The ruffian and the gentleman: a long short story

As we drove from Karnataka into the newly carved state of Madipur, I noticed immediately the colours, texture and function of the land had changed significantly since I had left the place.We drove from the lovely and expansive Bengaluru Airport along the new expressway, which ran through Malgudi before cutting through the new state of Madipur. The lazy countryside gave way to concrete, glass and steel. There was a markedly different tone and rhythm to Madipur City, the capital of Madipur state.

The Madipur City I grew up in was lethargic. Today, it was the hub of knowledge outsourcing. Most of the world’s largest companies had moved their research and development centers to Madipur. This new state had much to offer: an abundance of talent, natural resources, lovely weather, institutes of science and technology, proximity to the Bengaluru International Airport, and much more.

In exactly one hour and fifteen minutes, I had reached the Madipur Vidhan Sabha. 'It would take me that long to get from the Bengaluru Airport to Indiranagar,' I thought, as I got out of the car that had ferried me to the new legislative assembly building of Madipur. The exhaustively interconnected metro that was promised for Bengaluru was 20 years in the making and still incomplete. In direct contrast, Madipur had a fully interconnected metro network and a lovely system of roads. As we drove in to Madipur City, a large sign welcomed us: ‘Visit the State with no scams and traffic jams’.

The Vidhan Sabha of Madipur was an impressive building. Imagine the Vidhan Soudha in Bengaluru. Multiply its expanse by an order of magnitude and give it a coat of dark red paint. That was the Vidhan Sabha. Indeed, Madipur represented exactly what Bengaluru would have been but for the latter’s governance void, trust deficit and distinct lack of visionary leadership. In the beginning, constructing a new state adjoining Karnataka would have been hard. There was always the possibility the vibrant Bengaluru, with its greenery, its lively bars, strong educational institutions and young people would overshadow Madipur. However, within a short period, the young and the old had slowly moved out of Bengaluru to settle down in Madipur, “a happening place which is simultaneously a pensioner’s paradise, a hipster’s heaven, a dreamer’s delight and a teenager’s thrill location,” Poly Narayana Reddy, Madipur’s chief minister would say to me later that day. He clearly loved his alliterations.

He loved other things too, like food. But more importantly for Madipur, he had extraordinary vision and drove towards it with the energy of a man possessed. When he was elected to power as Madipur’s first chief minister, he declared he would make it the ‘cleanest and most progressive state in India’. In just 10 years, he was ready for the next big goal, having already satisfied his stated goal when he first took over as chief minister. “People talk about ‘single window’ government operations. In Madipur, we do not believe in either windows or doors. We believe in open plan offices,” he once said in an interview. Since he became chief minister, things he said were constantly quoted in business magazines; nearly 40 journal articles and case studies had been written on him and his style of open governance.

And I was here, in Madipur, to meet with him.

He had met me in New York the previous month where he was due to give a keynote address at a large management junket – sorry, conference! I was a part of the panel discussion that immediately followed his keynote address. He spotted me in the audience during his talk and waved. After his talk he came up to me, embraced me and said, “How are you Siddharth? We do not have much time to talk now, but you must come to Madipur. I need you there,” and quickly departed. I was amazed he remembered me. We weren't friends when we had grown up together in Madipur City. We went to the same college. However, we had had only a few dealings in my time there. I also thought he would forget our meeting in New York. However, two weeks later, I got a call from his office. The chief secretary to the Madipur state called me and asked if I would visit the city as a guest of the chief minister, Poly Narayana Reddy.

I stood outside his office wing and said, “My name is Siddharth Rao and I...” and before I could finish my sentence, Poly Reddy’s PA said, “Sure, we are expecting you. Please walk with me sir” and whisked me into the chief minister’s wing. It was called ‘The People’s Wing’ of the building.

Colourful modern paintings adorned the walls, which were all painted in solid colours and included sharp, clean corners. The furniture has sleek and, like the walls, had sharp corners. A few large plants in large earthen pots decorated the floor and helped accent the visual appeal just appropriately. Much like the people that worked in it, the place had a welcoming yet businesslike feel to it. I stood in the waiting are for exactly two minutes before I was asked to go into the chief minister’s office.

He was a big impressive man, with a thick mustache  He wore spectacles these days. He had a rather neat and cuddly tummy. That part hadn't changed. Indeed, when I was in college in Madipur, I would often wonder why he was known as Poly Reddy or Poly Narayana. Initially, I thought this was because of his cute little paunch, shaped like the ghatam, the percussive instrument often used in Carnatic music concerts. I thought his girth, the ghatam and his roly-poly appearance gave him his nickname. He would always rest his folded hands at the top of his pot, much like a ghatam player would. Sometimes when he was unhappy, his palms would rest face up at the top of the pot. That was when you knew you were in trouble; and with Poly Narayana ‘trouble’ meant losing your knee cap at the very least. It was only later that I found out that ‘poly’ had nothing to do with his roly-poly appearance. It actually translated to ‘nasty fellow’ in Kannada; that was where he had inherited his moniker from.

