Adopted

8 pounds, chubby and in perfect health,
Born to an Afghan, no home or wealth.
Consigned abroad and paperwork dealt,
Adoption concealed with perfect stealth.

Decades later the secrets unfold,
Writings shown are covered in mould.
Deception brings the chilliest of cold,
As the pain stings in when the story’s told.

The hazel eyes and the freckled face,
Hostile relatives with wanton gaze.
It all makes sense after all these days,
This foreign child, this big disgrace.

My parents love me nevertheless,
My brother teases me out of jest,
‘Bin Laden’s your dad he did confess,
No wonder you are a downright mess!’

Jokes apart the truth is bitter,
An unwanted child, just kept with litter
Traded, sold and left to wither
I neither belong there nor hither.

Benjamin Button Syndrome…

I was never the kind of kid who played with toys. In fact, the first ‘toy’ I selected on my first visit to the toy store was a puzzle book. So yes, I have always been a bit of a nerd. My childhood memories of playtime involved playing scrabble and being really annoyed by others who would not have the patience to finish the game or playing teacher to my little brother and making him do sums until he would throw something at me and leave.

But lately I have been feeling more and more like a child. I got my first soft toy when I left for uni and find myself sometimes unable to sleep without it. It’s a small black and white fluffy cow named ‘cowwa’. I have also come up with a bucket list of childhood things that I have never done and I try to complete as many of them as I possibly could without attracting too much scrutiny. So last week I danced like crazy in the rain and snuck into a children’s park to celebrate submitting my PhD proposal.  I went on the swings, monkey bar and that swirly thingy that I have never seen before. Sadly, the slides were way too small. Come to think of it, I am glad I did not get arrested because I am pretty sure children’s parks have age limits. I suppose calling them ‘children’s playgrounds’ is somewhat self-explanatory!

All of this had me wondering if I have a condition psychologically similar to Benjamin Button. In my case, probably not. Perhaps ticking the next item off my bucket list might convince my family to pick up the phone book and look up a psychologist’s contact details. I want to start drinking off a toddler bottle simply because as far as I can remember, I always drank off adult cups without even a hint of a cartoon picture. A quick search on google however proved that there are adults who grow up and suddenly find out that they are suffering from age reversing syndromes. The case of two British bothers, one who has a teenage daughter and the other a gunner in the RAF was particularly saddening. They now have a mental age similar to 10 year olds and require around the clock care.

So to prove you (and mostly myself) that I will not get too obsessed and break into a kindergarten, I have decided to advocate for constructing adult playgrounds. New York installed its first adult playground in June last year and hopefully it will become a catchy trend. I am not talking about outdoor gyms or spaces for orgies. I am talking about places where adults could go and relive their childhood fantasies. Go crazy on the swings, have water fights, sing, laugh, play and rejuvenate!

To be me or not to be me: It’s more than just a question…

 

‘People…go through their lives in a sort of coarse comfort, like petted animals, without ever realizing that they are probably thinking other people’s thoughts, living by other people’s standards, wearing practically what one may call other people’s second hand clothes, and never being themselves for a single moment’. -Oscar Wilde-

I am guilty of pretence in the face of conformity. It probably began with my infantile amused giggles as some adult played peek-a-boo with me, pretending to hide their face with the hands and then reappearing as if they’ve performed one amazing magic trick. Today I tend to do that to almost any baby that I come across and yes; it’s a perfectly ‘acceptable’ thing to do. Had I done that with every grown person I’ve met I would probably be locked up in an institution somewhere.

But don’t these babies really know that I am right there only ‘pretending to hide’? So why do they still laugh? And why the hell do I do that to them? I suppose it’s the same with all the everyday acts of my somewhat more ‘serious’ adult life. I sometimes laugh at jokes that I don’t really get in the first place. I’m guilty of asking how someone is and then completely mentally switching off when they reply. I’ve pretended to not watch cheesy Bollywood films when the truth is that I am a sucker for unrealistic romance. I’ve pretended to like animated movies even though squeaky talking mice irritate the hell out of me! And speaking of hell, I was once forced to get drunk and I spent the night out creeping into the bathroom and secretly emptying half of each drink or trying to throw up the tequila shots. I cannot drink and nor do I really enjoy drinking except for the occasional sweet cocktails. Yet I’ve still faked a blameworthy penchant for alcohol a few times simply to be ‘one of the crowd’. Come to think of it haven’t we all pretended to be someone we are not at some point?

