Firing an old idea anew

It was half past four when I walked into Ajay’s backyard with my father. His house is painted deep red the colour of red oxide not uncommon in Goa. Though there are no yellows along its edges to go with the red, something you’d expect to see in Goan houses, the house spat enough red at the sky to stand out even if much of its bulk hid behind itself on the turn in Bethoda, past Sapna Ceramics, up a narrow road that runs past a series of duplex flats.

There is this patch in his backyard where Ajay has spent a significant part of his adult life since 2003. Few places around have been dug up more than that patch, measuring over 20 sq. ft. or thereabouts. And today as my father and I walked past his porch fronted by flowering trees, turning left to take the narrow path between his house and the garage that is home to a succession of his two-wheelers over the years, dodging a coconut tree and sundry other things that lie scattered all around the place where his father has planted guavas, breadfruit, black pepper, drumstick, and mangos among other varieties, I was taken aback to see Ajay peering out from behind what looked like a brick chimney rising over the curving roof of a rectangular structure in the front, and a largish opening that ran along the length of the structure. Another kiln I thought; the fifth in three years. Looking at the brick structure rising up, I reckoned from the look of it that this one would last longer than its predecessors that Ajay buried in the same pit where he had laid their foundations once. From electronics, rock music, painting, reading, to clay-work, Ajay Dongre, a brahmin originally from Malvan in the Konkan region of Maharashtra to the west of India, had made one long journey in more ways than one from his college days when he went around town on his red Kinetic Honda scooter with a 'Thank God I'm an Atheist' sticker displayed prominently on the front of his scooter. I tease him about the sticker once in a while, not that he has suddenly found common cause with god. He is still an Atheist. In some ways he hasn’t changed much, only in some ways though.

I first met Ajay in the mid-eighties when I was in school. In the early years, soon after his arrival in Goa from Bombay after his father was transferred on his job with the Food Corporation of India, Ajay became a part of our group, playing cricket with us after school hours, and joining us on our cycling trips to the Bondla Wildlife Sanctuary in school vacations. Those trips to Bondla, 24 kilometres each way, left memories that’ve lasted time even as it swept away many others. At other times we shared an interest in electronics, building gadgets and generally having a good time when we were not studying, which was often. Eventually we completed our post graduate degrees; he took Physics while I opted for Computer Science. On completing his degree he took up teaching, and I left for Bombay in search of a job.

Meanwhile we explored Goa together, free-riding and photographing along the way. By then Ajay had taken up a job teaching Physics and Electronics at a local college, a job he still holds except for the year-long break he took to teach at Lisa Chowgule’s school in Vasco last year. After spending several years with what came to be known as the Abhiruchi group, named after the youth who congregated at Hotel Abhiruchi in Ponda, whiling away evenings over endless cups of tea and cigarettes and thinking up things to do but not quite managing to except occasionally getting together to organize a bicycle motor cross, Ajay sensed that his spare time after work was going nowhere over the endless cups of tea and banter. He 'opted' out of the Abhiruchi group to use his after-job hours to pursue painting instead. It was then he drifted toward sculpture after trying his hand at painting, eventually finding company in Raju Gujar and Donald D’Souza. Raju runs a metal fabrication unit in Jaycee nagar and has a yen for sculpture, having fashioned from chalk pieces a series of rivetting figurines that never fail to draw attention whenever exhibited. Ajay’s aptitude for design and Raju’s ability to implement the design at his workshop worked well for them both, resulting in sculptures made from scrap metal. All along Ajay practiced claywork, experimenting with clay, form, and kiln firing though the availability of refractory bricks to construct the kiln was as much a problem as was the Kiln design until he got hold of Frederick Olsen’s The Kiln Book from a fellow potter, Gauri Divan, a studio potter practicing in Goa.

Ajay sourced refractory bricks for his new kiln from a local foundry. "They had large quantities of these reject-bricks they were prepared to spare, rejected on account of fine cracks they developed and which could leak molten iron if used in their foundry. I recycled them for use in building my kiln," he told me. These bricks were originally designed and manufactured for use in making iron ignots. They’re hollow from the inside to allow molten iron to flow in a complex circuit. He picked up two varieties of these bricks. One measured 15 inches in length and 3.5 inches in width and height. The other variety measured 9 inches in length; the width and height were the same as the other.

Since these bricks were not designed for construction purposes they presented quite a few problems to Ajay and Raju in the construction on the kiln. Ajay cut them to required proportion to get them to fit in. The hollow insides presented a different set of problems. He filled mortar (made of chalk powder, sand, clay, and sieved mud) in the hollows that ran the length of the bricks, and placed them at right angles to each other to prevent any heat loss through 'straight lines' along the hollows. "It was quite an experience setting these bricks according to the kiln design," Ajay let on when we sat talking in his first-floor room where he has his studio; the remaining rooms are stacked with his clay work and sculpting-implements. Over 1000 of these refractory bricks went into the making of the new kiln; 600 bricks of the longer variety, and the remaining of the shorter one. "If we had managed to get refractory bricks specially designed for construction purposes, our task would’ve simplified greatly," he said. ”We needn’t have bothered cutting the bricks to desired lengths to get them to fit in then.” However they had to fetch special bricks from Khanapur in Belgaum, a border district in the neighbouring state of Karnataka, for use in constructing the kiln’s chamber floor measuring 40.5 inches x 40.5 inches inclusive of the two openings that let in flames into the chamber from the fireplace underneath. For now he is thinking of using wood to fire the kiln. "Gas-firing is a costly proposition as of now," he said. Both flame inlets, constructed diagonally across from each other, measure 18 inches x 6 inches each. "The kiln at Khanapur is a massive one. So big that trucks can drive in. It’s truly huge," he said of their trip to Khanapur. He’s expecting his new kiln to generate a temperature of 1200 degrees centigrade. "That should be useful," he says, smiling at the thought.

Refractory bricks or firebricks as they’re known are made to withstand higher temperatures. Clay is the common refractory material available in nature. However, clay quality varies from place to place. Ajay sources his clay from Bicholim as do most people who practice clay-work in Goa. Typically clay consists of Al2O3 (Alumina) and SiO2 (Silica). Its Iron Oxide content is a variable. The Alumina content is varied to control the clay’s refractory quality, increasing it enhances its refractory quality.

Ajay shows me Frederick L. Olsen’s The Kiln Book. He used Olsen’s book to design his kiln. It lists several basic principles to follow in constructing a kiln. The principles Ajay followed were specific to the type of kiln he is constructing – Fast-Fire Downdraft kiln. "It was a challenge to conform to Olsen’s guidelines with bricks that were originally meant for use in an Iron Foundry," he said. "However we did try to approximate closely to Olsen’s guidelines." In his The Kiln Book Frederick L. Olsen has crystallised his lifetime work experience and offered tried and tested kiln designs for use by professionals and amateurs alike. For over thirty years, Olsen’s The Kiln Book has explained in clear and detailed instructions and text the process of kiln design, choice of design, method of firing, fuels and combustion techniques, materials and construction. Ajay used the following principles from Olsen’s book in constructing his kiln.

The cube is the best shape for the kiln.
The chamber housing clay-work should allow for a free flow of flame.
The fire-place in wood-fired kilns should be ten times the chimney cross-section, and the inlet for the flame should be the same size as the outlet that opens into the chimney.
The taper of the chimney as it rises up should create a natural draft, and aid in trapping heat.
The chimney height should equal three times the height of the chamber multiplied by one-third the chamber length plus the height of the fireplace.
Critical areas of a kiln should be planned and built to be altered easily.

"Though a height of 18 inches was sufficient, I designed the fire-place to measure 21 inches. I thought it better to allow for tolerance on the higher side than fall short eventually. If the efficiency were to drop, I can always bring down its height by raising the base," Ajay said as Raju, whom Ajay calls 'My Chief Engineer on this project', nodded solemnly. "Even an inch of gap makes a big difference. I’ll know by how much once I start using the kiln." Similarly, he left the top two layers of the chimney loose to allow for any future modifications depending on kiln performance.

In his experience building four kilns of various dispositions before this one, Ajay lists several factors affecting the Firing performance: humidity, wind direction, the type of wood used to fire the kiln, the size and shape of clay sculptures packed into the Firing chamber and the way they’re packed together, and so also their thickness.

He shows me small clay sculptures (usually faces) that he makes from time to time, and which are favoured by some of his more fashionable students for use as key-chains. A few wear them around their neck. "They asked me for more of these," Ajay told me when he first made them over a year ago, surprised at their popularity. "These pieces were fired using sawdust," he tells me. "Sawdust firing is the simplest form of firing clay-work. It is particularly good for simple kind of work. Group the pieces together, pack them in sawdust and light the whole thing." He used the Bottle kiln to good effect when he first started out with clay-firing in 2003, two years after starting out with clay-work. Until then he never clay-fired his creations. Whenever I went over to his place he I would look around his room, stacked with books, cassettes and audio CDs, for new sculptures. "Many pieces I did in those days cracked from not firing them. I did not have my own kiln then," he reflected. Eventually he built his first kiln in 2003 - a Bottle kiln.

