THAT GIRL IN A RED DRESS

That was a bad morning. I was woken up by the squeaky voice of my maid, who wanted to make my bed.
Before I could tell her not to disturb me, she pulled away my sheet and started jerking it so hard, that I had to wake up.

A bad start to my day usually turns me off. But then it started raining and rain always make me feel happy, ALWAYS !
I pulled up the blinds of my window. The roads were all silent, but there was a  blissful bitter batter of falling raindrops. Everybody had taken to some shelter, except  a girl in a red dress and a few other girls. She was neither dancing in the rain nor taking shelter.
I reached for my glasses on the side table, so that I could see more clearly.

Credits- Hari Menon Photography

 She was a short, young dusky girl with a basket of bright yellow flowers in her hands. She was not pretty, rather she was very shabby but her eyes were beautiful. She was selling those flowers. The next thing I remember is that she started singing to attract people to buy her basket of flowers. Her voice was enchanting, though I could not understand what the song actually was. The language was unknown to me.
It rained for long that day, but she kept standing right there with undying hope. Her clothes were dripping water and her hair were all wet. But the yellow flowers were washed and bright!

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My maid pushed me aside to the sweep near the window. She would never let me live in peace! After it was dry, I came back to the window. The rain had stopped and the roads that were deserted a few minutes back were flooded with cars and scooters. The girl in red dress would have been lost in the hustle bustle of the city, but my eyes found her. A middle aged lady with curly salt-pepper hair was buying flowers from her. I noted that she bought the whole basket. The flower seller was pleased, so much so that her dry lips parted for once to flash her teeth. She smiled for the first time since I had been observing her.
A long truck obstructed the view for a minute. From beneath the truck, I could see her bare feet  making way for themselves. She suddenly tripped and fell. A few kind people helped her get up, and then I realized -

   She was Blind !
I felt so sorry for her. The eyes that kept me captivated for half an hour could not see, see the world around her, the  blossoms she was selling and the vibrancy of her red dress.

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Next evening, I watered the money plant near my table and opened the window to find her right there, yet again, in the very same red dress. It was a marriage in the colony  that day, so the streets were decorated.
 This time, her left cheek had a big cut. The blood was dry though,  I am sure it would have been hurting her. That day I saw her talking, for the first time, to a balloon seller standing by the lamp post next to her. They became friends, I think,as they chatted for long.

Credits- Audi Photography

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She was there everyday for the next one week. Listening to her songs and waiting for her to pack, gelled into my routine and became a part of my everyday.
Out of curiosity one day, I couldn't stop my self from asking her name, but I got no answer, just a faint smile.
I bought a bunch of flowers from her. She was trying to hunt for change from her little bag, but I told her to keep it with herself.
I tried communicating with her after that, but maybe I was too shy.
But now I regret that because she never came back with her basket of flowers after that. She just vanished.
I did not know anything about her. Who she actually was? And maybe I will never get my answer.
I remember  those days when I observed this girl whose name I never knew, with a sigh.

                                           For me she is ' That Girl in a Red dress'

Credits- Audi Photography

                                                       

AN ART CALLED 'CREATING'

Enter a carver's workshop. You will see a place too simple, lit up by a bare bulb, filled with  chisels, axes and blades, ruled by an eye for intimate detail.

Around the place, you will find, the works of the master, each of them dripping thousands of emotions. Works so splendid, it seems like creations of some spirits.

                              His chisel work among the stone,

                                        Persuading it of petal or of limb

                                     Or starry curve, till risen anew there sang

                                        Shape out of chaos, and again the vision

                                     Of one mind single from the world was pressed

                                        Upon the daily custom of the sky

                                    Or field or the body of man.

       But what gave birth to the splendid carvings is the stone.

A stone that would never catch someone's eyes, until it comes to rest in the magical hands of the carver. He carves out emotions from a mere rock and turns it into a mortal masterpiece that says a hundred stories and reflects a million feelings.

That is the art of creation that transforms something very insignificant to something that can leave anyone astonished.

Now step outside and enter the street just adjacent to it.

  Enter any one of the hundred small mud huts and you will be carried away by the beautiful fragrance of Incense sticks.

It is quite fascinating to realize that a mere black thin stick can take you to a land where fragrance takes birth, where scent and aroma live and where redolence drifts with the wind.

In a corner of the hut you will find some ladies rolling ugly yet aromatic plant material into thin sticks.

Under the stiff and still sunlight tip-toeing through the window

sat a lady in pink and gold, her wrinkled hands making sticks

turning the rolled plants into a house of essence

breaking the black walls spread the aroma

making her a magician !

This is the art of creation that can give rise to something that holds within it million experiences

Now let me take you to this place where garlands are made.

Short bamboo sticks hold the blue plastic sheet making a satisfactory protection from the sun.

Behind the site is a huge temple of Goddess Pullikaringali.

A basket flooded with pink tender flowers is disturbed by sun tanned fingers of a lady. She picks up one of them and pierces it with a needle.

She pushes it down the thread and it joins the other flowers, making it ten times more beautiful. 

 One by one, the needle of the garland maker 

   goes through a flower and soon it becomes a garland

which is much more alluring

much more admirable

and much more sublime.

This is the art of creation that hold the power of making something pretty, prettier.

It not a task, not a job, it is an art.

An art called 'creating'