Notes from the reunion: Gujarat is a "G" word for me

With every visit to India, I find that I am less and less inclined to be frank (vocally) about my views on anything related to India, whenever such topics come up in conversations.

I hold myself back for the simple reason that my critiques can easily be (mis)interpreted as one coming from an outsider, given that I have spent an overwhelming majority of my adult life outside India, in the US.

It is a fine line that I have to walk.

More so was this the case when I met classmates, almost of all whom I had never seen over the thirty-plus years.  The last thing I wanted to do was tick them off right at the get go--critiques are generally welcomed, I have come to understand, only when people know where the person is coming from.  In my case, I had to first earn that "cred."  And earning that cred will take a while.

In my classes too, it is the same case.

A couple of weeks into the term, if I engage in straight talk with students, they don't find it offensive; in fact, their feedback is often that they find my honest critiques immensely refreshing.  I have served as an informal adviser to a few students--all because they were convinced that I was the only one giving them honest feedback. 

One year--about the time the Great Recession started to unfold--my bottom-line to students was a simple "you are screwed."  Of course, I also gave them constructive suggestions on how they need to work towards their productive futures.  There is no way I could have given them such a dark bottom-line if I hadn't first established the relationship.

Thus, for the most part, during the reunion, I stayed away from serious topics.  I didn't want to open my big fat mouth and tick people off anymore than I might already have :)

One of those juicy topics was about Gujarat and Narendra Modi.  Oooooh, such a wonderful topic for debate and discussion.

I have always been firm about Modi--he needs to punished for having overseen mass killings. 

"M" was happy to talk about the part of Gujarat where he lives with his family.  He said it was another version of Neyveli, in terms of roads, facilities, small-townish characteristics, etc.  He seemed to be genuinely happy to be living there.

When he suggested that I visit Gujarat, I politely said I would, even though I knew well enough that I am not in favor of going there unless and until Modi and his cronies are sent to jail for their crimes.

"Y," who was driving her car in which "M" and I were passengers, joined in with her comments.  She said everything that I would have said about Modi, and how his government has made minorities feel insecure.

"M" and "Y" traded arguments, and I was happy to listen in.  I did comment that I was with "Y" on this topic.

I wanted to draw parallels with the Arizona situation, and how I have no inclination to go there.  It doesn't make me happy when minorities are not protected and, even worse, are harassed.  Compared to Modi's killing spree, the Arizona measure, of course, would not even blip on a radar.  In any case, it was one of those rare moments when better sense prevailed and I didn't get into any serious discussions!

I wonder if by now I have established who I am with my classmates and whether it will, therefore, be kosher for me to freely express my views.

Oh! Calcutta :) to OMG, Kolkata :(

In one of my previous avatars (!) I was a final semester engineering student.

There was a campus interview.  I had no idea what the hiring company was and nor did I care.  I had no idea what I was supposed to wear, or how I ought to behave, and I cared not.

It was quite an interesting interview I had with the personnel guy.  He easily figured out that I was not keen on an engineering career.  We talked and talked about societal and political issues.

He then took out a blank paper and drew concentric circles.  Pointing to the innermost, and the smallest circle, he said that was the limit to which I can directly act. An immediate outer ring, he said, is where perhaps I could influence actions.  Anything beyond that was stuff that I could only talk about and can't do a damn thing.

I thought it was all over.

But, surprise, surprise, I got a job offer.  And, a choice of locations as well!

"Calcutta, or Madras?" he asked.

"Calcutta" I said.

I figured it was a wonderful opportunity to go to a part of the world about which I had read and heard about a lot, and to experience it.  I loved rasagollas, and the literary and political influences that Bengal had played in India's freedom struggles.
I was also aware then about how much Calcutta's glory days were long over.  Rajiv Gandhi, who was the prime minister then, invited the wrath of Bengalis everywhere on the planet by declaring that Calcutta is a dying city.