The Bottle Kiln gets its name from its shape. It is the oldest and the simplest kiln known to man, and is a modification of Bonfire-firing that people practiced in ancient times where clay-work was stacked together and covered with firewood before lighting it. Though it resulted in loss of clay-work, sometimes in significant quantities due to lack of proper temperature distribution, it was used for a long time for want of a better design. The Bottle Kiln improved upon the Bonfire technique but was not found to be effective for all kinds of clay-work, leading to the invention of better kiln designs.

"I might’ve still been stuck with my previous kiln (a Bottle kiln) if it was not for the over 100 pieces of table-decorators that a friend ordered for that were blackened beyond use when I fired them recently," he said, showing me some of the severely blackened pieces while we (Raju, Donald, Ajay, and I) took a break from digging one feet deep pits around the kiln to put up a scaffolding in place for use in raising the chimney to its slated height of 14 feet the next day. Raju, in purple coloured bermudas, and Donald sat eating mirchi bujjiyas that Ajay had ordered from a Rajasthani outlet in the colony. We took our plates and gathered around the tap in the backyard where the maid washes utensils and sundry birds saunter over for a quick bath or drink from the dripping tap in summers. It was the first time I'd eaten a mirchi bujjiya that had potato-filling in it, the kind you might expect to find in a samosa but not in a mirchi bujjiya. "I had to discard the whole lot," he said turning the blackened clay pieces over in his hand. "Lack of proper oxygen resulted in the reduction of iron content in the clay, turning it black."

I’m not sure how long he can sustain his new kiln with firewood. Not only is it costly and inefficient when compared with a gas-fired kiln, it is quite a hassle to source firewood over a length of time. "The kiln design need not be modified much to accommodate gas-firing," he explains. "If not for the cost involved I would’ve gone for right now. Eventually I will have to use gas-firing."

He derives particular pleasure from the fact that the kiln now nearing completion did not cut deeply into his finances. "I paid 5 rupees each for the refractory bricks, 500 rupees for transporting them from the foundry to my place, 8 rupees for each butti of sand in preparing mortar, 500 rupees for whiting (chalk powder) for use in preparing mortar, 1,400 for 4 cubic meter of raw clay, the contents of a TATA 407 truck we hired for transporting the clay from Bicholim to my place, and 600 rupees labour charge for the three days it took to sieve the raw clay. About 8000 rupees in all."

As I prepare to leave, I congratulate him over his effort. "Wait until I test-fire the kiln," he says, smiling, betraying his concern from his experience with his previous kilns though they were nowhere near the sophistication that went into constructing this one. Outside, the night is still except for an occasional vehicle passing by his house up the incline, noise trailing in its wake. Suddenly it’s like old times even though times have changed and we cannot sit for long periods the way we used to, reviewing and listening to music, discussing dreams and ideas, cribbing about our education system, thinking up mechanical models one could build, going through picture books, and talking books and of even older times. But still . . . .

What's in a name after all?

I like Goan villages. They’re small, and everyone knows everyone else. And if you were to own a shop of any kind and were to put up a name-board displaying the name of your shop, in all likelihood no one will remember the name you’ve given your shop. Instead they’ll refer to the shop by your name until either of you survives the other. They’ll probably say in Konkani, the local language, “Anil-a-ger tuka meltele thay.” (“You will get it at Anil’s”). So why bother putting up a name-board that no one will bother remembering?

But then it is hard on visitors unless they’re from a nearby village, in which case they’ll probably know you as well, and remind you of how you got thrashed by your neighbour years ago for stealing mangoes from your’s neighbour’s tree. It’s only those who’re passing through the village who’ll find it difficult to locate your place. But then so long as they know that it is a bar what does it matter what you name it, or for that matter if you name it at all as was the case with a bar we came across past Amona on the way to Sanquelim. If not for the window displaying the word ‘BAR’ fashioned as window grills, a novelty in itself for saving on the cost of a board and achieving protection at the same time, we might’ve mistaken it for a house, for there was nothing about the place to indicate that it was a watering hole if not for those window grills. In fact they were the only alphabets visible for a fair distance around. Just made me wonder 'What’s in a name after all?'

The Light of Prosperity

Beyond Navelim, and Sanquelim there aren’t many places where you can stop by for tea. The few that exist are sleepy. I like them for their stillness. The one we walked into had wooden tables of unknown antiquity, placed in two neat rows near the front of the inn. A low wall at the back partitioned the room. Behind the low wall a gas stove hissed. There was no door to the kitchen. I stepped up to the opening and smiled at the cook. I believe he owns the place. The kitchen itself is a small one, made up of a blackened kettle, and a few utensils. The place serves pao bhaji. We opted for tea. Raju bought biscuits from the adjacent shop to go with tea. Donald and Ajay drank in silence. Outside, two elderly men sat on chairs. One was engrossed in a local newspaper. The other man sat in silence, his eyes peeled out for activity on the road outside; there was none though. Only occasionally a vehicle passed that way. Inside, a picture of goddess Lakshmi, garlanded, looks over the cash counter beneath. I walk up to the wall and look up at the deity. She is associated with prosperity, and her image is commonly found adorning shops, inns, and homes across India. There is something about the zero bulb I found riveting. I can't place my finger on it though.

The Welcome Party

When I took the stairs to the first floor where Ajay has his studio, I wasn't prepared for the welcome party. Ajay was in the backyard with Raju, working on the new Kiln at the same spot where four kilns once stood, each one making way for its successor. I believe the new kiln that he and Raju, and Donald are building will last longer than those that came before. Meanwhile I spent some time with the welcome party. I can't quite figure out why they're so surprised. Didn't they expect me?

Fast Speed!

Driving through Goa, past Banastarim, Marcela, to Khandola and beyond, we stopped for petrol at a wayside pump. The narrow, curving roads and unmarked speedbreakers meant we had to reduce our speed to avoid bumping into the roof, eventually I did bump my head into the roof after Raju missed one too many speedbreakers on our way to Chorla. Just as we pulled into the driveway, a white TATA Sumo was on its way out, at FAST SPEED!!!!!

Goddess on the wall

Passing through Bombay's old bylanes it is not uncommon to find history leaning out of walls, forcing the passer-by to pause and ponder like I did when I came across this image on the wall of a building in one such lane. I do not know what happened of this painter. The board still advertises his services, and the wall showcases his skills but he was nowhere to be seen. From the look of it I doubt if he is around anymore, at least not here where he once made a living painting sign boards, cloth banners, and name plates.

Uncertain Wickets

In the early eighties television was still some way off from becoming the staple diet in the small, sleepy town of Ponda where I went to school. It was 1983, the year India won the Prudential World Cup. Streets had emptied way before eight that big night, the time Ponda usually went dead on a normal day, and hordes of people had gathered in the few homes that had television, and huddled before grainy screens where an elephant's bottom would have been indistinguishable from a cricketer’s, they had urged Dev's devils on, going berserk when the mighty Caribbeans finally bit the dust. I was just out of primary school then.

Goa had received its first television signal the previous year; the 1982 Delhi Asian games and the following year big time cricket had finally entered the living rooms in the nondescript colony where I lived along with a boisterous gaggle of friends, pushing nine years on an average and unscrupulous to boot in the evenings we trooped out for a bit of rough and tumble.

Sundays were exclusively for cricket matches. The teams we, the Young Stars club, usually played against were those from Chirputae, Goa Milk Dairy and Haveli. The gaggle from Haveli had named themselves: Tufaan.

I fancied myself as an opening bat, and was often sent as one; I doubted the intentions of my captain though. It could have been anything from using me to take the shine off the ball to tiring the opposition bowlers from their youthful exertions in trying to knock my teeth off the ground. Then there was this little matter of expending the overs of their 'strike' bowlers so that when they had tasted blood, usually mine, they would fall back satisfied, cooling their heels while their slow pokes came on, to take on whom would emerge the 'Tigers' from our ranks. I rarely lasted long enough to sample these blokes turning their arms over. But then that was the whole plan, all I had to show for my efforts would be a bruised something, a score more often in single digits, nearer zero that is, and a stiff behind from watching teammates put the 'enemy' to sword.

The few times that I batted lower down the order it was unsettling to watch my teammates knocking up runs where I would have invariably pushed and prodded before deliverance came knocking at my stumps. At such times, occasions were few when I did not pray asking my teammates to be sent back to the pavilion, under a mango tree beside grazing cows, so that I could get my share of the batting. HE did not disappoint me often. Nevertheless team spirit was high and the desire to win at any cost, strong. The bowlers exemplified it; they would rub the ball vigorously on their backside and in the groin for good measure, ‘to get shine' they said, but all they managed in wearing out was not the batsman they bowled to but the desi half-pant off their reddened behinds. If the batsman got going the fielders had their task cut out, often running after the ball they could only have imagined seeing, if indeed they ever did, for boundaries came by the dozen from the ball whizzing past between their legs. I 'defended' more deliveries with my bony knees and shin than with the bat I had trouble lifting.

On the cricket maidan, after our first meaningful engagement with the Milk Dairy XI, it became imperative that we change 'Everything is fair in love and war' to ‘Everything is fair in love and war, and cricket’. The Dairy cricket team had a girl member. Priya Ghate was probably tougher than some of other 'milk thumbs' making up their playing XI.