His office had a wall of books on a range of subjects. There were several management and self-help books. Books by Christensen and Gladwell appeared to have been read many timesover. But the shelves also had Krylov, Pushkin, Gorky, Nabokov, Havel, Garcia-Marquez, Miller, Mahfouz and more. These weren't mere show pieces either. Through the day, he would quote from Nabakov or Mahfouz. He had actually read these books and recalled passages from them. This was a guy that hardly spoke English when we were at college together.

Poly Reddy wore a dark blue Armani suit and, as always, wore Hermes cologne. Even in his college days, when he walked you felt he ruled the world. He didn't believe in slouching, nor did he drag his feet. His was a walk of a confident, arrogant man. “The word humility does not exist in my dictionary,” he told me once while we were at college together nearly 20 years ago and, on seeing my raised eyebrows, continued, “...and although I could get a new dictionary, I prefer this one that I have.” I had one look at the way he went through his work that morning and was convinced that Poly Reddy had not yet procured that new dictionary. He did not need it.

He signed many papers that morning as I waited. It was fascinating to see the man in operation. He would sign papers with a flourish that represented poise and self-belief.

He looked at me briefly, peered through the papers he was signing, and said “Two more minutes Sid. I will be done here and then I am all yours,” and, as he took off his sun glasses, he paused and added, “...for the rest of the day.” I immediately wondered why he wore sunglasses inside his office. But I didn't linger on that thought for too long. I was, instead, concentrating on what Poly Reddy had just said. I had just heard him say “...I am all yours, for the rest of the day”; this was simultaneously worrying and comforting. How would I engage with him for the rest of the day? What would we talk about? Even if he brought it up, I was certainly not going to talk about our largely murky past. Even though I remained worried and strangely comforted, I was confident of what I could and did not want to talk about. And that was one major difference this time: I was no longer in awe of the man.

I was in awe of the man when we were at college together. I was always the studious guy and would never interact with Poly Reddy, who was already developing a reputation as a deadly ruffian. I was studying Maths and he, law. So we really did not have much interaction. I would see him from a distance every now and then. For some reason, he had taken a huge liking to me and would always nod or smile at me. I would be simultaneously worried and comforted. But I was also in awe of his swagger, his confidence, his walk, his very being.

However, I stayed clear of him because he worried me. Yet, my past interactions with Poly Reddy were not orchestrated by me though. It involved a girl called Malini.

I thought about Malini and how I had fallen in love with her. I was 17 and in the first year of my two-year pre-university course (year 11). Malini was warm, bubbly, extroverted and incredibly loquacious. She was also exactly what the testosterone of some 30 boys in our class needed at that time. Of the 20 girls in the group, she was the one that everyone wanted to talk to and be with. For over a month I plotted strategy after failed strategy, on how I might approach her and ask her out for a coffee when, one day, she made the first move. As our Chemistry lecturer was spotted walking down the corridor, I sat down in the chair in front of her. I leaned back to rest my back on her writing desk when she pulled the desk towards her. In a matter of seconds, I lost my balance and my head was, instead, on her knee. I looked up at her face and saw her smile in a benign and inviting manner. I fell in love immediately. The connection was thus made. The rest of the class was more electricity and biology than chemistry!

At the end of that hour, I actually didn't need to ask Malini out to coffee. We just ended up at the coffee shop. We didn't talk much. We didn't need to. Indeed, we rarely did. We just sat and stared at each other as 17 year old kids tend to do. This would soon become our regular routine at the end of our day. There were no posh coffee shops in those days. This was in the pre-CCD era. So Malini and I would go to the nearby coffee shop, which we fondly used to refer to as ‘Cholera Bhavan’,and stare into each other’s eyes as we sipped our coffees from a glass. After our post-college coffee, I would drop her home, which was one suburb away from my own home. I would drop her at the end of the street her house was on; her parents could not see us together. Not yet anyway. Occasionally, we would go to a slightly posh restaurant. Even there, we would mostly look into each other’s eyes. From time to time we would talk about Arun or Amit or Lalita or Swaroopini and laugh at their immense immaturity, their tendency to gossip or their inability to spend money on their friends. Every fortnight, we would go to a Hindi movie. Neither of us understood Hindi, but that was hardly the point of going to the movies. We walked in the park, we held hands and wanted the world to know that we were an ‘item’. We didn't care what people said. There was a song that released around that time that became the catch cry for us lover types. The words ‘khullam khullapyar karenge hum dono’ from that song became our refrain.

Life was good.

