Diwali And The Key To Happiness

In Kerala, Diwali is not traditionally celebrated with much dhaam dhoom as in other parts of India. That is the reason why I never associated this festival with crackers. We in Kerala celebrate Vishu and it is in this occasion that we normally burst crackers. I used to have lot of enthusiasm for this activity when I was a kid, but with time bursting crackers had become the least of priorities. So from the last six years that I am in Bangalore, I have never lighted a cracker for Diwali even when the whole neighborhood was enjoying their high decibel fun. 

But this year turned out to be different and how! What makes it more fun was that there was no plan till the last moment and it was just a momentary decision that made our evening the most enjoyable one in last few months. Diwali was a working day for us as the company management decided to give us off on Monday instead of Tuesday in which Diwali fell. My better half M went to meet my close friend and colleague V's wife S who stayed nearby. S had made some delicious Gulab Jamuns, and invited me too to join them after working hours. So evening I went there with V, who had got a huge box of assorted crackers, but was in a mood to gift it to kids. We four had jamuns and coffee, chit chatted for some time and then me and M took leave. 

We walked back and was about to reach our home when M remembered the key. She had kept the key at V's home when she was there. We had to walk back all the way to get the key. But when we reached their home, the plans changed. The decision was taken to burst crackers, at least some of that he had in stock if not all. We burnt the candles, took out the sparklers, rockets, wheels and had a great time. Our house key turned out to be the key of happiness this Diwali.

Book Review: The Bankster

As the title indicates, Ravi Subramanian’s latest novel The Bankster deals with the intricate world of international banking and the crimes associated with it. I have never read any of his previous books- The Incredible Banker or The Devil in Pinstripes. But I feel like reading them after reading this one. That I think in itself is a great achievement for a writer. These days many Indian writers are pushing their limits and are trying to achieve the heights scaled by several popular fiction writers of the West, in terms of content, genre, plot and quality (the tag John Grisham of Banking on the book cover of The Bankster is an evidence). Though the quality of writing in many cases is debatable, I feel the effort itself deserves a pat on the back. And with writers like Ravi Subramanian, the distance to be covered in this regards is getting shorter.

Bankster is a word coined from the words Banker and Gangster. The novel is about such a group of Banksters (bankers who uses their profession as a cover to perpetrate crime), their victims and people out to stop them at any cost. Narrative crisscrosses many national borders. The first act is in Angola where a rogue CIA agent buys blood diamond. Then we are told about a father in Kerala who lost his beloved son to the nuclear accident in Chernobyl and is hell bent on preventing any such atrocity happening again. After that action shifts to Mumbai, to Great Boston Global Bank, an international bank where everything seems compliant and efficient on surface, but deep inside something sinister and nasty is cooking. A chain of cold blooded serial murders disturb the peace and steps in Karan Panjabi, a journalist and former employee to uncover the truth. 

Spanning 358 pages, The Bankster is a fast paced thriller and in every page something happens that keep the reader engaged and thinking. The setting is chillingly realistic and gives a feel that such heinous crimes are possible inside the seemingly spot free and sophisticated banks. The best quality of the book is that even a novice like me does not feel bogged down by the narration that uses practices, procedures and terminology used in banking sector to move the story forward. The climax is good, considering that the suspense that build up from starting gets culminated logically and believably. No loopholes are left opened. 

Speaking about the negatives, the characterization is a bit shallow. You will find characters spanning a wide spectrum. Like the idealist Krishna Menon, to characters with grey shades like Nikhil and outright evil personified (I cannot take their names as it will be a spoiler). The writing never makes us feel about any of these characters. We are never made to enter their universe and see things from their perspective. Ultimately they end up just being pawns of the game that the author is describing and nothing more. Ifwe observe masters of this genre- John Grisham, John le Carre or Jeffrey Archer, we can see that they never rush with their plot. They take their own sweet time to develop their characters and plot, thereby making the reader care about them. But inspite of it, I would say The Bankster is a must read for people who like good thrillers. 

