Inshallah!

Sometimes it becomes so difficult to get the racist out from inside of us. On Sunday was one example – I was standing by the road waiting for Jasmine to pick me up. On the side of the road was a car standing. Oddly – as parking isn’t allowed there. There was no one in the car and I saw that one of the tyres had a flat. On the Back of the car were the words – Insah Allah. I wasn’t  going to stand anywhere near this car.

Many years ago, when I was in 12^th standard, Mumbai faced the most devastating terrorist bombing ever. Some 13 bomb blasts were set off in a span of less than a few hours. That was the first time that Mumbai was hit thus and everyone now understood what RDX (the explosive used) was. I passed through two of those spots just in the morning. I was trying to learn magic with a local magician at Shivaji Park. So I passed Sena Bhavan and Plaza Cinema that morning and the blasts were at around the afternoon. It was a lucky miss I guess. One explosion was setoff at the Bombay Stock Exchange. It seems that in a freak case, one person called up home to say he was safe after the Exchange blast and that he was coming home, and he was caught in the second blast at Worli. That was especially sad.

Mumbai has faced more attacks designed to cause terror since. Once there were a series of train bombings. A friend of mine told me that he was in the very compartment that was bombed. I felt that too as I used the train network to travel to work and home. Then there was the really infamous attacks by armed intruders on the Taj and CST station and The Oberoi hotel amongst others. My office was in the building right opposite the Oberoi hotel and from there I travelled to CST station to come home. That day I left at 6 sharp from work. It seems the attackers were planning to reach CST at 6 pm to cause maximum impact. They were stuck in traffic and reached by around 7.30. I missed those as well by a whisker.

In hindsight, if I was around, and hopefully safe, it would have been an interesting grandfather tale for the kids. Growing up in Mumbai and witnessing these attacks as well as riots of 1991, a Mumbai man is possibly hardened compared to most other cities. It hurts less and life goes on as normal faster than what it possibly would to another. I grew up in interesting times – riots, bomb blasts, attack and gangsters. Of course – the eighties were when the gangsters rules. There was an interesting story in the papers or a shootout or something or the other happening. Things are pretty much silent these days. I think it was a Chinese Curse that said “may you live in interesting times”.  Boring is good!

When I grew up I grew in charged times – the poor Muslim was an obvious target of religious discrimination. The same way a black male in US would face suspicion any Muslim male in India would face similar discrimination. It was us peace loving Hindus versus the fanatical Muslims. It has been a tough and long journey to conquer this racism and rise above. Its definitely not easy.  I try my best to tell myself whenever I see myself behaving stupidly – DON’T DON’T . We can’t be propagating it.

But when I see a car seemingly abandoned in the middle of the road (especially worli) and it’s got allah written on it in bold. I would like to wait a little further away. Nicely behind a tree. Ami being safe… Am I being racist… am !?

ding dong, oh baby sing a song

Music is beautiful. It can turn your mood to a different direction and it can also be used to reflect your mood. It’s beautiful. But I… I don’t listen to music. I have never been able to sit for hours listening to music. I can’t appreciate music for long. I don’t understand it. I love it when it plays. I can sing and dance along. But I can’t let it run for long. And I just can’t talk about it too much. Singers, musicians etc.. These are no conversations for me. Jasmine still likes her music. No she isn’t too picky but she still likes it. She can go to sleep listening to music and she can’t stuff her ears with the earphones and enjoy. I can’t do that. And ear phones for music… I can’t handle that as well. I feel it just separates me from the rest of the world. And I would like my sound system to be of a decent quality. But still even after all this I can’t spend money on listening to music. Concerts bore me after a point of time. I would love if someone tried explaining some of the music to me. I would be able to appreciate it better, but still not much beyond a point.

I think Jispa loves her music. Jasmine always has the radio on while driving and Jispa listens to a lot of radio. Now she has this thing for English music. Wonder where she picked that from. Jispa insists on listening to the English radio channel. I find that even more irritating. New English music has passed me by completely. My western music is limited to the stuff I heard in college and a few songs from there on. While driving, I feel is the best time to catch up talking with each other. So if Jispa or Jasmine is in the car then I don’t switch on the radio. I rather talk about something or the other. Music is a conversation restrictor. Earlier when I drove alone I heard the radio but since a few years I have listening to good podcasts and using that to further my readings. Sometimes this makes me feel like a completely fuddy duddy. I am hungry and have an almost insatiable appetite for knowledge and music becomes a faltu waste of time. And then it surprises me when sometimes I switch on the radio at times and love the music being played.

I love the music but can’t listen to it. What is this weird combination? In fact I feel most music listeners are highly pretentious. But then this I attribute to my own stupid judgment (or lack of). But I still can’t understand my behavior. If a song is stuck in my head, I like it. I can sing it again and again. Singing songs while batting have helped me improve it and I think highly of it. I sing so much that Jispa hates it and I a song is stuck in her head while swimming she blames me for it. She hates it when that happens. She feels irritated and I can’t understand why that is a bad thing. I love it. But I still can’t listen to too much music. I also never understood how people listen to music while studying or reading. I can’t do that as well. Today morning I tried listening to music while working or reading – it bombed as usual. I had to switch off the music.

It’s a weird thing. Music is so powerful and I have mentioned this incident before – I used to sing to a pregnant Jasmine. It was this one song and when Jispa was born whenever she cried I sang this song and it made her quiet. I completely believe in the power of music, but I can’t somehow get it to work hard on me. One song and at best two. Full stop. My mood is ok, now let’s get on with it.

Well, whatever. When I was marketing head for the wealth division, we used to have KK concerts organized for our clients. He was awesome and this song of his was brilliant. I loved it. I heard it today morning and I thought I could hear a few more. In fact I put his entire playlist to play from youtube and then I simply switched it off in 2 minutes. I can’t take more than 67 seconds of emotions. Brain fry ho jata hai J

For those wondering on what the title means - listen to this...