Yes, I met Frida. My dear Frida Kahlo. This time not in a dream but on a street. A vibrant street, as colourful as Frida’s works and her life. It wasn’t strange, I knew I will bump into her, she had mentioned it to me. Yes, you guys must believe me when I tell you something. She comes in my dreams. Yes, comes as in visits me, sits with me (sometime even lies down next to me), talks to me and often, even cuts a joke. Seriously, there is no need for you to doubt it. We do chat. Of her works, her poetry, her random thoughts, her bandaged body, the broken bones under her bodice and her unbreakable spirit.
This time we were face to face. I was a bit taken aback. Normally she informs me. Like the week before, she told me she would be visiting me, physically, in my day-dream, and you bet she did. She came while we were having lunch. Came and pulled a chair next to me, almost touching my left elbow, sipped from my glass, had half of the gobhi paratha with a chunk of white butter. Wishing me Merry Christmas, she turned and left without even saying a Hi to anyone else. Before she left she stopped by the alcove and spent time admiring the Kalighat painting I recently acquired. It is a work by Kalam Patua. In the artwork a man is holding his beloved in his arms, her right leg on his left thigh. Turning around Frida gave a questioning glance. ‘When?’ She asked, raising her left eyebrow. Oh Jesus, how much I love her eyes, her lashes, her eyebrows and the tiny pearly stud she pins on her brow, God knows how!
Never mind the eyes and the stud – she is hypnotic all over. Finding her here, of all the places in the world, that late at night I was a bit scared. At times she scares me, specially when I am with someone, you see she is very possessive, (of me, of course). To see her here in Kochi, where I am on a holiday with my dear wife was a bit surprising. For the Goddess herself, to appear in God’s own country without notice was a little uneasy.
Both of us drunk, and well-fed on beef curry, walking the dark street past the graffiti wall announcing Kochi Art Biennale. Under a lamp-post, a cigarrillo clutched in her fingers, Frida looked straight in my eyes, unblinking. Yes, thats where she stood, under a lamp-post, a sentinel tracking me. The flowers in her hair, I concluded, she must have picked up from the local woman selling toddy at the other end of the street. I am sure she also had a glass or two of toddy, the glaze still there in her eyes. The chandeliers dangling in her ears reminded me of the silver market of Jaipur where we met last. Her gaze and her silence sending shockwaves of love through the inebriated town where the ocean doesn’t let anyone sleep. Glad that I had opened my arms and that elusive smile had come back on my saline-puffed cheeks. Without another second of delay I gave her a big warm hug. ‘I need one too’, I told her. We stood there like pillars of unrequited love, fulfilled.
I don’t think she kissed me for when I looked at her face, her lips were wet but closed, maybe it was her gloss. My partner was nowhere near. Caressing her left cheek as I unlocked the hug I felt she tapped my right shoulder. A fleeting glimpse of something red felt it to be her Mexican silk stole. Looking at my moist eyes Frida was about to repeat vows of our eternal love when a red fez, the Turkish cap, came in view. A liveried young man stood there pointing his left arm to something behind me, “Madam Sir over there. Huggies and kissies, there sir, the bar closed sir.” He pleaded, “Please move, Sir. We to shut the gate, move from pillar, Sir.”
Next to me, Rajni smiled at Frida but didn’t say hello. Looking at me both of them smiled and whispered, ‘the world is watching love’.
Hopefully all of you had a wonderful year 2023 – successful, joyous, and healthy. While we wish each other ‘HNY’ on January 1st, a few of us while responding to the wishes, also reflect and think of the year gone by and, in the hindsight, pray that they don’t go through the bumpy patches again.
Thirteen days down the line while a cold wave sweeps the city and a grey sky adds to the gloom, I suppose it is time to look back at the year 2023 while tucked in a warm duvet with a cup of hot coffee or a glass of rum in hand.
But then going back is not easy unless one has maintained a meticulous account, a diary of sorts. It is difficult to recall all events – so before I began writing this I put down a broad selection of month wise events after which it was easier to sum it up.
