Kangleimaichou

We just love talking about inclusiveness for diverse opinions, and many even claimed that they had created a platform where people could debate differences. But the very people wouldn't even bother, out of self-convinced academic accomplishment, to engage people who are not in the clique.    Such is the mindset of people or of the leaders who could talk in round and pompous fashion only to prove their verbose superiority. They make one wonder what they will actually do and how serious their intention is when they can't come out of their cocoon to understand the greater reality.    You would find them talking dates and years flashing their stained teeth, sloshing their rotund shapes in university chairs, and when instigated they could brandish their stained hands. If the chums of Muivah, egging on the paranoia born out of prolonged misery, have achieved distracting the poor to march behind them with their hoes and machetes instead of helping them, then we ...

I have trodden patches Told myself, if I were to perish Then it should be while doing so. Never in life for years, I looked beyond that world Where I learned brevity. But the one where I feared love That love was dead Was clear to me. And that I should tread farther, Was the life I imposed on myself. During the long Lonesome days and nights; In jungles, I was gripped by melancholy On the white sandy beaches, I strove not to see love. But it was in the blue waters, It was in the reefs, It was even among the feared jellyfish. Oh love, oh my beloved I had not rested. I had not known it. For I was on the edge, Always on it. What I had was What I wished not to see What claimed me was What the very thing I wished To shake off But I had known brevity. I had dragged it. And I had donned it, And I salted it With literature. Yet I was A victim of paranoia; I thought I was at war I hated what I knew not I looked for hatred where love was; Bitterness in place of scent; Glooms in place of daylight...

Don't you worry, don't you worry too much, my child. Mummy will fly you out soon before the place and its people eat you up. You will learn them, you will learn every bit of them, and if possible, turn yourself to one of them. The place holds nothing, it's a rot, it's a graveyard, and if there are people, they will never be good. Go there, my child, and sit like them, eat like them, talk like them and make yourself one among them. If you have no idea, look at them, look at those who you see once a year. When you open your eyes, don't let the dust enter them, look at them well, look at how they mock, look at how they smile, look at how gesture, for they are called the complete ones, my child.

It must have been the first dose, like the first glass of Sekmai you would have had as a teenager, that must have made you see things. But, my child, when your ability to comprehend something so rudimentary as learning the alphabetical letters is being misconstrued as the oeuvre of the craft then you soon, not later, will find yourself in a decay called philistinism. If you are aware, Michael was either drunk or stoned, yet he was always thinking, and his nights were sleepless, for he was never happy with what he had created, and people had considered them masterpieces. The fact is, my child, you learn with the work, and at the same time, in that unwavering intensity you work with the reality that you are in this tower, which could be just a hovel, from where you issue out works for those what they called ‘the varied lots’. A similar one would be of those masters in the Ottoman's zenith of those blind master illustrators or those who would poke their own eyes with needles to ...

 In that world we met As anxious strangers In that alley we walked Behind our shadows We knew none Its smell was foreign That place was strange Yet the feeling was not The remnants hanged Thick in the walls Layered on the clothes Slowly and slowly They turned history That defines a person You don't sleep Thinking death You don't recall to forget You don't surrender to love Thinking you will lose That you can't choose That you can't disown Who that mocks Knows not the heart

I look for people and gather their tales. It's always a struggle in the beginning to initiate a conversation, but once the trust is won then I enjoy any conversation as much as I enjoy my drink after a long day. I thought I should show my gratitude for wishing me on my birthday and also for being always around with this photograph. I have been in New Delhi, and I think I will be here for quite some time. When I had returned to this city betrayed, intimidated and completely broke, my intention was to pick up a job and spend my mornings revising TALES OF HUMAN MISCHIEF and A CURSED LAND ( both withdrawn), and then to edit IN THE COURTS OF THEIR MAJESTIES. But one morning, a strong anxiety seized me and I sat down to write for months, a romance fiction. I am sharing this post just to inform all of you that I am still around and very much active, and I hope that all the four books of fiction will be out; perhaps by the end of this year.

I'll show up half-inebriated, probably shuffling in my Italian, and I know you will be waiting for me flapping that stamped boarding past of the most affordable flight ticket. We're going to our ‘parents' ' and to pay a visit to our loved ones. I expect the arrival gate to be thronged with people shouting my name and those Kalashnikov and INSAS-wielding lots preparing themselves to hobnob with me. I know your 'executive dad' will be in his 'Indian Pajero', and everyone will be staring at you, the handbag that you bought through the new app; the Fitflop pair which are still trendy in London, and recently launched in the Make In Hinduvta market; and then there are those dark sunglasses which help you veil your rolling eyes when you say those nonsense. But we are going to 'our parents'' and see our long-missed mates. I want to dip my tired feet in the slow current of Sekmai river like those successful corporate dudes you often see in Shuttersto...

