the best places for a woman to be. We seemingly reached a nadir in 2012 with Nirbhaya, and last year we topped a global ranking of most dangerous countries for women. Just this month, the Supreme Court of India refused to entertain a plea to make marital rape grounds for divorce. 

On the other hand, in 2018 the #MeToo movement arrived in India and took some powerful men at least a few notches down if not all the way; in Kerala, millions of women stood in solidarity for gender equality forming a “women’s wall” in the wake of the controversy at Sabirimala. There was/is still a long, long way to go, but things appeared to be slowly inching in the right direction. 

And then came Kabir Singh. 

In Indian cinema in general the hero / villain is very much a binary without much room for nuance. Given this, and the fact that the lines between reel and real are notoriously blurry, and the fact that we have a dearth of male role models, and the fact that Shahid is a popular and relatable star, was this film really necessary? 

The answer from those responsible for this monstrosity will be a resounding yes; the film after all has made 300 crores and counting. What may be less easy to count, however, is the number of times the misogyny, delinquency and toxic masculinity being normalised in this film will play a part in everyday acts of violence against women. 

And then there's Shahid Kapoor himself. I always thought that as most artists got older, they made artistic choices that reflected their own growth as individuals. I also, perhaps naively, thought the better ones among them would make art that was a response of some kind to the state of the world around them. 

If Kabir Singh is such a response, it is entirely the wrong one. As a young father to a little girl, would Kapoor be happy for her to be wooed in a few years' time by the kind of man he's immortalized with such panache? I dare say he's significantly increased the odds. 

Bollywood is - and always will be - a source of magic and comfort, and even this year there are plenty of other movies which tell the stories of ordinary men and women- stories that will fill your heart with pride and hope and optimism. India is full of everyday heroes, and Anand Kumar in Super 30 is just one of them.  
But Kabir Singh is one hero India didn't ask for and shouldn't have got.

We need to talk about: Kane Williamson

So much has been written about the New Zealand cricket captain in the aftermath of one of the most dramatic cup finals the sport has ever produced. He's been praised for his calmness under pressure, his grace in defeat and for basically being a near-perfect specimen of homo sapien. 

All of which makes me wonder what might have happened had he walked when he nicked the ball to the keeper in a crucial game against South Africa? Surely then he would have been elevated to the pantheon of the cricketing gods, seated on the left side of Bradman (Sachin’s on the right, obvs) with his blue eyes, immaculate beard and beatific smile? 

But Williamson didn’t walk, and instead went on to score a century and win a key game. And this is probably a very good thing, because it proves he is as human as the rest of us. 

There's no doubt he's a fine leader; and the way he goes about his business, both on the field and off it, suggests that he's a thoroughly decent man. But when he spoke about fine margins that led to their loss in the finals, did he also recall the extra fielder outside the circle when Dhoni was on strike in the semi? 

Admittedly, the manner of their finals defeat (if indeed it can be called defeat) was desperately unlucky. But given their overall performance throughout the tournament, Williamson will likely admit that they were also pretty lucky to have been in the final at all. 

This was a world cup of so many twists of fate - those pesky fine margins again - Brathwaite going for six with a run required just as he did three years ago but this time falling short; Stokes putting those demons of three years ago behind him and finally winning a cup; Guptill breaking India’s hearts by running out Dhoni in the semis only to be run out himself in the final; Dhoni trying valiantly to recreate the glory of 2011 but finding only mortality instead. 

And in the middle of the melee on that singularly dramatic summer evening at Lord's, Williamson stood alone. He looked shell-shocked, but writ across his face was also an acceptance that in sport, just as in life, you win some and you lose some. 

Professional sportsmen and women know this better than most, but it’s a lesson all of us would do well to remember.

A few years ago I was driving on a highway at night in pouring rain when I realised that one of my indicator lamps had blown. Since the driving conditions were pretty poor, I pulled up into the hard shoulder and called roadside assistance. 

About 20 mins later, there was a knock on my window from a mechanic in the familiar high-vis jacket. By this time, the rain had intensified and I could barely make out his face until I stepped out of the car. My only protection against the rain was a light jacket which was clearly not up to the task, so before saying anything else he ran into his van and got an extra jacket. He then handed it to me, shook my hand and said with a smile- Hi, I’m Carl. let's get your indicator fixed, shall we? 