The year 2023 was tiring and tough, though equally rewarding. At times trying and testing, at the others back breaking and on a few occasions frustrating to downright unpassable. Yet, the time-hardened bones, the stubbornness not to back down, to take it all upfront – not just face it but challenge it too – sailed me through. I can now say with a grin that both the clock and the time looked back and smiled. That reward was bigger than the financial one.
Till about the second week of March 2023 things were sailing smooth at work and home. Towards the last week we went to Bhopal to mount the exhibition ‘Hum Sab Sahmat: Resisting a Nation without Citizens’ (‘We All Agree’ – a testament to resisting a nation being shaped without its citizens). That’s where we got the news that two of our friends had been hospitalised. We rushed back only to see both of them pass away in a matter of three days. Comrade Suneet Chopra was first one to leave us and dear dear friend Vivan Sundaram followed on 29 March 2023. It was a huge setback.
Back at work picking up the threads I was debating the existential crisis that the death of a dear one leaves one with. Though a little hard to push, yet the wheel of life carries on gently patting the past.
Somehow I have always found that the Financial Year has a kind of continuity with the calendar year. As one settles in the comfort zone of a benign April suddenly challenges pounce on you from a hidden corner. Till then I was pretty much enjoying whatever came my way and what I was doing, professionally or on a personal level. I was more than happy with last years’ financials and with the healthy number of projects in our hand. Come May, the first unseasonal rain and a burst of seepage from the second floor terrace of our home brought with it an unending spate of problems at home which was also doubling up as part-office. Lo and behold, a civil works contractor and a melee of labour took over our place in an army-like operation disrupting everything for the next three months.
Between the work supervision and rounds to the market I could barely attend to work. On the professional front work suffered, deadlines overshot, clients screamed, and expenses piled. How can one even pretend to be creative and churn out campaigns or designs that satisfy the soul while one is tumbling over sacks of cement and slipping over stone dust, how? Most unhappy with myself and the team I was losing my shirt on everyone around which made matters worse. Fortunately, I got a grip on myself in time and calmed down before things went out of hand. The pressure of office work was increasing so did the delays at home caused by absentee workmen.
On June 1st bad news came from Dubai. My life-time mentor and guide Zamir Ansari passed away after a massive heart attack. I was devastated. We had a long association of nearly 35 years. He was the most gentle, the kindest and a god-like being who helped anyone with everything he had. While his loss jolted me no end, at a memorial meeting for Mr Ansari something good came up. I shook hands with two people with whom a misunderstanding had cropped up a few years back. In my heart I felt much lighter having cleansed my heart and having made-up with them. There is so much good in the world to see, feel, share, and give. Life trudged.
Home renovation is an unending pain. Once you start fixing seepage, masonry creeps in together with water-proofing; plumbing replacement brings down functional bathrooms which need to be redone from the scratch. Electricals and woodwork soon follow which necessitates paint work and floor polishing, if not entire floor replacement. The whole house was in a mess. It was physically and mentally draining running up and down the three levels at the peak of summers. With the dust and noise all around us Ma fell ill and then all of us followed one after another, flu, sore throats, congestion and the viral fever kept us down. A nagging threat of corona persisted with unmasked labour sauntering around the house for ten hours each day. With tea and snacks to be served twice a day to a team of thirty odd workers, the household help and the kitchen was operating more like a free-canteen about to collapse any day.
In between the saving grace was a decent exhibition design and execution project that came our way. Normally of short duration but hectic, exhibition projects are well paying, we made a packet for a week of sleepless nights.
While all this was happening I managed to hurt my knee and limped my way through latching on to stair railings and walls. Over weeks it came to a point that I couldn’t attend to work or even go for my morning walks. The orthopaedic said that I had a bone abrasion and had torn knee-joint ligaments. A busy work season had begun. With September came the festival rush of north India. Visits to the doctor and the physiotherapist were added to the hectic work schedule. Work pressure continued without respite (good it did).
We hadn’t had a break for over seven months. Not even a decent and calm Sunday. Catching a drink in peace seemed luxury. No friends, no party, no outings. Life was dull and boring only dealing with masons, plumbers, carpenters, painters, welders, electricians and floor polishers. Finally, and somehow having pushed everyone out, we managed to get the house back in shape and sing with us sometime in October. It was such a relief.
