Rain, here and there

 
The city rain blurs my window,
as I sit caged at work -

Back home, the rain fell different:
still wet, still damp, but alive -
the downpour's song, my mother's voice,
steam curling from our tea -
a warmth that sustains memory.

Same rain, same ache,
but only one place taught the sky
how to feel like home.

The Winter Calls Me Home

Sure as the season changes and winter sets

Like basic instinct kicks the birds to migrate, 

My instinct calls me to the mountains

To the cozy nest that my parents built

Linger I never, to heed that call

Sure as the winter calls, 

I'll surely be heading home

For within that little nest lays

All the love in the world for me

All the hopes and dreams -dead and alive

All the memories that weighted and lifted me

For I'm made whole by those yins and yangs

And sure as the season changes, 

I'll always have a place in that nest! 

Home

Dancing around potholes in the cobbled street
Sneezing with every swiveling clouds of dust
Home they said is all in the heart,
Luckily, the heart doesn't have eyes. 
But does home sound like the heart?
Or like the whistle of the winds on the tin roof,
Or the constant humming of the crystal creek? 
Like the heavy footsteps of the tired labourers
Or like the sound of the tired hoe attacking the barren soil? 

Home is like my old and tired mother 
A hidden world of safety and comfort
Struggling yet strong
Dying yet thriving
Hopes abound
Content! 

The Land I Once Knew

The land once familiar to me,

The roads I've walked,

The fields I've surveyed,

The trees I've climbed,

The hills I’ve hiked,

Were no longer familiar to me.

I failed to remember when

The land is coarse and dusty

The fields are barren and dry

The trees are old and creepy

Or that I am but a stranger!

Perhaps we've parted our way

One early morning, long ago

When I left the land,

In search of a dream,

Only to return a decade later, or so.

The land had been my dream,

In the day, and in the night,

And I promised myself

That I’ll return one day, soon

To live with the land.

But later in a sleepy slow

And the tricks of the sadist memories,

Little by little, the dreams began to change

And get buried away, deep

The land, with other memories!

A decade later that dream resurfaced

About a land that I once knew,

It tugged my heart,

And it tugged my soul,

Until one late hour in the setting sun,

When I finally kissed its feet.

But alas, the land has forgotten me!

I had walked these roads, pleaded I,

I had surveyed these fields, screamed I,

I had climbed these trees, begged I,

I had hiked these hills, cried I,

But an eerie silence was my answer!

So I walked the roads and surveyed the fields,

I climbed the trees and hiked up the hills,

But the missing feeling of belongingness,

Can only gulf the sense of being forgotten.

So I made this promise that one day

The land will never forget me again,

For I'll be one again with the land

Head to toe, bone and skeletons,

Never to part again, one and whole,

deep in the heart, in mother earth!

The Last Song

I still must have run about butt-naked for all that I care, but that was a long time ago. It was the time when my grandmother was still alive and told me tales of the wondrous days of her youth. I can swear she did sing me a few songs when she'd find it hard to describe but for the life of me, I didn't remember a single word of the songs or what it was all about. But that was not the last time I heard those songs.

Now almost 20 years later, I’m scouring the internet for one of those songs (don't you wanna frown at the irony here -learning/looking for our traditional song in the internet!) for reason which I should have foreseen and which people have every right to expect of me.

See my sister who studies in Norway called me about her peculiar problem. "I have the perfect dresses (traditional) but what am I suppose to do about the traditional song or dance" she moaned. For all that I care she can sing one of those Lengtong Pauno's, but it did bug me that I myself didn't know a single line of those song, which people identified with me as my traditional song.

I remember, as a kid, our yearly sojourn to either one or the other of our aunts' village during the harvest festival. my parents would hardly approve of us going for the simple reason that there were free flow of alcohol but not wanting to offend any of the aunts, they would sent us packing without them hardly ever accompanying us. As the youngest in my family, I do feel lonesome, but anticipating for the festival in itself was a treat!

I remember, seeing men and women, young and mostly old, sitting around the hearth, or dancing along in circle in the big porch or court-yard, and throwing those songs at each other in anticipation of a reply. The reply did come every time and the song and dance would continue - the beat of the drums and the shrill but melodious voices mesmerizing the quaintly dead night in to a full bright morning.

Then I remember listening to, as a kid, the Smokies and the Eagles, the McKameys, etc, and while growing up came the Back-street Boys, MLTR, the Gaither Homecoming Friends, Avril Lavigne, Leeland, Sugarland, et al. They have entertained me and mesmerized me like any songs is suppose to do... And if I needed to express myself, I got a diary and a blog to express myself! I don’t need to twist and reverse words and sing it in monotone to express anything!

See I never needed the song! Am I still who I am since I didn't know and can't sing any of those so called 'traditional' song? A man without a leg is still a man, right? But then why do I write all this stuff about a stupid song if I don’t so much as care about it? Or is it really that stupid? And don’t I care?

But the truth is, I do care and it bugs me that I don't know any of those songs and can't sing even a single line. It is like a little stain in your favourite white shirt that people hardly notice but spoiled the cloth for you!  Every time you looked at the cloth, you see the big (actually tiny-little) stain!

So for the sake of me, I downloaded those songs and practiced a few of them. I have never got the chance to sing or show-off. And when I do sing it, will it be the last song? I have this idea of force feeding my children (when I have them) with these songs. But how long will the song survives -especially when it is faced against the like of Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber?

The honest truth is, those traditional songs are dying... we can accept that fact or make plans to revive them by singing them in our daily life, in our churches, and re-packaging them in a different avatar! But then, that's not case now.

Another truth is, we had more advance and stylist way to express our feelings and emotions, we no longer need to sing each other a song... we just make a simple phone call. Those songs were supposed to be expressed and came from the heart only and are very special - just like my diary.

The final truth is - the last song had been sung and we don't know when! Another song will not be sung again simply because we don't know how to!