That was until Soma Prasad paid a visit to the park bench near my home one day and asked for me. When I wasn’t with Malini, my friends and I would gather at this park bench to either play or talk about cricket. On that particular day, when Soma came calling, I was with Malini at the movies. He apparently asked for me by name.

Everyone knew Soma as the local goon. He walked around with a knife hanging down the front of his trousers. He was always dressed in a tight yellow T-shirt and had a thick gold chain hanging down the front of it. The chain had a Volkswagen emblem at the end of it. I was never quite sure why this was the case, but that was what he always wore. Soon though, one gold chain grew into two and then 10; so much so that we used to sometimes refer to him as Chotta Bappi, for while he had the chains, he was only a quarter the size of the legendary gold-chain-loving musician of that era. Soma was a thug and he wore his gangster tag with immense pride. No one from our locality crossed Soma’s path. Of course, I was oblivious to Soma’s existence. I was either lost in my books or on Malini those days.

The next day, Soma came visiting again. He came over and warned me to not go out with Malini ever again, “aa Malini nann area hudigi, bit-bidu siva illandre ninage yen agaththe gothilla...” he said in Kannada. (“That Malini is from my area. Drop her otherwise I don’t know what will happen to you...”)

I told him I didn't speak Kannada but, nevertheless, understood what he was saying. I also told him, “Can’t do. Sorry.” and went on to describe the history of property and possession of property. I talked about possession as enshrined in law from the times of Renaissance Europe and of how human beings were deliberately and pointedly excluded from such ownership laws. I told him that Malini wasn't anybody’s property: not mine or his. I was incredibly angry at that stage, but also incredibly stupid, for Soma was less than impressed with the law lecture and was beginning to lose his shape.

He showed me a knife and told me that if I did not stop seeing Malini, he would have to use it. I walked away, but I was determined that I would not allow a goon to dictate what I did in my life. 

By then, I was having second thoughts about Malini. I wasn't really in love with her. We had gone past the ‘who can stare the longest into the other person's eyes and still show immense love’ stage. I needed exciting conversation more than I needed the eye exercise. I was convinced that Malini was not the one for me and was contemplating how to end that relationship. However, I was doubly convinced that I would not end the relationship on a thug’s say so. So Malini and I continued the hand holding and the eye exercises for another week.

Soma came calling again. This time, he came with two other people, who stood behind him, arms folded while Soma talked. Well, he didn't really talk as much as barked. He asked me why I hadn't stopped seeing Malini yet. I started talking about the origins of European Law once again when he lifted his right elbow and crashed it into my jaw. The speed of that one simple movement was enough for my jaw to crack. I felt my teeth rattle so hard, I thought they had all dislodged from their sockets. I could barely feel my jaw and doubled over. As I doubled over, he brought his knee up slightly. My forehead thudded into his knee. Everything happened so quickly. In just under five seconds, I was bruised and defeated. Soma and his two hooligan friends left saying he would not like to visit again the following week.

I was jolted back into the present by the strong smell of Hermes. Poly Reddy was hugging me.

While I was lost in my recall of the Malini-Soma episode, Poly Reddy had said to his PA that he had had enough for the day. He had asked everyone to leave his office. He had taken his Oakley sunglasses off and sat them on top of his head. He smiled as he hugged me; it wasn't merely a hug. His was a violent embrace.

The glasses were off and remained off for the rest of the day. I could see his eyes. They were fierce and determined; they were also the eyes of a tired man.

Poly Reddy and I talked continuously that day. We talked a lot about the Madipur that he had fought for, about his vision for his state. We talked about his passion for good governance and about how he wanted to show to the world that we could, in India, build a model city and state that the entire world could aspire to. He said, “I want the young people of my state to have career options and prosperity that people like you thought you could only secure by leaving the country.” He showed me that day that he had reinvented himself into a wonderful gentleman; a man with a large heart that had passion, pride and a place in it for everyone. 

The ruffian had given way to a gentleman. 

He was certainly a very different man from the Poly Narayana Reddy I knew in college. We talked of that man he was in college. We talked about how we first interacted with each other immediately after my needless interface with Soma.

The day after my close interaction with Soma’s elbow and knee, I was badly bruised and my face sported deep purple blobs the size of baby mushrooms. I told my parents that I had fallen down  the stairs at college. I don’t think they bought that at all. My father, Srinivas Rao, looked at me, shook his head despairingly, and walked away; we communicated mainly through a series of grunts those days. I did go to college that day even though I was bruised. Although, to be honest, I think my ego was bruised more than my face was. However, I was convinced that I would need to go through another meeting with Soma. And another. And another. I wasn't going to give up on my right to a choice.