After a few minutes of checking the fuses and wires, he'd figured out the fault but a new bulb was needed. Luckily, he had one. A few more minutes of opening up the casing, fiddling with screws, etc etc, and then he called me over to where he was standing and asked me to hold on to the bulb. 

"Let's do this together!", he said excitedly, and so as he held the casing over the socket to prevent it getting wet, I pushed the bulb in while simultaneously thinking that nobody should be this upbeat when getting soaked by the side of the road at 11 pm. 

“You see!” he exclaimed, as the bulb sparked to life and illuminated the drops of water on his glasses. 
“More hands make light work.”

Even though I haven't made any specific new year's resolutions to curb my smartphone addiction, the other day I had a vision of what life could be like if I did. 

It started out with what I thought was going to be a 10 min trip to the bike shop for a minor repair. Unfortunately, while it was only a few minutes worth of work, there were a few people ahead of me in the queue and it would be about 30 minutes before I could come back and pick it up. 

As I wandered around, I suddenly and unexpectedly found myself in McDonalds ordering chicken nuggets and apple pie (no idea how that happened). I printed out my receipt from the self-service machine and walked up to the counter to join the queue for collection, and while doing so I found myself involuntarily reaching into my jacket pocket for my phone. 

Firstly, I was surprised by how disappointed I was to find out it wasn't there. Secondly, I didn't know what to do with myself. 

After about 2-3 minutes of staring at the screen for my number to appear, I looked around the restaurant. It was a Saturday morning and the place was teeming with people of all ages. A little boy was running between the tables chasing a balloon, while people in their seats playfully punched it just out of his reach. A supervisor was accompanying a new employee out of the kitchen to one of the tills so she could order a meal to eat on her break. The young girl held up her new staff card and pointed up at the menu screen as she made her selection, all the while doing a little dance out of the sheer excitement of it all. 

Meanwhile, my order number finally appeared and I walked to the counter, only to be told the nuggets would be another 10 mins. So back I went to my corner, and watched as a grandfather and grandson collected their trays and shuffled slowly together to a corner booth where the grandmother was waiting with a big smile on her face. 

As I stood there, I realised if I had my phone I may have learned more more about Trump's government shutdown, the latest chapter in the ongoing Brexit saga, and Samsung’s latest folding screen, but I wouldn't have noticed any of the things actually happening around me. Had I really become of one of those people- chasing dopamine hits from notifications, alerts and viral ephemera while the magic of everyday life unfolded quietly around me? 

In the end, I got my nuggets and pie and both were worth the wait. As an added bonus, I got a couple of extra nuggets: officially because I had to wait, but I suspect the fact that I was just standing there, phoneless and looking like a lost puppy, might have had something to do with it... 

Nuggets or no nuggets, maybe it’s time for me to get smarter and my phone to get dumber?

The road through the forest stretches out seemingly into infinity. Each step takes you closer to the end and simultaneously further from home. 

Perhaps this is the beautiful contradiction of running; it's liberating and debilitating all at once. You run TOWARDS but you also run AWAY. 

From what? Fear? Regret? Perhaps also the fleeting transience of it all; a sense that a day will come, sooner than you think, when you finally run out of road? 

****

The sun streams through the tops of trees, each shaft creating a pool of light where it makes contact with the ground. At one point along the way, from a small makeshift hut in a clearing, there is always the smell of burning wood; and I'm instantly transported to another time and place: A very specific place from my childhood, where a grandmother busies herself around a wood burning stove. 

Amazing how just a smell can drag out specific scenes from long-forgotten vaults full of uncomplicated memories.

 ****

Perhaps it all starts as a search for a story. But sometimes the search itself becomes a story. Maybe it is always the greatest story of all; the quest for meaning. The greatest reward lies in the struggle to understand. 

**** 

Regardless of the route, the mind always encounters people, places and sounds it loves. It's no different for me; even though music streams through my headphones, the real soundtrack consists of other more familiar sounds: a son's innocent laughter, a wife's gentle encouragement, a mother's comforting voice. 

These are the sounds I live for, the ones I will always return to. Long after the sun sets for the final time and the stars are swallowed up by the sky. 

**** 

"What's the matter?", the voice asks. "I can't find a story", I say. "Ah, you've come to the right place. Every tree and blade of grass here has a story; it's just a matter of listening." 

The birds sing their evening songs as the sun drops like a stone. My body longs for my bed, and my heart longs for home. But even when the body sleeps; the mind stays awake and tells itself stories. 