That Little Village My Parents Love So Dear…

Every alternate year, I went back to that little village despite dreading the seemingly endless journey.  Despite being provided with options and having alternate and much better places to live, my parents insist to continue living in that obscure little mountain village often inaccessible during rainy season, with a distant mobile phone network that works just a few days a year.

That little village is also the place where they brought us up their six children.  It must be the one place they wanted to brought up their children and grandchildren but that’s not the case for my parents.  None of us stayed back and none wanted to live there in the future so we all tried to make up by spending our summer and/or winter holidays with them rather than getting away to one of those exotic location often advertised in those glossy magazines like most people do.  Of their eight grandchildren two were born in their presence and the last one was over a decade ago now.

That doesn’t meant I don't like the place.  No matter what that little village is the one place I still called home and my heart still beats for it.  Despite my untiring complaints of  everything, from the lack of privacy to my inability to use my mobile phone or wifi-internet connection, and despite my unending whining about the lack of basic infrastructures and the government’s apathy, I still yearn for that village and the simple people who live there.

My mother sent me off to live with my Brother just before I entered my teenage years not only because of the ethnic troubles at that time, but also to escape the drug-prone environment.  Moving to Delhi has been dramatic for me in many ways.  But I'm not complaining or blaming my Mother, rather I thanked her for letting me face the real world early without waiting for the inescapable reality we are ought to face in the future and being caught unprepared.

My whole family has been scattered across India and abroad.  My parents are getting old and there are slim chances of a family get-together.  I often wondered if my parents ever felt lonely and regret sending all of us off.  Mother always explained that it’s for our own good and with the hope that we can make something out of ourselves. 

I can’t say we made something out of ourselves with pride –to other, we are still nothing but we did it okay.  We all would loved if our parents wanted to live with at least one of us in a city, but they have sacrificed enough doing without us and we are not going to ask them to part with the one place they love.  Apart from that, I often observed how handicapped and worthless they felt in the few occasion they came to visit us. 

In the village, they have farm and garden to keep them busy, animals to take care of, have close relatives as neighbours who sought their advice for every decision and can take care of them if the needs be. They have a full and dignified life there, the only thing amiss is their children. If they had lived with us, they have to give up all that since life in a city call for a totally different life style. We don’t want them to make so many changes and adjustments so late in their life or feel sorry about themselves for the remaining years of their life.

We know how much they miss us and we miss them too.  It’s a sacrifice –a sacrifice to maintain dignity, to show our respect and love and as a token of thanks –a sacrifice that we all understand.  That’s the reason why we never wanted to drag them away from the one place they love –the place that we all realized we are still in love with.

LIVING IN THE EDGE: IN THE VALLEY OF FEAR

My innocent little friend asked me why most of the insurgent groups in the north-east describe themselves as revolutionary or liberation army. It stupefied me; it’s just too complicated and confusing to even describe. For me, they are revolutionary or liberating only in their efforts of letting animals hold guns to kill humans.

‘97 and the following chaos had taught me not to be too outspoken about any issues related to such groups, but my inability to forget their misconducts, apart from stealing away my childhood, hardly changed my views towards them. Apart from that their very presences bring fears and chaos in the society, and demands (though shaken) some reproach.

I first heard of the ZRA, KNF, KNA, etc. when troubles brewed in ’97, and as a Zomi, I have to thank the ZRA for saving my butt, and well, my head. I would earnestly bow my head in respect for what they did during that time, but I resented, as a Zomi, the ZRA of post-2000. The simple reason is, they look like the underworld (mafia) –working only for the vested-interests and pockets of their supreme bosses. The same apply to all of the outfits in Manipur.

The very foundation of their organization, I suppose, is to provide securities and fight for the causes of the communities, but most of the time, they are the source of communal discords, many other excesses and the trouble maker. Ask anyone in the streets, I’m pretty sure they will express the same sentiments.

Ignoring the brutalities and human right violations, the total ineffectiveness of the ‘never-the-first-choice’ Indian security forces gives us no choice but to embrace the ‘Z’, the ‘K’ or the ‘Etc.’ as our respective guardian. So there is no point in raising the questions of our security under them or their worth as our guardian, but I want to ask if they have any respect for us or are we their mere subjects liable to their wishes.

It is pretty high time that we, the common folks as well as the outfits, evaluate our situation and position within our respective communities. Do we, the common people, still need them or do they have served their purposes? Is their vision realistic, what steps they had taken in that direction and do we support that vision? While on the other hand, the outfits need to honestly assess, above everything, their standing and worth in their respective communities’ lives.

As a common folks, for me the main question is –can we do without them? Ask me if I am afraid of them; yes I am. I fear them as much as I feared a mad cow. Do I hate their presence; of course I do, they are loaded guns. But do I wish them away; only if all of them can be wished away in one go. If not, past experiences will force me not to, for those outfits are the one that can keep the other outfits at bay, and I still want my chance to fight for another tomorrow.

I’m not a critic of them, but rather, considering the role they played in our community, I want them to reform and organize in a better way, and keep their goal in their mind. I don’t want to be identified by the violence that they practice, like the Muslims are identified with fundamentalism and jihadi.

If those outfits are serious about the cause they are fighting for, let them fight like a gentleman, holding their heads high, with pride and dignity –not like the gangsters, who stole in the middle of the night or the mobsters who get their way by threatening and frightening everyone.

With all those outfits around, life for the common man is like living in the edge. You can’t expect everybody to know how to balance and counter-balance issues; which are a necessity for our daily survival as you are not given many priorities. It is like juggling 3 knives –pay too much attention to one and the other will hit you in the head, pay too much attention to the going-on around you and you will go crazy, but if you don’t pay attention, it may cost you your life.

There is no middle path here, silence may help but it is not always the answer. But then, talking doesn’t help much either, especially in this part of the world where everyone with a little authority, starting from the Chief Minister, are as deaf as a statue. Apart from that, be it talking or writing, they expect you not to cross a certain limit, or your warning may come in the form of death.