But, there was no doubt in my mind that I needed to take that option over Madras. 

That is how my global wandering began.

Everything that could be wrong in a city was there in Calcutta: cramped quarters that were dark even when there was ample light outside, potholes, crowds on buses, crowds in slow moving trams that seemed ancient, smoke everywhere from generators that were used because of power shortage, ....

But, it was all ok--I ate rasagollas every single day :)

I didn't stay on the job and in Calcutta for too long though.  Ten weeks later, I turned in my quit notice. The personnel guy tried to convince me that I could stay on and yet take the GRE and work on the applications.

But, I couldn't.

I was tired of engineering.

I left the city.

A few years into graduate school, I visited Calcutta again.  This time, I was devoid of any romantic notions about Calcutta, and had also lost my taste for sweets.  There was no charm in Calcutta.  The curtains had been peeled back to reveal all the negatives.

Reading this piece in The Economist makes me think that the city's conditions have only worsened:

Calcutta lost its title as India’s capital a century ago, and its status as the country’s industrial engine in the 1950s. By the early 1970s visitors were making apocalyptic predictions of plagues and starving, rampaging mobs, and by the end of that decade Marxists were in charge. Today Kolkata evokes Havana, beautiful but shabby, the last city to remain largely untouched by India’s 20-year boom.

When Calcutta is compared to Cuba, well, it is time the people there got on lifeboats and rafts and rowed their ways to the equivalent of Miami!

Notes from the reunion: I got punched in the face, about 32 years ago :)

I wish "R" were there at the reunion--we could have then shared a laugh over how his brother, "S," punched me :)

Picture this--the annual school day event at the auditorium.  Must have been in Class IX.  I think it was IX because that was about the time I had started feeling proud of my attempts at shaving the facial hair that would just not grow fast enough for me!

Anyway, it was the annual school day event--the one in which I always looked forward to the singers sing "we bring a welcome to you ...." 

(Towards the end of the first term as a graduate student, I found myself humming along to Notre Dame's fight song.  I was supposed to boo them, as a loyal Trojan.  Which is when I realized that the school day welcome song tune was the same as the Fighting Irish's.  Somebody from our school was familiar with the ND tune and copied it?) 

Anyway, bloody crowded the hall was. In the row in front of me was a group of boisterous juniors.  One of those juniors was "S," the younger brother of our classmate "R." 

Is the set up clear enough?

All of a sudden, "S" gets angry at me.  I have no idea what I did to make him angry.  And after a very short verbal exchange--perhaps nothing more than a couple of words back and forth--well, his fist came fast towards my face. 

I ducked, but his fist caught my upper lip--more like the gap between my nose and my upper lip.  I had a minor cut which bled as well ...

That was in the evening and later at night I managed to get to my bed without anybody at home noticing this blood/cut.

The following morning, however, was a different story.  I couldn't hide it. 

But, I was saved before I could even cook up anything. 

Dad said, "is that from shaving?"

Of course, I said yes. 

"Make sure you use a new blade the next time" was his response.

Given my dull and boring and uneventful track record, I am sure it would never have crossed my parents' minds that I got punched in my face!  Track record, people, track record :)

Even now, there is that small little real estate under my nose where hair doesn't grow.

Years later, in my second year at Coimbatore, I came to know that "R" was at another engineering college in town.  I went there one afternoon.  "R" had changed, and was not the same guy he was four years prior, which was the last time I had seen him.  He was bigger and stronger, and a lot quieter.  I didn't ever talk to him about his brother though :)

I wish I could recall the reason(s) why "S" took a swing at me ... I am sure I must have done something to provoke them.  Maybe I will remember it another day .... I hope so.  That will complete the story, eh!

"R" is back in our group--in cyberspace.  Will be fun to laugh with him, and his brother, about this in the real world.

Sabbatical report #1: Three glorious hours at Chennai's Marina Beach :)

It has been almost three weeks since I arrived in Chennai, and I hadn't yet visited my favorite Marina Beach.  I am usually there within a couple of days.

