Tag: 2005

The Thornbirds

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

I was talking to Manjiri about The Thornbirds. She had not read the book and I lent her my copy to read.

Very few books have touched me the way this book has… and I must also say, the mini series shall forever be connected in my heart and mind to my paternal aunts and to my grandmother. I had first seen it when I was between ten or eleven maybe… I remember sitting and explaining the scenes to my gran, because she couldn’t understand the language. I remember explaining to her, way back then about how the relationship with God was portrayed… who knew I could do that then? Maybe even I didn’t know what I was explaining to my gran completely and what she gleaned from the translations.

Of course, I didn’t understand the layers of conflict, and I couldn’t really understand Mary the way I understand her now. I saw her as this terrible villain who sought to corrupt the priest by any means possible, and I didn’t ascribe a lot to the sexual element running through the book. I catered to the Ralph de Bricassart ideal of the Rose and the untainted platonic love that he idealised. I got that, alright. I understood the fringes of blood and pain and chaos much, much later…

The book and series is linked to my eldest paternal aunt. She loved the series and I couldn’t help but think about all the times I spent re-reading and re-watching The Thornbirds. Today, I can sit with my mom and aunt and watch the series, and when they question the temerity of Mary Carson, and loathe the ambitious streak of Luke O’Neil, I give a half smile, sated in the knowledge that these things happen and one can do nothing to prevent them from happening. We are as helpless as Megan when she lashes out in anger or when she gives the marriage all she has and then some.

I spoke about it with my best friend in college and she read it and she loved the work, too. I haven’t loved any other book by McCullough as much as I do this one. But then there are few books that stand out through time for me. This happens to be one of them. I have been surrounded by strong female characters in my life and this book speaks of such strong women: Mary, Fee, Meggie and Justine … in essence, then, it is only right that I consciously or unconsciously, share it with all the women in my life.

The tragedy of love and its upliftment is quintessential to this work. Meggie rises, like the thornbird she personifies. The line of courage, resilience, hope and love that she epitomizes is something so intrinsic to what humanity should have and hold. The music by Henry Mancini for the TV series is haunting and takes me back immediately to a time when I had all of Meggie’s verve and hope, so it is doubly poignant because the epic quality of her character shines out when she has the capacity to forgive, forgive the darkest moment in her life. She remains someone worthy to be emulated – and I am glad that I lived through a time when I could see her heroism and I could ingrain a part of it within.

And yes, despite the fact, that there are conditions and circumstances that we cannot help in the making, we can deal with them as Megan does: wear the best darn dress we have, and walk away from a situation we tried our best to succeed at but couldn’t, and in so doing, keep what is bestowed and look to a tomorrow with whatever hope remains in our favour.

Being Superman

Published on by Harpreet Chhachhia2 Comments

I was just talking to my boyfriend about what people do and how they would be perceived at doing something. I think there is a world of difference between doing something for the sake of doing it because it makes one feel good, and doing something for the accolades and the recognition one earns on the way.

My aunt, for example, has been diligently teaching children from sections of society that do not have the means to get taught. She has never talked about it for the reason of getting applause. She teaches. Students learn. Simple. My writing about it here may gain her appreciation, but again, this is a by the way.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not dissing the fact that fame can be used for a cause and also that a cause can bring in fame, that’s all well and done, but sometimes, it’s not necessary for Superman to bring down a plane and save hundreds of lives, sometimes, sometimes, it’s nice when he picks up a cat stuck high up in a tree and bring it down to the scared, little girl waiting for it, under the tree. No camera. No applause. Just Superman being Superman.

As Gandalf says, “Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love. Why Bilbo Baggins? Perhaps because I am afraid, and he gives me courage.”

But apart from Bilbo’s journey, one of the heroes I shall always admire and respect is Samwise Gamgee. I think why should by now be understood.

Becoming Gollum

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

I have been sitting here, at my computer, reading messages coming to and fro from friends, people who used to be friends, family and wondering what it means to be a part of a community. Over the years, this sense of community has changed. I began life as a Sikh boy, loved by the women in his family, and probably, one male who happened to be my paternal uncle. I didn’t realise it then but the lack of male affection would play a large part in my psycho-sexual development. Family then was made up of these strong, Amazonian women – much like on the island of Themyscira. Loved and nurtured and protected.

 

Realising I was gay was not a gradual process, probably one of semantics; but never of nature or impulse. Sometimes, I wonder if life would have been simpler, if I would have been able to be sexually driven towards the opposite sex. Who knows? I sure as hell grew up with a very comprehensive knowledge of the workings of women. But hold on, I must correct myself, straight women. Because we all have breeds and distinctions, Lucy Davis, of course is very different from, say, Antiope. I have been rapped on the knuckles for not seeing that difference as a difference, very recently. I shall acknowledge and accept the difference, for straight men are quite different from gay ones.

