Monday 17 December 2012

Calcutta Dope

Olypub

I am talking to Max about the similarity between Paris and Calcutta when he starts rolling a joint. He has carefully stashed away some for the evening. Our taxi ambles away easily when the driver sniffs the dope and looks back, I look at Max who is coolly going about his job, mixing tobacco and grass in the right proportion, stoking the joint so that it holds and licking the rolling paper finally. French (Europeans as I get to learn later) are really fond of tobacco; Max says his biggest discovery of India is…well…cheap cigarettes…

Driving through the by lanes of Calcutta at night, dead communists lying at crossroads with dead imperialists. A Mr. AJC Bose running parallel to one Mr. Elgin (howdy gentlemen, bhadralok) roads are almost deserted and not all of them lead to the Park street, but our taxi that  night does lead to that hallowed street, to the most classfree place in the entire city, where there’s a drink for all: Olypub, where the maître d' will ‘accidentally’ spill over extra booze from the jigger into your glass.

The taxi stops, Max and I enter Oly with great expectations, much lesser cash and quite a few stares. Max tells me again he’s of sick of being stared at in Calcutta, I wonder whether I will be stared at if I am in Paris, meanwhile I am looking for a seat and true to the place’s reputation there’s none, bearded communists are drinking with the same élan as a group of college going kids, they are all here to drink, a great leveler like death. A virtual toast from my side to the sincere buggers…cheers…

Max approaches the college gang for a light and is obliged by a nymph (sorry for the lack of a more polite word, but to be honest she will behave like a nymph as the night proceeds). Max is pretty cool at this, striking casual conversations at ease “ you have a light on you” or just his European good looks smile with strangers, pretty effective, the gang adjusts us at their table ( all smokers…)

We order  drinks as the kids rattle off in Bengali, I can speak broken Bengali so I try to catch words and interpret…..bhalo…khabo…etc etc….but finally give up and order for another vodka for myself. The nymph asks me if I’ve heard about Parikrama who are performing at Someplace else at the park hotel, next door. I nod in the affirmative, Parikrama: arguably the bestest  rock band in India, apparently they play Floyd better than Floyd themselves (ever since Gilmour and Waters parted ways) “So why the hell are we here” asks Max,  by this time high on a joint and down a peg, I give him a stern look since I don’t want to declare in front of a bunch of college kids that we don’t have cash on us, he smiles back the French fool. Liquor at The Park Hotel will burn holes into his pocket so deep he’ll be able to scratch his knees.
           
There is an ugly looking Bengali chick among the kids who’s staring at me. Ugly women are my forte, easier to get and easier to dump. No (belch) strings (belch followed by another belch) attached. I already know I will eventually detest her, her body, her feelings for me. In fact I detest everything about her already except her body, the lust checks my disgust, lust for the bust, keeps away the disgust (my retort to an apple a day keeps the doctor away).

In no time we are four down ( four and a quarter thanks to the deary waiter), and life is much better. Max and nymph are sharing a joint, (not so) ugly chick has placed her arm next to mine, so the intentions are clear. Gulp Gulp. Five down.

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Talking about the stark contrast between their handwritings…his so ugly that a complete generation of professors at his school had cursed their career choices while marking his exam copies (all great men had bad handwritings…but vice versa?)…and hers’ so calligraphic that by the time she wrote his name on a ( The only...of the promised many…) book she gifted him, slanted her head and gave it one final look , he fell in love with it… ………………………………………………………………………………………….

Joking about people’s pot bellies one day when he vowed he’ll never have one…little did he know that pot bellies like death were inevitable, especially if one’s hatred of pot bellies was never greater than one’s love for good food…and he was to remember for the rest of his life the promise he could not keep…averting a self fulfilling prophecy of pot bellies…and many other prophecies which he had inflicted on himself…
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There was vodka in munnar…a new brand called ‘romanov’ (2002)…obtained from a shady malyalee ‘ llll’liquor shop stinking of piss…it was the first time it struck him that she was beautiful....the way her hair swung while she danced …her eyes were just the gentle medium brown colour…reflecting the bonfire…with a drunkard’s confidence he wanted to tell her all that...but wisdom prevailed…atleast once…

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She was listening to Sufi music when she thought of him…(or was she listening to Sufi music because she wanted to think about him)…she was not comfortable with not having ended it on a positive note…she wanted to finish it clinically...leaving no lose ends…no hard feelings….she would have liked to be in touch, once in a while…exchange of mails…or a message on social networking…but she supposed he would still be angry…jerk…

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I look for you in my city..
In places I know I'll not find you in...
In faces I Know are Not yours..