So what kind of place is this Tiruvalampozhil? It is your standard unknown village (something like the South Indian Charanpore from Swades) with huge paddy fields along which the hero in a khakhi half trouser runs screaming "aaththaa naan pass aayitten". The aaththaa in question will have an uncanny resemblance to Kamala Kamesh. There are minor deviations though - there is no aala maram (strange, for Tiruvalampozhil) where a couple of elders sits with a sombu and conduct a panchayathu!
Just to set the record straight, I've never worn a khakhi trouser and never ran across the fields crying "aaththaa naan paas aayitten" owing to the facts that I don't have a khakhi trouser and that I've never had the drive to pass exams! And yes, my mother does not bear any resemblance to Kamala Kamesh.
Places like Tiruvalampozhil have a strange effect on you. You come to the place year after year, every year you change while the village remains the same. Its the same old kids with leaky noses, the same old geezers with their soiled loin clothes, the same old ladies with bad stained teeth. The house remains the same, so do the million odd mosquitoes that show a particularly strong affection towards you when you are in the toilet. The place is like some reference point, some fulcrum around which your life revolves. Its like some sequence in a video which is always in a still mode, a backdrop on which you lead your entire life.
In fact it is the perfect backdrop for a lifetime of romance. A open terrace looking towards a golden sunset, rains peeping in through the muRRam, the pungent smell of the cow shed, the feel of the fresh earth on your naked feet, wonderful symphony orchestrated by the birds, the lone lamp flickering by the temple late in the evening...it would be a sin to not find love in this kind of a place.
Finding love...sometimes, life makes me think - do you find love or does it find you? Perhaps love is a sentinent being while we are its puppets...
P.S. And sometimes I'm left wondering how an outrageous movie like Austin powers has such lovely songs!!!!
Hmmm. I do agree with you about places like this are like a reference point because they seem like absolutes that dont change come what may in the world outside them. The zero movement here is quite uncanny methinks, and is sorta nostalgic, like going to our alma mater and seeing our Biology teacher going to the same old classroom teaching the same old structure of the human heart with its left ventricle, venecava and aorta...oftentimes this nostalgia can inch faster towards depression too..
ReplyDelete2. As to Austin Powers, what can I say? Outrageous or not, I like him / Mike Myers immensely. They are quite exceptionally hilarious, funny . And each of the movies does indeed deserve all the good songs that it has!!
that was a long hiatus..but well worth it..to see a post like this.I can almost see all the scenes in my head and it is lovely.
ReplyDeleteas for romance and love,how would i know;)though I seem to be a puppet as well...
JAB
you forgot the bamboo garden... it was my favourite haunt.
ReplyDeletePut another post about how we used to eat. round katti sapduvome... literally! :)
Hmm..Sriram,
ReplyDeletedo you think it will be a "lifetime of romance" if you were a resident of that place?!..Familiarity breeds contempt, they say.
@Parvati - These places have an effect more than nostalgia...you just be there and watch life walk by. :-)
ReplyDelete@JAB - All the world's a stage, eh?
@Viji - All in good time my girl all in good time. Its only because I don't want to miss out on anything that the posts are coming in installments.
@Subha - Interesting question there. I guess with me being a die-hard romantic, its going to take a long time before I become familiar enough to breed contempt! ;)