A night of full moon

 Today being the Lunar eclipse night I went out to see the blood moon as predicted. Alas, on the semi cloudy, full moon night I could barely see the moon, but was awed by staring at several sparkling stars on the western horizon. I could see on the crispy fall night couple of airplanes high on the sky were looking like walking stars on the dark sky amidst a plethora of stars, big and small, bright and pale.

The stars looked like tall, beautiful fairies in some distance land, smiling, probing the sky, savoring the beauty of the cool weather beneath, showering their "MUKTA JHARA HASA", a la thousands of pearls sparkling on their lips, smiling at us mere mortals below. I was immediately reminded of this stanza from this Kishore & Lata duet from the 1970s Hindi movie "MEHBOOBA" about a lover and his beloved -

"TAARON KI SAATH WOH 

JAGTE HAIN RAAT KO,

JHARNON HI SAAT BEHTE HAIN"...

Roughly transliterated...

"They awake in the night amidst the stars,

Flow together along with the streams".

All my romantic thoughts were brutally, rudely interrupted, coming to standstill as a moon headed guy came walking his dog and walking past my driveway, waving his hands at me. The white doggy with his conspicuous rock and roll walk was looking golden under the neon lights on the street, trying to keep pace with the man as the guy's bald head acted like a convex mirror reflecting the street lamp.

The blood moon was still elusive, partially visible, still playing hide and seek in the floating cloud, shy behind the gargantuan looking pine trees in the dark. I was reminded of another Bollywood song :

"CHAND CHUPA BADAL MEIN 

SHARMA KE MERI JANAA;

SEENE SE LAG JAA TU,

BALKHA KE MERI JANAA".

Transliterated into English.

"Moon is hiding behind the clouds,

Feeling shy, my love;

Come close to my heart".

Finally the moon suddenly showed up out of the veneer of bluish, fleece like clouds like out of the blue a pretty Iranian girl took out her veil in a soccer match I saw a while back

WOH ACHANAK A GAYEE

YOON NAZAR KE SAMNE,

JAISE NIKAL AYEE

GHATA SE CHAAND...

Transliterated from Hindi.

"She suddenly arrives

 In front of my eyes;

 Bolstering my mood

 as moon ventures out of cloud".

It finally made my day, rather the night of moon watching on a full moon night. 

Teachers Day 2025

Today is TEACHER's Day, all other brands are prohibited. (Teachers is a popular brand of Scotch). Joke apart, I salute to all my teachers who have made a huge difference in my life by shaping my knowledge and character. It is not just limited to my teachers in school and college. My parents were my first teachers. Then came some friends, relatives, acquaintances as teachers in various forms at different stages in my life. There is always something to learn from every human being, a prince or a pauper, a beggar or a sorcerer, an animal or an inanimate object. Life is the biggest teacher. 

A good movie can be a good teacher too. In the iconic movie 3 IDIOTs, on the Teacher's Day of 5 September, the character Chatur Ramalingam goes on stage to recite a Sanskrit Sloka (hymn) eulogizing the teachers of his college. He rotes the Sloka by memory, without understanding a single word of it, nor caring about its content, without realizing that the original speech was altered by a playful and witty Rancho (played by Aamir Khan). As Chatur on the stage was about to vomit the Sloka he rote from what Rancho wrote, the later told his friends to get ready to hear a sermon about the former's farting prowess. Chatur recites:

UTTAMAM GAD GADATA PADAM,
MADHYAM PADAM TUCHAK TUCHAK;
THUR THURIYA KANISTAM PADAM,
SUR SURIYA PRANA GHATAKAM.

Roughly transliterated...

"Loud farts are majestically thundering;
Medium farts come along stuttering,
Small Farts arrive whisteling & sirening;
The silent ones can be life threatening."

As the crowd goes berserk rupturing with laughter and poor Chatur gets kicked out of the stage, Racho's dark humor taught us another lesson in academics - Knowledge acquired through roting sans understanding may earn you a Degree, but will take you nowhere. My father always emphasized on learning through understanding rather than roting.

Decades ago there was this incident, when a sub-collector in Sonepur district of Odisha did this shameful, cowardly act of kicking a hapless school teacher, abusing him as a poor MASTRA (the way the word master is often pronounced in Odia, a term mostly used in derogatory sense for teachers back home). 