Today, the urge was simply unbearable.  At 3:30, as dad woke up from his nap, I told him, "I am going to the beach."  I then looked at mom and said, "I will be back for dinner."

Then, I took off.

What a pleasant afternoon it was!  Just the right temperature, and the Sun from behind me as I walked the length wading in the waters, and often simply standing there to enjoy it all.

Am I not one lucky guy to get time off like this?

I neared the waters, and I saw a family--a kid, parents, and a granny--talk to a young guy who was holding a horse's reins. 

Curiosity being my middle name, I stood there and watched.  It was clear the kid wanted to ride.  The solution was really neat: granny and grandkid on the horse :)

I started the very slow walk/wade from the lighthouse end to the radio tower end. 

It was one of the best afternoons I have ever spent at the Chennai beaches.  The fishermen boats looked so cheerful in their colors:

If one were to merely look at the photo of the fishing boats and the waters, and not read all the text, would one easily guess it is Chennai in India?  I don't think so!

This being India and Chennai, there were men in shorts, dhotis, lungis, formal trousers, jeans, and one in nothing but his briefs, with his undershirt tucked into the briefs.  Women were in saris, churidars, jeans, capris, and even purdahs.

It just shows that you can have fun any which way you want, and what you wear at the beach cannot, and should not, prevent you from enjoying it all.  Look at the group in the photo below:

Even the fishermen seemed to be having fun:

Before I knew it, almost an hour-and-a-half was gone and the Sun was rapidly going down.  Such a contrast to the long twilight hours back in Oregon.

Against a setting Sun, the same fishing boats looked different.

As the light faded, the sky started to turn red and pink and orange. It was awesome.  But, it was way too much for me: I didn't know if I should enjoy the skies or the waves or merely standing in the warm waters, or watch the kids splashing around or the lovers holding hands ... please, please, one thing at a time :)

As my eyes scanned away from the lighthouse, I spotted a plane against the reddish-orange sky.  I suppose nature and humans decided to please poor old sriram with everything :)

Thus it was that I spent nearly three hours at the beach. 

I came home, showered, ate chapatis with dal, a guava, chumchum, and am as content as my dog Congo always seemed to be.

ps: in case any of the administrators or unhappy faculty at my university read this: "sabbatical report" in the title of this post is a joke, and nothing but a joke!  All the content here, however, is for real :)

Mitt Romney's Iowa loss, er, win means ...

Notes from the reunion: More than "3 Idiots" getting together?

Soon after the movie "3 Idiots" was released, "S" emailed me about it and strongly encouraged me to watch it.  "S" is the sister of my school mate, "R," who was also a good friend and a neighbor.

Yes, "was."

In the primitive days before the internet and emails, most of us classmates had drifted away from each other.  I lost track of most, including "R."

More than 25 years later, I got an email from "S."  I was surprised and excited.  But the content of the email was nothing but tragic--"R" was no more.  Tears rolled down as I read that email.

The departures of "R" and "M" were the emotional triggers for me to begin to re-connect with old school mates.  I was, therefore, happy to say hello to the living classmates, even if I had no clue about them back when we were in the same school.

Later, as we settled into emailing about more mundane topics, "S" emailed me about "3 Idiots."

I didn't watch the movie. Even when it appeared as an option in the in-flight movie listings, I was not keen on watching it.

For a simple reason: I knew from the movie reviews that the plot was not going to be anything new for me--I had lived it.

Something like how a friend's husband, who is a public defender in capital punishment cases, said he cared not to watch "Dead Man Walking" because he lived with those very issues everyday in his work. 

I was one of the many idiots who went to study engineering because, well, that was what boys did, while girls went to medical colleges.

It didn't take me even a few weeks to figure out that I cared not for engineering.