Match day would see the two teams arriving on the ground eleven each but more often than not the dairy team would have an extra 'milk tooth' tagging along, sometimes several; I presume there were not many ‘young stars’ where I lived for we rarely ever had the luxury of an extra teammate who could keep the match scores. So it was inevitable that the batting team would detail one of its team members to log in their score book runs scored and for extra measure add 'phantom' runs for us to chase. The Dairy team had managed to turn this into high art. We were aware of the 'extra' ministration the scoring book received at their hands but having none of our own to spare, to keep a check on them and maintain a separate score book, we had to make-do with the mid wicket fielder taking responsibility for recording the opposing team’s batting scores, run by run, while he fielded. He kept the score book by his side, sometimes forgetting to record the score in a moment of excitement on the field, occasionally by design. It was no surprise that the two score books rarely tallied. When it was our turn to bat we 'nursed' our score book to health. Fights would erupt and more time was spent defending our respective totals than in meaningful play but it added to the overall excitement, and passing stray dogs sensing the sharp edge to the atmosphere joined in the ‘festivities’, forcing us to argue in even louder voices, to be heard above the barking; some solution would eventually be found; a rematch. Not that things actually changed much in the rematch.

One pair of batting pads meant the wicket keeper didn't have any to wear. The two batsmen wore a batting pad each. It was the same with batting gloves; how a right handed batsman managed to bat with a right glove on his left hand, the one facing the incoming ball, is a matter of conjecture. Anyone who could knock up some decent scores, a nine was decent enough, and knock back a wicket or two, was picked up to be the captain, or he had to be the one who owned the only bat, the only ball and the only pair of pads. Leadership was about practical matters. If runs ‘had to come’ they would, a 'leader' strategising or specifying how much we needed to score wouldn't have made a difference either way, we performed as much as the other team allowed us to, nothing more, nothing less. The captain went to the toss and specified the batting order if we let him and that was it.

There was never a time when our club did not need finances to keep things afloat, and cricket was the last thing our parents thought fit to spend money on, not after the losing struggle they fought each day to get us to exchange the cricket bat for textbooks. Pocket money was an unheard of concept then but not cashew nuts. Hills that rose protectively over the ground were home to cashew nut plantations. A kilo of raw cashew nuts fetched ten rupees. A second-hand bat from a comparatively richer club cost about thirty rupees, it was another matter that the bat the Tufaan club sold us for twenty seven rupees after hard bargaining was cleverly taped up to hold the splintered bottom together, coming apart after the first crisp drive that was hit off it. The Tufaan club swore by god that they had sold us a ‘superb’ bat. The gods we subscribed to were all benign creatures; they did not meddle in matters concerning 27 rupees budgets.

It had taken us three kilos of raw cashew nuts to raise the finance for the bat; then there was the small matter of buying a new leather ball for each weekend match. We chanced upon a simple solution. We raided the cashew nut plantations in groups; three on trees doing the plucking, three below to collect the cashew nuts and two to keep watch for the owner and his dog, the only dog I ever managed to outrun in my life. The cashew nuts were sold at a local shop. With money thus ‘earned’ we bought an entire cricket kit part by part, none of our parents got to know of our enterprise; it spared us spankings and worse, the lectures. Back then immediate necessity governed our actions.
And so the days flew by. I made many friends. Cricket kept us healthy, out of trouble and competitive. Victories were savoured and defeats forgotten. Team spirit was learnt on the maidans and so was the ability to relate and sustain relationships with one another. Not giving up until the last ball was bowled set the course for the approach some of us adopted, subconsciously, or at least tried to. Cricket was more than a just a game; a part of growing up that few text books or television could ever teach us.

Sightless in Bombay

It took me some time before I could locate S Cinema in Andheri East, along the A-K road. I was told that the cinema no longer exists and that I was not supposed to look for a building bearing 'S'. "Ask any rickshawwallah for directions. If he is an old hand around this part of town he'll take you to where S cinema once stood," a colleague told me. I looked at my watch. I was on time. Something told me that V R and F B were the kind who kept time and expected others to do the same.

They are visually impaired. V has no eye sight whereas F has some though it is of little use in carrying out his work. I met them at an IT company where they’ve been employed with over the last two and half years. They work on project assignments together, split responsibilities, and assist each other in completing their tasks. Each day at 1 pm, F leads the way to the office canteen, and V follows, holding F’s hand at the elbow. They lunch together and draw strength and companionship in the shared problems that are unique to their condition.

V lives alone in Mumbai. His father passed away last year (2005). His mother and brothers are based in Aurangabad. “It’s been a long time away from my family,” he told me. “Ulhasnagar had no facilities for the blind so V M School for the Blind at T became my home eventually. My interaction with my family reduced as a result though I would visit them sometimes, and they me, particularly my elder brother would come all the way to T to see me. Then they left for Aurangabad where I believe my father had some ancestral property. Gradually the distance grew. But I do visit Aurangabad every four months.”

V is a Sindhi. His family fled the carnage of non-muslims in Pakistan in the aftermath of partition, settling in Ulhasnagar, the ‘refugee city’. His father was a teenager at the time. To a question about what his mother feels on his securing employment with an IT company, the very kind of question nobody would bother asking people with normal eyesight, in turn highlighting the state of employment opportunities for blind people and the general perception toward them, he said, “She is not educated, but knows that I do something in computers, and that I earn and can take care of myself even when living alone. That itself is enough to make her very happy. I visit them every 3-4 months.”

V lives in Jogeshwari at the M.N.B home for the blind. “They give me food. I share a room with four others,” he said. “Except for the days on which my computer programming classes are scheduled at GTL in Wadala, I take the bus to my hostel in Jogeshwari, else I travel to Wadala after office hours, and attend the classes before making my way home to Jogeshwari.” When I ask him how he manages the traveling alone, not without its own uncertainties, he smiles before replying, “I’ve my white stick.”

“I’ve been directed onto the wrong bus on more than one occasion,” he said. “Sometimes the person at the bus stop whom I’ve requested to alert me when my bus arrives, forgets to tell me that he is leaving after his bus arrives, and I don’t come to know of it, and wait there thinking he is still around and will alert me when my bus arrives. But somehow I reach home. I do.”

In the time I spent with them at the company where they work, there were never once any hint of despondency. If anything, they were eager to be given tasks, and at one point even letting on, albeit very politely, that it would help if Project Managers were to explore their capabilities further, setting them challenges that conventional wisdom would hesitate at first thought. Preeti, a Senior Manager with the company, believes this to be a problem and would like to see project allocations account for possibilities beyond the conventional ones assigned to them. Parag, Program Manager, is open to the idea. The work V and F carried out on one of the projects he handled has changed his perception.

Parag made a telling comment when discussing their abilities and skills in the testing domain. He said, “I find them way ahead of testers with normal eyesight. V and F are much better than the others when it comes to certain aspects in functional testing. I can tell you this 100%.” He describes them as very focused. “This helps in delivering good results. As it is Web Interfaces are de rigueur in projects across domains, so why not employ them extensively on such projects because there are considerable testing requirements and much of it involves functionality testing.” The broad scope of any Functional Testing involves testing the system from a logical aspect, covering all the business flows as the business users would see it. Checking for the inter-dependencies and inter-linkages of one scenario with the other is another important event that we test for here. Also, checking for the validity and the sanctity of data and their relationships is confirmed during this process.

Web Accessibility issues are in the forefront today. Designers believe that in confirming to Accessibility guidelines, it’s not just simply accessibility to disabled people but would also benefit everyone. Accessibility issues typically affect those with disabilities that prevent them from seeing, hearing, and moving, or using tools that interface with information. Disabled readers have access to devices and assistive technologies such as screen magnifiers, screen readers (JAWS) among others. The extent to which these technologies offered independence to the visually impaired can be gauged by how they view them. T Balsara, without eye sight herself, referred to JAWS during a conversation as “we use the computer because of great friend JAWS.” The technologies are no longer merely technologies. They have helped extend employment possibilities for the visually impaired.

An e-learning company contacted V for help with functional testing of their e-learning courses developed in line with web accessibility requirements. V got 6-7 visually impaired people he knew from his days with Victoria Memorial School for the Blind and those he met up with on Access India (a yahoo mailing list set up to provide an opportunity for the visually impaired persons in India to share experiences, questions, and suggestions related to the use of computer technology) to test these courses. Barun Y, from the Senior Specialist Group with the e-learning company, is working to develop these courses, vouched for their effectiveness. “We asked them to go through 3 different courses without any help. These courses were either in Html or Flash. Our aim was to test the templates we created and whether those can be understood by them and our conveying what we intend to. These templates also included interactivities. They did well,” he said.

Barun believes that “We (normal eyesight) can see the screen and they (the visually impaired) have to visualize the screen with whatever they hear. As a sighted user we assume a few things because we can see. They don’t.” Parag shares the same opinion as does Preeti. She says, “I find their ability to focus without distractions amazing.”

Lack of distractions is one thing, but to be equipped with a certain minimum training in computers to improve their employability in IT companies is quite another thing. I ask Parag what he would look for in employing a visually impaired person. He said, “I expect them to have a basic training in computers before I can consider taking them onboard. They are not expected to know advanced programming. Profiles involving graphic design and related skills are out of bounds. Basic computer training is essential before they can be considered for a job in the IT industry, and aptitude, and attitude.”