***

"How about this one", the voice says, as we stop by a tree lying on it's side, its stump sticking out of the ground in the shape of a cross. It's as if the tree's last act before it died was to mark its own grave. 

The shadows lengthen as dusk approaches, and in the distance a couple of deer dance in the long grass. 

"Or maybe this one?", says the voice as we look at a flower with a dozen colours, peeking out of a rock. 

**** 

My feet keep pace with the beat of my heart. Or maybe it's other way around. Or maybe both my feet and my heart are both just in step with the gentle rhythm of the universe. Is this what it feels like to feel truly alive? 

Everything in sync. The natural order of things. 

There might be a simpler explanation for why I feel the way I feel. It's the predictability. The knowledge that despite all the choas and uncertainty of life on this beautiful, broken planet, all I need to do is take one step at a time and I can keep moving forward. One step at a time. 

**** 

I reach the end of my journey for now. It is time to head home. 

"I'll be back soon", I say. "I will bring my son and show him this tree, and those deer, and that flower. I'll remind him that marvels lurk in every nook and cranny. I'll teach him to never lose his sense of wonder; that look in his eyes when he points at a plane leaving trails in the sky and calls it a rocket." 

"Ok. I'll be right here, waiting", says the forest, softly.

Back to the Future

The other day while I was driving I looked in the rearview mirror and caught a glimpse of my son. His little face was focussed intently on his mother’s phone screen, but I smiled at the thought that one day he’ll be the one driving and maybe I will be in the back seat, most likely banished because i was giving him too many instructions from the front- I can definitely see that happening. Or maybe he won’t bother driving at all, he’ll just use an app to call me a driverless car while he attends a business meeting on Mars. Either way, his journey is just beginning. And for a few seconds, I was looking through the rearview mirror and seeing not the past but the future.

To witness a sunrise from the inside of a plane is like having a ringside seat for a magic show in slow motion. 

For a while all you can see is a blanket of haze, and then - through a tiny crack in the clouds way out in the distance - the first glimmer of light, which in turn appears to combine with the smog to set the stage for what is still to come. 

As the eyes adjust, they start to discern shapes and patterns, and the clouds seem to part like curtains to allow for an unobstructed view. The scene now shape-shifts and resembles a shoreline; and while you can just about make out the horizon from the tiny burning filament of light, there is no way to otherwise distinguish between land, sea and sky. 

Some clouds continue to toss and tumble across this aerial arena, while others spontaneously sprout out from the floor of the sky like pillars of steam. Meanwhile, the plane engines act like giant fog machines, heightening the drama by emitting streams of vapour onto this glorious theatre. 

Now the glowing line of light in the distance grows in intensity. Colours mix in with other colours- a bit of gold here, a dash of purple there. The whole scene looks like it’s being stirred in a pot, slowly simmering but not quite coming to a boil, with a consistency that’s simultaneously liquid and gas. It seems both real and breathtakingly fake at the same time. 

And then- without so much as a warning, it appears- the sun in all its blinding brilliance. The sheer artistic scope of it makes it feel as though it should be a rare and unusual event. And yet, twenty-four hours later, it happens again. Similar each time, but, like the best of shows, never the same. 

Magic. The world practically abounds with it.

Pear-shaped Memories

Yesterday after lunch, I was peeling a pear and chopping it up for my son, and my mind drifted to one of the many afternoons I spent in my grandmother’s house in London. The reason, funnily enough, was pears. In her later years, one thing Ammachy truly enjoyed was pears. Not just any ol’ pears. Conference pears, not too raw or too ripe, and the longer the better (short, stubby ones didn’t have the same texture). 

And so almost every time she gave me a shopping list beforehand, or if I just rang to ask if she needed anything, pears would invariably feature. I enjoyed buying them, because it was always a little challenge. I had to select just the right ones, not just mindlessly chuck a few in a bag. And then after we’d had lunch she would pick out a couple, cut them up and place them on the table. 

"This one isn’t quite ready", she would say, or "the last few times they haven’t been sweet". And once in a while she’d really enjoy one and just say "good pear" and I’d feel like I had personally fashioned it myself.  

I thought about these things yesterday mostly because I caught myself chopping the pear in exactly the same way she did, and then placing it in front of my son the way she did for me. 

I think of Ammachy often, and most times the thoughts are accompanied by a sense of sorrow at the fact that she’s not around anymore, but this time seemed different. Yes, there was still a yearning, a melancholy realisation that even though I still have her number saved in my phone she’s not going to answer anymore. But for the first time the over-riding emotion was not sadness. 

