Farmland, shopping mall and a walk: A futuristic romance

There are avenues of escape even in the midst of concrete jungle. Its not that hard to imagine a mesmerised surrounding engulfing you slowly in a place where you tend to sit for a while, for some time, for eternity. Shopping malls are never thought of such a place where you can romanticise your imagination. These are the places where you are supposed to come, buy, consume the space that surrounds you, eat or get dressed and look beautiful. Once you have finished the cycle you can take a selfie.




That has become part of our late capital, postmodern everydayness. Suddenly the world seems to be unbearably hot for Kaleidoscope so as to compel him to do every meeting with friends at one of those spaces. Being in a shopping mall definitely makes you conscious about how you look, how you walk, how you dress, how you eat and how you talk to others. However, there is one that carries the legacy of its past nearby. Yes, City Centre II, of Kolkata happens to stay at a place close to an existing farmland. You can stand on one of those foot bridges that connects two massive constructions to have a glimpse of it.




Kaleidoscope, happens to be one of those consumers who happened to go to the place for quite some time now. His earlier thought was that the farmland will disappear soon to give rise to high rises. He also thought how ugly the place will become if the other side of the major arterial road consists of highrises. Wouldn't it be a jungle of concretes only? Kaleidoscope asked himself several times. However, as he walked towards Chinar Park there is another wonder. Between high rises plazas there stood a small tract of village life near No-Para. A couple of buildings, a bamboo garden and a peaceful graveyard. Kaleidoscope thought again, how long one can hold on against the land grab. Meanwhile, the greenery continued to add hints of past country feeling in the midst of cacophony, highrises, reflecting glasses.




However, even after all these years, they continue to live on. The bamboo garden, the farm land continue to invite Kaleidoscope to an imagined past, perhaps to an imagined future. What would happen if suddenly, City Centre II, nearby Spencers supermarket and the like disappears from there? Ambuja group or the Goenka group would certainly loose nothing. Afterall, they have effectively rented the space to the latecapital consumers at an "affordable" high cost. They wouldn't mind abandoning a pile of concrete structure and glass panels! Would they?


What would have happened next? Trees would definitely outgrow the fashionable gardens, the farmland will continue to be cultivated. Soon, the greenery will show its signs of invasion to the concretes. Kaleidoscope, nevertheless thinks concrete buildings awaits such moments. There seems to be a pause in that eternal lovemaking  -  the pause is anthropocentric - the source of most the pauses in this planet.  

Letting go: What happens when you leave?

Kaleidoscope has just finished his wonderful days at the wonderland. When he was shocked by the fact that he has to leave the place he fell in love with, has to stop seeing the river he can't live without, he was numb. He knew that best days of his life was about to get over. Its not that he never thought about this day. He knew he would be shattered when these days would be over. He had in his distant thought about the things that would have happened when he leaves the place he is so attached to. When the moment arrived he fell short of words to describe exactly what was going on inside his self.

The abrupt departure:

The nature of attachment Kaleidoscope had would made any departure abrupt to him.  He made it sure that he leaves without tears, he made it sure that he leaves with a positive mind. On his way back he talked to the river and to himself, said its not the end. Its a beginning with a new journey at a new place. He also expected a new journey with his friends at the wonderland. He expected new beginnings at the new place.

A divided and restless soul:

Its now about two months. One part of his soul still lives at wonderland and perhaps will never leave the place ever. Perhaps there is another part of his self,  an imposed division, which he had to make because of the sudden change of place. Now when he roams around the city where he grew up and has so many memories, he finds himself as a complete stranger in the middle of a crowded place, all alone, attempting to find a refuge, attempting to develop a language to converse with.

Everydayness and the loneliness:

He is transferred to a new part of his city, rather an extended part, specifically designed to house the Information Technology hub. Everyday he travels in a crowded bus to reach his work place. He cannot estimate the time needed because he almost forgot to calculate time and distance, keeping in mind the traffic conditions. He usually lets go most of the over crowded buses and stands alone in a fleeting bus stand to see people come and go. He sweats, looks around the busy people talking over phone, or arguing with the bus conductors and fellow passengers. Often nothing registers in his mind. He looks out, tries to transcend his contextual change and imagine the highway rides, sunsets over the river, kisses and smells of the waves that made him survive so many hurdles of his everyday life.

When stuck at traffic jam Kaleidoscope never gets irritated, he is usually in a process of churning the memories, because memories are all he has.