He lists ‘proactive’ among the qualities that are mandatory, and believes that a proactive employee will take initiative in trying to sort out problems they encounter in the course of their work. “Other skills expected of them are: Basic computer awareness, proficiency in JAWS or any other similar screen reading software, knowledge of applications like MS Word and MS Excel, and certain tools. Training in tools (e.g. Code Review) such as those used in logging in defects uncovered during testing and passing them on to development teams is mandatory. Together, this constitutes adequate proficiency in computers to help them carry out the following tasks after providing them with supportive training specific to particular tool usage.”

V and F completed their graduation (BA) before enrolling for Basic Computer courses. V went one step ahead, enrolling for an advanced course teaching programming. When he took me to his desk to show me how JAWS works the first time I met him, I looked at the black screen while his fingers raced on the keyboard. I’m accustomed to monitors taking their own sweet time to power up, so I waited. It was only when V began explaining what he was doing and I could see nothing on the screen did I wake up to the fact that he does not need the screen to do his work. I asked him to power up the monitor so I could see the screen. He did. And I sat on for the JAWS lesson.

The 'Discount'

There are some people you don’t tangle with. You don’t tangle with them because you’ve searched the whole place for a book you hope is the one your friend wants but haven’t found it no matter how many shops you stepped into asking “Do you have something on pottery, pottery techniques that is?” only to be shown designer art-books showcasing riveting designs but very little about how to go about creating them, and you’re close to giving up after what you promise yourself that you’ll try one more time, just one more time.

My ‘One more time’ came on a sultry day in Fort off Victoria Terminus (renamed CST) in Bombay (renamed Mumbai). Ajay had asked me to look for a good book on pottery, particularly one about glazes. He’s set up a small studio on the first floor of his house in Goa, actually he’s using the entire floor for his clay-work. I thought I had a good chance of finding the book in Mumbai until I began to draw a blank shop after shop. But when I walked into Sterling Book House off DN Road in Fort after dodging a water melon stall and nearly bumping into two people tucking in red melon pieces with toothpicks from paper plates I was at the end of my search.

Once in, I had difficulty in getting the young shop assistant to understand what I was looking for. The word ‘pottery’ did not draw any response, he looked at me with a blank look.

“It’s what people prepare from clay, like pots, jars, cups and saucers,” I said, using my hands to shape a pot out of thin air. His eyes lit up and he disappeared between two narrow shelves in the elevated portion of the shop reached by climbing two steps a few feet off the desk where an old man sat, collecting payments and answering queries of people stepping into the bookshop looking for a book. The shelves were placed very close together to make up for lack of space in the shop. There was space only for a single person between them. If any of the shelves were any taller and if you were searching for a book near the top of the shelf chances were the back of your head would brush books in the shelf behind you. Outside the shop, beyond the hawkers’ stalls on the pavement adjoining the road, the sun shone bright and vehicles drove past, honking as they went. However it was cool inside the shop.

The shop-attendant came up to me with two books, the kind I find ornamental because apart from gorgeous designs and cursory information on pottery there is little else to satisfy an advanced amateur looking for techniques to advance his craft of pottery. As I waved them away the shop-attendant said, “Saab, we don’t have those kinds of books here. We only have these kinds.”

Most book shops did not. They kept a few titles which typically lasted them a year or two, sometimes more.

“Look again,” I said. He went away and returned the books to their sections and looked up another section. I saw him pluck a book out, dust it and head toward me. Glazes for the Craft Potter by Harry Fraser read the title. It was highly technical, dealing with the chemistry of glazes and formulations. I asked the shop attendant for a piece of paper and copied down the contents page and read them out to Ajay over the phone that evening. He was pleased with it. “What’s the cost,” he asked.

“₤14.99, about Rs. 1,300,” I replied.

“Ok, get it,” he said.

Two weeks later I returned to Sterling Book House. The old man was still there. The book was an old edition and had probably lain on the shelf for years, and two weeks was not about to see someone step into the shop for it I thought as I walked into the book shop.

“I want to buy the book ‘Glazes for the Craft Potter by Harry Fraser’,” I told the old man at the counter. He wore a white shirt, full sleeves. He seemed to favour white shirts, for he had one on the last time too.

“We don’t have it,” he said. Taken aback it took me a moment to recover. In two weeks a book that’d lain in silence for several years was gone! A sinking feeling took hold of me, somehow I could not believe it was gone. Surely there was a mistake somewhere.

“Someone bought it?” I asked him.

“No. We never had it,” the old man replied.

Colour returned to my face and I smiled. At least no one had bought it I thought.

“No, it can’t be,” I said. “Just two weeks ago I saw it here.” I was alarmed at the turn of events.

The old man put his work aside, adjusted his glasses and looked up at me.

“We don’t have it. I know we don’t have it,” he said. His tone had a finality generally common to old men. “Maybe it is there,” he said, pointing to a bookshop across the street from his. “Go there, maybe you’ll find it,” he said.

“But I saw the book in your shop here, just fifteen days ago,” I said, exasperated.

“That’s our shop too,” he said pointing at BookZone across the road. “Check there, you might find it.”

Reluctant, I made my way out. Maybe they’ve shifted some books there I thought. But I had a strong feeling that BookZone didn’t have it. I was correct. They didn’t have it. I made my way back to the Sterling Book House and confronted the old man.

“They don’t have it,” I told him and taking a slip of paper from my pocket I held it out in front of his face. “Look, this is the page on which I copied the book’s content page, and this page was given to me by your shop attendant.” I looked around to see if I could recognize the shop attendant I met the last time I was here. He was nowhere to be seen. Then turning to the old man I repeated, “It was only two weeks ago that I saw it here,” and drew his attention to the contents in the slip of paper and the title of the book written in capital letters on the page.

“But we don’t keep those Harry Potter kind of books around here,” he said.

“Harry Potter?” I exclaimed at this unexpected turn of events.

“Yes, we don’t keep those kind of books,” he said dismissively. I smiled the second time that day.

“Sir,” I said, relief washing over me. “It’s not a Harry Potter book. The book is titled ‘Glazes for the Craft Potter’ and is by Harry Fraser.”

He kept quiet for a moment and turned to look at the shop attendant who was listening on, and then he let out the faintest of smiles and signaled to the shop attendant to go get it. In two minutes the book was on the table. Considering that the old man had hid his embarrassment rather well I thought I might succeed in wrangling out a discount on the book. Some bookshops are open to it considering that they get paid a sales commission between 30% to 40% on the book price, and do not mind passing some of it to the buyer. Moreover this particular book had lain on the shelf for a long time, I thought that he must be pleased to see it ‘go’. So when he drew his calculator from the drawer to convert the ₤14.99 into rupees, I suggested that he give me a discount on the book. Without looking up at me, busy punching keys on the calculator, he said, “you’re getting it at a discount.” And he presented me the bill. I had one look at the figure and half-shouted, “What discount!”

He had converted the book price to its full equivalent in Indian rupees, totaling over 1,300 rupees. “You haven’t given me any. You’ve drawn up the bill for the full amount,” I said.

“This book in your hands is the old edition, costing ₤14.99. The new edition costs five pounds more at “₤20.00,” he said looking up at me. “If I had covered this one’s price with a label showing ₤20.00 you wouldn’t have known. But I didn’t do it. I let the original price show, so I’ve saved you five pounds. Consider that your discount.”

I looked at him silently, wondering if there was anything in his hard boiled face that I could identify that explain his cheekiness. There wasn’t. He was serious, dead serious.

For three rupees I fell for it

“Company ka gaadi hai, wholesale rate hai, kewal teen teen rupaiyya,” the voice announced. Curious, I retraced my steps. It was a Saturday, and with nothing in particular to engage my attention I had ventured out to Fort to explore the bylanes of Bombay.

I find a rickshaw carrier parked in the middle of the street opposite The Fort Central hotel. 1942 read the letters on the hotel’s display board. Unlike some old hotels you see in Bombay, this one looked refurbished, nothing to show from the outside its sixty four years. I was disappointed. I was hoping to see the original décor and furniture, and feel to the place. Outside the hotel, people sit in the shade of trees. A banana vendor sits down and prepares to set up his basket. A group of three in white topis and dhotis sit in a circle talking, under a tree. Another group is in the middle of a card game, gathered around a newspaper in the middle and laying cards on it. A man sits cross-legged engaged with a crossword. A shoe-shine boy has set up his shoe-shine box and already has a customer.

“Company ka gaadi hai, wholesale rate hai, kewal teen teen rupaiyya,” the voice blares out again. The rickshaw-carrier is painted light green. In small letters, Sadguru Prasanna graces the top of the windscreen. The rickshaw-carrier has a Maharashtra number plate, MH-14 AH-192. To the back, under a canvas top, is a freezer and a callow youth stands beside it, bending awkwardly to avoid brushing the canvas top with his head. The freezer has two openings. He has opened one and reaching in draws out two ice-cream bars. Three people are gathered around the back of the rickshaw-carrier.

“Malai chocobar, malai chocobar. Sirf do minute rukhega,” announces the driver, his right leg jutting out of the carrier, steering the vehicle while announcing in the microphone. More people gather. The rickshaw-carrier is parked in the middle of the road. Playing cards are returned in a pack to their case and the men troop to the carrier to buy the chocobars.

