Tuesday, 31st March
Bad Bengali film with Father, kind of a day. I do love them— the women in tight jeans and plump thighs and curled hair. The Don-like men in similar outfits but they always wear sunglasses. There are fewer songs and dances in Bengali movies than in Bollywood ones so I can tolerate them for a longer time. The soap operas in particular have a scandalous story line. Everyone is having an affair with everyone’s wife or sister in law.
Nothing gives me more pleasure than watching a cheap Bengali soap with my mother. My father, for all his penchant for French writers and Nobel laureates, secretly watches these terrible movies in the afternoon. He doesn’t fall asleep as he does watching Homeland or Game of Thrones. He is wearing his classic red polo shirt—red as Santa’s suit. He fiddles with his phone but for the most part he is watching the girls shriek on screen. This would have been a good time to get the Prince upstairs, as mother is asleep in the first floor guest room. She has been complaining of the blast of the air-conditioner in the room she shared with my father.
My father doesn’t suggest bringing the Prince up and as I keep wanting to faint when I open my mouth, I keep shut although I’m dying to talk. It’s a terrible affliction. A part of me longs to be silent, without music, without television. Just the sound of the air and the sounds inside my body. The other part of me, that is terrified by all the voices in my body, can’t wait to lie in the puff of my parents bed, as I did this morning, with big square pillows and the fan on medium and the television on mute while father had a lengthy conversation with a Dr. Majumdar who is a virologist. They had never met before. My father introduced himself as someone from The Telegraph and Anandabazar but did not identify himself as part of the founding family. I don’t think this Dr. Majumdar made the connection either. They spoke about the virus of course. My father told him he was a mathematics enthusiast and a descendant of Dr. SN Bose. They spoke for well over half a hour so obviously there was something he said that peaked the virologist’s interest.
I love closing my eyes and listening to his phone conversations. He too, takes extra pleasure in them when I am around, always making the interesting calls when I am in the room, in the expectation that somehow they will end up in a story of mine. I am sure that is what it is. This one though, I got bored with. It’s usually the scandals that I particularly love listening to.
India’s lockdown turns into a human tragedy— that is the headlines in a BBC article today. Two of my Facebook friends share this— one an Indian, the other, an American artist who has, as far as I can recall, never really shown any specific interest towards what happens in Asia, although she is an intelligent and articulate woman.
This house is quiet in the afternoons, except for the sounds of Ajaan that come from the windows. These days, from only one mosque as opposed to three or four clambering on top of each other’s voice. Nothing in this house suggests there is a calamity going on outside. Nothing in my room suggests that I am any different today than when I was last living here. The bed is still undone at four in the afternoon, my scant belongings sprawled on a side chair. I have not made any effort to put them into drawers. Everything I own is outside and in plain view. I have previously lived like this, in this house, for months. Always with the expectation that this was a halfway house which I would soon leave—able and healthy.
On the good news front , there is a bill being proposed to freeze NYC rents for three months for those whose lives have been affected by the virus. It hasn’t been passed yet. The Governor (Cuomo) needs to sign off on it. I hope it gets passed. My apartment lease begins tomorrow and I still don’t have any subletter. I am hoping to off-load the costs on my travel insurance so I am not particularly worried but it would mean more peaceful recuperation while I try to muster up strength to move.