While we were enjoying our wine and cheese and the music played in the background a hearty duet joined the chorus. My brother and his wife, from pardes, joined us in the freshly redone space. Warmth filled the place. From then onwards it was a party each morning, noon, and night. Evenings were only for drinks which drowned us. World Cup Cricket was here – the fever gripped us too. Succumbing to the loot by the black marketeers we headed to the Private Gallery view of matches in Chennai and Ahmedabad. The on-ground cricket entertainment is a different game. It is heady when you know that the rest of the universe is watching the game 17 seconds after you.
Bad news somehow smells of the relative peace and joy one is enjoying. This time it came from Palestine. Innocent Gazans have had to suffer unending brutalities at the hands of Israeli forces for over three months now.
Clients were kind during the next two months. No one was dying or flying. No one asked for a brochure at the last minute. No press conference wanted a PR push, no Annual Reports were delayed. All in all work sailed smoothly. There were more holiday breaks and parties than work during this time. Festivals, together with a spate of birthdays, meant celebrations. Fun and frolic carried on with heritage walks, concerts, visits to monuments and museums, excesses of street food topped with heady overdose of drinks.
Finally, as all good things end, so do parties and celebrations. Work pressure increased together with the knee pain. Brother and bhabhi went back home. Life was coming back to the drudgery of a routine when the happy bells rang.
A new, prestigious, and fairly large exhibition project came our way. This one was to happen in Shahjahanabad – inside the great monument built by Emperor Shah Jahan. I fell in love with the Red Fort all over again as we had the special permission to drive our car straight inside the Fort through the historical Delhi Darwaza with its life-size elephant statues guarding the magnificent edifice and its age-old secrets. Despite the limp and the pain it was a joy to work inside the 17th Century fort. Even in the peace and quiet of Diwan-i-khas I could hear the nautch girls sing and dance.
The commute from Gurgaon to purani Delhi was a dampener but it also had the bait of ‘Delhi 6 ka khaana‘. The near 5,000 sq feet of our exhibition space finally turned out as a stunning art gallery overlooking the Mughal grandeur spread around us. Decked with priceless artworks from across the country the hall looked like a haseen dulhan. The design and the display was appreciated and applauded. In our hearts we were more than happy for having done a bloody-good job.
The successful completion of a project has to be celebrated, so, leaving the foggy and cold Delhi behind, off we went to the balmy and sunny coastal Kerala. The year was coming to an end and we knew that one has to reward oneself for the accompanishment/s and all the hard work. Driving along the south-western coast we rode further down south from historic Kochi to the backwaters of Alleppey to Trivandrum and to the blue-water and white-sand beaches of Kovalam enjoying fish fillets and toddy – all the way through watching Bharatanatyam and Mohiniyattam performances while admiring the pollution free sparkling blue skies. While in Kovalam as I watched the sun set behind the Arabian sea two clients called to say that their “Calendar designs” were delayed. What???? Didn’t you get an auto reply saying I am out of town? Ugghhhh!!!
I wondered, could I complain to the sun why was it setting, could I? A fishing boat crossed the pale orange sphere as it dipped in blue waters. A flock of birds were circling the boat waiting for the catch. A few stars peeped out from the dark northern sky. I poured a drink.
Designers and artists can’t complain even when their dreams are broken.
To sum up, the year 2023 indeed was tough yet it was rewarding in more ways than one. Hoping that 2024 will be kind and joyous for all of us, personally I look forward to more vacations, explorations, more journeys and more laid back weeks over work, work and work. Cheers to all of you. Stay safe and stay in love.
Some noteworthy jobs of the year 2023 were: Advantage Tennis magazine. Annual Reports for SISCOL, IFFCO and CEQUIN. Brochures for Global Health Strategies, Ashoka University, Jainson and Ojas Art. Books for NLGI, Ruzbeh Bharucha, Aditya Saikia and Dr. Kamal Rustomejee. A portfolio for Vivan Sundaram. Table calendars for SISCOL and Sahmat. Exhibition designs for IAADB and Jainson.
Ankahi. Unsaid. 
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