I guess this is what time does. A person is present, and then is absent, and then, in time, they are present again. And then one day you think about them when you’re peeling pears and you look at your little son relishing them and it feels like that person is still there, sitting across from you and commenting on the quality of the pear. 

Maybe this was just another reminder to me of how ingrained our parents' and our grandparents' influences are within us. And when they leave, their memories are our oxygen, their shadows are our shade. But most importantly they are, and will always be, what we are, and will be to our children. And in that cliched but beautiful circle of life, we can find a way to smile. 

So, yeah, pears. Just wanted to share.

Around 20 years ago (which is my new favourite way to introduce an event from the past without betraying my age), I was spending time with my grandparents while on holiday. I was officially staying with my uncle and aunt, but during the day or in the evenings I would make the short trip over to my grandparent's house and hang out with them before my uncle or someone else came along to pick me up. 

This worked out pretty well until one evening when it was time to leave and I started to say goodbye. I hugged my grandmother before turning around to my grandfather to let him know I was heading off. I think I said ‘see you tomorrow?’ (framed as a question) or something to that effect, at which point he looked up, considered it for a second or two, before shaking his head and making a sound that basically said ‘No’. 

It’s worth mentioning here that my grandfather, who I’ve been told was a fairly quiet man his whole life, had by this time suffered a double-stroke that had left him unable to speak altogether. And so for as long as I knew him (which was nowhere near long enough) his modes of communication were sounds, smiles and twinkles in his eyes. We knew when he was saying yes, but this was a firm No; i.e- I don’t want you to leave. 

I asked him again, thinking maybe he hadn’t heard me properly the first time, and added some extra details like the fact that it was nearly dinner time and I should really get going. But again, it was the same shake of the head plus the sound. At this point, my grandmother stepped in to inform (rather than ask) him that I was leaving. Different phrasing, but still the same reaction. After a few more minutes of trying to make a case for my departure, it was clear my grandfather had come to something of a binding decision in his mind: I was to stay the night at their house. 

‘Is that what it is?’ asked my grandmother, seemingly incredulous that this otherwise somewhat aloof man was suddenly fixated on his grandson’s sleeping arrangements. This time the answer was a vigorous shake of the head and the sound for ‘Yes’. It was done. The man had spoken, in a manner of speaking. 

All these years later, I can still remember sitting back down in my chair and looking over at him as a little smile flashed across his kind face. And I remember feeling a special sort of feeling that I’ve only felt a handful of times since. 

One of those times was a few nights ago when I walked into the room where my son lay sleeping next to his mum. I was there to pick up something and head back out, but before that I leaned in to give the little man a mini-hug. As I did that, his little hand came out from under his own head and made its way around my neck. I could tell he was fast asleep, and yet, the more I pulled away, the tighter his grip got. Finally, as I tried in the dark to pry his hand off, he made a sound that reminded of that same sound all those years ago. Softer, and not quite the same timbre, but similar nonetheless. 

My grandfather had lost his words before I was old enough to talk to him, and my little boy hasn’t found his words just yet. But to be loved and wanted even without words- is there a better feeling than that?

Right Now

Right now, I have a choice. 
I can choose to tell my nihilistic friend where to stick it. 
I can tell cynicism to get his lazy ass off my couch. And then look up my old friend hope and ask if she wants to grab a drink. 
I can stop asking whether an article is genuine, and start being the genuine article. 
Accountable. Consistent. Morally obliged. 
Right now, I can keep dissecting race, or embrace the reality that even though we might look different, we’re all in the same race against time to avoid oblivion. 
It is no longer a problem for future generations. It is a problem for my generation. 
I can keep hating against the press, or keep pressing against the hate, the prejudice and the not-so-normal normal. 
I can keep reading about the latest X, Y, Z-gate or I can instigate my own little scandal. I could call it ‘Today-I started-giving-a-shit-gate’ 
Right now, I can keep talking about ‘them’ and ‘they’ or I can shift the narrative to the first person 
that needs to change- Me. 
I can acknowledge my indifference. 
I can watch from the sidelines or get some skin in the game. 
Right now, I can choose to make my voice heard. Or zone out and go along with the herd. 
I can keep speculating, pontificating and abdicating responsibility, or I can do something. 
Even a small thing. 
Because Small Things Matter. 
And the Ripple Effect is a thing. 
Right now, I can be steered by fear into a corner, or steer clear of the naysayers, the merchants of misery and the prophets of doom. 
I can sit back and watch the livestream of bile and vitriol gush past me or I can try and dam it, goddammit. 
Preferably before it flows into that ocean of negativity, the one where the levels rise higher with Every. Passing. Day. 
Right now, I can keep counting down to some imaginary moment in some utopian future. 
Or I can make this present, actual moment count. 
Because you see, at this precise moment all I have is this precise moment. 
So I can either choose to make a choice, or keep pretending I don’t have one. 
My life depends on it.