So, why watch the movie, right?  After all, my own life is as complicated and exciting for me to live it, and no movie with the same plot can be any better :)

But, my brother was keen on us watching it, and we did.  While made quite differently from typical formulaic Bollywood movies, it is still one long movie at almost three hours!  We ended up watching in bits.

Even the scenes of the freshman hazing at college were all too familiar.  The demonstration in the movie that salt water is a conductor of electricity was not humorous to me as the director might have intended--it reminded me about how the "raggers" directed the fully nude me to pee on exposed electric coils in a corner of the room, which I stubbornly refused, and for which I was slapped as well.

At the end of the movie, I told my brother and mother that I routinely tell my students I would be a college professor teaching the topics that I do, even if I got paid nothing at all.  My profession is my hobby too, with the result that it is all fun and play for me.

Life is not about money, nor about fancy gadgets, all of which would have been in plenty had I continued with engineering.

But, that would not have been my life.

I am happy to be an idiot, who lives paycheck-to-paycheck.  Well, it is stressful at times, yes!  But, it's my life :)

All izz well!

Don't think yourself stupid! :)

My brother and I walked over to my sister's place.

"Let's get something from that sweet store across from her flat" he said.

After a detour to that store, we walked in with keera vadai, vegetable cutlets, and chumchum.  Sister made tea (black for me, of course!) and we talked about stuff.

Somehow the chat turned to the topic of real estate prices in the city.  The figures are simply astounding.  So, naturally, I asked, "how do people afford such prices?"

The response was that professionals earn quite a salary these days.

"But, what about people like the domestic help?  I mean, where do they live?  How do they survive?  After the cyclone rains the domestic help didn't come over because of the water-logging."

Turns out that Earl has sane advice for idiots like me:

I laugh now, but I know I will keep asking these questions forever.  After all, that is why I ditched engineering!

Notes from the reunion: Segregated we were, but united we became thirty years later

My cousins were also impressed with the fact that JHSS was a coeducational school.  Until they pointed it out, I didn't know anything else.  As a kid, I was under the impression that boys and schools attended the same schools.

But, coeducational did not mean that we boys and them girls freely interacted.  In the early days, we did, as all kids do.  But, as we progressed along, the societal gender divide was reflected in the school and classroom too.  Most boys kept to themselves and most girls stayed away from the boys.

The hormonal outbursts of teenage years probably made this divide even wider and deeper.  The feminine gender became even more mysterious to me.  Books and movies didn't help in any way.

After living in the US for nearly 25 years, I now find this past all the stranger.  I wonder if the culture in schools and society in Neyveli has changed, or whether the the gender-conscious interactions continue.

The same classmates thirty years were so different.  Gender no longer divided us.  Perhaps it was because of the three decades of life. Or because most of us have traveled long ways--mentally, culturally, and geographically--from that small town. Or, perhaps it is simply that the world has changed.  Or, maybe because we are all nearing fifty and we have reached a stage that we no longer care?

Gender mattered only when it came to sleeping and bathroom arrangements. It did feel a tad strange that all of a sudden the girls went their ways to their rooms, and the guys to ours.

For the first time in the reunion, we were strictly a bunch of guys sitting around and chatting about the old days, and about updates in our lives since we completed high school.

I have no idea if girls were girls and had pillow fights :)

We guys were far from being guys.

I listened to friends, and "K" in particular, talk about the health issues of parents.  "G" asked me about my atheism, though it might have because he wanted to divert attention from another topic.

When "S" lit up a cigarette, I was surprised. "I didn't know you smoked" I told him.  He had an immediate comeback: "I didn't know either."  "W" sat with us and slept.

Come to think of it, our parents would have been pretty happy that we were so decently human!

The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that the gender divide was a huge loss.  I don't think I knew how to "normally" interact with girls until I went to the US.  Graduate schooling was a learning experience in more ways than one.

Now, after practically all my adult life in the US, I find that I am oblivious to the gender aspect.

