Tomichan Matheikal's blog

Janus January is named after the Roman god of beginnings and transitions, Janus.  Janus has two faces, one looking backward and the other forward.   January is the time to look in both directions. I am terrified and challenged simultaneously by this January, January 2014.  Because 2013 has been the worst year in my life.  In spite of the fact I am not new to the usual ups and downs of life.  2013 was the year of FACES for me.   MASKS.  I had never seen so many masked faces in my life earlier.  I had never seen smiles that looked angelic but turned out to be diabolic – not even when my students cared to point it out to me.  Not ever to the extent 2013 undressed itself. I saw more than half of my colleagues lose their jobs in 2013.  I witnessed the march of capitalism and religion, hand in hand.  They marched wearing the best saris or the best of cravats available in the market.  They marched on the bones of people they buried beneath the land they acquired in the p

Politics has been nothing more than an entertainment for me.  When the entertainment crossed the most stretched limits of human sensitivity, I wrote blogs to soothe the ruptures within me.  The more I watched the political dramas in my country, the more I began to find it detestable rather than entertaining.   That’s when I chose to stop writing about politics and look at humanity from literary perspectives.  I don’t know whether my choice was an escapist act.  Even Narendra Modi’s acquittal by the Ahmedabad Metropolitan Magistrate would not have prompted me to write a political commentary now.  What has prompted this blog is a question raised by someone with a pseudonym.  He seems to have taken the trouble to follow my blog using Google+ only to raise the question, what do I think of AAP’s coming to power in Delhi?  Similar questions have been raised by a few pseudonymous persons in the recent past and I ignored them.  Perhaps it’s time to tell them that I am bored, utterly

Bottom and Titania in a Multiplex Bottom had walked into the multiplex for window-shopping.  The centralised air-conditioning in the multiplex was a joyful relief from the scorching heat in the city’s overcrowded open spaces.  Moreover, he could gratify his voyeuristic inclination by looking at the legs or cleavages of the pretty fairies that wafted coquettishly around with mobile phones clinging to their ears like earrings and chocobars slipping through their velveteen lips. Though he imagined the girls as fairies Bottom didn’t really believe that fairies existed.  So when he was approached by Titania, the fairy queen herself, his surprise was quite palpable.  But, like most twenty-first century boys (and girls, of course), he knew how to tackle any odd situation in life and so he overcame his surprise sooner than any person from another period of human history would. Titania had just woken up from a sleep.  But her mind was still under the influence of the overdose of the

He came, peeped in, and hesitated a moment. Any better option? No, not much choose from.  The winter has denuded the trees. Soon the family festival started. 

Fiction Father Joseph was an eccentric priest, according to his parishioners.  His best friend was Thomas, an atheist.  People loved him, nevertheless, because he cared for them with the tenderness of a shepherd who knew every one of his sheep by name.  Yet another Christmas came and the very active parishioners were in the church building the crib.  “Is it because Jesus taught us to care more for the lost sheep that you love Thomas so much?”  Chandy asked Father Joseph while they were working on the crib. “Whoever said that Doctor Thomas was lost?” wondered Father Joseph.  Thomas the atheist was a doctor who gave free treatment to patients who could not afford to pay consultation fees.  People used his services but hated him merely for being an atheist. “He’s an atheist,” said Chandy. “Why should atheists be counted as lost?” countered Father Joseph.  “Many of the atheists are far better human beings than orthodox Christians.” “But you are a priest of the

Nature can look bizarre sometimes. It may indeed be bizarre. Death and life coexist at times. Life longs to thrive, not just survive. Even in the hollow of a tree trunk life can be born and may thrive too. When there's no nature left the wild bees may come in hordes and besiege the concrete jungle with its synthetic light.  PS. All three photos were taken today, a very hazy day in Delhi.        I'm longing for sunshine.

Painting by Pietro Perugino (1446-1524) Fiction I had seen greed of all sorts.  My ancestors had told me about the various kings and conquerors who crossed the mountains and the seas out of greed for land and its riches, for power and wealth, or for sheer adventure.  The usual varieties of princely greed failed to enchant me.  My parents were disappointed in me as I did not grow up as a prince was supposed to.  “Caspar will be no good,” I heard my father tell my mother once, “he gazes at the sky more than is good for a prince.” My greed was for knowledge.  I wanted to know everything that lay beyond the horizon.  I wanted to know what the stars knew.  I became a star gazer.  It was thus that I noticed a unique star in the sky.  Was it a dream or an illusion?  I was not sure.  Sometimes I could not distinguish illusion from reality. The star invited me to leave the cosy comfort of the palace and explore the world beyond the horizon.  Thus it was that I started my lon