LifeStorming at Leisure
On a quite roadside rock or the green park when it is time to chill after the rigorous professional compulsions during the day, it’s time to deliberate. From cricket to democracy, nothing is spared. Ruthless in its criticisms and crowning in its praises, life is on the hot line. Laughter that can make the world look beautiful or the violent shouts which have the potential to bring back the great wind of Paulo Coelho’s “The Alchemist” back to life, there is reincarnation of fun in a new dimension. The continuous puffs are the ultimate lifeline. Welcome to the great Bengali way of survival, “adda”.
No, if you think this particular phenomenon is bounded by time, space, age, gender, etc you are going all wrong. It is the natural instinct of this maverick race. Ask the poor parents of college goers or the lonely housewives, adda will send a shiver down their spines. Pleasure for some might be terror for another, but still life is here for the quintessential Bengali.
Having spent my life in such an atmosphere, the winds of adda mesmerized me and took me in its arms in a way which can put many love stories to shame. Its influences were enormous, to some extent it shaped my character, to a major extent it spoiled me. But I have no regrets. It brought out the hidden passions and the fire from the belly. It opened my brain and mind to the outside world and the ability to reflect on dynamic issues was aroused. Human behavior looked fascinating and was worth exploring . Exchange of thoughts and ideas liberated my soul from the dark experiences that any mortal encounters. I learned to be flexible and at the same time being myself.
Ayn Rand remains one of my favorite authors but that is restricted to her literary brilliance. I love going through her philosophies with the objective of criticizing her. But if I don’t accept her ‘I’ factor, I must be a hypocrite. I love the adda sessions because may be I am selfish. I love these gatherings because of the already mentioned virtues. At the end of the day I gain. And when many such ‘I’s gain, ‘We’ gain . Accepted! But now I’ll give you a classic example of how this brilliant phenomenon of adda will make Ayn Rand’s concept of ‘I’ void and glorify ‘We’.
As usual that day I walked into the most beautiful place I know at that time. To my surprise, an unknown face was clearly visible. As I moved closer, there was this bespectacled person with sparkling eyes and neatly combed hair sitting between my two friends elaborating something. As I joined them, he looked at me and said, “We are discussing Sholay, you’ve missed the introduction, I sleep, eat, drink movies. Hi, I’m Avishek.”
The next 90 minutes were magnificent. If the humming of the two different musical notes in the first scene of Sholay when the inspector was on his way to meet the Thakur of Ramgarh through different landscapes was exquisite, then the description of the film on Picasso where the director attempts to capture live his movements of the brush behind a screen for 45 minutes was passionate. Satyajit Ray’s refinement of the main protagonist which was all grey in Tagore’s ‘Ghare Baire’ was deliberated. The Italian director(Pasolini) who was beaten to death due to his film on atrocities was brought down straight from heaven. The facts, issues and thoughts just went on. Possessing a fair bit of knowledge of world cinema and having an interest towards it, I found him a revelation. The passion behind his delivery and the facial expressions was unmistakable. His advices, the revealing of the sources of information and the access to rare movies were voluntary and spontaneous. To top it all, he wanted us to explore that source through him so that we can enjoy the greatness of world cinema. And it has to be done fast as he will be leaving the country very soon for professional reasons. Only true passionate lovers of an art can behave like this. This is ‘We’ at its supreme best.
Such chance encounters add the ice cubes into a glass of perfectly blended whisky. ‘Adda’ might attract the severest of critics who might coin it as a place for lazy bones with no constructive pursuits in life, but the fact remains that he is also very much vulnerable to this ‘fatal’ attraction. He just needs an encounter of such kind. This jargon has an aura of its own with an overwhelming presence. If I have missed out on the humor component of adda, then that is deliberate as it stands out on its own and will need an exclusive article on it with a preface. It is not long before this mighty word finds a coveted place in the Webster. Cheers!