You were supposed to pick the Asics pair, but the mind is still trapped in that bonk. At the florist, you weighed words and lines. You must have stood there for hours staring at the words, the lines and then the distant face. What did you get? This widening hollow in which the writer in you kept sinking. You thought it would be nice if she could come, even for once, after all the bitterness, to look at you and to look at what you have curated for her. The morning caffeinated person says the bonk belongs to yesterday. Oh, yes the trainers, and the mist-engulfed track where you barely recognise faces. You meant to go, you wanted to jump off. The emergency exit couldn't be pulled off; you wished had done so holding that book in which the person's occupation is thinking, yes, you have been thinking. But you haven't made money with the thinking. Why those three-piece suited 'gentle folks' and the ever-smiling few shower you all the reverence a medieval knight would have...

The choice to begin this quest was ours. We have been away for quite sometime. There is a realisation; this quest itself is a learning. What could bother you would be how many miles should be covered in a day, and then be ready to embrace another serendipity. This is what a troubadour would have embarked on; where a young soul would encounter discovery; life becoming rather progressive; and gradually you are this individual who can shed more.

Looked for you in the back of the cottage, for I had heard so much about you.The shepherd in the valley told me where you would be found. I trekked the long winding leaf-covered path. The snow-capped Himalayas appeared in the distance. But the day-long quest appeared futile, I had wandered long enough that spontaneity ceased to excite me. Another shepherd's direction helped me find the main road. There, the sounds of the birds were remote, the sight of machines became frequent. I trudged without the quest in mind. Then, it was by a turn, in an unlikely tree, you and others were found hiding behind the thick leaves. I meant to take you home. I should not have done. I would have offered a thousand apologies to make up, but it wouldn't mend. Don't we live, at time, with great remorse and grief?  The only consolation was to make your beauty eternal this way. I do hope someday nature will forgive the excited admirer, and hope that it will lessen the remorse one carries.

I and my kind around here have witnessed the place transform from a virgin forest to one through which this asphalt road cut through. If you tread further, my Kanglei friend, you will see the people of the place who are still clinging to farming. But they will soon become mere caretakers, as rich folks from the metros are here to build the cottages they have seen in some Alpine country.

Entering such an alley after having spent a few hours walking through the crowds was quite a relief. Suddenly, the buzz dwindled, the sight of humans completely absent, making it possible to breathe. The pasted fliers on the walls gave the impression of the place being the museum of information, and when the silent walk ended, one was welcomed by florists.

Does it really matter that one should be affected by how others perceive about others or let's say about us? How we live could be filthy, scabby and noxious, bu t that's your perception influenced by your surrounding and the set of rules which you have conditioned your mind. Likewise, how you live and how you conduct yourself could be, if I allow myself, is idiotic. So this marijuana we smoke every day, this mud on the body, and the dreadlocks we keep, all these are the manifestation of a defiance which you so much dread; we are outnumbered, the larger world is not ours, but we live here thinking that we are living the life we like.

Stood in front of this stall having kabab, with ascending smoke over our heads and surrounded by veiled ladies and skull-capped men who had just come out of one of India's most renowned mosques. After it, it was again among a lot of people, but the delicious desserts in glazed earthen cups and authentic biryani could make anybody not to think of the crowd, instead it would make you feel privileged.

He lives in a tent surrounded by empty bottles, when asked if I could photograph, he didn't even look at me, instead he remained puffing his local cigar looking at the distance

The Dutch came, promised us money for our milk. Most of us were motivated, but we don't ride horses like the Americans. But we like their boots, their jeans, and when we all are in cowboy boots and tight jeans and the temperature dropped we like to have our fair.

I wear to work what I think it suits me. It makes no sense for me in walk in what could be yours. For what I wear, I don't ask anyone; I used to visit my father's factory, there they had one colour. I grew up in that colour, and now it represents the affection I have for him. So you know it couldn't be others', like the distinct taste for food, I have this self-discovered design and colour.

After a long day I like to be below a tree to be in such a shade, enjoying me smoke and thinking about the water before me.

Sent to the 'ghetto' at an early and years later castrated only to make the her in me feel it was time to come out of the closet. We don't go to schools, we are trained to dance and beg at traffic points of the metros. They know we exist, and we exist in our demarcated areas as 'pushed-out' kind. They say there is equality. Well, yes, there is only when we return to our place, among our own kind. How could my father walk with a proud face when his son roams the streets of the city in sari and dances for money? I don't think about them, my family, anymore. My family means the 'pushed-out' ones in the 'ghetto.'