And then there was this guy….oh yes the moment when you fall for someone and you try to convince yourself that it is a match made in heaven!! I persuaded myself to listen to the same kind of music he was into and even train myself to love the sport Cricket! My Sinhala language competency vastly improved simply from facebook-stalking him! I practically brainwashed myself to like everything that he liked. And guess what? There comes a point that you can lie to yourself so much that you actually start living it. I realized soon that I was falling more in love with cricket and music than him. They now play a significant role in my life. As for the guy, who knows where he is now!

But I am afraid that this boundary between what I truly love and what I pretend to love would soon be blurred. For some things you want to change in your life, a ‘fake it till you make it’ attitude sounds promising. Go ahead and try it! Fake confidence and you will eventually become more confident but don’t fake something like an aptitude for swimming because the chances are you will probably drown before you make it. So what if I truly become everything I pretend to be? Andre Berthiaume once said ‘We all wear masks and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin’. Perhaps plastic surgery ought to do the trick…

I’m into Marijuana smoking Cockroaches…

La cucaracha, la cucaracha,	The cockroach, the cockroach,
ya no puede caminar	can’t walk anymore
porque le falta, porque no tiene	because it’s lacking, because it doesn’t have
marihuana pa’ fumar.	Marijuna to smoke

I love catchy tunes and often find my self in situations where I sing without reflecting much about the lyrics. It started somewhere around the time when we were kids and my brother and I performed ‘honey caught me red-handed sleeping with the girl next door’ on a family trip. (I still remember the mortified looks of the adults!). I’ve had ‘Tempted to Touch’ blast out as my ringtone, driven to the tune of ‘I wanna make love right now now now’ while giving a ride to a very conservative teacher and recently been caught off-guard humming ‘I kissed a girl and I like it, hope my boyfriend don’t mind it’. All these times, not once did I actually pay attention to the meaning of the songs until someone gave me very judgmental stares!

The most embarrassing case however was when I declared to a couple of guys I just met that this beautiful Sri Lankan tune as being one of the favourites of both my mother and I. Only when they explained the meaning did I realize how inappropriate that must have sounded! The thing with this Sri Lankan song was that it contained such graphic meaning in very seemingly innocent words. So lately, I’ve begun to over analyze lyrics so as not to embarrass myself and made some pretty amazing discoveries.

La cucaracha was a term originally used to refer to General Pancho Villa’s car and later used during the Mexican Revolution to talk about Victoranio Huerta, the dictatorial Mexican President who was said to live only to satisfy his addiction to weed. The lyrics changed according to one’s political/personal beliefs with witty improvisations such as:

Cuando uno quiere a una	When a man loves a woman
y esta una no lo quiere,	but she doesn’t love him back,
es lo mismo que si un calvo	it’s like a bald man
en la calle encuentra un peine.	finding a comb in the street.

But alas when I found a dead cockroach in our bathroom yesterday, I couldn’t help myself but to pick it up and sing La cucaracha only to find my Chilean roommate stare at me with the most baffled expression. I guess it’s time to sing ‘I’m not crazy, I’m just a little impaired’.

For the love of Miroslav Klose…

Football fever was full on when a couple of us touring Scotland decided to head out on a pub-crawl around Edinburgh. Despite the chilly exterior, the cozy wooden pubs, now decorated in an array of flags to celebrate the FIFA world cup was surprisingly hot. Perhaps it was the constant flow of Jello Shots, Fosters and JDs that was keeping everyone warm and transforming their faces towards an ever-increasing shade of rouge.

