They say, India: That is a mini world; And when my dad used

to visit me, a mini India used to come along with him, hooking

the fish of it in a dilapidated banana leaf, wearing an uncanny

urgency to come first, slum in the armpits pushing the heat out,

coalescing into a cologne, blocked somewhere between inners

and a blazer. Surge of pickles about to burst, contained well within

the pots by shackles, tapes, whacked by batons, belans, silenced

even in peak altitudes to look like nothing ever happened. Ankle-torn

socks covered with elite Woodland shoes, whose last letter is a t

instead of a d which nobody can really spot, other than me, since

he had bought me many Adidaz, Pume and Tommy Hilfigr before.

Jingle of aluminium molds, which are the future of a thousand

idlis, smoke and love, absorbed by spongy electronic carriers and wires;

Never shown to the mist or the skies since they’re born are the fries,

the fritters, taken the shapes of triangle or square in cartons, in tiffin

boxes, wrapped around by one round of paper, one round of silver foil,

still oozing out their curiosity through the multi pads of cotton towels,

touching every possible untouchables; For every hour that he couldn’t

kill, for a missing headset wire, for an occupied lavatory, the back-pedaling

it gives, for a waning boundary, it’s unstoppable anxiety, for a sudden

lift, a doodle was donated to his servant’s son’s experience certificate. His

dexterity with tight knots is remarkable. In spite of all the turbulences,

it kept the adult’s night creams and children’s DVDs, well within their

territories, though both were compartmentalized in the same bedsheet.

How much time he could have taken to send back with the driver, that

excess baggage which included my books, some grains, all nodding happily

in the trunk, having sent a deity, agarbattis and a mini pooja mandir abroad?