I don’t find any appropriate word to describe the situation we live in. Express your feeling and you’re forced to remain silent, remain silent and nobody will care about you. Cry for help, but there’s no one to hear you, definitely not the government, neither will the outfits. Apparently the government and the outfits don’t give a damn about you. Apparently the government and the outfits don’t know that forced silence is a horrifying torment, and an unattended cry for help is the superlative of all brutality.

The unresponsive government and the reckless militants pushed us all to the edge; suppressed anger, desperation and helplessness forced us to be more aggressive, more brutal or to totally give-up on everything. Our daily life is a struggle for survival, being cheated of even the most basic of facilities supposed to be provided free of cost by the government, the common folks are left at the mercy of our merciless shylocks to be fleeced to their bones.

But we are survivors, we have survived thus far, and our survivor instincts are strong. I only hope those militants apprehend and appreciate our daily struggle. God helps us all…

Long Live The Zomi! Happy Zo Minam Day!

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

Going Home...

[“You are coming home?” “This Christmas?” “Please do come, oh God, it has been over a decade now since we last saw you.” “They are fine, everybody is fine” “Oh, your grandparents will be very happy when they hear it” “Yes, yes, you know, they are old and failing”. “No, no, they are alright, nothing to worry about” “How is LC” “She’s also coming?” “All of you?” “Oh, I am so glad, we should kill one cow when you come…”]

A week after this phone call, I was on my way home along with my parents and sister.

It was a little over nine years ago that we left this little hamlet perched in the hill when my father got a job with a central government department and we had to move to Delhi. I remember all my aunts and relatives that consists the whole village crying with my mother as we boarded the jeep that will take us to Lamka from where we would sojourn to that unfamiliar territory. At that time, I thought such parting as very silly and I often wondered why my favourite mithun had to suffer for our leaving this otherwise sleepy little village.

In Delhi two year later, I find myself more comfortable conversing in Hindi rather than my native language. My little sister always got scolding for speaking in Hindi at home. Having a father who spent most of his time in office, a mother who hardly speak, and never hearing it outside our house, I always thought it was hardly our fault that we never realize in what tongue we are speaking.

My father forbid us to speak in any other language other than ours’ in his presence, and being forced to speak to my mother with whatever of that tongue that remained with us, we often found ourselves in the gate of Babel. But now I thank my parents for that. Our Hindi translated native tongue, thought badly structured and often funny to my mother, is the face that we proudly wear today.

It is not easy to live among people who will always call you a stranger no matter how hard you try. As for me, I don’t have to try, to have their way of life, the environment I live in ensure I have the same habits, the same pronunciation, the same likes and dislikes, and the same way of life. But once I became more sensible to the situation around me, each habit, each word, likes and dislikes pushed me farther and farther away from my assumed identity that one day I broke down on the floor, weeping –wondering who I am and why I am here.

Once I questioned my identity, it is not difficult to realize the thin veil that masked my real identity, the pursuit of which, bring smiles to my parents’ tired and dejected face. In this instance, however, environment or circumstances do no favour me and I have to REALLY try hard to regain that perfect pronunciation I had lost, and pick up nuggets, facts and stories that my mother told me when I was young, so that my parents were not ashamed to take me HOME and say that I am their son, and that I am not left out when people talk of our tradition, culture and history. The hope that I am not lost is the only one thing that weight on my mind when I boarded that train that will take me home to meet my grandparents, relatives and above all, to put an approval stamp on myself for the hard work that I have undertaken.

Breaking the sleepy silence of that little hamlet one evening with our arrival, it doesn’t take me much time to realize that I belong here and that I am no stranger in this place. That night, when I retired to that hard cotton mattress to rest my tired body, I have the pleasure of my heart dancing joyously on the knowledge that I have recovered that something, which is as important to me as my existence, and which I thought was gone forever, and become so out of reach in the clouds which swiftly pass overhead.

I was ready to be rejected, to be humiliated like the black crow, instead I was very much accepted as a peacock –each and every word that I said, each and every sound that comes out of my mouth stamped that I am a true blue peacock, and I revel in dancing with my beautiful tail.

But my revelry did not last long. A day later, I feel like a drawn cub board, forgotten to be pushed back –totally dislocated. I wondered what this people are talking about, I heard no one telling the stories of Penglam, Galngam or Neino, I heard no one talking about bawng and sial, no one thought of zuha or zupi.

Well, I never heard of people personally telling me that such things are STILL done, but I distinctly remember such things being DONE when I was young, and also, I often read it in the books and magazines that I painstaking collected from all corners where the good postmen rendered their missionary work. But now instead of hearing Cing Khup and Ngam Bawm, I heard of Jack and Rose of Titanic, instead of hearing the Japan gal & zo gal I heard of Iraq and Afghanistan, instead of a zozu I heard of whiskey and beer.

There is no denying that any society must move on (on which way, I am no longer so sure of). It will be wrong on my part if I am weaving a dream of ‘them’ in a rather romantic or primitive set-up. But the last thing that I expected was to see a bevy of giggling girls clad in Jeans pant singing an English song in the church, or to see the young boys wearing big branded apparels hanging low –sweeping the dusty narrow lane. Indeed, everybody has as much right as me to move on, move on we must, but on which direction and at what cost?

Till now, I thought I was the only lost one and I often thought of myself as an excusable case on the ground that I am breed in a city that is too far off to maintain any sort of link with this place. But I never excused myself. The word ‘lost’ is always with me. It spins in my head, it tugs at my feelings, and it destroys anything that might be remotely pleasant. I took this journey in search of a home; I cannot say I found one.

A month later while sitting in the little jeep that will take us to the airport in Imphal to catch the flight that will finally take us to Delhi, I am no longer sure which way I am headed for -am I going home, or am I leaving home? While pondering over these unpleasant questions, the man sitting next to me asked where I lived. I promptly answered him without thinking; and I don’t want to think about it either.