The good thing about this painted face is that people can't tell anything about me. If you want to know then you look at the eyes, for they are not painted. The first time I went out in this clown costume with the face painted I was nervous. Everyone stared at me and laughed. Many of them even had their photographs taken. But after six months, five hours each day on the roads, I am an experienced man; even my eyes can betray you.

Down a crunchy path, partly concealed by tall grass on either side, I got to this dark tunnel: a dark nest frequented by love birds. It must have been a strategically important place in the past, but today it remains almost ignored and littered with waste.

This site at the foot of this once-green hill now topped with new buildings was ours. It was only us. We haven't known migration, but we have learned adaptation to an extent. When the white men planted this red-painted Victorian structure at the foot of the hill they left this old tree and a few others which have housed many of our generations.

People say one should take a walk in one of the boulevards, some say the paths along the canals in Venice are breezy enough to arouse senses, many suggest an idle stroll around Trafalgar could bestow you a different mood. I suggest you try this, in Langthabal which runs along the foot of Heibok Ching, to know what it is like to be in Kangleipak.

It would have been them, before the sofas, the Danish furniture, the bean bags and the plastic containers entered our houses; just like Takhelei being replaced by roses. In a quiet corner of Khwairamband Market, Imphal, Kangleipak.

"We waste nothing; from the bits of flesh between the jaw bones to the eyeballs we sell. It's business, and there are customers with varied tastes."

Her incomplete rhymes entertain you, her cries make the place alive, the mere sight of her introduces to the world one has long forgotten; the world of innocence and untamed spontaneity.

When I plough this patch of land with hope I sense the scent of earth, and the scent, mixed with hope, only enhances when the colour of the fields turns yellowish.

For my beloved Uncle, Udoy Thongam, who passed away this morning. The Uncle who told us the stories of Revolution. The unique Uncle from whom I learned what to absorb and what to reject. The Rebel Uncle who turned his back to gods but worshipped my grandparents.

It was my grandmother who had brought the parent of this Kundo from her home. She grew it and it flourished as a healthy bush below the shade of pomelo and mango trees by the family pond. When we moved out from our grandfather’s yumjao my mother brought this kundo plant. Within our bamboo-fenced plot, by another family pond, my mother planted it. She joked one morning,” I want you to find a woman who deserves the kundo here. I will tell you which ones to be picked. Tell her that your paternal grandmother did the same for your father, and I threaded them for your father.”

"Chinglen, you talk as though you know it, you know death. Why you keep saying it when you are so young. I know people have tried to talk you out of what defines you, they ask you to get new clothes or more money. But you should know that you are just like this golden disc to me."

First, it was those green reptiles, simply lying stuffed with heavy food but picked up to entertain parched humans. Then the green parrots trained to fetch cards from hands. The world is never a fair place, the victors and the powerful always expect things to go according to their whims. You all could have been in a swamp enjoying the sun or pecking my grandma's mangoes. I could have left you alone, but they flocked the invented place in tens and one among them was to find you, and you were too colourful and you just stood out. Beauty certainly comes with a price. Dogbane beetle

I don’t know what they call me. I don’t if there is a future, security and something that I can’t see at the moment. But I do know that sometimes people are nice and to a lot of people I am a disgrace. If I could do something different? I took my first steps near a gutter, and today I sleep by a different gutter. There is no use thinking too much. It is the unexpected moments that I live for.

Chewed some fresh tamool and sauntered the street in Laimukhrah . I heard someone say, "He look press man with camera and all.", then asked, "My photo come in paper tomorrow?" The tamool which had made my lips and mouth red now made me dizzy. I wanted some water and give myself some space. With the voices remote and yet the people still active I was able to see the other side driven my a sub-conscious mind.

You say my fish bad, and I try sell bad fish before it's late. No, saheb. I sell you bad fish today you not come back tomorrow. Who lose, huh? I want my regular customer, very happy, they come back all the time. I no sell today and run away.

  A son becoming a monk means that soon he was going to be in the Potala and thus he will be around his Holiness. It was then, long long ago when his Holiness was just a boy and Mao's had a reputation in the world. Today, the memories of Lasa is distant, and by now the streets must have been run by the Hans. No one is going back, all that we have is FREE TIBET printed on the shirts and the flags which you can buy in our settlements spread across India.

"You always asked if I had looked at any beautiful flower with you in my mind. Before I met you I had looked; I had always looked at flowers from the angles I wanted and the backgrounds that would make them shine. I carried what you asked in my mind, thought over it several times. It is different now, different that the moment I see something beautiful I wish you were there so that I could see the happiness on your face. I know that moment will never come, for you are the love who I can never have. But I am happy that when I see something beautiful I do think about you."