Quite by accident, I met Poly Reddy at the college entrance that day. I really did not know why Poly Reddy needed a college education. He wasn't interested in studies. He would turn up every day for a few hours, talk to a few girls, eat some tiffin and head back home. He was the son of a wealthy businessman and land owner in Madipur. He drove to college in a chauffeur driven BMW car -- these were times when CEOs of large companies could barely afford an Ambassador car. The previous year, he saw me act in Macbeth as Mark Anthony. We played 10 nights in the college auditorium and he was there every night. He would stand up and applaud after the ‘Friends Romans and Countrymen’ speech. Every night. And he couldn't speak one full sentence of English. Yet, he would attend every play I acted in. There was a connection between us that was as baffling as it was deep. I couldn't quite understand the connection.

He wanted me to teach him English. “Teach me to talk like you,” he said one day. He knew I wanted to go overseas and study some more. He used to say he was proud to know a guy like me who spoke “such perfect English”. He wanted to speak English like me and wanted to be a lawyer. He told me once in Kannada, “I know you will become a big shot in the US. Me, I only want to wear suits and cooling glasses and work as a lawyer somewhere in India itself.”

Poly Reddy met me at the college gates that morning. He took one look at my bruised face and raised an eyebrow. That was his style. He wouldn't ask directly. He would gesture with his eyes, his hands or his face. I said the bruises were nothing much and tried to move away. But he would have none of that. He stopped me in my tracks and asked, “Who beat you up? I don’t even want to know why? Just  say who?”

There was concern, empathy and anger in his voice. I had no idea why he sought me out. We never talked at college, but he would seek me out always. We would say a hello or raise eyebrows and that would be all. But he would always look out for me those days.And today, there was anger too. I tried to avoid the issue. But he pressed and demanded an answer. He saw through the ‘fell down the stairs’ attempt and said,“Just tell me who.”

So, I told him what had happened and immediately sensed his anger and consternation. I told him that this was something that I would go through, on my own.

That night, he called me and said, “Come to the Narayanapura grounds at 11am tomorrow. Sharp,” and hung up. I did not know what to make of it. I knew it wasn't to play cricket. Poly did not play any sport, as evidenced by his immense size. I went to the grounds at ‘11am sharp’ as I was instructed. My worst fears were confirmed when I spotted Soma on the cricket pitch. I saw a crowd of 10 people standing next to the cricket pitch. Soma had been summoned at '10.30am sharp'. Apparently Soma had arrived there and for half hour Poly Reddy and he had been talking about the state of local politics. The moment Poly Reddy spotted my approach towards the cricket pitch he pointed out to me and asked Soma if he knew his ‘very good, beloved and most lovable friend Siddharth’. As Poly said this he rested his palms on his belly, face up. Soma immediately fell to Poly Reddy’s feet and asked for forgiveness, “nanigge gothilla guru, bitt-bidu nann-na,” he said (“Leave me alone boss. I did not know at all”). But Poly did not stop there. He did not let Soma get away. He held the knife that one of his henchmen handed to him and marked Soma’s thigh with deep gash. As Soma yelled in pain and anguish, Poly said that that gash should serve as a reminder to Soma to never mess around with a good friend of his.

He then turned to me and said,“Now continue your romance without fear.”

My teeth clattered uncontrollably at the sight of blood, the knife, the sound of pain and the brutal aggression I had just witnessed. Without my knowledge, I stuttered and spluttered my way through a lecture on the principle of property as enshrined in European Law. Poly Reddy waved me away and asked me to go home.

The next day I met Poly and told him that I was not impressed with what had happened. I told him that I was not interested in the staring exercises I had been indulging in lately. I told him that I was also not impressed with him defending my rights and my principles, especially in the manner he had and especially when I had not requested such help. I told him that he had no right to protect me or defend me or make me an accomplice to thuggery. I protested vehemently and told him that it was my problem to solve and confront. Not his.

He said, “Principle or love, your choice. To defend you or not, my choice. Now go.”

There was something unsettling about it though. I wondered if that choice he had made came with a price tag.

It did.

“Here have some coffee,” he said as we walked around the lawns of Madipur’s Vidhan Sabha, thereby jolting me out of the Soma episode. He would tell me later that Soma worked for him these days as his principal private secretary.

The Vidhan Sabha in Madipur was an impressive building. There were no security machines, no gun-toting policemen, no barricades. People could walk in and out of the building when they wanted to. “It is, after all,theirs. We are merely temporary residents of this building, occupying it with the people’s permission,” Poly Reddy told me.

The facade of the Sabha was like the Vidhan Soudha in Bangalore. However, behind the facade was a large lawn that covered the rest of the building. The assembly hall was buried under this lawn. Madipur’s people were invited to sit, eat and play on the lawn above. He would tell me later, “Like the parliament house in Canberra, I wanted the people to be able to sit and walk on top of the assembly area as a constant reminder to us legislators that we are only here for one purpose: to serve the people who stand above us.”