In a corner, avid football fans were bellowing cries of mostly outrage as Germany scored their third goal against England. England’s hope of claiming the 2010 World Cup was almost over. Seeing me all engrossed in the match, my German tour buddy of a week’s acquaintance who was seated opposite to me, decided to talk footy with me. Yet another beer in hand, he was performing a victory dance and asked me who my favourite German player was. Excited to have finally met another football fan among our not so football crazy group, I gave his question some careful consideration. Should I say Ballack, Schweinsteiger, Podolski or Klose?

Finally, I replied, ‘Klose’.

‘Whaaat??’ was his reaction.

I screamed over the deafening pub noise, ‘TONIGHT I THINK I LIKE KLOSE THE BEST’

Completely misunderstanding what I said, he got up from his chair, sat right beside me with a hazy grin before putting his arm around me and replied, ‘ I LIKE IT ‘CLOSER’ TOO”.

I spent the rest of my tour running away from him.

An Egyptian lover’s sigh

 

Joy and hurt when mixed together
Brings smiles and tears that’s fixed forever
I cannot help but wish to see
You amidst the papyrus reeds

I gaze at the faint stars across the Egyptian sunset
You by my side so silent like we’ve never met
I cannot help but stare
There’s something in the air

The Cairo traffic’s blaring, my words you cannot hear
Yet when our eyes meet you beam, dissolving all my fears
I cannot help but smile
Towards the flowing Nile.

Tomorrow you’ll leave; that’s my belief
Prove me wrong; please, spare my grief
I cannot help but wince
Towards the giant sphinx

Happiness lasts forever not

I truly loved those fairy tales,
With unicorns and tinkerbells
And other types of crazy myths,
Those ones i yearned to hold.

But as time flies my memories fade,
I see the wars, I see the hells,
And I realize the piercing truths,
Of stories never told.

Happiness lasts forever not,
We all know what it follows.
Life is tough through night and day,
We have fewer friends than foes.

But problems are not all we’ve got,
There’s more to life than sorrows.
We need to laugh, we need to play,
And cherish all that comes and goes!

Sarcasm

Sarcasm is but a shrouded veil,
That bites with spite and pain.
It jests for jest’s sake and all in vain,
It stings yet brings no gain.

A pretentious cry for attention,
Redemption replaced with vengeance
Sarcasm’s a callous obstruction,
A restriction, a downright hindrance.

Cricket Crazy

The toss they won and chose to bat,
But luck they thoroughly lacked.
The final match that was to judge,
The tri-series began.

Spectators they flocked to view,
The final match being played.
Amongst the beer and hotdog stalls,
The match they quite forgot.

The umpires came the first to field
Justice they did assure.
But when their teams were pressed for runs,
No balls and wides crept in.

The bowlers they were desperate,
The economy rates were rising fast.
Despite the short balls shoulder high,
Fours and sixes were a common sight.

The batsmen they were displaying,
All possible forms of dismissals.
If not for rules and regulations,
Who knows? What would have taken place?!

And then the rain came pouring down
The workmen they were running about
Lewis Duckworth system call it now!
For the run rate is indeed a doubt.

The rain it went away so quickly,
The match resumed and not so badly
The scoreboard ticked, opposition flinched
Victory was a run away.

A run away and one ball left.
And once again a commercial break.
When at last the bowler came,
Dam lights of mine they went away!

Cheating Husband

Her soul’s like a broken thermometer,
Heat it absorbs, temperature it reflects not.
The glassy crust is hardened,
Resistant to inevitable blows.
The inner core’s mercury,
Liquid and volatile to sentimental pain.

The desperate attempts to present accurate results
Are barricaded by alien mercury that
At room temperature have solidified.
The glass battles the mercury,
The mercury fights the glass.
Both controlled by an indecisive, confused mind.

Like an invisible prism, whose coloured rays are scattered not,
She’s indifferent to feelings all.
Suddenly the scale becomes too blurred.
Her efforts in vain,
His vision diminishing,
A digital thermometer finds itself
Replacing the broken one.