 

I will however, be speaking my mind here and people who think that I am being politically incorrect and/or disrespectful can keep their thoughts to themselves. There are just about so many arguments that one can bear regarding martyrs and their complexes. But I digress and this is the last simile to an apology that I will be professing.

 

So, straight people are different from gay people. Naturally. We have our own problems. Then there are communities within communities. Let me just talk about the gay ones. We have a whole plethora of them. Each having their own issues and their own journeys. I begin by taking on the victim complex myself, hell, if you got things to cry and rant about, Let me partake in similar masochism. Or is it sadism? Who can tell the difference these days?

 

I learned that every path of every human being is their own and no one, no one gets to judge that. I learned this while being beaten by my father. I learned this when I was ostracized from groups who wanted to play games. I learned this when vendors would grab my arse because it had a swing in it when I was younger. I learned this when I learned to remove that sway from my arse and walk ‘how men should walk’. (No one pointed out how men should walk though – there were variations there, too.) I learned this when I saw how men treated men, women treated women, men treated women, women treated men, children treated children, and – well, you get the gist. Humanity sucks.

 

The third gay man I met broke my heart. I mean, all of you who have had your heart broken, and that’s one claim that everyone knows how to make, know how that can suck. The group that helped me, the only one that did, and I did reach out to the one already known, was the one that was just forming. Its first hundred members then. They helped. They helped by being there. By bringing a shattered self-esteem back, bit by bit, a kind word, a compliment, a pass and laughter. There was a lot of laughter back then. A lot of it. Sigh.

 

It had its first drag party in ’98. Everyone dressed up in drag. Even from the group that had let me down, they were there, too. Everyone knew how to adjust – or was I too young to notice what was happening, too ignorant of innuendo and malice? Or maybe too blind to what humanity has always been capable of? All said and done, I believed I had found a place to be and grow.

 

I did grow. I found love. I found company. Friends. I found that my family was a brilliant family and they had a place in this new-found company that eventually became family, too. When I had a heart break again, it was not as severely felt because I had so many shoulders to lean on and so many other avenues to which I was brought into.

 

Lights fade. Fights happen. There comes a time when even Frodo refuses to drop the Ring into the flames. And you go, “what the fuck?!” I realized that money matters to a lot of people. I realized that money does make the world go around. And in reality, the Ring does win. Human beings can be capable of the most terrible horrors. Rods in vaginas, puppies been thrown from buildings, infants being raped, homosexuals being tied to fences and left to the elements, friends turning on each other for profit margins, families breaking apart over property and again, money.

 

Time wore on, relationships I had hung my faith on, shattered. Ultimately, faith, itself, shattered. I began seeing the world askance, away from the rose tints of equality. There was no such thing as equality. So, I turned to diversity. The thing I so unwillingly mention in the first paragraph itself. Straight women are different from gay women, gay boys are different from straight boys. Well, huzzah, for diversity, huzzah for all the colours in the rainbow. Somewhere over the rainbow remains a song, I don’t think the somewhere is the destination, Dorothy had it right: we aren’t in Kansas anymore. (Thankfully?)

 

I stuck to ideals for a couple of decades. You know the spiel: loyalty, fidelity, honour, code, right, left, yada yada yada. When I hit my late thirties, I realized that it’s all a crock to bring about some mimicry of civility, an act in which you can either gain thunderous applause, or get booed off stage – either way, you go back to your dressing room and rub the make-up off and go back to a bed, misunderstood and spent.

 

You see, the people who said you could look to them for help, turned their backs. The ones who said you were good enough, found other people who were better. The ones you sheltered in your home, offering them food, and solace (don’t forget the fucking solace), said that they never needed you, in the first place. They didn’t know what they were thinking back then. But, fucktards, if you could think, and decipher your cock from your arsehole, you wouldn’t have needed me to point the two apart, would you have? You can’t blame me for pointing to your cock, if you don’t have it now, can you?

 

I was thinking in the depths of what now appears to be nothing where there was a facsimile of a soul leaves much to be desired in the constraints of action. Everything has become a little worse than Death. When mom faced cancer, we strove against it. But what do you know, there are things worse than Death. For all those naysayers and peeps who talk about how Padmavati didn’t need to walk into a pyre, don’t really know what they are on about. The Nazgûl exist. The blades, they pierce virtue with, exist. The wounds they leave behind exist. There is no Glorfindel to carry you over the Bruinen. The real fuck up is that Valinor doesn’t exist. Frodo, in this day and age, is essentially fucked. All that’s left to him is to become Gollum – look out, here comes the video game.