He took me on a tour of the property later on. And as we walked on the lawns I noticed a sign out of the corner of my eye. It read: “Please walk on the grass”. I had seen that sign before. It was in the botanical gardens in Sydney. The sign spoke of confidence and courage; it spoke of humility and it spoke of sharing.

As we walked around the lawn he told me of his political career and his future ambitions. It was impossible not to be swayed by his energy, his dynamism, and his animated and expansive style. He looked me in the eye and said he wanted me there. He said he had followed my career as a scientist and then as a science policy maker in Washington. He seemed to know every single project I had worked on; every single paper I had written; every single publicly available policy document I had authored. He said that he admired my own energy and drive and said that he wanted me in Madipur to help him make his beloved state an even better place. He talked about how he had completed his law degree, practiced law and moved into politics; a move that was as natural as it was necessary.

He then said, “None of this would have been possible without you.”

I didn't quite see it that way, maybe because that reminder embarrassed me thoroughly. It left a sour taste in my mouth and the only way of me coping with the discomfiture was for me to push it to the dark recesses of my mind. I was in denial. I shuddered every time I remembered what I had done as 'payback'.

Yes, there was ‘payback’ for his defense of me against the wrath of Soma.

A few months after the Soma-leg-marking incident, Poly came home. He had never been to my home up until then. He said he needed a favour. “I need a big favour from you,” he said, and the moment he said that I knew I was in trouble. He was a proud man. He seldom asked people for favours. He said it was his lifelong ambition to become a lawyer. He said he had attempted three papers twice already and had failed in all attempts. He had one more attempt at passing “property law”, “advanced English” and “interpretation of statues”. I had to remind him first that it was statutes and not statues that needed to be interpreted. I then told him that I would be happy to tutor him on these courses even though I wasn't an expert in these topics. I was already thinking ahead at the work I had to do myself to score well in my own final exams when he said, “No I do not want to be tutored. I want you to write these exams for me!”

I could not believe what I was hearing. I said I had no familiarity with the content and had my own exams to pass. Moreover, I told him that I wasn't a cheat and did not want to get apprehended for being one. I told him that it was blatantly wrong to be an imposter in an examination. “It is totally against the law,” I said, pointing to the subtle irony that these were law exams we were talking about.

I protested. But my protests were ineffective. He assured me that the invigilators in the exam hall would turn a blind eye. They had all been paid off. He said he was confident I could study the courses and pass them for him. All my protests were useless. He said he had had other people write the previous two attempts too, “All useless,” he said. In the end, he said, “You have no choice guru. You have to write these exams for me. No one in my village has a law degree. No one in my family knows what a degree is. I want it. And you have to help me get it,”and placed his palms on his tummy, face up as he said this.

And so I studied ‘interpretation of statutes’ and ‘property law’. The irony did not escape me, for after all it was my allusion to ‘property law’ that got me into trouble with Soma in the first place. I studied for my own exams too. All the invigilators in the law school exams knew I was a petty imposter. I felt horrible and irrelevant. In my own eyes, I was worse than a common thief. Even though I did not seem to have a choice in the matter, I was angry, bitter, repulsed and nauseated. This was wrong at so many levels. But the exam invigilators turned away as I wrote the three papers furiously. In each case, I walked out of the exam hall in two hours in three-hour exams.

Poly Reddy passed. Indeed, he had scored the highest marks in the college in these three papers. He came home when the results were announced and told me he had secured a ‘first class’ in these three examinations. He hugged me and said I had no idea what this ‘achievement’ did to him. He told me that I could ask him for anything I wanted. I reminded him that this wasn't his achievement. I told him that the only thing I wanted was to never be reminded of this horrible offence I had committed. He agreed to this and as he left, I said I had another request, “Never make contact again. Ever.”

My awe had given way to anger. Slowly, that anger dissolved and was replaced with indifference. I was also in denial of my own wrongdoing.

That was then.

Today, Poly Reddy talked to me from across the table. He was the chief minister and wanted me to work with him. He said to me, “I have followed your career with great interest. I know you talked to Malini saying you wanted to end it the very next day after our little event in that cricket ground. I know you went to Harvard to complete your PhD in computational chemistry and then become a professor. I know that even though you stopped publishing science papers 2 years ago, you still have an h-index of 42. I know you specialize now in Science policy.” He said he needed my help in Madipur. He wanted the best companies to come to Madipur and set up their R&D facilities there. He wanted the best colleges and universities to come to Madipur and develop talent there. He said,“You need to work with me to achieve this vision. You need to give back to the place that made you.”

I got up slowly and placed my palms on my own tiny belly. Face up. 

I told him I had lived with the examination blot on my conscience for way too long. Despite the remarkable progress he had made for Madipur, this was not what I wanted as a constant reminder. And despite his own progress as a human being,  and regardless of his immense energy, vision and passion, I told him that he wasn't a person I wanted to work with. I told him, "You are an impressive gentleman today. But I cannot forget the ruffian that forced me to be a cheat."