Well, I am gender-conscious.  For instance, as a middle-aged guy, I find that almost always, automatically--without thinking--I hold the doors open for women of all ages to enter buildings or cars. 

A few days ago, my mother's cousin and his wife visited with us for a few minutes.  While they were leaving, I held the passenger door while the wife sat inside.  As I was beginning to slowly close the door, I felt her pulling the door in, which is when I understood that she didn't know I was standing there to close the door.

"It shows that you live in America" she said.

The husband had a wonderful joke.  He said that in India, if a man holds the car door open for a woman, either the car is new or the wife is new :)

We all laughed.

It is awesome that humor hasn't died in India.

Notes from the reunion: Our paths cross, again and again

In the reunion schedule was a couple of hours of unstructured free time.  The idea was that we might want to visit the respective homes where we lived, our old haunts, and perhaps even run into a few familiar faces in town.

We broke off into small groups and headed in different directions.  It was no surprise, however, when even within this, our paths crossed.

"J" and "S" were the first ones we ran into, in the drizzle that was falling thanks to Cyclone Thane.  It was outside the town's main library.

I have spent many hours there, scanning through materials that were not in any way directly related to the school materials.  As Mark Twain humorously noted, I've never let school interfere with my education :)

"J" said that she probably spent half her life there, and I thought I did too.

"S" chuckled.  "Sriram and Srikumar rarely did their school work, and read everything else" he added.

That is true; neither of us cared for the school work.  Was that to our advantage or disadvantage, I will never know.  After all, there is no real life Groundhog Day.

We parted again, for a while.

A few minutes later, we ran into another group--this was a large one of five or six. 

With one arm over "P" and another over "U," I told them how much I appreciated their presence.  "You two are so much fun and wonderful, and I feel awful that we didn't know each other when we were in school" I told them. 

What I told "U" and "P" is equally applicable to many others at the reunion--the guys and the girls.  "G," with whom I had very little interactions is one neat guy to talk to, especially on serious subjects.  Similarly, the time I spent with "D" was not much at all at school, and now it is such a delight to talk with him.

After a few minutes of joshing, we all went our ways, yet again.

And then we all got together again for a final meal together.  Only to bring the curtains down and begin to head back to our respective corners where we lead our daily lives.

But, I am sure our paths will cross again, and again, and again, and ....

Jawahar School has quite some flaws. No false comparisons. Yet, it is awesome!

Growing up in Neyveli, whenever cousins came from small towns deep in the south of Tamil Nadu, or even from Madras, I was made to feel that Neyveli was one advanced town.  They marveled at the roads, the buildings, the abundant clean water that was piped, electricity that was always available, and a school that was fabulous.

I am confident that all these were not merely my perceptions, but were factual.

After such a life, and after a few years in the US, when I visited Tanzania a couple of years ago, I was shocked at the conditions there.  Even in their big city, Dar es Salaam.

A couple of days later, our group headed to the village, Pommern, where we were to spend the two-plus weeks.  That village was way poorer in every which way than any of the villages I had visited throughout my childhood.

The high school at Pommern, which was a residential one, was supposedly one of the better rural high schools and students came there from towns and villages quite far away.

But, conditions were awful.

Even the blackboard was not a blackboard--it was merely a rectangular portion of the wall that had been painted black.  Very few students had textbooks, and the furniture in the classrooms was not anything to write home about.

But, that was Tanzania, I thought.

Now, after visiting Neyveli, my old high school seems to be only a couple of notches above that high school in Pommern.

Thirty years have gone by but the school does not appear to have undergone appropriate upgrades over the same time period.

The classrooms looked the same as they did when I was a student.

How can that be?

More so when the industrial activity in town is immensely more profitable now compared to three and four decades ago.

There is something seriously wrong with this picture.

As I walked around with "W" and "J" I kept muttering to myself, and to them, that this was all too depressing.  Maybe I was screwing up their homecoming experience!

Were/are my expectations unreal?

