Tea And Sympathy: Cal Chronicles 2

Second week in Cal, and things are already better. Much more interesting than the first one, in any case. For one, the Sherlock Holmes was a better one, The Speckled Band. To think of it, the tv series isn't really as great as it could have been. Of course, as a kid, it seemed fabulous, but parts of each episode do seem bland. I mean, Jeremy Brett is still intensely fascinating, and the title tune is haunting, but...um...well, maybe it would work better as a Sunday morning show- or even a Sunday evening show- than a Tuesday night show. The Speckled Band did have one great thing though- Dr Grimesby Roylott, scary as hell. I think what I'd like is some more darkness in the stories. So far its just been the lighter cases, not the really intriguing ones. I long for post-sundown foggy hansom chases, and flashing Colt .45s and blood-curdling eerieness. Ah! The modern youth I tell you.
Earlier that Tuesday, I got a better treat- a performance by the St Xavier's choir. Now, I will never profess to understanding what goes on in the making of a good choir, but I do know that I like a good one when I hear it. This one was fabulous. The harmonies were mostly spot on and sometimes the force of the singing really got you. The carols sounded exactly the way I had hoped they'd sound. Full credits to the guy playing the piano, and the arrangement of Xaviers' much loved prof Bertie. I love how these things just happen so unexpectedly in Cal. I was loafing about Park Street when my friend Dana called me up and asked if I wanted to go hear the choir. Her brother was one of the singers. Now, I wasn't even aware of such a thing here. Well, a nice surprise.
The days passed by in a daze. Met my ACJ friend Virat for lunch at Flury's (excellent Chicken Strogonoff) and then made a short trip to New Market to pick up some of Nahoums' legendary brownies as a Christmas gift for Suhrid and Payal. The good journo was in a rotten mood when I met him at his office, fuming at some beaureaucratic turd from the Planning Commission who'd dared be insolent with him! Had to help him down four pegs of gin in record time at 4 in the afternoon! Then, dunno why, I blithely got on the Metro and travelled a couple of stations the wrong way before switching tracks...
Lemme tell you about my friend Dr D. He first earned my gratitude by sheltering me for a couple of weeks in his Vasundhara Enclave apartment in Delhi when I was without a place to live. While there, he entertained me with a stream of excellent movies which made a cine fan out of me. As if that wasn't enough, he entertained me further by fleeing the city following some fuck-up in office (which involved angry, threatning Jats, go figure). This meant packing up all our stuff and slipping off to the railway station at 6 in the morning for him to catch a train at 4:30 in the evening! A very eventful day it was too. He earned my gratitude some more by carrying my books and cds back to Cal. Now, he has his defects- horrible English which he pigheadedly feels proud about being one of them- but I love him al the same. I messaged him cause I wanted to meet him and get my stuff back. He replied, "Am shifting to Dargeling (sic) tomorrow night. Meet me soon." The sentence threw me a little, but I recovered to realise that he couldn't possibly be shifting there for good. I went to his house the next day. The journey was short but interesting, taking me into little-known depths of Jadavpur. He has the habit of spending all the money he earns, which is a tidy bit, on books, cds and dvds. Quite a stupendous collection. His profligate philosophy is that if he can buy it, he won't burn it. Reprehensible case of wastefulness, but it means a lot of entertainment for reprehensible me. So when I got back home a couple of hours back, apart from a sackful of books, I had two Traffic Live dvds, two Traffic albums, a Thelonius Monk album and the George Harrison Concert For Bangladesh dvd...hmm. As you can imagine, he's well stocked.
What I needed was loads of sleep, but I could only get fitful snatches of it. This left me a lazy lout with a killer headache. This meant I missed my morning appointment with Virat. I had promised him that I would show him the sights and sounds of this fair city, like the museum and BBD Bag (where all the fab colonial palaces are). Hungover and bullshitting, it was the last thing on my mind. Afternoon came and went, with it a random Hepatitis A shot which my lunatic doctor of a father thought was good for me. I finally met Virat at sundown, skulking outside the British Council, Poor soul, I had wanted to ease his lonely soul, but booze had got the better of me. Had coffee, walked about, and went to his place at the YMCA on SN Banerjee Road. Man what a place to stay. Old Calcutta personified. My regard for the Markandeya (for such is his name) went through the roof. Its tough not to have friends in an alien place.
