I am a one-cigarette-a-day man. Sounds suspiciously like a fidelity statement, no? Like, I am a one-woman man: Don’t ask me for a commitment on that. If desires were translated to sins, hell fires await me…Coming to smoking, I eagerly wait for the moment I wind up work in Office each day. Go to the car park and smoke an ultra light cigarette. Deeply enjoying the moment. Away from prying eyes. It is my idea of unwinding/ de- stressing. I overhear snatches of conversation among Officers from the Armed Forces. Typical conversation in Punjabi-English, the Lingua Franca of the Indian Army Officer no matter where he comes from, runs like this:
Junior/smart/handsome Officer : Good evening Sir
Senior Officer: (Patronizingly) Good evening. How are you?
JO : Absolutely fine , Sir
SO: How is Neetu, Chintu, Mintu….?
(Neetu being the young Officer’s young attractive wife and Chintu/Mintu the little monsters)
JO : First class…..On top of the world , Sir. Neetu was asking about you just the other day, Sir
SO walks away into the sunset smiling… pleased to hear that the young attractive Neetu has remembered SO
JO walks away hoping that he made a good impression on the SO and the same would translate into good grades in the Annual Confidential report.
In the summers there is an air of stillness around. The leaves are dry, the grass parched. An occasional bird chirps, but it is not dark yet. The dome of South Block in sandstone looms ahead majestically. In winters, it is dark by 5.30 pm. There is frost in the air. It is biting cold and very lonely. I watch the Langur catcher who is taking a break smoking a bidi while his Langur is busy scratching its’ baby's head for lices. I see a lot of drivers playing cards on the grass. It is quite relaxing. Except for the occasional retinue of cars carrying an important politico with revolving lights passing nearby breaking the silence.
These are times when the Health Minister to everyone in civil society pours scorn on the smoker. The smoker is an irritant, a leech, and a polluter. To be able to smoke a cigarette away from the prying eyes of civilized society is indeed a privilege. I smoked a cigarette with a beer in a pub in London just a few days before the ban came in to effect from July 2007. I did it in honour of Inspector Morse, my favorite hero of detective novels written by Colin Dexter.
How times have changed… There was a time not too long ago, when the act of smoking defined the persona of male machismo. An after dinner smoke was an occasion for male bonding. There were some who would slowly take the cigarettes from a round aluminum tin containing enough coffin sticks to bring early onset of cancer and light up with a golden lighter. There were others who would flash amusing brands like. …Passing Show (featuring a fat man with huge side burns wearing a tunic and a top hat, next to a horse and buggy - could never figure out what it signified? a magic show? theatre?) There were those who could blow smoke rings slowly into the air. Those who held the cigarettes in style and imparted a whole element of style to the process of inhaling and exhaling polluted air. Then there was Rajnikanth, the dark non descript Tamil Actor who made flicking cigarettes into his mouth after twisting & letting them hang in the air into a style industry. You could see auto rickshaw drivers in Chennai trying to imitate him.
We started smoking in college for …hm… style. Somehow we thought that women are attracted to men with normal characteristics of …well men. Proof doesn’t exist of anyone in College ensnaring a woman to his bed/heart with his smoking/style of smoking. The few who did indeed manage to attract women were non-smokers. We still puffed away in eternal hope….
My father has been a smoker for as long as I can remember. Early years I remember him smoking triple fives. He even maintained his brand preferences for a few years in India (including Black label whisky). When he migrated to India finally, he realized the futility and high cost of hanging on to the symbols of past glory. He rapidly graduated to Wills filter, Panama and even bidis once in a while. He is 87 now and is reasonably healthy except for the occasional memory lapse. If anyone needs proof that smoking increases longevity, I could show that right at home.
When I joined for training, as probationer in my present job, there was this girl, let us call her V. A JNU product, a closet smoker, she was the daughter of a senior bureaucrat in Government. To explain this you must get an idea of the atmosphere in the Staff College in Nagpur. The majority in our batch were young probationers fresh out of great Engineering Colleges/ RECs/IITs and a few like us who were from humanities. The Engineers were just out of college without work experience and the rest of us had earlier experience in other jobs. V identified me early as one of the occasional smokers and a possible source of regular supply of cigarettes. When I would be walking back to my room after a late dinner in the Mess hall, she would often pull me into her room and bum a cigarette off me. We would sit quietly and smoke in her balcony and I would leave. Many young Engineer onlookers had other ideas of a Boy and girl alone in a room in the dead of night. Like… the most complicated poses in Kamasutra were being enacted inside. …? Chi Chi. V was madly in love with a young Sardar (whom she married later) and would share stories with me. Anyway soon V’s habits were public knowledge and she dropped the veneer of secrecy and started smoking in public. She was great company. We often went to a bar in Nagpur to have a beer. In the 90s’ small town India, the sight of a woman smoking and drinking can create strange reactions in the male hormones. You could almost see a rush among males to somehow impress her and looks of envy towards me. I have a sis in law who puffs away something like 2-3 packs a day. She is a senior diplomat and a great pal of mine. I often worry about her health. I often wonder if it is not the mythical weight reduction properties of smoking that drive women to smoking. In Europe I always see more women than men smoking.