A few weeks ago, I remember being a little down. Things were fine on the personal front, but a few things seemed to be happening in the world that brought over a particularly strong tidal wave of negativity. 

Gauri Lankesh, a well-known journalist and activist had been murdered outside her Bangalore home in gruesome fashion. ‘President’ Trump was threatening to pull out of the Paris Agreement on climate change. North Korea was stepping up the war games. Everywhere I looked, the forces of darkness seemed to be gaining ground. 

At around the same time, I went with some work colleagues to volunteer for a day at the Movement Hotel, a project started by a group of not-for-profit organisations here in Amsterdam. Their plan was to create a pop-up hotel run by refugees and professionals together, on the site of a former prison. The goal was to empower asylum seekers through job training and give them an opportunity of a new beginning in the Netherlands. 

While painting walls (badly) and hearing more stories of the people involved, I had a niggling suspicion that the universe was sending me a message. Here I was, being part of a project that was helping to transform a place of sadness and negativity into one that was open, bright and hopeful- complete with pink walls. 

‘Fear can hold you prisoner; hope can set you free’, was the tagline of that great film, The Shawshank Redemption. Over the course of those few hours spent with some truly inspiring people, I realised this was something that I needed to tell myself more often. Every day, I could wake up and decide to stay trapped inside the Shawshank of my own mind, or I could decide to be more hopeful. And not just hopeful in a passive, lazy way, but hopeful in a get-up-and-punch-holes-into-the-darkness kind of way. 

And while it can often seem futile, in the end that beautiful verse from the Good Book puts it best. 'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it'. 
I’ll take that for now.

I live in constant fear of my worst fears coming to pass. It is not just a mild paranoia or chronic anxiety; it is more like a profound existential dread. The source of this lies not so much in the natural world (though the threats there are by no means insignificant) but rather in the man-made realm. I think about trains, cars and planes, for example, and of elevators, cable-cars and subway systems. I think of bridges and flyovers and underpasses. I even think of boilers and heaters and nuclear reactors, of cranes and pulleys and mechanical levers, and when I think of all these, I mostly think of one thing: catastrophic failure. 

It is a strange obsession, one that I justify to myself as a means to constantly have my guard up- to be prepared at all times like a scout might. And yet, it is at the same time a crippling affliction; a state of mind so negative it is bordering on the macabre. Why does my mind fixate on such things? I’m not really sure. Of course, failure is an inevitability; all systems eventually fail. It is a random event that one plans to perhaps delay, but can never avoid altogether. Everything we make is, in a sense, both fragile and transient just like us, no matter whether it’s brick and mortar, or iron and steel. In the end, cracks appear in everything. 

To live in the midst of these without being at the very least slightly pre-occupied with their decay has always seemed to me a little naive; perhaps even reckless. Of course, to be obsessed to such a degree seems just as foolish, particularly since I can do nothing myself to prevent such eventuality. Still, I continue to spend my time (my fleeting, finite, precious time) seemingly at the edge of imminent destruction. 

My wife reminds me that there’s enough negativity in the world already, and that I should be spending my time spreading goodness, beauty and hope. And instead here I am, casually peddling unfettered panic, blithely tossing the seeds of future phobias into minds that might already be a little frayed just from the compounded exertions of our modern day-to-day existence. For this, I apologise. 

But I hope I have adequately explained my own state of mind. I am actively working on changing it, but I fear there is a core of permanence running through. Perhaps that too might crack eventually; but until then, every time someone tells me about efficiency and built-in redundancy, I remind them about human selfishness and indifference. 

How, I ask them, can we expect our creations to be somehow superior to their creators? No, they are at best merely replicas; at worst, cheap imitations with all our flaws and none of the self-awareness. I remind them also about the story of the King who asked his courtiers to each pour a glass of milk into a large jar over the course of the night and the next morning the jar was full of water because everyone thought everyone else would pour milk and no-one did. This is us. 