I remember a cartoon related to the above incident which came out on the local vernacular Newspaper with the following caption, (rhyming with our famous Sloka "GURU BRAHMA GURU BISHNU... "

GURU DEENA GURU HEENA
GURU SAMANYA MASTARA;
KANDOOKA SAMAN GURU
TASME SRHEE GOITHA MARA
ITI UPA- COLLECTOR
JILLA NAMA SONAPUR.

Transliterating in the same rhyme form to keep the theme intact,

"Teacher is poor, Teacher is mere;
Teacher is just an ordinary Master.
Teacher is akin to a football;
To be kicked for sure.
Courtesy Sub-Collector,
From the district of Sonepur."

I have heard parents asking in Odia to their children "KIRE MASTRA AJI KANA PADHEILA" meaning "Hey, what did the master teach you today". The English transliteration may not sound so bad but the way it is delivered in the native language is not a sign of great adulation. It shows the respect they the guardians give to their teachers.

My simple take - A society which does not respect its teachers, can never  prosper. Period. Great nations are made by great men. Great men (and women) are shaped by their teachers. HAPPY TEACHER'S DAY to all.

Uttam Kumar - the legend

Today, September 3, is the birthday of Bengali actor Uttam Kumar. Many girls confide that he is the only Bengali man they ever had a crush on and could have readily married him as women of that era swooned over him. The man had grace, style and a killer smile. It is said that talented artists are "Gandharvas" reborn who live for a small time, but leave early leaving their mark. He died early too, a week before the death of legendary singer Mohammed Rafi. Both were of the same age.

Uttam Kumar’s death at a young age of 53 brought Calcutta to standstill on July 24, 1980. The Bengali hero of all ages was a natural actor who won over generations with his charm and persistence. After getting symptoms of a heart attack he drove himself to a clinic in Calcutta where he was attended by a team of cardiologists. But he died the next day in spite of the best effort of the doctors to save him, stunning the entire state of Bengal and nation.

Sharing a small incident of his life which stands testimony of his polularity and his stature as "Mahanayak" or the mega Star by his fans. Sometime in May 1966, the famous director Satyajit Ray called Uttam Kumar - “Uttam, my movie 'Nayak' premieres tomorrow at Indira Cinema. I hope you will be there".

"But Manikda (the nickname of Satyajit Ray in movie industry), the press and public will be in attendance. Do you think I should go? There possibly will be pandemonium,” he replied.

“Uttam, don’t forget it is a Satyajit Ray film (movie is also widely called as film in India, especially in Odisha and Bengal, the two states bear a lot of resemblance in language and culture). Please be there,” - Satyajit Ray commanded. It wasn't easy to say no to Manikda, even for a man of superstar status. Uttam Kumar relented, though reluctantly.

The next day, the news of Uttam Kumar’s appearance at the cinema house spread like wildfire and all the hell broke loose. By late afternoon, roads leading to Bhowanipore in Calcutta had to be barricaded. Uttam's car (probably a Chevrolet Impala) was piloted through the bylanes. The theatre was shaking under the weight of uproarious chanting, ‘Guru, Guru’ (Uttam's nick name given by his fans) with demands to see the Star. 

The hall manager rushed to Ray. “Sir, if we don’t bring him up on stage there will be a serious law-and-order issue.” 

Minutes later, the lights came on and Uttam Kumar was seen standing on the platform in front of the screen. He raised his hand. The crowd fell silent, as if by the waving of a magic wand. “I request you to please be silent and watch the film. Don’t forget it is a Satyajit Ray film.”

This story, a piquant testimonial to two of Bengal’s foremost immortals, is probably apocryphal. But that takes nothing away from what this tale protrays, which testifies two stalwarts in 1966 – from Ray’s sway over his cast, the pliant theatre manager and finally the phenomenal stardom of Uttam Kumar. In some ways, this story encapsulates the fantasy that was Bengali cinema. But as is known, it is not Ray who colonised that cinema, either as fantasy or as commerce. It was Uttam Kumar, and the one and only Uttam Kumar. Happy Birthday to the Mahanayak who if alive would have been 98 today.