They say smoking kills. I ask, even one cigarette a day? If so, then so be it. Many die in accidents, bomb blasts, shootings, poor medical care, broken down lifts, rash driving, air crashes, train accidents, lightning, falling coconuts, electric shock, depressions and even sheer boredom. Read the story of the King of Patiala and you will know what I mean - Evidence points to his death by imbibing excessive wine, super excessive sex and the unimaginable boredom that it all brings - Aha some are destined to die of acute hedonism. The rest, are destined to die of denial. I am but a number in that statistic.
Junior/smart/handsome Officer : Good evening Sir
Senior Officer: (Patronizingly) Good evening. How are you?
JO : Absolutely fine , Sir
SO: How is Neetu, Chintu, Mintu….?
(Neetu being the young Officer’s young attractive wife and Chintu/Mintu the little monsters)
JO : First class…..On top of the world , Sir. Neetu was asking about you just the other day, Sir
SO walks away into the sunset smiling… pleased to hear that the young attractive Neetu has remembered SO
JO walks away hoping that he made a good impression on the SO and the same would translate into good grades in the Annual Confidential report.
In the summers there is an air of stillness around. The leaves are dry, the grass parched. An occasional bird chirps, but it is not dark yet. The dome of South Block in sandstone looms ahead majestically. In winters, it is dark by 5.30 pm. There is frost in the air. It is biting cold and very lonely. I watch the Langur catcher who is taking a break smoking a bidi while his Langur is busy scratching its’ baby's head for lices. I see a lot of drivers playing cards on the grass. It is quite relaxing. Except for the occasional retinue of cars carrying an important politico with revolving lights passing nearby breaking the silence.
These are times when the Health Minister to everyone in civil society pours scorn on the smoker. The smoker is an irritant, a leech, and a polluter. To be able to smoke a cigarette away from the prying eyes of civilized society is indeed a privilege. I smoked a cigarette with a beer in a pub in London just a few days before the ban came in to effect from July 2007. I did it in honour of Inspector Morse, my favorite hero of detective novels written by Colin Dexter.
How times have changed… There was a time not too long ago, when the act of smoking defined the persona of male machismo. An after dinner smoke was an occasion for male bonding. There were some who would slowly take the cigarettes from a round aluminum tin containing enough coffin sticks to bring early onset of cancer and light up with a golden lighter. There were others who would flash amusing brands like. …Passing Show (featuring a fat man with huge side burns wearing a tunic and a top hat, next to a horse and buggy - could never figure out what it signified? a magic show? theatre?) There were those who could blow smoke rings slowly into the air. Those who held the cigarettes in style and imparted a whole element of style to the process of inhaling and exhaling polluted air. Then there was Rajnikanth, the dark non descript Tamil Actor who made flicking cigarettes into his mouth after twisting & letting them hang in the air into a style industry. You could see auto rickshaw drivers in Chennai trying to imitate him.
We started smoking in college for …hm… style. Somehow we thought that women are attracted to men with normal characteristics of …well men. Proof doesn’t exist of anyone in College ensnaring a woman to his bed/heart with his smoking/style of smoking. The few who did indeed manage to attract women were non-smokers. We still puffed away in eternal hope….
My father has been a smoker for as long as I can remember. Early years I remember him smoking triple fives. He even maintained his brand preferences for a few years in India (including Black label whisky). When he migrated to India finally, he realized the futility and high cost of hanging on to the symbols of past glory. He rapidly graduated to Wills filter, Panama and even bidis once in a while. He is 87 now and is reasonably healthy except for the occasional memory lapse. If anyone needs proof that smoking increases longevity, I could show that right at home.
When I joined for training, as probationer in my present job, there was this girl, let us call her V. A JNU product, a closet smoker, she was the daughter of a senior bureaucrat in Government. To explain this you must get an idea of the atmosphere in the Staff College in Nagpur. The majority in our batch were young probationers fresh out of great Engineering Colleges/ RECs/IITs and a few like us who were from humanities. The Engineers were just out of college without work experience and the rest of us had earlier experience in other jobs. V identified me early as one of the occasional smokers and a possible source of regular supply of cigarettes. When I would be walking back to my room after a late dinner in the Mess hall, she would often pull me into her room and bum a cigarette off me. We would sit quietly and smoke in her balcony and I would leave. Many young Engineer onlookers had other ideas of a Boy and girl alone in a room in the dead of night. Like… the most complicated poses in Kamasutra were being enacted inside. …? Chi Chi. V was madly in love with a young Sardar (whom she married later) and would share stories with me. Anyway soon V’s habits were public knowledge and she dropped the veneer of secrecy and started smoking in public. She was great company. We often went to a bar in Nagpur to have a beer. In the 90s’ small town India, the sight of a woman smoking and drinking can create strange reactions in the male hormones. You could almost see a rush among males to somehow impress her and looks of envy towards me. I have a sis in law who puffs away something like 2-3 packs a day. She is a senior diplomat and a great pal of mine. I often worry about her health. I often wonder if it is not the mythical weight reduction properties of smoking that drive women to smoking. In Europe I always see more women than men smoking.
They say smoking kills. I ask, even one cigarette a day? If so, then so be it. Many die in accidents, bomb blasts, shootings, poor medical care, broken down lifts, rash driving, air crashes, train accidents, lightning, falling coconuts, electric shock, depressions and even sheer boredom. Read the story of the King of Patiala and you will know what I mean - Evidence points to his death by imbibing excessive wine, super excessive sex and the unimaginable boredom that it all brings - Aha some are destined to die of acute hedonism. The rest, are destined to die of denial. I am but a number in that statistic.
No comments:
Post a Comment