“Sirf teen rupaiyya. Wholesale rate retail mein. Sirf do minute rukhega. Maallllllaaaaaai Chakobaaaarrr.” At the back of the carrier, the youth is overwhelmed with hands stretching out in his direction. He works furiously, reaching in the freezer to draw the chocobars in cardboard covers out. The crowd draws more crowds. People in crisp grey trousers and creased shirts, office-goers taking a break from work, crowded the back of the carrier offering five-rupee coins. Women came out, in salwar kameez, denims, saris, skirts. Infused with energy from seeing the response to his exhortations, the driver went one notch higher. He roared.

“Company ka gaadi hai, wholesale rate hai, kewal teen teen rupaiyya. Maallllllaaaaaai Chakoooobaaaarrrrrrrr. Siiirrrrrrffffff teeeeeeeeeen ruuuupyyyyyya.”

Emerging from Fort Central Hotel, a tallish man pushed his way through the crowd and strode up to the driver’s cabin and pulled at the door harshly. Startled, the driver moved his elbow out of the way just in time to see the man slam his door shut.

“Get Ouuuuut,” he screamed at the driver, pushing at the door with his left hand as the stunned driver tried to push open the door. The microphone was still on, and the driver’s curses in marathi muttered under his breath are broadcast to the crowd. At the back, the crowd surges and the youth gives out the chocobars as fast as he possibly can, collecting three rupees, and giving out the change.

Seeing the man seething in fury at his rickshaw crowding the street in front of his hotel, obstructing his customers and possibly drawing their attention away, the driver wisely chooses to move ahead, still cursing in marathi under his breath. “Ya aila.” He moves a few metres ahead in front of a side street and promptly blocks the traffic emerging from the side lane, descending into verbal slanging with angry motorists in the side lane. Empty cardboard packets now litter the street.

“Teeen rupya, company ice cream, straight from the company. Just three rupees,” he announces into the microphone, having regained his composure and steadfastly ignoring the motorists gesticulating from behind car windscreens. Two of them have stepped out of their cars now and are walking briskly to the driver. More trouble. Undaunted, he calls out “Malai Chokobaaar. Maaalaaaaai.”

Eventually I fall for it. I knew this was a con job. For all his announcements of this being a ‘company offer’ nowhere on the vehicle, advertising the chocobar on the sides, was any company information. There was no company name mentioned nor its location, not on the vehicle, nor the packets, only a picture on the carrier showing the chocobar and text celebrating its taste: Chocobar Ice Cream. Wah! Kya Swad hai. The Chocobar itself came in a cheap cardboard pack without any company name nor location details. On one side of the pack, information listed the content of the Chocobar's outer layer, inner layer, and ingredients. The only ingredient I could recognize was ice, and I feared its quality.

“Paanch rupaaiiiyyya ka teen,” he announces to speed up the sale. There isn’t much time left now. It is a narrow road and he has invited angry responses from motorists using the street. Dhondi, the old lady, buys one chocobar and returns to her place on the pavement by her cow, Sita. I reach for one, handing over three rupees to the youth. Just one bite and I knew I had been had, royally. The chocolate layer was no chocolate, only chocolate colour. Underneath was ice. As for malai, the cream that the driver announced repeatedly, it was imagination. There was no cream that I could identify. As for sweetness, I only imagined some, but there was none. I smiled, embarrassed at having fallen for it despite initial skepticism, and looked around sheepishly to see if anyone was watching me. No one was.

“There is nothing in this, just ice, no cream (malai),” a boy eating the chocobar tells me. “Since there is no cream, only ice, how can I call it an ice cream? I’ll call it ice instead, na chocolate ice is a better name,” he says, grinning. I smile back. Just one bite and I cast the ‘chocolate ice’ out. It’s over twenty minutes now that the rickshaw-carrier has been in business on this street. Empty packets litter the street, over a hundred of them. The carrier moves ahead, forced by the motorists it was obstructing.

Two policemen on patrol stop their bike and ask the rickshaw-carrier to park on the side of the road, and ask for his driving license, as is the practice with cops when they want to probe you. I notice the driver trying to engage the cops in a conversation at which one of them snaps at him in marathi, “Samjath nahi ka Marathi.” (Don’t you understand Marathi?). Marathi is the local language, local to Maharashtrians who’re fiercely possessive of their own, almost parochial, and dismissive of others. It is common knowledge that if you know Marathi and can pass off as a Maharashtrian you’ll have little trouble with the local cops.

Within minutes the crowd that had thronged the street has dispersed. I make my way to the narrow lane, past Dhondi and Sita. I pat the cow on its hump. To its left is parked a scooter with a sidecar. A teen is ensconced in it and eating the chocobar. The old lady, Dhondi, turns to him and pointing to her chocobar, says,” There is nothing in this. It’s not even sweet.”

I cannot resist recollecting the taste or the lack of it as I walk past them. In a few minutes I emerge from the lane into the bustle of D.N Road, near Alice building and turn my head to see its empty arches. To my left is Flora fountain. I turn right and find myself in the middle of hawkers running helter skelter, carrying away their wares. I 've unwittingly walked into a raid on hawkers by the city Municipal Corporation, and I find myself beside an elderly gent in an Islamic skull cap and flowing beard whom the hawkers call Bohri bhai. But that is another story.

Because cows don't talk

They made for quite a sight not that anyone bothered looking at them in the busy street. People using the inside road that branched off the Cawasji Patel street were those who knew their way about the place, knew why they were there, and went about their daily way with minimum fuss. The unlikely couple at the street corner appeared to be a permanent fixture on the narrow pavement that turns off the Cawasji Patel street into Nadirsha Sukhia street, a narrow lane that joins the DN Road near the Khadi Bhavan chowk, a short distance off Flora Fountain in Fort.

At the turn where the narrow pavement runs past a shop selling suits, jodhpuris, and sherwanis, an old lady in a green, cotton sari sat cross-legged on the pavement, her back to the wall showcasing colourful suits and sherwanis in a glass display behind her. To her right, stacked lengthwise were grass stems in a small bunch, whittled down to its current size by passers-by buying it off the old lady to feed her genial cow tethered in front of her, now regarding its surroundings with a timeless calm that few other animals are capable of, with the possible exception of ruminating buffaloes. And the only buffaloes I’ve seen in my time in Bombay are at tabelas (shelters for milking cattle) I pass on my way to SEEPZ on the Jogeshwari link road. But cows can be found in Powai, by the side of the road that leads past Hiranandani. I cannot remember seeing untended buffaloes on the roads.

Like most Jerseys, this one too is a mix of black and white spots, and big liquid eyes. I cannot resist touching a cow when I see one. It could be that the reverence for the animal stems from growing up in a hindu household. I patted the cow’s face and trailed my finger along the outside curve of the horn before bending down toward the old woman, and pointing to the grass stacked by her side, I said, “Give me for two rupees,” offering her a two rupee coin. Eager to make the extra rupee before leaving for home now that her stock of cattle-feed was almost over, she said, “For three rupees you can have the whole lot.” I gave her the extra rupee and collected the small bundle from her before dropping it in front of the cow.

It was nearing half-past two in the afternoon. I imagine the old lady and the cow took their places at the street corner early in the morning. The stack of cattle-feed must have been sizeable when they started out early in the day. Watching the cow bend to chomp on the feed I’d just placed before it, I wondered if the cow knew what was expected of it when offered the feed by anyone buying it from the old lady, for, if it were to ignore it from being full from eating such offerings through the day, the old lady would lose business. She counted on people buying cattle-feed from her to feed her cow. It helped that people revered cows and considered it poonya to feed one.

In villages, even small towns, stray cows visit homes and wait to be fed before visiting the next one. By the end of the day their foreheads are heavily coloured with kumkum and haldi powder that women adorn the cows’ forehead with before offering them food, usually rice, gram, and the like, sometimes leftovers from chopping vegetables. The scene repeats each day at the same time. I suppose if a cow can read time without having to look at a clock, it can surely understand what it needs to do to keep it’s ‘owner’ in business, for, I’ve never seen them refuse any such offering made, even those that I’ve seen from the bus along LBS marg in Mulund, and the one before a temple past Asalfa in Ghatkoper on my way to the office. Each one is tended by a lady. The Mulund one has two cows tied near barbed wire fencing.

In three minutes, Sita, that’s what Dhondi, the old woman, said her cow’s name was, finished off the fresh feed. I looked at Sita. She looked back at me, ears still. We said nothing to each other. She did not blink nor move her face away when I stretched my hand to pat her snout. I wondered what she made of me. I can only wonder because cows don’t talk.

Then I wandered off into the lane, reading name boards as I went. Flavours and Aromatics, Sheet Exporters, Chemicals.

Margaret and Stream of Consciousness

The second day of the Writer's Workshop 'Authentic Voices' conducted by Margaret Mascarenhas at the Fundacao Oriente was unconventional in as much as it exasperated and thrilled. As she handed us yet another exercise I remember thinking 'Wow, she sure is a mean one.'

Margaret called the class to attention. Like on the first day, we began yesterday with 'journalling' or what Margaret called 'stream of consciousness writing'.