I think not.  If four decades ago the facilities at the school were that much above norm for my cousins to go ooh and aah, then am I not justified in expecting conditions to be correspondingly better now?

When traveling, I have come to use a convenient shortcut for getting a feel for how things are: peeping into bathrooms at public buildings.  So, of course, I walked into the toilet facilities for students, and took a couple of photographs as well.

There is something seriously wrong here.

In a way, this ties in with my earlier observation that "long-term investments that could propel continuous productivity enhancements seem to be severely lacking.  From the physical manifestations in roads and power supply to education and health."

Makes me think all the more about the Chinese versus Indian approach to development--my hypothesis is that schools in cities and towns in China would not have fallen behind in their facilities, compared to how things were four decades ago.  Some day, I hope to visit China and check it out.

But, as Shakespeare wrote in Sonnet 130, there are flaws and we still love them:

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red ;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

You said it, Will!

Notes from the reunion: "I always remembered you as a pappu face"

There is at least one practical reason for high school reunions: they remind us how much we have changed physically, aged, all perhaps for the wiser.

Over the last year or so, as I re-connected with many old classmates, and shared my latest photos with them, many had a tough time relating to the new me.

Willie was very happy to see me at the reunion, but it took him some time to adjust to my appearance that has very little in common with the face he last saw in 1981.

"I always remembered you as a pappu face, with slightly chubby cheeks" he said, and added "even when I talked to you when you were at Venu's office a couple of years ago, I only imagined your pappu face."

I laughed.  I can easily recall that face.  The face that also got affectionately pinched a lot.  Facial hair was light, and I had just about started shaving.

The face now has a beard, which is mostly grey. The hair on top is grey and balding.  Pappu no more!

Willy on the other hand is so easily recognizable because, well, he pretty much looks the same.  So do a few others.  Most of the rest of us have gone through various levels of metamorphosis.

Sudha and Uma too had problems relating to the way I speak too.  I distinctly recall the first time I called them up from the US--they could not relate to the new me as the old Sriram of Neyveli, with my slightly Americanized accent and use of words.

One wonderful aspect of the reunion was this: despite all the changed appearances and voices, in no time we were all relating to each other of the old days.  Physical changes do not necessarily mean all that much.

Not seeing the pappu face didn't affect Willie, who sat with a small group of us who were chatting into very late hours of the night.  He was sleepy, but chose to sleep sitting up on an uncomfortable chair.  When I asked him about it the following morning, he said he slept that way because he felt he might never again get such an opportunity to be amongst old classmates.

After a couple of friends freely admitted to using hair dyes to cover the grey hair, Uma asked me something along those lines about me.

"Literally and figuratively it is 'what you see is what you get'" I told her.

I was tempted to get into how I weave my own life into the newspaper columns and academic presentations.  I wanted to talk about autoethnography.  To quite an extent, there is a lot about me in the open.  But then better sense prevailed, and I let it go.  I can imagine how bizarre it will be for a transformed pappu face to talk about autoethnography to a friend whom I barely knew 30 years ago!

Notes from the reunion: "College changed me"

"P" was one non-stop laughing machine.  At one point, "S" walked over to the table where I was seated with "P" and a few others, and tried to see if he could get her to be serious at least for a minute.

But, as he walked over, "S" himself started laughing.  Such was/is the nature of "P's" infectious laughter.

"S" composed himself and told "P" to look straight into his eyes.  But, again, "S" cracked up almost in an instant.

As "S" walked away, I told "P" that I do not recall her being such a laughing person when we were in school.

"College changed me" she said.

The transformative powers of college!

In the US, we routinely advise students about the importance of college years, for content acquisition as well as to develop a sense of who we are.  The best experiences, then, bring out the best in us.

While it might be true that whatever didn't kill us only makes us stronger, my college experiences were far from pleasant.  The reserved person in me became even more reserved.  It was graduate schooling later on that provided that transformative experience.