I have been away for over a month now, I miss Delhi.

Category: Write-up

A BITTER CHRISTMAS

Christmas is here once again to heralds -from many other things, the coming new year. Once again, it is time for introspection –and that is the part I hated the most. I hated it because I know it well how I’ve wasted the year, I hated it because I know it well there were many things that I could and should have done, and I hated it because –because I had the best Christmas gift last year and it was taken back.

This year, I got all the time I needed to continue my education but I didn’t, I got the chance to travel around the world (well, at least half the continents) but I let it go, I got some offers which I should have not declined and there are many more that will be and should be lost in the pages of my diary only.

But the year also gives me few things to cheers for, moments and memories that will linger on for the rest of my life. I don’t want to confine those memories to my diary alone, I’d love to remind myself of those moments when I’m down. But, alas, since those moments were blotted by as much bad moments, they will hardly lift my spirit –for optimism is not one of the qualities usually associated with me.

For I am born a pessimist –sarcasms and ironies are the words that I live by. Loneliness is my constant companion and I hate that. But it is a lonely world here and if you ask me, I think your life is as lonely as mine. At least I know what I am talking about –that my senses are intact.

Life in a city has always been lonely. But I never felt as lonely when Christmas approaches. It is the time of the year I missed home the most –with emphasis on home and the things associated with it.

I have a home here in Delhi and most of my close family members are here in Delhi only. We often have a family gathering during the festival seasons including Christmas, still I longed for home and I don’t know, why?

May be life in a city has become so complicated that it is not easy to have some simple and pure fun. One has to go through nightmares just to have some fun and that fun always comes with a price tag. I missed the days when I had pure and honest fun doing the simplest things and those very things that I cannot afford here in the city.

May be the chasms between the privileged and the under-privileged has become so wide that we the under-privileged failed to savour our time and surroundings as we are constantly engrossed with our contempt and envy of the privileged.

Maybe life in itself has become complicated, for, a few years ago, I spent a Christmas back home and still found something missing. May be it’s the price I paid for growing–up, or may be, it got to do with my feeling of belonging neither here nor there.

I don’t want answer for all my questions, for I know I’ll not be willing to accept the answer. But one this is clear that I am a bitter person right now, for Christmas is the time I look back at the harsh reality of my life and it's not easy to be constantly reminded of your failure and missed chances. And this Christmas, I’m especially bitter for I was cheated with a gift last Christmas, which was the best gift that I ever got. It was taken back a few months later and now, tomorrow is Christmas and there’s no chances that I’ll get it back.

Well, may be I should try what a true optimist would do in this situation by saying “Well, at least, I can savour the memories!”

Merry Christmas!

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

Manipur: A Dead End..?

Walk around the state of Manipur, you would find many young men –educated and uneducated; some may even belong to an insurgent group and some could be a drenched-out daily labourer; some walk with big dreams and some aimless wanderers. They all may speak different dialect; they may come from different background, tribes and upbringing. But one thing they have in common is that they accepted the government for what it is –a non functioning government.

Go and ask them what they want the Government to do for them; most probably they won’t know how to answer, or what to say at all. But ask them about their lives, their families, and their backgrounds, you would most probably find hundred things that the Government can do for them.

Go and ask the old woman what sort of help she got from the Government, she would say nothing. Ask her what she wants from the Government; she would most probably have no idea. Ask her if she knew any welfare schemes for an old and poor woman like her, she won’t have a clue. Think of the amount the central and state governments have spent on all those welfare schemes.

Go and ask one young terrorist why he chose to be a terrorist, his answer, most probably would be he had nothing else to do at home. Then, ask yourself why he had nothing at all to do at home and think of what he can do and why he can’t do what you think he can do, then, you will know who failed them.

For a lot of wronged youths, becoming a terrorist has become the sole viable option to vent their discontentment, and demand redressal because they feel they are being denied a fair treatment. They never knew in which way they are wronged, but at least they know how to compare their situation with youth their age of other states or countries, and they could clearly see the difference. They may never be able to tell you eloquently what they are deprived of, but you don’t need to be a social scientist to know what they are deprived of.

Their feelings of discontentment and humiliation make them become an easy cannon fodder for insurgent group who had been waiting for this opportunity. It’s high time the government took steps to address the grievance of the people.

It may be difficult to bring awareness to people who had resigned to their fate, and waking up a government that pretend to be a deaf as a statue and as mute as the Chief Minister himself. But then it has to be done, in some way or the other.

For Our Tomorrow..?

Exactly a decade has passed since I last stand here. I can still feel the sting of the evening winds, it still whispers in my ears and the hustles of leaves can still be heard –but the smell, it smells different.

I sat down at the trunk of the old ugly oak tree where I used to sit. The tree –not deterred by age and change, sprouted new saplings whose buds are snipped by the mark of a sharp tool, most probably held by some itching hand.

I used to sit in one of its poking branch overlooking the whole village and its valley. A dry stump with marks of axe partially hidden by undergrowth is the remaining remnant of that branch which, to my childish imagination, put the village and its valley under my mercy.

I don’t care where I sit now, I don’t bother how much I have to bend or in what position must I put my foot to step over the village, nor do I bother to count the number of houses anymore. The voices of playful children coming from the village don’t lull me nor the call of darkness scares me, but the beckoning of my conscience makes me restless.

I looked around; the stark contrast between the two sides of the mountain ranges provoked my always helpless conscience. From the village, looking up at the vast green covering of the mountain ranges is a pure delight for the senses. As long as I can remember, this ranges of mountain has been a restricted zone as it was the main source of water that gurgle down the gorges through the little brooks that supply water to the village and paddy fields.

But looking at the leeway side of that very range is a different story. It had never been deprived of its green covering thought never a protected forest. I remember women folks climbing up the mountain to collect firewood –it was abundant enough, they never had to cut down any standing tree. But a decade has totally washed down its greenery.