His hand too rested on his ghatam; his palms, face up. 

His shoulders tightened. I feared that he would force me to do something I did not want to, again. But then, after what seemed like an eternity, his shoulders drooped. He then jumped up from his chair, rushed forward and hugged me. He thanked me for my honesty and said ruefully, “...Here’s the smell of the blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.” He was even quoting Shakespeare now! He then said, “Go in peace Siddharth. I understand. Some blots are indelible and are impossible to remove from the copybook.”

He waved me goodbye at the end of the day and as I drove away, I noticed his folded hands. His palm rested atop his ghatam, face down...

- Mohan (@mohank)

Life is a slow dance

She walked. Every morning.

She was frail; that is the first I noticed about her. It was as if her body was fighting a losing battle with gravity, one that was determined to push her down with each passing day.  I could time my clock according to her arrival at the park where I jogged every morning. She would be there at 6am. Every day. She was almost bent double when I first saw her over two years ago. She had abundant, flowing grey hair. It was as though a thousand spiders had conspired to weave a web of silver magic on her head. When the gentle rays of the rising sun bounced off her bent head, it was almost as if she walked with a halo.

And she walked without a stick although I suspect she needed one.

I observed her this keenly because she was one of three people who walked anti-clockwise in the park near our home in Powai. Although, she did not actually walk. She hobbled, painfully. Her left leg was the one that would not cooperate; as though she had to ensure that it didn't get left behind as the bolder and more able right leg propelled her forward. Each wincing step was a small, painful journey for her. Each foot forward, a mini-project. I watched the folds of skin on her face, swelling and flattening like a restless ocean, wave after wave. Her skin would crease and furrow as she dragged her left leg, only to ease into comforting smoothness when the right leg dragged her forward. Ebb and flow. Pain and comfort. Left and right. But she walked every morning.

She must have been beautiful in her youth, I thought. She still was. In fact, I was sure she was a dancer because even as she hobbled along, there was a grace to her walk. The left leg she dragged behind her made a circular movement in much the same way a mohiniattam dancer might. This lady, she danced every morning. Her movement wasn't an ugly yank; far from it, to my eyes, it seemed elegant and graceful. And she had commitment. She could have chosen to sit at home, but no, she was out here in the park, every single day. At 6 a.m. She walked.

Or maybe she danced. -- who can tell -- every morning.

This park has a small 300m walking track; not a big track for someone like me who jogs about six km most days of the week. But it is much better than dodging dog (or human) poo on the main roads of Powai, or jogging with a nose-clamp through the methane-laden smells of Aarey Milk Colony. Of course, I still do my long runs on weekends in Aarey Milk Colony but my daily jogging is still in this park near our home; the park where my silver-haired mohiniattam dancer walked every morning. Anti-clockwise.

In all these days that I had observed her during my morning runs, I had not seen her look at anyone, or smile at anyone. She would struggle through her walk with quiet fortitude and lonely grit. I watched her and grew to appreciate her resolve. She would look at me occasionally and her eyes would signal recognition; however brief. But she had more important things to do. Her left leg would require her concentration. She would look away and prepare for her next step; either a graceful dance movement or a painful wrench.

One day, completely breaking the fabric of quiet familiarity between us, within sight of me, she waved out to someone. Most walkers in our park tend to listen to their personal music systems or talk to their walking partners. Often, one of the walkers or joggers might wave a hello to another. I hadn't noticed the old lady wave to anyone before. But that morning, she did. It wasn’t actually a wave in the true sense of the word. It was half-wave, half-reprimand. She looked up from her hunched position as she approached me and made that movement with her hand. At first I thought she had waved at me. I then looked back to see a most unusual old man, just behind me. I hadn't noticed him before today. I was so immediately fascinated by this man that I stopped by the side of the track and pretended to stretch my hamstring. I was mesmerized as much by him as I was by his strange run. As the old lady hobbled towards us, she too smiled at the old man in an encouraging and knowing manner.

I do not know why I paused that day. But something told me I had to stop to look at the man. Maybe it was the old woman’s half-wave. Maybe it was to see what bond these two old people had. Maybe it was to see this captivatingly eccentric run. Maybe I was just being needlessly nosy. But mostly, it was his eyes.

His eyes weren’t the first thing that struck me about the man though; it was his run. While sprinters mostly look straight ahead, most joggers tend to look at a spot on the ground about four to six meters in front of them. Not this old man. He ran with his eyes fixed straight ahead. It was a very unusual style. He did not run fast, but certainly strangely. His legs would bounce up and down and with them, his hands too. His left hand would reach up to his eyes as his left leg came up. His right hand would reach up to his eyes as his right leg bounced up. Now, most joggers would move their left hand forward, or even upwards, when their right leg thrust forward and right hand forward when left leg moved. But not this man. It was as if his hands were constantly running away from his leg. Sometimes it felt as though he was spot-jogging. But somehow he found the momentum to carry himself forward. I'd often run behind him and observe this quite unique style. Later, one day, I did find out why he ran this way.