The return:

Kaleidoscope could perhaps never return to the wonderland, to the river, to the lover like he used to rush everyday, every moment. He could, perhaps never be the one with the wave. Perhaps he would never cry out thousand rivers. He would never be the same again.

However, kaleidoscope returns everyday, every night in his dreams, sometimes in a surreal way to his river. His soul claims the river, the sunset and the wonderful highway.

Would it ever be the same again? Would the river give him another chance, another time to cry, tell a story. The story of growing up misplaced. Would his highway set him free like it used to be?

Hegemonic Hypocrasy: From Body to State

The broader question of this quasi technical essay is to understand to whether our hypocritical selves help sustaining order of things which we technically call structure. There is a significant scope of using Gramsci's (1971) concept of "cultural hegemony" as the structure is a structure of  dominant groups that maintain their power by gaining the consent of the populace. Ideological manipulation has been the primary technique of doing that. Dominant groups use “symbolic violence” to encourage subalterns to adopt a worldview that is consistent with their own interests (Bourdieu 2001). Public perceptions are influenced by disseminating national ideology—a state-sponsored system of beliefs— across various societal outlets including education, media, religion, and folk wisdom (Omi and Winant 1994). 

The central concern (may be difficult to accept) of my argument is that primary mechanism of such hegemony that dictates to a large extent over how we live is hypocrisy. When I refer to "how we live" I refer to how we the people of semi-urban, formally educated, middle class Bengali people live in and around Kolkata. To establish this argument I will refer to some of the posts made by Kaleidoscope in this blog.  

The private parts and eagerness to share:

Kaleidoscope in his if it is private post explains why he sometimes write private issues in his blog. He reports "Kaleidoscope wants to share what is personal... but he does not want to share it with people who physically know him... In web world, with crores of pages, Kaleidoscope's words are kept as safe and secure, with a hope that there are people who read them... may empathise them..." The interesting part of this hypocrisy is the amount of risk involved. I am told in an "interview" that Kaleidoscope has never been asked any question regarding what shit he writes in the blog - because no one cares to read them, and bothers to take them seriously. Yet Kaleidoscope feels relieved from the burden of not carrying all the "irrepairable stuffs" (click here) with him (?). He occasionally dumps them to the Worlds and words. Kaleidoscope smiles and says its a risk well taken.

Therefore, Kaleidoscope successfully fits himself in the stereotypes of proper. Now if Kaleidoscope is burdened with some emotional vulnerability, why cannot he simply speak the truth and not hide himself in the mask of "messy text" (Click here for a detailed study of Kaleidoscope's messy texts). I think it has something to do with his definition of proper/improper, order/chaos, good/bad, love/hate, sex/heresy. This is precisely the reason we are taught that we are born because god wanted us to born (not sex), we should have sex only with one person (even if you do otherwise keep it secret), we should love a single person (even if you have romantic feeling for others, hide it, let it go). And ultimate triumph is not over the land or wealth but over the sexual rights of the women of land. Therefore incidents of rape continues and we tend to stigmatise a rape victim and often not the rapists. For a similar reason we tend to scandalize "improper" love affairs. 

Therefore, we learn to be hypocrite in our maintenance system and we manifest a fine tuned hypocrisy in our projective systems. 

The caste and religion dilemma:    

There is no caste based hierarchy in West Bengal -  at least that is what we are taught to believe with long years of "communist rule". Theorising this issue has been championed by Dwaipayan Bhattacharyya. He writes about party-society, which has over the last three decades displaced the older patron-client form of relationships. Bhattacharyya (2009) argues:

“Land reform legislations and local government bodies (the panchayats) were the tools and the CPI (M) (as well as its peasant wing, the Krishak Sabha) was the primary agent to bring about this change. The new politics set new norms of transaction to which every political outfit – the ruling side as well as the opposition – had to conform, willingly or unwillingly. In this organizational grid … [the] political party was largely accepted as the chief mediator, the central conduit, in the settling of every village matter: private or public, individual or collective, familial or associational.”

Now as Bhattacharyya noticed the dominating nature of party which has effectively displaced older caste and religion based networks which is apparently true in most of the cases, but what happens when this political network is under challenge with the rise of new political or other forces? When the dominating political power group is loosing its grip, perennial classificatory systems rejuvenate. Therefore, Kaleidoscope in his field visits noticed:

1. Teli-Bagal caste based conflict related to access to land and water in West Medinipur

2. Dominance of kinship networks in Bardhaman through the oligopoly of cold-storages

3. Caste-tribe dilemma and use of tribal sentiments to make a political change and sustain skewed allocation of resources in Bankura

4. withdrawal of support from the "harmad bahini" because of involvement of Muslims in Paschim Medinipur.

