Belated Valentine Thought!

I adored you, you puzzled me
You crushed on me, I was scared
I held a hand, you were terrified
You reconciled with my heart, I started counting our good times
I obsessed, you let go
You pushed me to grow, I helped you to stand
I shed a tear, you invited me to a roar of laughter
I exhibited the bond to the world, you nourished the tenderness in your sweet little world
I ran, you beamed easy
You grew to great heights and my pride heightened
You chided, you applauded
You shared and cared, I embraced and became glad
We danced in brilliance, we breathed in symphony
We were parasites in the form of full grown trees
We clung, we distanced
We romanced, we fought with a unified heart beat
You were a mother in pain, a friend in crime
I was an edifice and at times thorn
You taught me tough love yet became a boon
Every single leap of faith, I took holding on to your kind heart
I draw strength, you are my courage
I am going far but never before stayed so close to you my sweetheart!!

Struggle!

Running down the alley

Yes, I can see the light 

Two more steps 

I daresay I can hold it

Wait, strange hands pulling me down 

The land beneath my feet is slippery!

Is this treachery

Is it my own people's tears?

That can't be

Those hands nurtured my young mind

Strength! I have it 

To kick the chains away

Run, faster and wilder towards the light

Towards the dream

Grab my destiny 

Roll over with happiness

Book review: Memoirs of a geisha

“He was like a song I'd heard once in fragments but had been singing in my mind ever since.”

Having read such a romantically intense quote one would expect this book  to be a deep love story. The book is all but a love story. The highest honor and happiness the protagonist Nitta Sayuri receives is to be the mistress of a man she loved. To quote Sayuri "You cannot say to the sun, "More sun." Or to the rain, "Less rain." To a man, geisha can only be half a wife. We are the wives of nightfall. And yet, to learn kindness after so much unkindness, to understand that a little girl with more courage than she knew, would find her prayers were answered, can that not be called happiness? After all these are not the memoirs of an empress, nor of a queen. These are memoirs of another kind." These are memoirs of a geisha.

The 448 pages of emotional upheaval is a narration of her past life from the protagonist Nitta Sayuri. The mood of the book is not melancholy but hopeful. Readers are introduced to Sakamoto Chiyo in her impoverished childhood in a small fishing town of Japan. After her mother's deathbed, much to little Chiyo's shock, she as well as her sister is sold off to a stranger by her father. Little Chiyo's scary journey to become a Geisha thereafter hold's the reader's breath. A geisha is not a prostitute but an artist in her own way.The most literal translation of geisha into English would be "performing artist". While Japan's tradition expected women to be confined only to the walls of her kitchen, geisha were the women who accompanied men in social gatherings and entertained them with their dance, music and games. It was traditional in the past for established geisha to take a danna, or patron. A danna was typically a wealthy man, sometimes married, who had the means to support the very large expenses related to a geisha's traditional training and other costs. The geisha who worked within pleasure quarters were essentially imprisoned and strictly forbidden to sell sex in order to protect the business of the okiya (traditional geisha house).

Chiyo much desired for her loving face with the tender and piercing blue green eyes, missed her chance of getting art training to become a geisha when she bears the angst of mistress of okiya while fruitlessly trying to escape. On a chance meeting with a man she calls chairman throughout, young Chiyo's life is changed forever. She is awarded the generous apprenticeship with a magnanimous tutor Mameha and learns dance, singing and many other art forms as a Maiko (a geisha in training). Rechristened as Sayuri she is made to sell her virginity to the highest bid of 15000 yen. 

On her journey to becoming the most successful Geisha in the pleasure town of Gion, Sayuri earns a lot of friends and also a ruthless enemy Harsumomo. Every step she takes after that meeting with chairman is to get closer to him. But fate holds other plans for her. Chairman expects her to reserve her attention and care to Nobu, chairman's friend. The world war 2 pushes Japan into a fearful state and leaves Sayuri to sweat it out hard in a Kimono maker's home. After 2 years of gruesome work, Sayuri comes back home only to see her it having lost all the grandeur and to witness geisha culture severely challenged among American soldier troops. How Sayuri brings back the traditional standards of a geisha, how she keeps alive the geisha manners among lustful American soldiers and how she ever gets closer to chairman is best appreciated when one reads the book himself/herself.