"These Mugal buildings that you see around here were built on snatched lands. In what you now called Delhi our ancestors were farmers. Then the white men came and enacted Land Acquisition Act. We were evicted and settled somewhere. And when India became an independent nation, during Nehru, we were again evicted with the promise of meagre compensation."

"Damn old post box, man, much much older than my grandfather. But thela ( push cart) not so old nah. only ten years. But owner left many years back and never came. But children think cart same old as post box nah."

Shallow it may look and the current may appear slow, but it always has enough water to defeat even the severest of the drought, and its current strong enough to push the water as far as the ocean. Not lesser than this shallow river with slow current, my heart carries enough love to create a history and enough strength to outlive the emotions of generations.

  A Naga baba at Haridwar "Arey baba, welcome, welcome. I happy you like listen my story, also happy you take my story your country. I come here many many years ago with my guru. I boy, he teach everything. Now I find peace. Life good, my guru good. Haridwar my home now. I like many many people come pray god. You come for god too? Come, come you look good man, from good country. Take photo my guru, my friends, and we smoke. Good god smoke, you like for sure, baba. But why you listen my story, meeting my guru, my friend and do god smoke and say 'god live because you live?' No good, against god. Now you look good, look come from good country. But you not for real."

Never mind, we 're gonna leave behind what we can't take. Take what you can and lock the old house. Its walls and thick roof will keep them intact. We could collect when we return once the future is built elsewhere. You shouldn't look at everything. The umbilical cord in the earthen pot must have turned earth. From now on we must learn new things, new practices, think like what some say they think . A bigger world is there, why do you cling to that shallow or empty world in this place? It's one life, and you must live it. The bus leaves soon, oh we should be thinking train and the bustles of people who have made a better place. Don't you let me drag you, now. I already feel so rotten here among these rats! You must overcome , shake it off and start moving. For chrissake! The house is locked!

When your parents tied your shoes laces before you were sent off to school, they saw this person who would mature soon, understand the world and someday would do something to change this place. They also saw your return when you left the place with future before you. A few years have transformed you to the point that today you begin to see this place as some Japanese tourist would perceive; your p ity for the place is found in the few tea tabled casual words; your attachment to the place is the grumpy week-long stay. It’s a free world, though; you have the right to choose what illusion or what inferiority complex you prefer. But just don’t fake that it really is yours when you have nothing to hold onto in this world. You can forget that the past exists; the scent of mud faded long ago; its people are strangers; its smell disgusts you; its sight are ‘very remote’; and you don’t even understand their medium. But just don’t say that you really care. It sounds like those gr...

I have lived too much of it, I have known it too well, enough to know its cul de sac. Now life's spontaneity doesn't surprise me, a point where humans appear in their true colours, where humans display their dead hearts to justify their conducts. There are only takers, but nothing is given in return. At such time one turns to extreme solitude to do what justifies one's existence. Grim, they will say, yet they enjoy grim comedies.

The whole sky remained concealed the whole day. When it was released from its clutch, only to disclose the approaching dusk, one happened to be walking in the woods.

New Delhi is eternally soaked in rich chaos and congestion. And if you happen to be from a quiet corner, you know what to expect. But a coin becomes real to you after you have seen its sides; you would certainly consider yourself lucky if you explore the city’s magnificent gardens.

Oh you , my  gracious Oh you ,  my youngest nymph  Dance, dance to excite the rain Oh you ,  sweet heart  Dance, dance till the earth joins Oh you ,  damsel For who men unsheathe swords Dance, dance  to  make your ancestors proud  Oh you ,  my soul Dance, dance till you enthra l l the earth Till your footsteps are felt  In the core of the earth Dance, dance ,  my beloved  Till the rain dances to your tune Dance, dance ,  my fare lady  Till the world comes and joins you Dance, dance ,  my life Till you they come and rest at your f...

  Let your voice balm  This aching soul Let your smile s bear this sight Your scent shall  Place this soul in a spell When I wake up  Healed When I walk thinking And  hopeful Hope I shall find you In the moonlit nights The fireflies shall help My sight In days  I shall walk this surface Drinking little Resting in quiet corner s Savouring what little I get But I shall  walk Looking for you Longing you In heart and mind And when  my  body fails, When sight has left, When I lay helpless, Then Memories Will prop They will be my company They...

Long long time ago there existed a few families. My ancestral family was considered wise, and all family members could read and write Sanskrit. But the other families were simple hard-working people who knew nothing but farming and their kin. Time passed, but the knowledge and the language remained in the family as it was passed down from one generation to another. We would teach the rulers a few words every now and then, but to those sun-burned lots we never disclosed a thing.  With unwavering favours from the ruling dynasties, we...