And so I think about the things we make; I think about how maybe one more person getting into that lift will cause the cables holding it up to snap, or how one more emergency brake will cause the train to slip off its rails. I imagine myself, in fact, standing and staring at some breathtakingly beautiful thing, maybe like the Eiffel Tower, and thinking just how many more people leaning, climbing, jumping can it take before it keels over. And from there it doesn’t take much for me to imagine myself watching this remarkable human creation come crashing into me and for a few seconds before I am flattened under its weight, I would feel, for maybe the first time in my adult life, complete and utter calm. 
Now that, that would be ironic.

It’s a lazy Saturday afternoon; the sort of afternoon that’s hard to come by these days. It’s also warm, which makes it rarer still. The weather, blackout curtains, and a fan whirring at just the right speed, all make for a heady cocktail. I lie in bed and pretend that the flashing ‘pending’ signs in my head are little mosquitoes and I run around zapping them with one of those electric zappers. They don’t really die, of course, but it’s still a fun exercise. Sort of… 

At some point, the weather outside changes. It’s still warm, but there’s just a bit more stickiness in the air despite the breeze. Someone from a nearby house calls out to their neighbour in Malayalam (even though everyone has mobile phones, there’s nothing quite like having a conversation through the window). 

A scooter of some description is coming down our street; I track its progress by the sound of the engine. The rider honks the horn to announce his identity in advance: it’s the unmistakable sound of the mobile fisherman. If it’s a good catch, that means most likely fried fish for dinner. I can picture it now, golden brown with a dash of lemon and some fresh red onion rings. I marvel at my own capacity to get excited by the smallest things. But then again, fried fish is no small matter. 

On a tree somewhere, a crow appears to caw at nothing in particular. The curtains are still drawn, but the heat seeps in through every crevice, and tiny droplets of sweat seem to form on my arms in the time it takes for the table fan to swing towards the window and back at me. 

Somewhere else, a cow appears to moo at nothing in particular. Or maybe it is directed at the crow who decided to shift its perch from the tree to the cow. Crows are like that sometimes. 

In a couple of hours, it will be tea-time and I’ll be sitting on the porch, blowing into my tea while munching on jackfruit chips and banana fritters and all kinds of other magical, sumptuous things. The air would have cooled down a bit by then, and there’ll be the faintest scent of impending rain. 

My eyelids get a little heavier. Despite the buzzing pending mosquitoes (this imaginary swatter must be defective), I decide to give in and drift off into sun-kissed slumber…. 

When I wake up, my son is trying to clamber over my stomach. I blow into his face and he smiles. His smile has the dazzling quality of a thousand suns. His big eyes seem to look at the world with such hope and optimism, such fierce kindness, it’s almost heartbreaking. Which is not to say it induces sadness; more like a profound sense of gratitude. Such moments are always a reminder of how precious and fleeting life is: a realisation which seems to always be accompanied by a hint of melancholy. 

I lift him to on my stomach and for a few seconds he regards me with the same fascination with which I regard him. And then with another giggle he slides off again; after a brief interlude he is ready to resume his journey through the universe. I close my eyes and listen to his babbling. 

Outside, the sun sinks slowly into the canals. It’s late evening, the time when the whole of Amsterdam - beautiful, charming little Amsterdam- appears to pose for all the waiting cameras. 

Sometimes dreams seem to offer a glimpse into another reality. At other times, reality itself seems like a dream.

I thought I’d write about bliss, but I wasn’t quite happy enough.
I thought I’d write about loss, but hadn’t quite lost enough.
I thought I’d write about love, but hadn’t quite loved enough. 
I thought I’d write about life, but hadn’t quite lived enough.
I thought I’d write about pain, but it didn’t quite hurt enough. 
I thought I’d write about triumph, but hadn’t quite won enough. 
I thought I’d write about adversity, but hadn’t quite suffered enough.
I thought I’d write about faith, but I wasn’t quite trusting enough.
I thought I’d write about hope, but wasn’t quite hopeful enough.
I thought I’d write about all kinds of things, but wasn’t quite good enough, wise enough, original enough.

Some might say there’s nothing new to be said. 
And yet, there are stories all around us, waiting to be told. 
And to tell them all, one life isn’t quite enough. 
Best get started.

To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.

- Arundhati Roy

People have been asking me how it feels to be a dad. I am not sure how to answer. Those who have experienced it before will know already, but for others I am not sure I have the words. 