But he ran, or rather, spot-jogged; every day.

And that first day, as I overtook him, I also noticed his taut, wrinkle-free face. It was as though he had ironed his face that morning. He did not just have prominent cheek-bones. He seemed to have no face other than cheek bones that cried to be freed from his taut skin. His large, black-rimmed glasses sat uncomfortably on those bones. He had a head full of thick, lovely salt-and-pepper hair; the hair was busy, but always well groomed. It seemed as though, for him, the run was like a prayer; an uncompromising and divine routine that required well-oiled and supremely-honed preparation. His shorts were ironed. His T-shirt, like his face, was ironed too. There wasn't a wrinkle anywhere. Every drop of sweat was meticulously cleaned away with the help of a crisp wrist band that smelled of fragrant washing liquid. Here was a retired army major, I thought to myself. I wasn't wrong. I later found out that he was a retired navy commander. He loved his routine.

And so he marched and ran, his right leg trying to constantly catch his right hand, each time in vain.

His eyes, they were simultaneously severe and kind; deep and simple; firm and yielding; serious and mischievous; exacting and benevolent. On the first day I noticed him, as I paused to pretend-tie my shoe lace and as I stretched my hamstring, apart from his peculiar run, what caught my attention were those eyes. On that day, I looked back involuntarily because I could feel his eyes on my neck. I felt his eyes follow me. And when I looked back, he smiled. It was a caring, benign smile. His eyes encouraged me to run farther away from him. His eyes gleamed in the morning sun and spoke of extreme intelligence, as a complement to it, a wicked playfulness. But mostly, his eyes spoke of a willing reinforcement. He willed me to push myself. Behind these eyes, I could sense experience, contentedness, kindness and some melancholy. I did not know why, but I felt drawn to this man immediately. I continued ahead that day.

This happened every day. I would look at him and he would smile encouragingly at me. I would marvel at his strange jog, his crisp appearance, his immediate smile and his eyes. I would then run ahead.

But he march-ran and his wife half-waved at him and smiled as she crossed him in her anti-clockwise walk. Every morning.

They would dance-walk and march-run every morning for at least 45 minutes. They would do some stretches in the central area of the park and be gone before I completed my run. But one day, I finished early; partly because I was tired and partly because I wanted to talk to these two lovely people. I was thoroughly fascinated by this old couple. I was intrigued by their commitment to a healthy life. I was curious to explore the melancholy in his eyes. I was drawn by the old lady’s encouragement of the old man; or was it admonishment? I also wanted to understand his encouragement of me.

The dancer did not speak. She kept a distance although she did smile regularly at me. But the march-jogger talked. And he talked. He was certainly one of the most loquacious people I have ever come across. In that very first meeting, he told me the various ships he had captained, the fleets he had commanded and much more. In 10 minutes, as he and I stretched, I knew everything about his professional career. I knew all the various towns he had lived in; he loved Bangalore and Vishakapattnam the most. I knew that he lived in Mumbai, “not far from here” and that he did not enjoy retired life. He did not like to read. He did not like computers. “I like to work with my hands and I like to make things,” he said. But he was upset this world had no place for old people.

He appeared edgy and furtive. Even as he spoke, he glanced around him impatiently. It seemed as if the world moved too slowly. He talked quickly and rapidly. It was almost as though the idea that he had would escape from his mind before he spat it out in the form of words. And that is how he spoke: he spat his words out. Not venomously, but with a tangled and intense urgency.

That is when the dance-walker waved her peculiar wave at him.The march-jogger laughed immediately when his wife gestured at him thus. It was a laugh that shook his sprightly frame. It was as though the laugh had to reach every single bone of his body. And that was the first time the park had heard him laugh. The laughter club members who had congregated in one corner of the park turned in unison in our direction to see where this laughter came from. His laughter could easily drown out the combined sound produced by the 10-member-strong laughter club whose sole purpose was to laugh uncontrollably and hysterically each morning. But this lively, nimble, lanky and somewhat emaciated march-jogger was able to laugh out the laughter club! I too was quite taken aback at the roaring bellow and was surprised that his bones held together; he shook so much that I thought his bones might fall off his body. The laugh deserved an explanation and so I wanted one; I raised my eyebrows, waiting, asking.

He said that his wife of 65 years was not a fan of his “nervous energy, his frenetic disposition and his severe intensity” and wanted him to slow down. He was 89 and she was 87 years old. She had been teaching him to slow down and enjoy everything around them. As he continued to laugh and as it tapered off, he continued, “Don’t think she is waving to me with love and kindness every morning. Of course, she is the kindest person I have ever known. But she is not being kind when she waves to me. She is rebuking me and reprimanding me for jogging fast.” She nodded wisely as he spoke to me.