(To Avishek Biswas who is currently working with a software major)
On a quite roadside rock or the green park when it is time to chill after the rigorous professional compulsions during the day, it’s time to deliberate. From cricket to democracy, nothing is spared. Ruthless in its criticisms and crowning in its praises, life is on the hot line. Laughter that can make the world look beautiful or the violent shouts which have the potential to bring back the great wind of Paulo Coelho’s “The Alchemist” back to life, there is reincarnation of fun in a new dimension. The continuous puffs are the ultimate lifeline. Welcome to the great Bengali way of survival, “adda”.
No, if you think this particular phenomenon is bounded by time, space, age, gender, etc you are going all wrong. It is the natural instinct of this maverick race. Ask the poor parents of college goers or the lonely housewives, adda will send a shiver down their spines. Pleasure for some might be terror for another, but still life is here for the quintessential Bengali.
Having spent my life in such an atmosphere, the winds of adda mesmerized me and took me in its arms in a way which can put many love stories to shame. Its influences were enormous, to some extent it shaped my character, to a major extent it spoiled me. But I have no regrets. It brought out the hidden passions and the fire from the belly. It opened my brain and mind to the outside world and the ability to reflect on dynamic issues was aroused. Human behavior looked fascinating and was worth exploring . Exchange of thoughts and ideas liberated my soul from the dark experiences that any mortal encounters. I learned to be flexible and at the same time being myself.
Ayn Rand remains one of my favorite authors but that is restricted to her literary brilliance. I love going through her philosophies with the objective of criticizing her. But if I don’t accept her ‘I’ factor, I must be a hypocrite. I love the adda sessions because may be I am selfish. I love these gatherings because of the already mentioned virtues. At the end of the day I gain. And when many such ‘I’s gain, ‘We’ gain . Accepted! But now I’ll give you a classic example of how this brilliant phenomenon of adda will make Ayn Rand’s concept of ‘I’ void and glorify ‘We’.
As usual that day I walked into the most beautiful place I know at that time. To my surprise, an unknown face was clearly visible. As I moved closer, there was this bespectacled person with sparkling eyes and neatly combed hair sitting between my two friends elaborating something. As I joined them, he looked at me and said, “We are discussing Sholay, you’ve missed the introduction, I sleep, eat, drink movies. Hi, I’m Avishek.”
The next 90 minutes were magnificent. If the humming of the two different musical notes in the first scene of Sholay when the inspector was on his way to meet the Thakur of Ramgarh through different landscapes was exquisite, then the description of the film on Picasso where the director attempts to capture live his movements of the brush behind a screen for 45 minutes was passionate. Satyajit Ray’s refinement of the main protagonist which was all grey in Tagore’s ‘Ghare Baire’ was deliberated. The Italian director(Pasolini) who was beaten to death due to his film on atrocities was brought down straight from heaven. The facts, issues and thoughts just went on. Possessing a fair bit of knowledge of world cinema and having an interest towards it, I found him a revelation. The passion behind his delivery and the facial expressions was unmistakable. His advices, the revealing of the sources of information and the access to rare movies were voluntary and spontaneous. To top it all, he wanted us to explore that source through him so that we can enjoy the greatness of world cinema. And it has to be done fast as he will be leaving the country very soon for professional reasons. Only true passionate lovers of an art can behave like this. This is ‘We’ at its supreme best.
Such chance encounters add the ice cubes into a glass of perfectly blended whisky. ‘Adda’ might attract the severest of critics who might coin it as a place for lazy bones with no constructive pursuits in life, but the fact remains that he is also very much vulnerable to this ‘fatal’ attraction. He just needs an encounter of such kind. This jargon has an aura of its own with an overwhelming presence. If I have missed out on the humor component of adda, then that is deliberate as it stands out on its own and will need an exclusive article on it with a preface. It is not long before this mighty word finds a coveted place in the Webster. Cheers!
(To Avishek Biswas who is currently working with a software major)
2 Comments:
Great Argha..!!!! Thanx for putting all the words which I cud not tell through pen..!!!
Arghya,
Great write-up as usual :). Just thought abt mentioning cpl of things that u might consider - my name is spelt 'Avishek' and not 'Abhishek' :). The Italian director is Pier Paolo Pasolini.
And.. you can consider adding - 'ekei bole telepathy'r jor' - how Amlan turned up on that day !!!
And 4give my 'sms' type lingo !!!
:)))))))
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