Anyways, was meeting Dana for SomePlace Else, as she had been working her ass off and I felt she needed some fun. Yeah, I'm the messiah of the work-oppressed. So this meant reacquainting myself with my old haunts at the Park. Some things don't change. Some P is one of them. Well, the silly cover-charge routine is gone, but that bunch of octogenarian noddy-heads, Hip Pocket still play "Classic Rock" in bland-out mode and the croud feels they have to appalaud it to be hip. So me, Virat and Dana hung around, got a table, and to keep it had to drink. Well, me and Virat did anyways. So Hip Pocket lumbered through some shit they called jazz, and was soon playing Doors and Scorpions. Then came the slap in the face. Oh yeah? the band seemed to say. You think we can't add stuff to our repertoire? Well, here's Linkin Park!
I died a little.
One of my oldest pals, Arj the energetic messiah of every down and out soul, showed up, as I knew he would, with two more old chestnuts from school, Kakeesh and Boy (not their real names, but real enough.) Things change, so while Kakeesh is set to marry, Boy's planning to open a Lebanese restuarant. A lot of bullshitting and some cigars later, Hip decided they need to sleep, so they played some more Rolling Stones. I was disgusted. Dana had had enough and wanted to go home. So I left Virat- who had become a part of the upholstery by then- in the care of nobody in particular and stepped out to see Dana to her car. Wham, wham wham!!! I meet people and places in the lobby whom I've not met in years, including a girl who I last met in a Presidency orgy. She had left before the orgy, but well, here she was 6 years on, asking me about jobs in Delhi!! Then other kids, juniors of mine from College and finally Rohan the Riddermark, a Chris Martin-Pete Townshend lookalike, my favourite guitar player and good friend. He was suitably rude, especially as I seemed too eagre to get people's numbers. Oh well, he asked me if I wanted to sing with his band who were going on after the sleepy fogeys. I said yeah. So we enter the cavern- smelling of beer and cigarettes- again, and I find Virat has vanished. Oh woe, what'll I tell his parents? But he was there somewhere, and I soon found him between a woman about to pass out and a man about to feel her up. I got to him before he could get traumatized and hauled him out. The bunch of wobbly knees also known as Hip Pocket were looking as if they needed some life support system to keep em up and duly retired. Rohan's band took to stage, with Malmshi the frontman, a dedicated bassist, a zen keyboard player, and Chotu the drummer. The are, a bit unfortunately, called Supersonics, and they play their own stuff. Whch is laudable, given the lounge-core old men who had preceded them. Supersonic were punky, their words couldn't be heard, Rohan was rocking as only he can- laconica morosa- and they kept getting electrocuted. While their songs sound the same, they are energetic...well, a ROCK band. I stood around and looked disdainful at their originals. What was funniest was that these guys have an awestruck fan-following of their own -the present college kids, who hover like proud parents, go "ooh aah" at Rohan's leads and hold on to harmonicas when they're not being used...Rohan has developed into a mean harp player as well...Soon enough they limbered up to play "their only cover" which turned out to be "I'm Free" by the Rolling Stones. While in the middle of the song, Rohan asked me to come up on stage. I was a bit embarassed but well, how can I be asked to perform and refuse? With the music muted, Rohan says, "I'd like to introduce an old friend of mine, Beq!", and he leads the band into the bouncy rhythm of "Sympathy For The Devil". What ensued was frenetic dancing (me), loud singing(me), wild cheering (a packed SomeP, with Hip Pocket induced dozers finally waking up), and a happy happy Rohan. By the time I started howling "Won'tcha tell me baybee, what's maai naaaime," the place was going wild, which meant an extended chorus, tearing my voice to shreds!!! Anyways, it ended in a stream of flashlights, and screams of encore...The song ended, and I did a Beatle bow, and said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, The Supersonics!" Mamshi, clapping over his Gibson hollowbody, "Bibek!"
"No no. Beq." Rohan.
So ended my rockstar -in miniature performance.
I came off the stage in a barrage of back thumpings from enthusiastic revellers. The overawed kids, seemed overawed yet again, and some offered me their beers. Virat who had never seen anything like this in Delhi, was simply loving it.
Then a drunken hand grabbed me by the hair and a voice bawled, "Vivaaaash". Arj, of course.
A splendid time was had by all.