I would talk to him most days after my run and after their jog-march and dance-walk. In that time, I learned that he was a keen long-distance runner in his younger days and had run several marathons; he had a full marathon best time of three hours and two minutes. He had tried really hard to break the 3 hour barrier but was just unable to do it. All of that was before he retired. After retirement, the dancer had put an end to his running. She wanted him to stop being intense and hyperactive. She wanted him to slow down and look at the leaves, the birds, the children and the sunshine. And she would do it by gesturing at him.

I did not learn anything about her. I did not ask. I did not know their names nor did I know where they lived. All I knew was that they lived “not far from here”. I wasn’t curious to know. Moreover, I knew that this garrulous and voluble man would tell me his story anyway; without prompting or provocation. Each day as we stretched, he would tell me a bit more about his life – and never anything about the dance-walker. She would not talk either. Every now and then she would wave-admonish.

Slowly, they became my motivation to run. On some mornings, I would feel unwell or if my muscles ached for a rest, the knowledge that these two people would be out there in the park would be enough to spur me on. I needed that inspiration, that encouragement. Soon, they became the reason I ran. “If they can, I should,” became my stimulus. I never told them that but I think he knew; he was wily,a sly old imp. He asked me one day as I struggled with my post-run stretches, “You were struggling there today. I could see. But for the two of us you would have pulled a sickie today, right? Hahahahahahahahahahaha!”

I nodded while she wave-admonished.

They did not talk to anyone else. Indeed, she did not talk at all. One day I plucked courage and asked her if she had had a good walk. She nodded. When I asked her again she made an incoherent sound. Realization dawned. It wasn’t as though she didn’t talk. She couldn’t. The colour drained from my face.

March-jogger must have sensed my discomfort. He pulled me to one side and started lecturing me about my running. He told me that I did not observe anything around me while I run. He told me to listen to the birds, not your iPod; to listen to the leaves and not the traffic sounds; to smell the rain, not the foul odours from the open drain that ran alongside the park. He asked me to slow down. “You need to enjoy life around you, my friend. You need to look at the world around you and not run through it”. He said he did not see me enjoying my run. “It has become a chore for you, man”, he said. He added that that was exactly what his wife had been trying to teach him all along and it was only now he was allowing it to percolate.

That day, he told me his wife had taught him to slow down. He jogged the way he did because that was the only way he could slow down. His wife had taught him to appreciate the world around him. He told me that she would say to him every day that life is a slow dance. And so as she crossed him every day in her dance-walk around the park, she did not wave at him, but gestured to him, asking him to slow down and appreciate the world around him, to listen to the children, the birds and the rain.

And as he left that day, for the first time, I noticed something other than radiant positive energy in his eyes and his voice. His eyes averted mine and his voice trembled as he spoke, with a tinge of melancholy, “I do not know if you will see much more of us. But as long as I am here, I will remind you to enjoy your morning ritual. Commit to it, but enjoy it.” And with that, he waved goodbye and they were gone.

The very next day, I came out for a run as usual. They weren’t there. And the next, and the next day.

Just as suddenly as they had disappeared, I saw him as soon as he entered the park one day, two months later. Immediately I noticed a decisive difference. The dance-walker was not with him. He was alone. My heart sank. And then as he stumbled into the park, I noticed the rest.

The erect frame was gone; he was frail. He was almost bent in half. It was as if his body was fighting a losing battle with gravity, one that was determined to push him down with each passing day. His hair was still thick and abundant; but it was now unkempt. The black strands had disappeared. The pepper-grey had transformed into silver-grey. It was as though a thousand spiders had conspired to weave a web of silver magic on his head. When the gentle rays of the rising sun bounced off his bent head, it was almost as though he walked with a halo. He wore clothes that were wrinkled. And as he entered the park, I realized that he did not march-jog anymore either. He walked instead. Interestingly, he chose to walk anti-clockwise, like his wife had. But then this wasn’t a walk either. He hobbled, painfully. His left leg was the one that would not cooperate. It was as though he had to ensure that it didn't get left behind as the bolder, more able right leg propelled him forward. Each step was a small, painful journey. I observed him wincing. Each step a mini-project. The once-taut skin had collapsed into many folds. I watched these folds on his face, swelling and flattening like a restless ocean, wave after wave. His skin would crease and furrow when he dragged his left leg, only to ease into comforting smoothness when the right leg dragged him forward. Ebb and flow. Pain and comfort. Left and right.

And so, he now dance-walked.  Every morning. And every time I crossed him, he would wave to me. But it wasn’t a wave. It was half wave, half admonishment. He was asking me to slow down; to listen to the birds, the children and the rain.