The girl wearing a white order-uniform with a buzzcut and a knapsack - obviously some kind of nun in training - gets on the seat opposite me. I desperately want to say, hey. But I don’t. For I am an oddity, and must be adequately apologetic about my oddities before I say “hey, what’s up?” I have begun hanging out in the Radha Gokulanand temple off the street from Radha Raman, if nothing, because it’s quietness and lack of popular pull, seems to rekindle some part of my old fervour. There are two old women here - both widows, and bossy ladies, who look at me sternly. I avoid their gaze. I remain silent. But my presence is loud.
[A still from Sange meel se Mulaqat (1989)]
I go to posh cafes that serve margarita woodfire pizzas. These are the only spots where they expect someone like me. Calcutta - especially north Calcutta - haunts me. I complete reading Dubliners in Bangla. They call it Dublinnama- how fun! The O’Flahertys and Gabriels and D’arcys and Freddies become Amals and Anondos and Shormilas in my head. They are all negotiating a claustrophobic defeat. Nothing happens here, it’s all humdrum. Just like the alleyways of North Calcutta. Dublin seems replete in Calcutta-like adda zones - crevices and corners where men gather in fours and fives and talk religion and politics. Women play the piano to sacred verses demurely and are predictably embarrassed at praise. Some grow to be spinsters, and remind me of Nita in Ritvik Ghatak’s Meghe Dhaka Tara. Roast duck is served with apple sauce. I think of the monsoon hilsa cooked in the thick mustard sauce. Dublin turns into Calcutta. The Irish melancholia of damp walls, church singing, the piano and the organ, clingy wives, and mysterious neighbours turn into memories of my Calcutta childhood. Calcutta of the 80s resembles some bits of Vrindavan very much - especially the narrow alleys with open drains. The Mridanga-maker expresses some silent melancholy at my wanting to film him while he makes the instruments.