Arthur Golden, the author has entwined the delicate controversial story of a geisha in powerful words. A reader is not disgusted when she reads that Sayuri's mizuage (virginity loss) is sold; instead one cannot help but pray that Sayuri gets the highest bid so that she can repay the amount to okiya for which she was sold and liberate herself to become independent geisha. The author compels you to shed tears when Sayuri finally gets her first kiss from chairman. Though the form of narration is prose I felt it is no lesser than a wonderful poem. Sayuri is pictured as a strong woman fighting against many odds; yet she is that delicate vulnerable girl whom anybody would love to protect. At once Sayuri looks like she is the unfortunate girl who deserves better, but the very next moment she is a happy soul to get the best out of her world. 


I wanted to put down the book after reading the first few pages but once the book got into my skin I felt pulled towards the characters. Though it is about a culture I was not aware of, people whom I could not relate to, hardships I never had or  will endure; I could still feel the pain of Sayuri's journey, the purity of Mameha's secret love to her patron,the intensity of Hatsumomo's genuine jealousy and the kindness of Chairman. 

“Perhaps it seems odd that a casual meeting on the street could have brought about such change. But sometimes life is like that isn't it” 

Yes Sayuri. Life is all that unpredictable yet promising. This character of Sayuri is one which will continue to remain in my heart for a long time. While there are many trivial things to complain about in life, women like Sayuri show to the world that an unflinching desire in heart is all that's required to get to the destination what come may. Kudos to the lion heart in a geisha body confined by many chains of oppression, social norms and restrictions. Hats off to the kindness, hope and faith life never fails to provide even after many blows. 

To treat yourself with beautiful quotes from the book:
http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/614.Arthur_Golden?page=1

Book review : The Guide

I start a blog on my favourite reads and not mention 'The Guide' by R.K.Narayan! Impossible. This book is always dear to my heart because not only its the work of a great Indian writer, or has the scenic drop of my favourite Malgudi town but also it is the novel that marked the beginning of my book world. Although my ever thoughtful persuasive mother loaded me with children books during my primary schooling, I rarely had the mood to indulge in them. Primary schooling for me was the blissful monkey period where playing 24*7 on the street, with my buddies was all that mattered to me. As I grew up, in the middle of ninth standard I came across 'The Guide' in our school library (gosh!! library was a place me and my friends never stepped into and our actions were somehow justified for the library lay in the lowest basement level of our school).

The protagonist of the book is a highly corrupt and shrewd guide Raju, who makes money through selling outrageous lies about his hometown Malgudi to the tourists. One fine day Railway Raju as he was fondly known, comes across a tourist couple that would change his life forever. The husband Marco, an archaeologist is immensely dedicated to his work and has little or no concern towards his demure, sensual and talented dancer wife Rosie/Nalini. Raju gets flown away by his lust for this love deprived woman and takes her under his wing with alluring promises of a love filled life and of a bright dance career for Rosie. Raju becomes Rosie's stage manager and propels her dancing career to great heights. The tragedy sets in when Raju's lack of education and genuine appreciation for art takes a toll on his lover. Rosie begins to grow more and more focussed on dancing and spends time with her artist friends which leads to irritation, depression and anger in Raju.

The story takes an unexpected turn when Raju is imprisoned for two years in a forgery case. Rosie being absorbed in her art fails to lend her support and love to Raju at this stage of his life. On release form the jail, ashamed to return to Malgudi with the disgrace, Raju enters another village where he is mistaken for a Sadhu. Life was never the same for Raju after that. His reputation of a great Sadhu reaches a large number of people and he ends up holding a much publicized fast to please the rain god and relieve the village of long stretched drought.

The last line of the novel is 'Raju said "Velan, its raining up the hills, I can feel it under my feet." And with this he saged down'. With my limited knowledge at that age to decipher philosophical meanings I failed to understand this line. I was left to imagine what happened to Raju with a prolonged fast - did he die? was the village blessed with rain? did he survive and continue to live a life of hermit? If suppose he was successful at pleasing the rain god did he return to his love? did he attain the divine knowledge and determination of a sage? what happened to Rosie? I never had the luxury of internet at that age of my life. I thought about the book, characters, scenes and meanings for a long time with many questions that my immature mind couldn't answer or understand. I don't intend to maim the thoughts of my first book by a reread. No, those thoughts are better left how they are - unclear, want for better explanations, incomplete understanding of the characters, puzzled philosophy, strange murky vocabulary. I will cherish my first book for some more time with memories just as how they are.