Small dugouts –burnt and black, can be seen everywhere. In most of the dugouts, you can see people packing or digging-out the black burned-out remains of the trees that once covered the place, and nearby them, bags of charcoal lies in a haphazard row. Farther down the slope, clouds of smokes seeped out of small foxholes. The smokes come from the burning woods buried beneath the ground.

Those bags of charcoal will be transported to Lamka, and from there –they don’t bother. But the little income they earn from the charcoal is their lifeline. Times have changed; the land is not as fertile as it used to be. The hard, day long toil at the field can no longer sustain their simple existence.

The glowing rays of the sun can be seen in the far horizon; at least that horizon is still dense with trees. Just then I heard a voice calling out my name, it was my aunt. It would otherwise have been hard to recognize her blackened face if not for her shrill voice. She reminded me that I should be at home unless I wanted another bout of malaria. Indeed, it is funny to see what a tiny little mosquito can do.

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

SEE LAMKA AND DIE!

The road was bumpy, the ride was long and the bus ran furiously. We were on our way to Lamka from Dimapur. There was an eerie silence inside the bus amidst the noisy engine and clanking of the bus. Each one was occupied in his own thought. I stole a quick glance of the other passengers and the faces I saw rather baffled me. I wonder, what good do those Marwaris and Biharis bring to our land?

Reaching down Imphal valley, the air was humid and cloud of dusts danced on our trail. My little niece was not impressed by the sight, she chose to cover her face and doze off. I thought that was a better idea than ‘trying’ to admire those balding mountain ranges, so I followed suit.

Despite the hideous daylight, and being stiff all-over from the day long torture, once we were there, the sounds of Lamka excited us enough to scramble for the door.

“Eew!” shrieked my little niece, stopping at the door. I don’t know what it was, but being nudged from behind, I pushed my niece and jumped down right after her. It was my turn to shout “eew!” I’d just landed in a pig sty! Well, that ‘pig sty’, officially, is called CCPur Bus Station.

Anyway, struggling along Tedim Road, it doesn’t take me much time to notice the shift of gravity in Lamka. My beloved Lamka, it has changed, and that too –for the worst, and it’s crumbling down! The building mourned under its weight and age, the drains cried for help and the roads struggled in agony with every passing vehicle throwing up heaps of dusts. The ghost of the old town gagged me with its stench and dust, upsetting my stomach, and squeezing my tear duct to the last drop with every gust of wind.

I don’t know if living in the metros for all these years have prejudiced my eyes and judgement, but Lamka is no longer the Lamka that was deeply etched in my heart, it is just a pathetic caricature of the old town.

Lamka of yonder years is a confluence of all culture –desirable and non-desirable, with none being dominant. It was the gateway to the world and life, it was the centre of education and learning, it was the centre of entertainment and life –of the enlightened sort.

I remember guitar strumming young men and women strolling the night streets and alleys, crooning Lianlunching, Lienzapao and Lengtong Pauno with the same aplomb. I remember people struggling for tickets at Light-house, I remember people rushing from all over the district to Lamka for the best of education, but, alas, we can only say ‘those were the days’!

There is no denying ’97 has dramatically changed our world, and of course, Lamka cannot caught itself in a time wrap. It has to change. Change we must, move we must, but in which way and which direction?

We definitely moved and changed, but in the wrong direction. We continued to mistake communalism for nationalism, and terrorism for patriotism, rendering a thick cloud of suspicions hanging in the air.

It will not be a mistake to say that the mass exodus of young men and women from Lamka is the direct consequence of such mentality. Nobody wants their children to grow-up in Lamka anymore. Those who can afford prefer to flee and live ‘outside’ or at least let their children study elsewhere, and with big relief.

I don’t want to sound like one of those self-appointed moral guardian, but I cannot help commenting on the declining brotherhood in the society. There is a big shift from the traditional societal living to individualism. The previously unnoticed differences in the pronunciation of a certain words stand higher as a boundary than the high walls they built to mark their plots –and we still sing ‘tuun sung khat pan’?

Corruption was rampant, so much so that even within the church, it was put as an ‘understood’ thing and was conveniently swept under the carpet –and they continued dancing and praying on that carpet! The once pitiable government servant are now the one who are most envied as they can keep drawing their salary without even working for a single day! And shall I say, Lamka thrives on them?

My big cousin who is a Headmaster of a Government School in a certain faraway village offered me to show his new building. I declined, I just cannot digest it. The building, and every newly built building I saw in Lamka, disgust me as much as the dirty drain that flowed in their nerves. They are dirty and stained, like each and every soiled currency note I saw was stained with tears and bloods of overtly exploited poor farmers who risked their head to earn it. How many people must have been deprived of their basic standard of life by the owner of such building, and other luxuries, so as to enable them to afford them?

To me each and every one of the government employee of Manipur are doubtable –doubtable of being corrupt. If I am at fault, it’s not my fault, rather it is theirs –for letting me believe to such extend. They said I am a pessimist, I am, I don’t denied that. But who can be so positive after tampering upon the not so hidden dirty drains running beneath the ground?

Every time I come to Lamka, it never does me good but antagonize me. A friend suggested that, may be, I am failing to see the bright and positive side of the situation, well thinking of anything positive there, my mind just went –well, blank. My friend suggested Khuga Dam, to me Khuga Dam is nothing but a picnic spot, a humiliating mockery of the thousands of lives it uprooted!

May be, the only positive thing that I saw there was –that my drug abusing HIV+ cousin died a decent death at Shalom while I was there. Thank you very much; the very presence of Shalom and its tribe is not a positive sign of development, since you can never say that you are very proud of (with due respect to) the dedicated doctors and nurses who work there. But I’ll definitely give a standing ovation, once, the people who run homes like Shalom, Priscilla Homes and Gamnuam, etc, are rendered unemployed.