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Orhan Pamuk’s Snow: Tiring But Insightful

In Orhan Pamuk’s acclaimed novel Snow, a middle aged writer on political exile returns to his home country only to find that everything that was once familiar to him is changed. The novel set in Kars, a border town in Turkey, is a multilayered story dealing with subjects as varied as the conflict between East and West, religion, belief, God, secularism,love, art and power. The book has a snail-like pace, but rewards the patient reader with several profound insights about the topics it deal with. It makes us think about real people living and dealing with issues in a world where the gap between politics and religion is getting narrow by the day. Ka reaches the border city of Kars (Snow) as a journalist to investigate the suicide of several young girls and also to report on the mayoral elections. The previous mayor was killed and this time Muhtar Bey, of an Islamic party is the popular candidate expected to win the election. Radical Islam is slowly getting popular in a nation governed by seculars. The secular government has banned girls coming to educational institutes wearing head scarves. Political Islamists claim this as the reason for suicides. Ka has one more personal agenda to fulfill- returning to Germany with his old lover Ipek, ex-wife of Muhtar. Heavy snowfall blocks the road for three days and there occurs a chain of events that change the life of everyone in Kars. Ka witness the death of an official and a drama troupe with the help of secret police and ex-military personnel conducts a coup. These events makes everyone involved introspect and find what is really important to them in life. More than the plot, it is the characterization that makes this novel interesting. Each person in the story is integral to the plot. Every one of the characters is strong willed and has their own value system according to which they act. Some of them like Blue, the enigmatic terrorist and Sunoy, the actor who leads the coup, pronounce their belief outright. But some of them like Ipek or Kadife, her sister reveals it through their actions. Snow that falls incessantly and blocks all the exits to Kars is also an integral character in the drama. Sometimes Snowfall is contributes to solitude, sometimes to happiness and many other emotions according to the occasions. Ka gets back his ability to write poems in Kars and later he organizes his poems that ‘come to him’ in Kars in the shape of a snow flake.Orhan Pamuk’s Snow is a profound novel that can be tiring but also insightful to readers who are ready to invest their time and effort.

A weird dream

I have had my share of weird dreams. Flying snakes, war scenarios, cob webs, oceans, guns, dragons, whales, pirate ships, mountains, ghosts… you name it, I’ve seen it. I’ve even dreamed waking up, doing my regular chores and going to office, only to wake up and find that I’ve to do it all over again. But these days I’ve acquired a knack of forgetting my dreams just moments after waking up. So there are mornings when I ponder hard about that great dream that I had moments before, but all that draws in my mind is a blank wall. Last week one early morning I saw this dream that lingered a little while in my mind even after waking up. I don’t remember the whole episode but just some highlights and the ending, as it caught me totally off guard. I am not a person who believes that dreams point to one’s future or analyzing the images and the symbols in dreams can give insights to one’s psychology. But if any of you can make any deduction with this one, I don’t mind you sharing it with me. I saw myself at a relatives’ place. They are very close relatives of mine, or so I should assume by the manner I behaved with them. (Now don’t ask me how I am related to them. I don’t have any idea, nor am I remembering any of their faces.) Time is late evening and I have to return from there to Bangalore. Bus starts at 10 pm, but before that I have to pick the rest of my family from a nearby place. Many people are entering the household, greeting me and chatting with me. I am looking at my watch and noting that it is time to go. Then I noticed that these guys have a dog at their home. And what a dog it was! I should call it a hound... such a ferocious and mean looking dog. I saw it standing on its hind legs and effortlessly placing its forelegs on the shoulder of a man. And then it was time for me to move from there. I collected my luggage, bid farewell to the people there and walked towards the place my family was. I walked some distance and looked back to see the hound and another dog following me. The other dog was a dwarf compared with the hound. Its barking was more of yelping and was irritating. It tried to run behind me and when I threw an imaginary stone at it, ran back and hid behind a tree. All this time the hound was peacefully strolling behind me with an indifferent look on its face. I was about to reach my destination, just few more meters will take me there. The hound increased its pace. It was just behind me within seconds. I turned back to face it with a slight tension in my mind. The hound stood on its hind legs, placed its forelegs on my shoulders, looked on my face with a friendly expression and enquired: “What time is your bus?” “Ten O clock” I replied calmly.

SPIRITual Bliss And A Bewildered Friend

A couple of years back, I had met this guy from North India who was on a short term assignment to Bangalore. He was a pale, lean and tall person, so naive that I crossed a busy Bangalore road and had to wait for ten minutes for him to cross. I had spent a couple of days with him and had took him around our locality to show the place. Everything in Bangalore- food, transport, culture, language, people- was all very new to him. If you are from Bangalore, you probably will be familiar with the sight of men fallen on ground in deep drunken stupor- in a real SPIRITual bliss. That day when I took him to a crowded market there were three of them lying just some ten meters apart. When my friend saw this sight that was alien to him, he stared for some moments, then looked at me and whispered nervously: "They are not dead. Are they?" "No, they aren't... I hope they aren't", was my reply. ...who knows?