Seeing the world through Kamalam tinted glasses

8am I wake up to the news that a decisive action has been taken, Dragon Fruit will now be called Kamalam.
Sometimes I wonder how these ideas are proposed. Does an official call his deputy and say, ‘China has apparently built a village in Arunachal Pradesh, so we must give it back to them. This Dragon Fruit, it sounds Chinese right? We will change the name and show them.’
‘Ok, Sir ji, but what will we call it?’
‘I have a brilliant idea. We will call it Kamalam.’
‘But why, Sir ji?’
‘Bewakoof, because it looks like a lotus only.’
‘Sir ji, I just googled the fruit and saw photo. It is pinkish-reddish, and has spikes all over, and looks more like the coronavirus than a lotus if you ask me.’
‘Shut up! If I say it looks like a lotus then it does. Now, go get the name changed.’
On the other hand, there could have been a large committee, a week-long debate and a ballot system to rename the fruit, though
I am unsure which scenario is worse.

12pm We have finally shifted from virtual meetings to physical meetings and as we sit at socially distant chairs with our masks on, I realise that it is the lone male member of our team whose mask slips down below his nose repeatedly when he talks. Apparently, this is a widespread phenomenon.
At Biden’s inauguration, Bill Clinton had difficulty with his mask as well. This led to headlines like, ‘Is Mask-Slipping the New Manspreading?’ I wonder why unlike us, holders
of XY chromosomes seem to suffer from all sorts of drooping conditions. No, I am not referring to erectile dysfunction, but this new mask dysfunction where these poor sods are just unable to keep it up.

6.15pm Cleo and I are getting old together. People talk about their spirit animals in figurative ways, but she is mine, all flesh and fur and liquid brown eyes. We both limp a lot more these days, but still try to push our bodies forward and faster as we walk around
the compound. During our fifth round, we are suddenly engulfed in a dense toxic fog and we rush inside the house, coughing and wheezing. Life is unfair. Arnab is reportedly informed about the Balakot air strike days in advance and here, the building
manager launches an attack on the mosquitoes in our compound without any prior intimation.

7pm Put Shere Khan from Jungle Book in a bandhgala jacket with a signet ring, and you have a menacing Saif Ali Khan sparring with Mother in Tandav. I watch the last episode hurriedly before scenes are snipped after the recent uproar against the show. In what could easily be part of an episode in the next season, UP police have swooped down to Mumbai to serve notice to the makers of the series. Meanwhile, there are FIRs lodged in Mumbai and MP against the team as well. ‘Mirzapur’ has also come under the scanner
and another team of police personnel from UP has come to Mumbai to investigate an FIR against the show. Notices have been issued to the makers, producers and the streaming platform. Going by the speed and efficiency of collective agencies, one would almost believe that the greatest crimes in this country are committed by the entertainment industry.

Though, I suppose, every now and then, a spectacle
is required. How do you celebrate the victory of Ram without setting Ravana on fire? And if Ravana is missing in action, well,
you just make a giant effigy of real, imagined and exaggerated slights and throw it into the all-consuming pyre.
I hear justifications from supposedly sane people who say, ‘Have you seen the extent of censorship in China? Be happy it’s not like that in our country!’ I wonder though, should we set the bar so low that all we do is trip over it?
My reverie is interrupted by a whiny voice, ‘Mama, I
am hungry.’ ‘Baby, go grab a banana from the kitchen, dinner is not ready yet,’ I answer and recall reading a tweet by my ex-editor, ‘Oh,
if they are renaming fruits by their outer shape, then
I am really worried about one fruit.’
It would be ludicrous, but then anything can happen when instead of rose-tinted glasses, we see the world through Kamalam-tinted ones.