"Write continuously until I say 'stop'," she said. She had insisted on this exercise in her previous workshop too, before beginning each writing session. “The rules of 'journaling' are: Don't think, write whatever comes to your mind, even if it's rubbish," her voice pierced the silence in the room, drowning the low hum of the air conditioner at the back. Beyond the room the rain fell hard, drowning noises from the street. It rained heavily yesterday.

"Most writers are schizophrenic," she continued, "There is a constant conflict between the writer as a creator and the writer as an editor. The editor is mostly in control, telling the writer-part 'write this', 'write that'. If the editor in you starts talking during journaling', ask him to shut up. All that matters is - don't edit, don't cross out, don't worry about punctuation. Just keep your hand to it, and write." About then she smiled on noting surprised eyebrows of those confronting this for the first time. Absurdity, even if just on the surface, draws attention, and hence would appear to have a definite purpose. I thought her crisp voice, unmistakably American, having spent time in that country after majoring in Comparative Literature from UC Berkeley, complimented her persona, sharp nose et al. She would make for a good teacher, I thought.

I had only recently finished reading her first novel 'Skin', published by Penguin over a year ago, telling the story of Pagan Miranda de Flores reverting to her roots, traveling from America to Goa, long after her paternal family disowned her Goan father after his marriage to her American mother. Her writing fairly raced, chronicling a fascinating story, lean in patches, and expansive otherwise.

Margaret stepped behind to the board that hung from a hook between the two windows that opened into a small garden adjacent to the road that led to the building. With her left hand she picked up a piece of chalk and wrote on the board the first few lines that she expected us to begin writing 'our rubbish' with. The sentence read : 'When I die, I will miss ....'

Then turning to face us she commanded, "Start with this take-off line," pointing to the intriguing sentence on the board behind her.

Wendell Rodricks, Cecil Pinto and I shared the same table. We put our heads to our writing pads and began writing all the things we would miss out on after dying. Elsewhere in the spacious hall, others were busy with their pens, and their dying thoughts. Margaret's voice rang out again, drilling into perplexed minds her faith in this exercise.

"Don't worry," she said, "I'll not be asking any of you to read out this part of your writing. This is just for yourself, to clear your mind for the serious writing ahead, to clear it of all the influences of the day as it prepares to focus on the task at hand. I use the method regularly before beginning writing, and have found it to be very useful." Then she narrated an incident where her friend had evinced curiosity in her notebooks containing her 'journaling' exercises.

"I've over twenty notebooks of this garbage," she said, smiling, "and I gave her the notebooks to read. After she went through some of them, she told me 'Wow, now I feel great.' I asked her, 'Why?' She replied with, 'Now I know that a published writer can write such shit.' Around the room, smiles broke out, indicating acceptance of using 'writing rubbish to clear rubbish out.' Five minutes later Margaret called out: "STOP." And we stopped writing. Strangely, I remember feeling exhausted after this exercise. Then it was time to begin learning about character development.

"Writing is a lonely process,” she said looking at her class. "When you build characters that you might not like, go for it, even if it is scary," she said as we plunged into an interesting second day full of exercises, readings, critiques, and smiles.

"My way of embracing the lonely aspect of writing - I embrace my characters. I talk with the 15 characters appearing in my book," she explained as we got down to tackling an exercise in developing a character.

Later, different aspects of writing dominated the remains of the Fontainhas evening. Time had closed out yesterday's session rather quickly, I thought, remembering the details as I looked up the road for signs of other participants. It was about time for the third and final day of the workshop, today, to begin.

Note: Margaret's Home Page.

At Willy's place in Khotachiwadi

Willy Felizardo sitting outside his house in Khotachiwadi in Girgaum, Bombay. Willy works at Bothello's garage, and 'enjoys' his drink, and plays the guitar in impromptu singing sessions at birthday parties, and church programmes.

Behind him on the wall is the tilework he did, as also the floor in the small courtyard inside his house where he stays with his brother's (John Felizardo) family.

To one corner of the courtyard is a fish tank. He pointed out to me a biggish bloke swimming inside. "He's been with me for 14 years," Willy said while I looked on trying to comprehend what it means to have a fish for a companion for 14 long years. Behind us in the courtyard near where a door opened into his house, a sloping roof dwelling dwarfed by tall buildings, his friends lazed out in the warm afternoon sun, sipping beer and liquor, an East Indian couple among them.

Away from Goa for a long time, "born and brought up here, in Bombay," Willy's konkani is hesitant though he tried gamely to match mine. "I hardly get to talk the language here," he told me.

He invited me into his house, introduced me to his friends settled in a circle around a low table, sipping drink from glasses, and then went out to fetch me a cold drink from the shop around the corner. I sure needed one in the sun that day.

Seeing me trail my eyes over some artifacts, he showed me his driftwood collection that he had fashioned out into interesting forms from driftwood he had collected from various locations on his trips around the city. "I found this one near a construction site once. I hired a taxi, lashed it down to the taxi roof and brought it home," he said showing me a largish artifact at the far end of the courtyard.

A low wall with a gate opening into his courtyard runs along a narrow path that separates his house from James Ferreira's, the well known fashion designer before passing by a small church on its way out of Khotachiwadi on the Girgaum side.

Khotachiwadi was a settlement started by the Pathare Prabhus, a brahmin sub-caste, its earliest history dating back to the 1700s. Eventually East-Indians made it their home, followed by Goan Christians, quietly settling into the rhythms and colours unique to their communities, culture, and lifestyle, until now that is.

Lately, moneyed businessmen have moved in, apparently reveling in changing the wadi's decor of old-world style houses and comely balconies to shiny granite exteriors, replete with modifications more in tune with the crowded apartments of Mumbai than the heritage of Kotachiwadi. Turning those quaint balconies into rooms brings Bombay into the house. It's happening nonetheless. Willy is not happy with the "kind of people ('mostly marwaris, bhaiyyas, and the new local rich') buying their way into the locality from widows and families whose children are settled abroad, and with no one around here to look after them or their property."

"These people (the new occupants) have no understanding, appreciation, or aesthetic inclination for the architecture or the culture of the place that's survived centuries," he said as I photographed him against the cheery lemon-yellow backdrop.

Then we walked to the small church.

On a cardboard display, Willy pointed out the families signed up for the Family Saturday Rosary at the cross.

"We gather here each saturday with the family praying a Rosary, and pray together," he said, pointing out a family listed in the table against their scheduled Rosary date.

Usually, the Rosary begins with the invocations of the Apostle's Creed, followed by one Our Father, then the three Hail Marys (offered for the family praying the Rosary, for increase in faith, hope, and charity). Then Glory Be ('Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, Amen.') , concluding with the Hail Holy Queen. The sequence or the number of prayers are open to change. Willy gets his guitar on Rosary days. "I play for the kids, and for everyone," he said.

"Then I distribute chocolates. The kids love it," he smiled. We sat down, and talked. He spoke about his days growing up in the area. His youth. And now. In the serenity of the narrow lane, the story took on a poignancy of worn cobblestones on fading paths, their history passing with them. I listened mostly. His presence abutted my thoughts in a melody of its own. Then it was time for me to leave, I had kept him from his friends for some time now. We stood up and shook hands.

"Come again," he said, his ponytail swaying side to side, when I thanked him for the time at his place. "The next time I'll introduce you to some of the old families around here."

"I sure will," I said and waved back before retracing my path past the small church, and into the hustle of Girgaum. The next time I'll ask him to play the guitar, I thought, as the first sounds of the traffic on the road outside swallowed me.

The Timeless is Temporary

For ten months I let it lie in the brown paper envelope in which the India Today magazine is posted to my address back home in Goa. I collect these envelopes. They are sturdy, and I particularly like their feel. For ten months it lay quietly. And for ten months that it rested in that brown paper envelope, Parul didn’t say a word to me. She didn’t ask me if I’d read it. She counted on me to tell her when I was done reading it. She waited. I waited. And the book waited – until new year day.

After the clock struck midnight bringing 2005 to a close, and firecrackers exploded outside the building, lighting up the night sky near where I live, I dusted the slender brown packet on an impulse and drew the book from its resting place. The Bridges of Madison County. By the time I finished reading it, only taking a break to SMS Parul that ‘Yes, can relate to Robert Kincaid, some characteristics seem familiar territory. All too familiar actually’, it was past five in the morning.

For a long time afterward, the curtains sheltering me from the Sunday sun waking up to a new year, I lay on my back running scenes from the book through my mind, turning Robert Kincaid over in neat somersaults through compact hoops of experience honed from living on the far side, to an extent like him or so I believe. The more I did that the more Robert Kincaid came alive, in memories from long ago, and some in the notes Parul made and stuck them to pages at ‘appropriate’ places meaning to remind me, moments spanning a private sky and parts that I shared with others, and they, with me.

I don’t usually tuck books into brown paper envelopes. I like them out in the open where I can see their covers. When I’m reading them, I let them lie where I can see them from across the room. I did that with Marquez’s Chronicle of a Death Foretold, that lemon yellow swathe dwarfing the three protagonists, one of whom is backed up against a closed door. Yes, the door. Ditto with Camus’ The Outsider though the cover reminded me more of the Titanic than Meursault, pictured against the hulk, alone – the outsider. And Jack Kerouac’s On the Road too. But I returned The Bridges of Madison County to the brown envelope. I had my reason for doing so. I did not want to lose those notes on lemon-yellow stick-it paper pasted to pages.