Well, I should end my ranting here or else, it will destroy my mood every time I think of home until I can call that rented flat in Dwarka as my home. But the fact is Lamka is my home, and I love it. It is the place that gives me my now so cherished childhood memories as well as the nightmares in the form of ‘97. But no matter what, it will always remain my home and I would jump with happy feet every alternate year to return there.

Go and see Lamka, if you don’t die of ecstasy, you would die of revulsion. But if you think you survived, check yourself again, may be your heart, you mind or soul is being buried in one of the alleys of that old town, but for certainty, once you are there, you will never be the same. SEE LAMKA AND DIE!

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

A Birdeye View of Khuga Dam

Khuga Dam: A Curse or Blessing?

How many people must have it replaced

and how many of them are suitably rehabilated?
How many hectares of land have it rendered

useless or submerged

and how many hectares does it irrigate?
How many sources of livelihood had it affected

or provided as compensation?
What are its possible worst case scenarios?
Is not it a time bomb within the heartland of Zogam?
And, why, in the heartland of Zogam

–Is not it in a scheduled area?

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

Just What I Don't Need

When I planned to go home one sweaty night a month ago, I never planned for one this. Well, looking back now, there are many things which I failed to foresee and forget to put it on my plan, but then I can manage with them or without them. But the last thing that bothered me was to be used as a guinea pig!

A week at home at 1400+ metre above sea level, I was down with typhoid or they said so. Well, in this God forsaken village, the doctor is the pharmacist, and they said he is as good as a doctor but he is not a trained one so everywhere else, he will be called a quack!

The first two day, I was down with fever with high temperature. At high noon, I was shivering with cold even after covering myself with three blankets. I was given a combination of 'Combina Forte’ and 'Nimesulide + Paracetamol’ tablets. Later when I complained of my foot being ice-cold, the said I could be typhoid and my medication was changed accordingly. I was given tablets of 'Chloramphenico’' which I took thrice a day and after another two days, when my situation did not improve they changed my medicine to the more effective (that's what they said, not me) 'Ciprofloxacin - 500 m’.

That medicine seemed to work as on the first day itself it reduced my regular two-three fever a day to one. Another two more days and when my one fever a day did not decline further, my parents suggested that I could be contracting malaria!

The doubt, quickly agreed to by the quack resulted in the addition of another medicine! From the next morning when I took my medicine, apart from my usual dose for typhoid, I have to take two tablet of 'Quinine Sulphate’ thrice a day.

The medicine must be very strong as I hears insects and birds chirping in my ears for the whole day and have to live the life of a deaf for two days. When I complained of not hearing anything and the chirping insects, they all knowingly nodded their heads to suggest that the medicines worked as it should be!

Thanks to the quacks (including my parents) I was up and going after two weeks in bed. The moment I was up, I rushed around the house poking all over the dust-bins searching for the empty covers of the medicines that I was given so that I can wrote down the detailed combination that makes up the tablet so that I can possibly look for their potential side-effect on the net once I was back to Delhi.

And hopefully, I'll be back in a short while!!!

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

LOST IN TRANSLATION

It is always great to be home. To meet your parents, relatives and friends whom you don’t see for the last 3-4 years and to re-live the ‘moments’ that struck you with a sense of déjà vu after seeing a particular thing or faced with some particular situation. But it is not that great when the trains of memories chugged down along the dark and windy cavern of reality that is presently waiting for you. You cannot help comparing between the one scene that was etched in your head like a fairyland and the one that is presently spread before your eyes.

But the worst thing is it will not stop until it ran havoc the flimsy imagination that you used to cream the harsh reality. Then the train will stop, falling down the gorge head first down and you are woken up by the ugliness of the present which will enslaved you till you got some legitimate reason to get out of there.

You might think that I will be dying to go home after staying away from it for nearly a decade now. And you might probably assume that I would take no notice of the long and dangerous way that we have to pass through to reach home. That is like saying Antarctica is in my neighbourhood –it is far from true. And to tell the truth I am not eager at all to go home -to meet the old ghosts which are made much wilder by the newer and younger ghosts.

To me that little hamlets perched out in the jungle of the north-east India is like a God forsaken country –one can only say it is unfortunate. It is as difficult to get in there as it is in getting out of it. Meeting your parents for the love value and meeting relatives and old friends is heart warming. But it is the aftermath that is depressing. And stay for another day and everything will remind you that you are lost in translation.

Even though I never really feel at home when I am in Delhi, I miss and long for it when I am away. I cannot say the same is true of my home. I don’t know if I misread my minds. But I am sure that it shows the sense of tie and attachment are missing. That is why I said I am lost in translation –I belong neither here nor there.

The truth is I miss my parents, my family, relatives and friends and not the place. I like the place but not for living there permanently –only as a place to spent some times. Where else could I get the fresh air, the clean and clear flowing water, the lush green environment, the sunsets and sunrises? What I don’t like is the environment, the new culture and attitudes of people.

I hate those who accepted corruption as a natural things, I hate those government doctors who charged the poor and helpless for the free surgery, I hate those government welfare schemes distributor who pocket them all, I hate those who did not work but draw their salaries anyway, I hate those church elders who don’t practice what they preach, and above all, I hate those gun trotting animals strutting around looking for some helpless victim.

How can I possibly live among those I hate? But on the other hand, if I ever forsake the place, the missing ties will never be restored, and I’ll be lost forever. I hate being lost; the concept of itself makes me guilty. I have lost my cultural identity already, I have no place to be identified with, I lost my tradition, I lost my religion, and by deserting the place, I’ll be severing that last single ties that I have with my identity.

I want to be here, I want to be there, and I don’t belong neither here nor there. There is so much contradiction, too much complication; it makes me confused, dizzy and guilty. It seems globalization is catching up far too fast with us. It seems there will never be a Zogam or Zoland and I’ll never have an identity that will burn my spirit to trot forward confidently into this world.

After many centuries of losing their country the Jews have returned back to their homes, after a centuries of migration, the Chinese have returned back to their motherland, after half a century of brain-drain in mainland India, they are flocking back home now, but when will the Zomi return home? When will they have a home that they can call theirs and recognized by the world? When can they have an identity of their own?

