Monday, January 9, 2012

By-lanes 02: Snail Trails....

In By-lanes, I narrate experiences of the Serpentine journey, full of detours, diversions, tangents, and by-lanes. Name inspired by the song By-lanes by friend Lueit Parasar. Check: https://soundcloud.com/adimachine/
 
9th Jan, 2012, 12:45 am, late night, Guwahati. We reached 7th Jan, afternoon and were immersed in diagnostic process of father in laws urinary tract carcinoma. Wife Sangeetas place was super full with her whole family reunion gathering. I was clamouring for a breath of respite. My friend Baba picked me up and we went to lokhra for his car servicing. While coming to Adil's place we were walking down the Bhetapara shortcut/ matahauri/ levee. Where I and cousin Bhaiti used to take our late, late, morning walks in 2003.

It was a awesome, serpentine by-lane, with strange, wild foliage, bogs, strange trees, isolated temples. The rivulet/ canal was always jammed with corpses of abandoned dogs, cows, buffalo. Because of running water, the bodies were preserved like atrophied mummies that looked like plastic inflatable dolls. Today I again saw a cow corpse floating and preserved in flowing, water like some swamp in prehistoric Africa. It was an uncanny moment, for a sunday morning. I was flooded with memories of  demonic morning walks of  2003 with Bhaiti. I was crossing a narrow Serpentine trail, yet overlooked by progress,  frozen in time. A tract which was frozen, mummified despite the vicariously changing urbanscape. A fragment of a tract, frozen in time.....

Later Baba, adil, Aftab I went to Ethnic Food festival in Maniram Dewan Centre. Since forever had i craved to taste exotic dishes of the neighbouring states. But had always found my options completely blocked. But today, in the 3rd post itself, I found release/ relief. Suddenly, all desired exotic dishes  gathered under one roof. The Bodo stall was offering snails. Snails cooked in tribal style, tasted unimaginably exotic. Raw, reptilian, primitive. An ancient taste, the hallmark of Lord Rahu. Suddenly I was chemically transported to forgotten, primeval lands of far ago. Palates forgotten to the human taste buds. Ancient forgotten chemical memories. The essence of the Serpentine flavours..