It was last Feburary that Parul gifted me the book with her observations, recollections, and reflections (written in blue ink, sometimes pink, other times black, occasionally red, and light orange, once violet, yet other times green, another time star-dust pale white, and occasionally in pencil) on lemon-yellow stick-it paper. The small, square pieces of lemon yellow were scattered through the book, stuck to paragraphs and lines in the book that she drew parallels with from occasions we shared in the years we have been friends since the day we met at Ratna’s apartment in Borivali, nine years ago, and occasionally with moments from her own life married to R, and bringing up P, her angelic daughter, and other times spent clambering over gates in the dead of night to share girl-talk with Aksha, her friend.

I met Ratna at a wildlife sanctuary (Tadoba) in the central heartlands of India where fifty of us spent five days camping in Tiger territory in the middle of the Naxalite tracts of central India. Parul was Ratna’s friend from Elphinstone college. Four years after corresponding intermittently with Parul by post, lunch brought the three of us to Ratna’s apartment in a dusty locality in Borivali that I cannot quite recollect now. Parul met me at the door. I hadn’t seen her in person until then, having come to Bombay to work at an Infotech major who’d taken me in in my final year at the university. Parul, ever the mischievous imp, took one look at me (I’d just recovered from food poisoning), and promptly directed me back the way I came, down the four floors I’d climbed up, when I asked her if this was Ratna’s house. “No. I think you’re in the wrong wing.” After I had taken the stairs down and walked out into the blazing sunshine, sweat gathering under my collar, irritated in the heat of a blazing sun, two voices called out to me from a corner window, Ratna’s and Parul’s. I retraced the path, not amused but smiling none the same.

In the story where Robert Kincaid steps out of his pickup on sighting Francesca ‘sitting on the front porch swing, drinking iced tea, casually watching the dust spiral up from under a pickup coming down the country road,’ smiling as he asks her, “I’m sorry to bother you, but I’m looking for a covered bridge out this way, and I can’t find it. I think I’m temporarily lost,” before wiping his forehead with a blue bandana and smiling again, the note penciled in Parul’s handwriting, pasted to the paragraph, reads: “Is this Ratna’s house?” “Hmm.. No! I think you’re in the wrong wing.” REMEMBER?!

Yes. I do remember. It’s close to ten years now. But how could I forget it.

Another day. Another time. Parul, Aksha, Asif and me start out from near Dadar station. Asif and me are carrying cameras. I like shooting city life. People. Faces. Places. Activity. Moods. Vendors under the bridge outside Dadar station are hawking flowers, vegetables, newspapers. One old lady. Wrinkled face. Sari pulled over her head. Selling ‘luck’ - Green chilies strung together and stitched to a yellow lemon. People who want to ward off ill-luck or ‘buri nazar’ (evil eye) will buy it off her, later nailing them to corners of door frames back home, or hanging them from their vehicles. She has a meditative face, calm, composed, and intelligent. I kneel down and take a few pictures, then take a narrow road, step over the railings outside, climb up the empty crates. Some more shots. All along talking to Parul. Explaining why I’m doing what I’m doing. The angles. The composition. The colours. The light. The works.

The folded note in Parul’s hand, written alternately in orange and blue ink obscures the portion: ‘He (Robert Kincaid) couldn’t get very keen on the idea of fashion. People threw away perfectly good clothes or hastily had them made over according to the instructions of European fashion dictators. It seemed dumb to him, and he felt lessened doing the photography. “You are what you produce,” he said as he left this work.’

I open the folds, straighten out the note and read her hand.

The old nooks and curves of Goa. Unlikely places in Mumbai, Dadar market, wild forests, machan . . . .

“Look at this one. It’s one of my favourites.”
“Hey, it’s good. The colours merge well.”
“Yeah, but there is something else which is striking about this picture.” I stared blank.
“You see this white object?” It was a table. “See the way it’s cut off at the edges, just where these colours begin. It is because of this bright white that the colours look lively.”
“Uh-huh,” I stared, meaningfully, this time.

The objects blurred. The colous began to pace out. The sharp images smoothened and what remained was only white. I don’t remember the picture. I remember ‘the white and the words’.

I remember this, too.

I turn the pages to where Francesca directs Robert Kincaid to the Roseman bridge. And where she ‘watched him walk up the country road, taking a camera from the knapsack and then slinging the bag over his left shoulder,’ I lift the note pasted to the page and continue reading.

‘It was quiet. A redwing blackbird sat on fence wire and looked in at her. A meadowlark called from the roadside grass. Nothing else moved in the white sun of August.

Just short of the bridge, Robert Kincaid stopped. He stood there for a moment, then squatted down, looking through the camera. He walked to the other side of the road and did the same thing. Then he moved into the cover of the bridge and studied the beams and floor planks, looked at the stream below through a hole in the side.’

I let the note rest on the page, unfold it and read the pink handwriting.

Just short of lake, you stopped. You stood there for a moment, then squatted down the steps, looking through the camera. You walked to the other side of the steps and did the same thing. Then you moved to a spot on the steps, sat on it and studied the old buildings and their worn out walls, looked at the lake below through the camera . . .

It was quiet. A pair of crows sat on the tree branch and looked in at us. Nothing else moved in the “white” sun of june . . .

Banganga. My first visit here. June. Parul. Asif. Aksha. Me – on the steps. In the water before us – geese. Parul has been here before. A man on the opposite side, stripped down to his shorts is drying himself with a towel, facing the massive walls. I frame him. Click! The shutter releases.

‘Francesca peeks through a crack between two of the side planks, down toward the stream where Robert Kincaid had gone.’

‘“It’s real nice here, real pretty here,” he said, his voice reverberating inside the covered bridge.’

Francesca nodded. “Yes, it is. We take these old bridges for granted around here and don’t think much about them.”

The note. Blue handwriting.

“It’s so calm here.”
“I’ve come to Banganga quite a few times but have never found such peace.”

The calm waters!
The ducks!
The steep steps! The steady cooing of pigeons.
An ordinary day at Banganga! Yet, a lasting impression on mind. The minutest detail that you captured of the man against worn out walls of buildings; the play of ducks, waters caressing our feet, the shared giggles . . .
Washing face with soda?!
How can one . . .?!

An extra-ordinary day, timeless!

Both Missing

The rickshaw driver told me I was lucky today. I nodded and replied, "we both are lucky." He said, "Yes, yes, we are."

It’s been a long time since I got through to office this quick. At the turn that takes the rider through Saki naka, past the main signal where roads carrying people traveling from Ghatkopar, Kurla, and those from Thane, Bhandup, Kanjur Marg, and Powai meet, it is nice and proper chaotic on regular days. Today, there was little resemblance to the otherwise frothy tide of vehicles, honking, and dust jamming the senses on the daily ride through Saki naka on the Andheri-Kurla road. If you’re lucky, it’ll take you about thirty minutes in the morning to travel the four kilometers from L&T Gardens, past Saki naka, to Marol naka. In the evening rush-hour it can easily take you an hour to traverse the same distance. Once it took me two hours in a BEST bus. I spent the time dreaming at the window that day when I was not looking at the vegetable vendors hawking the only freshness to be found in that part of town.

I wonder if it is a holiday today. I remember only those holidays that I get off from work. Today isn’t an off. So what is it about the light roads then I wonder. I see rickshaws parked on the sides, indicating slack business. I recollect newspaper headlines for an answer to light traffic on the roads. There is none I remember that’ll answer my query. About then the rickshaw driver turns to me and says, “Today is a holiday na, that’s why.”

Then things fall into place. Over the last few weeks, shops, and other establishments lining the route showed off a fairly large population of garlanded goats, some sporting green ribbons on their small, pointed horns and tied to metal or wooden pegs, doors, railings facing the road on either side of the route. Today there was not a single goat visible, nor were the kids who played with the goats as they stood silently, turning this way and that as the children yanked their ears or pulled them by their horns.

I sift through my mind and watch out for shops and establishments from recent memory that hosted in the narrow space fronting them children playing with the goats leading up to Bakri Eid day, today. I find neither. No goats. No children. Both missing.

Surely, only the goats will have copped the knife. But for a moment I wonder what if one of the faithful can’t afford a goat, and is bound by his god to kill today, ‘sacrifice’ as they term it, and has eleven children to feed, but no money to do so, and a god too powerful not to appease.

Shades of Silence

The day had started out like any other till the moment the lights went off. The old Orient fan slowed down before creaking to a halt. A light drizzle fell outside, and a lone mosquito came to life now that it did not have to contend with the whirring contraption setting up swirl upon swirl of damp air in the musty room, smelling strongly of fungus, their lives extended and strengthened by Goan monsoons.

Waking up, I noticed that it was one in the morning. A quick glance outside confirmed the blackout. A short while later, the drizzle petered out, and from somewhere in the distance came muted croaks of frogs. Otherwise there was silence. Total silence. I had drawn the windows shut, so if there were any crickets prancing about in the dark or calling out to one another for whatever reasons that crickets call out for, I wouldn't have known of it. Silence had settled her weary limbs in the room. I lit a candle and placing it on the floor lay down again, on my back.

