Jimmy was wondering why the Manager selected this of all the places for the office get-together. It was pretty far form the city where they worked. Tucked in the deep south of the subcontinent all the employees had to be flown in by a charted flight. Some had already made other plans for the weekend and he had to use all his persuasive power to get them in. Nobody wanted it to miss it really though. They had worked like crazy for last 6 months. But the announcement was so sudden. Anyways except for a few almost everybody made it to the party.
As he tucked into the third glass of champagne he was swept by a sense of loss. The park they were having the getto was opposite to the college that he so loved. It’s imposing medieval structure had corners that would open at every turn with their own little secrets. of love lost and love made, of silly fights for the great ideology, of half done busts that looked full. Jimmy had just spend 2 years in that institution. But this was the place where he belonged. On evenings they would walk to the park and sit by the backwaters. Sun setting in the background with a poet breaking into Neruda.
Meanwhile the group was drinking into the beauty around. Everybody moved towards a corner and were getting boisterous. They had become a little unruly and were close to the ridge . He couldn’t help shouting aloud about a friend who fell into those waters and never returned. A pack of friends were so precariously poised against the stone walls by the backwater and he was jammed inside . A mortal fear gripped Jim as he saw Rekha coming near. She just touched and they fell like a pack of cards into the murky waters below. thud... thud ... thud they splashed rapidly into the sludge below. Plunging deep into the water body below all he could see around was cocktail of crude, hay and water. It was like an endless tunnel to eternity. He flapped like crazy ... he had to. Cannot surrender so fast. Finally a hand came in from nowhere as he broke into air. It was an arduous climb up the slippery moss filed walls back into the park. There were a couple of hands clamoring be rescued from below. He wanted to help them. But someone told they were all taken care of. Rekha was looking back as she walked out of the main gate. Of all the people why she ??
He rushed to the shower nearby and washed all the dirt. Didn’t really care whether somebody was looking. Felt like there was accumulated dirt of centuries. Coming out of the shower the park had transformed. Beastly carton characters with large heads had taken control. They romped freely on the pavements whipping everybody who came near. The park had turned into a cartoon farm while he was reborn. Don’t know how they had taken over. But they were absolutely in command trampling anything that came on their way. They showed no mercy to women or kids. Everybody was bought into meek submission in the labor camp and was never let out. The beastly toons walked, metals whips in their hand swirling it on any being that they took a fancy.
Years passed…. everybody had settled to their fate. The winds of change were blowing slowly. Over the years the cartoon masters were growing week and old. Or probably it was futile for them to keep a talented populace under submission. They allowed small concessions. The new generation were allowed out of the camp. But they there was tough exam to clear. Jimmy sat by the steps of his modest dwelling as he trained his beautiful grand daughter for the exam.
7 comments:
Heavy duty stuff ( another way of saying I didnt understand )
Got some questions:
a) Was the body of water leading to another world ( the cartoon world ) . You mention earlier of somebody falling into the water and not returning.
b) What was special about Rekha's role?
c) The new generation was allowed out of the camp - out to where?
yours confusedly,
Sachin.
Sachin:> you probably got most of what I intend to convey and I feel elated about that. actually the thread of the story was a dream. your questions made me think in directions which I had not at the time of writing. there could be multiple interpretations
answers
a) yes it is. the dip into cartoon world is a major shift. but when i look back the character spans more than two worlds. past college, the current, cartoon camp and a future looking outside world where his grand daughter might move to.
b) Rekha could be a metaphor for somebody/something you believed in soo much, but let you down when you most wanted. there is this sense of betrayal felt by Jimmy which i have not been able to communicate very clearly.
c) Away form the tyranny of cartoon camp. The cartoon farm is tightly controlled regime almost like a labor camp. i had some visions of the movie "the pianist" about the holocaust as i was writing it
Great First Very Short Story :)
My dad once quoted some one "Life like a dome of many coloured glass stains the white radiance of eternity". I would like to say the same about love. There are so many colours to it. It could be as non-possessive and parrallel and pseudo platonic as it was when Jimmy, in the two years he roamed the regal college, chatted up the nubile beauties after every hour one in the canteen, one in the library, one in the park, one near the gate, one near the department and on and on until it was time to rush home and differentiate, or was it integrate ten thousand time or risk being thrown out. Or it could be as possessive as that of Zubeida who chose being united in death to losing her lover. Rekha might have only intended to pull Jimmy back from the edge and accidentally ended up pushing instead. Jimmy cannot deny that there was as much murky water of hay and dirt on one side as there was firm ground and plants and flowers on the other, as he stood teetering on the slippery moss filled stone wall. Rekha was just a 'nimitham' as they say in Hindu philosophy.
Jimmy's pal who fell in and didn't come back, probably didn't flap about to come up like Jimmy did. When he dived in, rather than fell in, maybe the season was different. Outside the water, the searing summer had heated the stones red hot and the water provided a cool getaway. When he came up, he probably saw the cartoon monsters moving in and plotting their take over; he gave up without a fight. It is also possible that, in that season, the water was bluer and so he decided to hang out there for a while.
Re-reading the story many times, I am now able to feel a surge of hope that is expressed in the last paragraph. A hope of success, in a struggle against the tyranny, that could be fulfilled by another generation. I feel it is a parallel to the fate of India which, against all odds, is awakening like a giant is silencing all her tormentors, repressors and critics with a new generation that she trained, like Jimmy trained his grand-daughter.
Exactly mathai. It is amazing how stories can communicate in a way we don't intend. I too noted the parallel upon reading it on publishing. The surge that India is experiencing now is the wisdom of the generation before us.
Did you mean Zubieda in the movie by Govind Nihlani of the same name.
Oh yeah Rekha is a nimtham. That is s why Jimmy never felt any hatred towards her. he felt a little betrayed though
Meanwhile can you post the 3rd comment if you have it on your system. I inadvertently purged it.
Yes, I meant the Zubeida in the movie Zubeida played by Karishma.
(I see that you got back the 3rd comment.)
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