Right now, all I can say is –God only knows. We Zomi, including me, are one good case of a tribe lost in translation. I wanted to be back home, and I don’t want to be back home. I don’t want to be here nor there and I don’t belong neither here nor there. But to be sure I’m not a crow pretending to be a peacock, only a simple case of mistranslation. A simple case of mistranslation which can be corrected, I sincerely do hope so. ©lyan

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

The Best Christmas Gift

Once upon a time, Christmas is a festival for me. It means lots of gifts, love, holidays, ample of time to play with friends, and a time to feast. I remember what it feels like –being free and care free and oh- spending with friends the hard-earned pennies saved throughout the year just for Christmas and I must say I certainly enjoyed those Christmases. But as they said, that is the age of innocence, and once I grew up; it seems I somehow lost the essence of Christmas along the way.

Nowadays Christmas Eve, rather than being a festival is a time of introspection for me. It is the time when I retrospect and evaluate myself, my family and the world. And I must tell you that of the eight years I spend in New Delhi, there is not a single time when I spent Christmas with dry eyes. The only exception is the time when I spent it back home with my parents in Manipur, -it is too much like Christmas, I cried. And I must also admit, despite all my shortcomings and pathetic life, never once did I shed tear because of my life. You can blame it on my ego, but the thing that makes me cry are also, on a second thought, is all about my big fat ego.

Christmas, to my brother is also a time of introspection. It is the time when he retrospects and evaluates himself, his friends and his foes. And I must tell you that of the eight years I spend in New Delhi with him, there is not a single occasion when he was not drunk. It is the time when he unleashes his angers, frustrations and stresses of the passing year to -none but his family. And that is the time when I cry –not because he hurts me physically but because he remind me what Christmas would be like if I were with my dear Pa and Ma back home.

Every Christmas eve, I would look out at the dark and silent night and feel what it would mean to be free of worries and regrets. What it would mean to be roaming around with friends singing carols in the freezing night, and still sweat? What it would mean to hop from one church to another to taste whose food is better? It may sound a little silly now, but I know what all these feel like at that time. But, I don’t know why is it the silence that I can remember of the Christmases I spent here despite the loud annual argument played on every year in the next room? Why is it the coldness that I’m reminded of when I think of all the previous Christmas despite the heater and, why is it so dark when I think of the dazzling Christmas trees and decoration?

It had become a Christmas tradition for me to run out of the house and spent the night at the nearby park. I would sit, lost, lonely and in total silence if not for the lavas of tear cracking the December frozen cheeks and the whispering wind that echoed the sounds of a heart breaking into thousands pieces. It has been a pretty long time since the moonless night mourned with me in her foggy white.

But living in this great world of the Lord, one can expect miracles everyday, in fact, every moment, as long as you believe. And I never thought that I can spend Christmas without tears! Last Christmas, my brother made a resolution that he will never drink again. True to his word –he didn’t drink a single drop this year. I know he had faced a lot of troubles –he had to part with some of his best friends who are also his drinking partners, have to avoid certain important people and worst of all, he had to fight the greatest demon: his urge.

This year, Christmas Eve is different. No one run around to avoid Christmas at home. We laughed together and prayed together. We sang carols and we feasted. There is no fighting and everyone is too busy to sit near the heater. Yet it is loud, noisy and warm. As the clock approaches midnight, I cannot help standing up on the side to admire my family. Once again, we are one big family! When my brother approaches me later on to enquire about me, I have no ready reply –I wanted to say I love you, I wanted to say thank you, but I just cried and for once, I allowed myself to cry. Tears say more than word. Then I gave him a big hug! Once again, it is Christmas!

Tags: mizo, zomi, zogam

I’M LOST! (SOMEBODY HELP ME)

Last night, my niece approached me to help her with her assignment of listing the names of 100 endangered species of animals. She is a bright little child and she had already managed 99 names and was needing my help for the last one final species that will give her 100% marks. I have to admit that I don’t know much about those thing and even the few that I knew were already listed. I offered to look it up in the net, that is when my friend, always the joker, chipped in to suggest my name to complete the list.

We had a good laugh at that time, but late at night when I think again about it, there is nothing funny about it. Rather, the irony of the joke sickened me. I try to ignore it as a simple joke, but the more I think about it, the more it makes me uneasy.

It hurts to think that I, a proud Zomi should be in the list of the endangered species. I’m simply not ready to accept that that I, who would painstakingly explain to everyone where the fictitious Zogam is –instead of just saying Manipur when I’m asked of my native place, should now be in the verge of extinction. The simple thought of it totally unsettled me. I don’t know why. May be, because it is the truth. I wonder why reality is always harsh and truth always hurt.

Zomi -on the verge of extinction? It may sounds exaggerated or you may questions the connection between that little joke and the Zomi, as a whole. Well, I do admit that I sweat out at the first sight of danger and get panicky at the false alarm. And I must admit that I don’t represent the Zomi as a whole – but let me also admit that as a human, the only claim that I’ve got is being a Zomi and I’m pretty proud of that fact.

How serious I was? Well, like all my peers, my favourite song is Thawn Kham’s Zogam song. I got a high every time such a genre of songs are played and apart from that I make sure that I never missed any of the Zo festival and tried hard, even though sleepily, and learned the roots and beginning of such festivals.

Everything seems so ironic and pretentious now. I see no more point is singing “Zogam aw, ken hong taisan kei ning” from Delhi, or for that matter, from Yangon, Tokyo, Florida or any of the “tuipi gal pan”. After all I spent half of my life here in Delhi and feel more comfortable conversing and thinking in my broken English. And if I were back home right now, I’d be itching to abandon it, especially after knowing the easy way of life that a city affords.