The candle quickly came to life, casting the room in a yellow mould. I fixed my eyes on the ceiling, now cut into four sections by lumbering blades, their ungainly shadows marking out territories where they had slowly ground to a halt. Some other time, when they would cut the room into four sections after yet another blackout, the sections would diminish or increase in size, depending on where I chose to place the candle.

Unlike mirrors which compel you into paying attention to details, shadows, in extending the outlines of forms, help the eye focus on the wider context set up by shapes contorted by space constraints, and reaching out only as far as the candle allows them. I now watched the shadows the blades threw, cut by ceiling corners, elongated, and twisted into strange shapes. It was as if in their silence they had relaxed and let their bodies sag into forms worn from age, but glad to lie still once in a while.

Outside the room, darkness framed against the glow in the room had lost its contours and appeared like an unending swathe of the unfathomable, hiding shapes where they lay. The silence had made the swathe even more mysterious, and trailed faint noises in the distance like shadows. I had sobered to the realization that it is in the dark that silences acquire long strides. And though there is nothing to tell where they passed by, or how quickly, silences manage to heighten the sense that the inevitable is … well, inevitable; the inevitable of dreams, of nightmares, of hopes, and of foreboding. And knowing that there is silence to be had if it can be taken, voices cease to let ears pick up nuances we know are out there. And the small things begin to matter once more, all over again.

Even out in the wilds when you're far from the hustle of everyday living, typified by life in towns or village squares, it is never so silent. It surely matters that one lives amid noise of the kind cities come to accumulate, to enjoy the silence that comes from sudden stillness brought on by power failures, or worse still, riots. Over there, gusts of wind set up a low moan, and accompanied by rustling trees silence never quite attains the character it now did in the room, where on the wall to my right, a smiling Buddha on pink handmade paper watched over me. The head study, done by Wilson in his first year at the Goa Art college, still sat where it was put up by him before his family shifted to their new residence. The Buddha was at home now and in peace with the candle.

Beyond the room there were no utensils clattering in the kitchen, no honking vehicles, no conductor whistling from a bus, no dogs barking at real or imagined enemies, no children playing nor birds calling from trees, no conversation among friends and family, and no fan spinning about itself and contributing the reassuring sound of blades in setting up draughts of air to cool the skin and keep a persistent mosquito away. Not even a cough in the night. Nothing. Nothing at all.

It was then I became aware that I had lost touch with silence. To be able to hear my breathing, the many alienated thoughts and imagined noises of turbulent memories, once again turned into an alien experience. The silence I associated so long with the absence of people and vehicles bore little resemblance to the dark curtain with infinite folds now squatting lazily about the place.

I could hear my thoughts as they rearranged themselves into coherent entities, in the process forcing me to think about myself more clearly than anytime I can remember doing so. It was as if the mind, and hence the thoughts, did not have to contend with distractions at however subconscious a level, and as a result it could bring to focus the blurred vision that everyday living brings to bear upon every little turn fixed into strange and unfamiliar paths that destiny maps out for us. And, I could now hear my thoughts and distinguish between my priorities as if they were people extolling their attributes in a language that carried across, facilitated by the invisible whip of silence loitering with the easy exuberance of the very satisfied – and the very smug.

But she had no way of knowing that

She had the same voice as those who’d called before her, and there were many before her. Maybe she was the same person. I cannot be sure. But when the phone rang in the morning, I picked it up thinking it must be from one of my team mates on the project. It wasn’t. Nobody calls me ‘Sir’ where I work except for the credit card salespeople who dial my number. Actually they don’t know it is me on that number. They know the number, not me.

“Sir, good morning,” she said over the phone.

The voice had acquired the eager tone that is peculiar to people making a sales pitch. The tone turns apologetic in that extra effort to sound friendly, tinged by a tentative, often over-the-top softness that results from knowing that you are making an unsolicited demand on another’s time, and that it is important to say whatever you want to say, quickly, before the other person bangs down the phone.

This places me in an awkward situation: to bang the phone down on the caller or not. Try as I might I’m rarely successful in finding a pause in their sales pitch that I can latch on to and tell them ‘I’m not interested,’ or fob them off with ‘I’m busy right now, and cannot take your call.’ Like people on railway platforms awaiting local trains, their sentences are strung so close to each other, and the torrent of ‘benefits and opportunities to be had from the credit card’ so many that I almost never manage to get a word in, and I bang the phone down, at times, specially when work-deadlines stare back at me from the screen.

Today was different. I’m not sure if it was because there was no pressing work on my desk or because this sales pitch was different from those I’d heard before. For all I know she may have been different herself.

She introduced herself as Nisha from Standard Chartered. I couldn’t help wondering if that name was an interchangeable mask they wear when it is time to dial a number from the list before them because those before her had similar sounding names, easy on the tongue and common enough not to stand out.

The calls are usually made in the mornings, an hour or so after Bombay has settled down from the swirling traffic kicked up by office-goers negotiating the dug-up roads.

She proceeds to offer me a small loan facility of Rs. 15,000 that Standard Chartered has thought up for people who might baulk at larger figures. “All you need is a visiting card, company’s identification card, and you can repay it in six months. The interest rate is so negligible that you could actually think of gifting it,” she said.

“Gifting it,” I exclaimed. This was the first time I’d heard a loan packaged as a gift you can make to another.

“Why not,” she persisted. “You can convert it into a fixed deposit in the name of your parents. After all the interest rate you’ll pay on it is less than what you’ll get from making it a fixed deposit.”

She refused to believe that I had no use for 15,000. “How can you not want 15,000?” she asked, surprised. “How come you don’t want it,” she rounded off. It amused me no end to know that I’d managed to perplex her.

“Because I don’t need a loan,” I said.

She had dialed the number not knowing who would pick it up. She knew it to be a software company though. “I know you’re a software engineer and you earn lots, and 15,000 may not be lots. Maybe you can use it for a party,” she took a different line now. After I was asked which banks I bank with, the cards I use, she asked me to try Standard Chartered. “But I don’t need any. Moreover I don’t use credit cards, only debit cards,” I explained, admiring her persistence. “I’m happy with what I have,” I tell her.

“Imagine you ate pani-puri at a stall, and that you liked the pani-puris from there” she said before continuing, “Then there is this second pani-puri stall that you haven’t tasted yet.” I go ‘hmmm’ wondering what she is driving at.

“So, if you don’t taste the pani-puri from the second stall, how’ll you know it is better than the one you ate,” she asked me.

“What if I fall ill from eating pani-puri from the stall I haven’t eaten from before? Isn’t it better to stick with the one I know is safe?” I counter her.

“But you need to try once else you might be passing up an opportunity,” she refuses to give up, “this loan is an opportunity for you.”

Then I tell her of stories I’ve heard of Standard Chartered hiring criminal or criminal sounding elements threatening the elderly and housewives with physical harm during their loan collection drives.

“But you sound so decent, why should you worry when you pay your loan on time,” she says. I sense she’s taken aback by the turn the conversation has taken. “Have you had such experiences with Standard Chartered?” she asks me.

“No, I haven’t. I never had an account with your bank,” I tell her. “And its not about me having to be worried,” I explain. “It’s about not wanting to have anything to do with a bank that employs such methods. It just shows their mindset,” I tell her, confident she will give up on me now. But I had underestimated her resolve.

“How can you believe other people just like that,” she asked me, defensive.

“Because they’re people I know and trust,” I clarify.

She asks me for their numbers. “I’ll call them up and sort out their problems or misconceptions,” she tells me. I tell her that I appreciate her initiative in wanting to sort out their problems to help clear her bank’s reputation. I meant it. Few people seek to take the kind of responsibility she sought to take.

“Imagine you and your friend are answering the tenth standard board exams. Your friend is not serious about it and has not studied well, and finds the exams a difficult proposition, and hence is apprehensive about answering it. Would you also not answer the exams?” she asks me. “Why should you believe what your friend says, because if you’re well prepared you won’t find the exams difficult.” I see the point she is trying to make.

“Ok,” I say. Her approach, and persistence induced in me a politeness that I rarely display with unsolicited sales pitch. “Leave a contact number behind and I’ll get back to you when I need to avail of this particular loan scheme,” I tell her.

I’m averse to taking any loan unless it’s an emergency, and I haven’t faced an emergency yet. But by the end of her sales pitch I surprised myself by actually thinking of what I could go for with this short-term small loan. I actually pictured the Tamron 70-300 mm lens that I’ve been meaning to buy for quite some time now but could never budget for. I even picture the photographs I aim to take.

Strangely, I sense a hesitation in her voice when I ask her for a contact number I can get back on if required. Her voice is muted.

“Leave a contact number behind, and I’ll call you back if I need the loan,” I repeat. It is met with a murmur at the other end, silence mostly.

I’m surprised at her hesitation. It strikes me then that maybe asking for a number to get back on later is a common practice used by people to shake off the sales pitch, and that most people never get back, mostly because they never meant to, and to the sales person those words indicate that their sales pitch has failed. I’ve done it myself several times, using the same approach, with the same words. But this time around I was serious even if the words I used were the same; I did mean to get back if I felt a need for this loan, and it was likely I would have.

But she had no way of knowing that.