Archive for April 20th, 2009
.Plain Tea
Woken up at noon today, by my brother saying we were to have lunch at a relatives place. Got up and got ready. Got there, nothing to do, no one to speak to. Ate lunch, wondered who the hell the little kids were. An uncle shows off his dual-SIM Chinese phone, goes on to talk about Tamil gangsters in the UK, and how Tamils are great at creating their own businesses. Familiar faces entered, finally someone to talk to. Everyone’s finished eating, the kids are playing out in front, I see Dad’s phone on the table. Snatch it, get onto Twitter, scroll through the updates, don’t feel like saying much. End up on camera, take a look around. Fuzzy, try changing settings. Sepia tone looks best, click. Turn off flash, click. Mess around with exposure, click. Contrast, click. Suddenly feel energetic, zooming in and out. Move about clicking at random, the display becomes my eyes, my sight, my vision. Capturing still-frames hoping to hold on to a thought, or steal one right out of another, and freeze it in one place, to look at again. Don’t understand grown-ups being camera shy. Asked no one to pose or smile, ‘cheese’ didn’t slip off any tongue. I felt alive, in such a strange way, just looking at the moments I’d caught, like bugs in a jar, birds in a cage. Tea was served, “plain tea or milk tea”, plain, please. Relatives do not understand the concept of “plain”, ginger does not go into plain tea. Not enough sugar, I take 3 teaspoons. Never mind, I’ve got pictures to take, moments to steal. Grandma is sitting outside, drinking her milk tea. Pouring it onto a saucer, this is how tea should be drunk. Carrom board comes out, game on. I choose to spectate, watching from the sidelines, in sepia tone. It’s not only the fingers that snap, even the toes curl and snap, so intense. The kids have come in, they all join in watching the game. Everyone’s together now, though I hardly know their names. I have no more pictures to take, I am fully immersed in this time and place. I felt great.