I recall one experience in my first semester as a fresh-off-the-boat graduate student.  It was in the planning theory class, with Martin Krieger as the instructor.

Having shifted from engineering to a completely new field, in a new country, where the educational system was completely different, I never ever felt out of place like I did in that classroom.

A couple of weeks in, we were discussing the readings.  I had something to say.  But, as I started speaking, I started sweating out of sheer nervousness.  I bet the class looked at me with sympathy.

A couple more weeks later, we turned in the first of the papers in Krieger's class.  Again, never having written essays all through the four years of college, I had no idea how to write papers.

When Krieger returned the evaluated papers back, I had earned a gentleman "C."

"C."

I felt crushed.  Not that I was chasing the magical 4.0 GPA; I was, after all, the same old high school student who couldn't care about grades.  But, a "C" was a shock.

I worried that I had erred in ditching electrical engineering and getting into intellectual areas that were far beyond my abilities.

There was nobody to talk to about this.  But, the wonderful aspect of being an adult, as opposed me in my teenage years, was this: I was able to work it out within me.

Now, when I write opinion pieces in newspapers, for instance, I get appreciative remarks about my writing.  In my classes, when it comes to students making presentations in class, I often share with them my own experiences at having been awful as a student.  I go one step more, and tell them, "if you think I am a bad teacher now, well, you should be glad that you were not in my classes a decade ago."

For me, the transformation that began in graduate school continues even now.  I wonder how I will be a couple more decades from now.

Maybe I will get to share such stories at the next reunion with my high school classmates.  As I say these, perhaps "P" will keep laughing throughout.  "Y" will also laugh throughout, but a lot quieter is her laugh.  And, we will all laugh with them.

Notes from the reunion: From America to the biology lab

Our "reunion" bus pulled up outside the school.  Even though we were there during the week between Christmas and New Year, when schools and colleges are closed back in the US, there was a lot of activity here at Neyveli.

Students were at exams.  Yes, exams!

I would think that it is a crime to force students into classrooms and exam halls during what ought to be vacation time.  I recall that thirty/forty years ago, we had holidays during this time.

There were clusters of students everywhere, like this group outside the building.  Why were they sitting there on the road? I know not, and I didn't want to  ask them either. 

I did walk over to a bunch of inquisitive and giggling students who were outside the gates.  They seemed to be waiting for a few more students before heading back to their homes in the van in which a few were already seated..  I heard one tell her group "they are old students."  Yes, we are old!

I walked up to them and said "you are right. We finished school in 1981."

The group became shy.  I knew it was up to me to draw them into a conversation.  "We have come to see our old school and town."

That made at least one girl a tad confident.  "Where are you from?" she asked me.

"I am from America. In our group, we have classmates from Dubai, Bahrain, and from all over India" I spoke slowly.

Their eyes got wider.  All the eight or nine girls, who were probably 13 or 14 years old, were intently listening to me.  I wondered whether my Americanized accent was making the words all mumbo-jumbo to them.

I wished them well and entered the school.

About five or six custodial workers were sweeping and washing the floors.  When they were done, they sat down and were observing us alumni walking around. 

"We finished school thirty years ago, and have come back to the school now" I told them in Tamil.  I was sure they chuckled inside at my Americanized Tamil.

Of course, the first question from them was "where are you coming from?"

"America" I said.  "The school has changed a lot.  But, still, it means a lot for us."

They looked at one another.  One woman stepped up with a question: "what is your salary?"

I laughed.  "சம்பளம் பாதி கிம்பளம் பாதி" I replied in jest, recalling the old movie song.

I rejoined the rest of the group in the biology lab.

Tolstoy was correct that we are unhappy in our own ways. Yet, most are happy

Many years ago, when I read Anna Karenina, I was struck by the profound message in the simple opening sentence: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

I hadn't quite graduated from my teenage years when I read that Tolstoy masterpiece. My mental maturity was nowhere near the levels required to understand that complex narrative of humans and their emotions.  But, I read that book, nonetheless, primarily because the opening sentence was such a hook.