How, for example, do I describe the fact that when I look at this little person who extends only as far as my arm, my love for him seems to extend to the farthest reaches of the universe? Or verbalise the feeling when his bottom lip quivers and lonely tear drops appear in the corners of his hopeful, curious eyes? 

How can I explain that every time he exhales through his little heart-shaped nostrils, I feel like there’s a bit more love in this ravaged world? That when he smiles it’s the closest thing to pure happiness I’ve ever had the privilege to encounter? That when his eyelids slowly get heavier and eventually fall across those beautiful eyes, it’s like watching a sunset in slow motion? 

No, these things are inexplicable. They are to be merely stored and treasured in that little corner of the mind where magic resides.  

And there they will be for the rest of my life, on the top shelf where gratitude and awe jostle for space. And the cup of joy always flows over.

As strange as it is to be pondering the possible loss of your faculties while still in your mid-thirties, it is exactly what I have been doing lately. Perhaps it has something to do with another birthday appearing on the horizon, slowly coming into sharper focus with each passing day. Youth, time, strength, speed- the diminishing of all these seem to roll into one at this time of year, gathering pace as this annual bitter-sweet milestone approaches.

But this time seems a little different. Something strange is happening. Once-familiar names and places take longer to get plucked out from the ever-deepening fog of my memory, witty come-backs now come just a couple of seconds too late, and I’ve noticed I can’t watch a movie nowadays without going online to remember the name of at least one of its major stars.

It’s not just the mental side, of course. Physical transformations are taking place as well. They grey hairs are appearing with greater regularity; laugh lines are politely making way for wrinkles. Creaking sounds that I once could safely assume came from the chair I was sitting on, now are just as likely to originate from a part of my body. Mysterious patches appear on my skin, and when I try and investigate further, Google helpfully points to articles on ‘ageing spots’. And I find I involuntarily reach for the subtitles button on videos, because I just don’t hear so good anymore.

Even writing is harder now; words that once seemed to flow and slot into place on the page (or screen) now shuffle about like naughty schoolchildren refusing to get in line. Ironically, I seem to expend more energy on things that used to come easily, at a time when I seem to have less energy overall. All the evidence points to a loss of a spark; a blunting of an edge.

Could it be this is all in my head? Is it just fatigue? Or is this the beginning of the end? Is it possible that the well is running dry, things are in steady decline, and the window of opportunity afforded to me is slowly closing? These are the questions that have been plaguing me over the past few weeks. The questions have fermented into doubts; the doubts have begun to crystallise into belief.

And yet, and yet - of all the years I’ve had on this beautiful planet, 2016 has been one of the best. And somewhere in the back of this ragged, tentative mind, is the lingering feeling that the best is yet to come. Happiness is still a legitimate choice, loving and being loved is still an everyday reality. I am where I need to be. Yes, life is still fragile and oh-so-fleeting, but maybe I am more conscious of it now because I have never been more aware of its beauty.

So if things now take a little longer than usual, then so be it. The world will keep turning, and I will keep learning. Life is short enough even without my spending time thinking about how short it is. Now if I only I can remember where I left that anti-ageing cream…

I love my iPod. I love it all the time, but rarely as much as on the morning commute, as the Tube trundles from one station to the next, carrying with it a heaving mass of humanity, each of us taking comfort in community while craving solitude at the same time. 

I love my iPod; because without it, I would end up listening to one half of telephone conversations and therefore know more than I need to about Maureen’s surgery, and Jason’s dodgy knee, and how the chicken in most burgers isn’t chicken. 

These things are interesting, to a degree. But most of the time, I prefer Bob Dylan and every time I ask my iPod for him, it politely and willingly obliges. No questions asked; no judgements passed.

The process of losing a grandparent is a strange and mystifying experience. On the one hand you grow up with the inevitability of their passing; and yet, when the time finally approaches, it leaves you reeling. 

It is a unique bond, the one between a child and a grandparent. Time and circumstances can sometimes combine to make it a very special relationship, one in which - oddly, given the invariable age difference- you are in a sort of kinship with each other. Perhaps the one-generation gap affords some unexpected common ground; or maybe it is to do with the fact that if life is a circle, then children and their grandparents both exist on the same minor arc: one at the start of their journey, the other approaching the end. This was brought home to me in poignant fashion every July for the past several years, when Ammachy and I would cut the same cake for birthdays that were three days apart. 