But, let face it. Who can deny that we are not lost but firmly grounded in our tradition? I don’t need to remind you how many Davids, Josheps and Marys we have had among us? And, how many of them can speak; forget about the writing part, our language? As for our brethrens in Chinhills, forget it, the youngsters can hardly write or read their names in our own Romanized script.

When we talk about the concept of lost, we often thought only about the ‘tuipi gal ate’. Yes, I can’t deny that these people, including me, are not dying to go back home, but to spent a few day there, and that too, sadly only as a holidayer since we cannot afford other tourist hotspot. But let me tell you, those people who stayed back home did not fare much better either.

The other Sunday, I sat down to read some magazines sent from home in Manipur. I cannot help getting a goose bump when I found an editorial page of a reputed newspaper written by someone by the name of ‘Nowluck’ followed by a Sunday magazine whose editor goes with the name of ‘Heartjoe’! My friend cannot help wondering if these people moved a little down south, will they be called ‘Nowlucka’ or ‘Heartjoei’!

There is no denying that we all, either willingly or unwillingly, abandoned our home in search of a better life. Even all those who still live back home will not miss to grab the fist opportunity to leave after all having one or more family members in a foreign country is a social symbol that everyone looked up on. It would have been another fairy tale had we all returned back home with the money and degree that we earned but alas, we all dreaded returning back home by that time.

But the saddest part of the story is that even if we wanted to, we simply cannot return home. The simple fact is that there is no opportunity of employment and earning our livelihood. The other sad irony is that instead of our ‘tuipi gal a te’ returning home, all those students studying back home will have to leave once they are eligible for graduate school since there is not a single good college back home. And it is doubtable that they would return because of the lack of opportunity as said before.

The simple fact is that we certainly are lost if not in the endangered list. You cannot blame me and my tribe alone. The sense and sign of lost are everywhere.

Even if I’m not lost yet, at least thinking of all these makes me lost my mind totally. May be I should seek for help. Seeking for help may be the boldest step that I can afford right now. Or may be I’ll just call myself ‘a citizen of the world’ and blame it all on globalization. Oh! That would indeed be a good way to let go -Damn you, Globalization!

Tags: mizo, zo, zomi, zogam

Stranger at my Home

(This piece is an extract from my Diary dated 23rd December, 2005

when I returned back to my native place to the jungle tribal village of Manipur.)

People used to tell me home is where the heart is. But some times, like this very moment, one can feel like a total stranger at one’s home.

The feeling of homelessness is no stranger to me. I have traveled to most part of India which I called home but wherever I go, I remained a stranger. I reluctantly accepted the tag, forgiving them for their ignorance or at other time consoling myself as being a lesser Indian. But among my own people, I am not ready to be treated as a lesser one, at least not in my own village where I grew up.

As a child, I was given the notion that anyone from the mainland, especially the army, should not be trusted. I remember my mother going berserk when I, once, went to the army camp with my friends. Their fear is understandable as I myself had often seen and heard incidents to justify it. But this time round, my only crime is that I dared to say that I am an Indian and that India is my home.

It is true that I am an Indian (I want it or not) and India is my home (at least my home lies in India). But the sad irony is that my Indianess ends the moment I passed my region into the mainland. Wherever I go, people would ask me which country I came from. I would tell them that I was from Manipur. When people don’t know that I would substitute Manipur for Mizoram or Nagaland, it doesn’t help either. Most of the states in the North-east, according to their guesses, are in Nepal or China. At the end, I was so feed up of the question; I simply nodded to whatever country they guessed for me.

Then I would went to visit monuments and there they would charge me 500-600 percent more unless I am ready to spent some amount of time explaining the geography and demography of India. And in the sphere of education, every subject that includes Indian subject matter exclude me, and in the few occasions when the media picked up news from the north-east, they would be half-baked with most of the name being misspelled as if they were aliens’ names.

I traveled aboard to see people raising their eyebrows when they know my nationality. They thought I must be a Red-Indian. They wanted to ask me about Indian food, Indian music and Indian culture. But the Indian food, music and culture they wanted to know were alien to me.

During my stay in Delhi, I tried hard to learn and appreciate the ‘Indian’ language, food and culture. I forced myself to sit through an hour of ‘Indian’ dance recital, endured many three-hour long ‘Indian’ films and spent sleepless nights after stuffing myself with the spice infested foods which my ancestral would probably say ‘killed the taste buds’.

No matter how hard I try, the freaky question keeps popping out, and would irritate me as ever. I tried to take them as an innocent question but still, it fuels one’s feeling of alienation. People often tell me to take them easy but the prejudice, abuses and discrimination one’s faced cannot be easily taken by the stride. And it doesn’t help very much even thought they sincerely apologized after abusing you especially if your abuser happened to be someone as educated as your very own teacher.

Such situation, though infrequent, aggravate one sense of alienation. It is under many such situation that I started to believe myself as an alien in this country, and take that little jungle village in the tribal areas of Manipur to be my only home.

But now standing here in the middle of the road, surrounded by the chief and elders of the tribe, I certainly feel like a stranger. I was absolutely enthusiastic to return home after more than two years of absence, but the moment I landed up, the first reaction was of general disappointment. Everybody takes a look at me and the first comment was that I was a lost child. My language was adultered and my pronunciation stained. ‘Lost, absolutely lost’, the elders lamented whilst the youngster called me pretentious. And with that big crimes I was standing here with the elders who sermons me on our value, how we were free and independent, with our own land and laws.

I don’t know if it would be wise to remind them that the government doesn’t even want to recognize our existence. To me that is as good as being lost. The elders may think that we are free with our own lands and laws, many anthropologists may come to study our primitive ways and our wild photos may found home in galleries and museums around the world, but that may not be enough if a seven degree minority community living under the mercy of others wanted to survive. But I choose to remain silent.

I don’t know, as of now all I need is some one to talk to me and make me feel at home without pretension. Then I started to wonder, if I can call this place as home even after what I have been through, why cannot I do the same anywhere else? After all, the whole world is my home.