Since then, as I lived and experienced life, the more I have come to appreciate the idea that unhappiness comes in many forms. 

I have even reached a state where I now question the very idea of the existence of happy families. 

It is not that happy families do not experience unhappiness--they do.  Happy families are those that are able to be happy despite their own versions of unhappiness.

This understanding of life was further reinforced at the high school reunion. 

Over the thirty years, we transitioned from the families into which we were born, to creating our own families.  From the few conversations that I had where were went beyond the "hi" and jokes and onto more serious topics, the more it seemed that happiness comes despite all the unhappiness. 

In fact, I am now more inclined to believe that happiness comes through unhappiness.

Tolstoy's Anna saw and felt way too much unhappiness.  Could she have created happiness out of all that?  I think so. Perhaps a high school reunion would have given her a better perspective on the world, and her own life?  Her life wouldn't have ended horribly then.

I am a bat-poet? Hanging upside down and observing the world?

Sometimes, a book is not simply a book.

The high school reunion happened.  Over the thirty years, we have traveled many different journeys.  Very few were simple, and most were over meandering paths.  And, yet, there we were.

I was amazed at how much I didn't know my classmates.  I suppose it is understandable, given that we had gone our separate ways when we were seventeen, or eighteen.  With a few, it was even earlier when they switched schools.

As much as we had already re-acquainted ourselves in cyberspace, it was an entirely different and wonderful experience re-connecting with each other in the real world.  What a pleasure to know them, at least now.

While chatting with them, sometimes in groups and other times in one-to-one settings, however brief they were, one of them, "J," said, "I have this book that you might like to read."

She meant it.  When I saw her again after a few minutes, there she was with the book.

"You are giving this to me because .....?" I asked "J."

"If you want to read it.  Not necessarily right here.  You can return it to me later when you visit my place."

That too is a beautiful aspect of this reunion--it is also a desire to take the re-connecting to more substantive levels.  Another classmate, "S," for instance, has been a serious reader of my blog posts over the past few months, and sends me interesting reads as well.  It was through "S" that I ended up trading emails, on the topic of atheists in carnatic music, with TM Krishna, a leading voice in that art/profession.

Anyway, I thanked "J" for the book, which I safely tucked away in my backpack.

The book "The Bat-Poet" is not any heavy reading.  It has a deceptive appearance and presentation--as if it is a children's book.  At forty-three pages, which includes quite a few illustrations, it certainly seems like ten-year olds are the intended audience.

But, there is a lot in the book even for this forty-seven year old.

The bat-poet is curious, which then leads the bat to observe and think about life around him all by himself.

As I read the book, I wondered whether "J" meant that I, too, was like that bat-poet who was hanging from the porch all by himself and noting the life and activities all around me.  At one point, I thought that a modern day re-telling (the book was published in 1964) will have the bat-poet as a blogger!

When he would wake up in the daytime and hang there looking out at the colors of the world, he would say the poems over to himself.  He wanted to say them to the other bats, but then he would remember what had happened when he'd said them before. There was nobody for him to say the poems to.

As a blogger, I don't have to know that there is no "bat" audience for this bat-poet.  If somebody reads them, and finds them worthwhile, and I hear from them then, hey, I am not merely saying my poems to myself!

Later, the bat-poet thinks:

I'll go to the chipmunk and say, 'If you'll give me six crickets I'll make a poem about you.' Really I'd do it for nothing, but they don't respect something if they get it for nothing."

Yep.

At the end of the book, the bat-poet, who explored these by himself, gets back to hanging upside down with the other bats.  Did "J" mean that it paralleled the high school reunion too?  I will find out soon when I get to meet her and her family at her home, and her family at her work.

For now, I like the idea of me as a bat-poet, however awful and out-of-meter my blog posts are :)