Ammachy's was certainly a life well lived. Uprooted from happy, familiar surroundings in Kerala and arriving in the alien land of Singapore, bringing up five children in the post-war years while barely out of her teens herself, then moving to England and starting up all over again, battling and overcoming the odds, caring for her beloved ‘pappa' after he was struck down by a stroke; this is the sort of thing some of us in my generation read about in books or see in films, with no awareness that such everyday heroes are in our own families. We walk around with the confidence of youth, forgetting that we stand on the shoulders of giants. 

While her tough life made her tough, her heart was forever seeking out opportunities to show kindness. This kindness and generosity of spirit characterised her 88 years, and there are countless stories of how she has touched the lives of complete strangers, many of whom are now part of our extended family.

In my own life, I have been a constant beneficiary of this kindness. Although I was born on the other side of the world, Ammachy nevertheless features in some of my earliest memories. There we were, my cousin and I, conspiring to wreak some fresh havoc in her living room or back garden, an exercise that invariably ended up with one of us getting hurt and both of us re-acquainting ourselves with the wooden spoon. As I grew older, I was fortunate to be able to spend more time with her, first by way of occasional summer visits (during which I occupied the famous box room), and then eventually moving to within a few minutes' drive away. 

Sometimes when she had not seen or heard from me for a few days, she would call on the phone and the conversation would almost always begin with her asking "nee evide aada, ninte annakum onnum illalo." (Where have you been, I haven’t heard from you in a while.) I would proceed to offer up some feeble excuse for not visiting her and she would listen patiently, eventually saying "Sherri. Njan orthu nee enne marannu poyi ennu" (Ok. I thought you forgot about me) 

In recent months, with Ammachy increasingly home-bound, I had become used to walking in to her always-warm house, and seeing the top of her head sticking out above her chair as she sat watching the tv or reading a book. As soon as she saw me, she would stop whatever she was doing and smile. She would ask me how I was, and the next question was usually "have you eaten?" at which point I would always say no, even if I had eaten just a short while ago. Anyone who has tasted Ammachy’s chicken will understand.

We would then talk about her health, the latest developments in Kerala politics, and the private lives of the birds she had been watching through her window. But the overriding themes were what she considered the two most important things in life: faith and family. For as long as I live, I will treasure these conversations and the wisdom she imparted through them. 

Ammachy’s was an all-encompassing love; she cared as much for people’s emotional and spiritual well-being as for their physical. In between spoonfuls of chicken, she would ask if I was praying and reading my Bible, and give me advice on how to be strong when dealing with difficult situations. Even now, if she could, she would be telling me to keep it together. But this was what made Ammachy the special person she was- her genuine love and selfless concern for everyone she came into contact with, even her consultant at the hospital. 

Now, as she lies in a side room of West Middlesex hospital, on the verge of departing to a place to which I don’t have my own key and where I can no longer visit anytime I want, I find myself replaying some of these memories over and over again in my head as a defence against the waves of sadness. 

I will sorely miss Ammachy but I believe that if there is a heaven she will be there, with a full head of hair and a twinkle in her eye. And I will live the rest of my days in the hope that one day I will be able to go there too, and watch as she stops doing whatever she was doing and smiles at me. And when she asks “Where were you; I thought you forgot me?” I will finally be able to say - Never, Ammachy. I never forgot you.

Update: Ammachy breathed her last on Monday 8th Feb at 10:15 am.

Pondering over Lego

I have often thought that words are like lego bricks. Use them well, and you can make tons of cool stuff. 

Interesting fact 1: Six eight-stud lego bricks can apparently be combined in 915,103,765 different ways. The possibilities are almost endless. 

Interesting fact 2: There are now so many pieces of lego in the world that if they were divided up amongst every person on the planet, we’d each have 86 pieces. 

Tomorrow, chances are we’ll have even more. In much the same way, we’re each given an ever-increasing set of words to play with. Any time we like, we can open up this little box that we carry around in our heads, and start clicking the little pieces into place. We might use them in different ways, languages, styles or forms, but the ‘universal system’ which ensures that every lego brick ever made will lock with another is, in some ways, just as true for our words. 

Just like lego, words also have the power to both inspire and hurt. Anyone who has stepped on a stray piece and howled like a wounded hyena (maybe that’s just me) will recognise the parallel. A casual word tossed around without much thought always somehow causes more pain than you might expect. 

A final thought: The name LEGO is made from the first two letters of the Danish words LEG GODT, meaning 'play well'. A pretty good mantra for these troubled times. So, what are you going to make?