The Hypocrisy is when we are told to believe that West Bengal is a secular country where communism is not impossible to achieve, we are actually taught not to speak (remain silent) regarding the issues of communalism, caste-religion political games. Silence and silencing discourses can play an important role in the perpetuation of legitimizing myths and the social order (Bhattacharya 2009; Clair 1998). Some scholars have even asserted that secrecy is indispensable to power (Foucault 1978) and lies at its very core (Canetti 1962). 

He-who-must-not-be-named is real Lord Voldemort(s): 

While our greatest Sita is associated with Agni Pariksha- Inspector Clouseau seeks to know whether there was "Not even a little smoochie-woochie?" happened between Nicole and another detective who took his chances with Nicole in Pink Panther 2. This apparently fun-filled dialogue exchange once again reinforces the stereotypes a) you must make love with a single person, b) being faithful means you are monogamous, c) love is singular, d) your right on your body is defined by the structure and settings, blah blah blah!

In a similar tune we are taught not to trust our fellow citizens hence we fail to make Rizwanur a hero, villagers misrecognise Kaleidoscope and his HoD, and there is unnecessary religious view points come out in everyday discourses. 

The puzzle which pushes me is that the situation in which we live in is not a perfectly fitted hegemonic false consciousness (hope someday social scientists would find a true consciousness!), because we know what we make out of caste, religious, and class differences. We know about our romantic feeling, bodily involvements. If this is precisely the case then social silencing of everyday realities cannot be equated with hegemony, or similar dynamics that imply false consciousness. On the other hand yet silencing, of ethnic difference or monogamy per se is compatible with understandings of hegemony, as the process of silencing clearly reinforces power structures. 

At least in "Worlds and Words's" present state of condition, my interview and association with Kaleidoscope I would rather define Kaleidoscope's present state of being Hegemonic Hypocrasy.

PS. After reading this draft Kaleidoscope continue to remain silent, and I think it is better not to poke unnecessarily

    

FROZEN MOMENTS - a note to self

Kaleidoscope had very many letting go experiences and with time he thought he has mastered the art quite well. Until recently he was developing a self that could let go anything. His recent self enriching reading and experiences with the "setting" was paving way to let go anything. While Kaleidoscope finds his letting go self becoming powerful,  he finds something to hold on, to never let go - a feeling coming from within.

Frozen....

Clearly the river Dulung with whom he has recently fallen in love is taking him to his previous self  that fights with itself -  a self which he has buried years ago. The graveyard has been such a distant place that his past has trouble to remember his date of birth - point of origin.

However, with a cup of coffee Kaleidoscope makes a time travel simply because he is having too many frozen moments with the river. He finds out:

SELF denial

self DENIAL

Hallucination

S   P   A   C   E   S

Self Deprivation


and


finally the key word


ACCEPTANCE


Therefore, whenever, Kaleidoscope experiences a high frequency of frozen and cinematic moments with Dulung, he must also be conscious to make each moments count... so that even when he has another letting go experience - he manages to do justice with the key word ACCEPTANCE...  

"Many faces of jungle people" - yet another love story

Prelude: 

Sometimes a little push is all it takes for Kaleidoscope to start typing which his head often labels as unimportant and insignificant. This post (and many others too) owes a lot to Kay Cha... kaleidoscope's black and white friend (not quite) from down the memory lane simply because Kay Cha pokes Kaleido on absence of blog entries, and in thousand other ways.

Annual field ritual:

This year's yearly field ritual is guided by Kaleidoscope and his favourite HoD. The chosen place has been Gidhni, a small station having tiny villages located within dense forest, once a Maoist inhabited zone of the Paschim Medinipur, West Bengal. Apart from the ethnographic romances, kaleidoscope and HoD because of their vagabond(ish) selves soon discover more forests, stones, ups and downs rivers, within the forests, rivers and everything else. Once a liberated zone for Maoists, also a place where Kishenji has allegedly been killed, Kaleidoscope falls in love with the most spectacular river he has ever encountered - Dulung - which become another name of his love. 

Walk is worship:

Kaleido and HoD are both expert walkers... they can walk restless for hours. Kaleido kept concentrating on his Camera - his second wife and HoD with GPS (arguably his second wife too!). Kaleido and HoD together kept exploring the forest which directly connects Paschim Medinipur with Andhra Pradesh... the famous Red Corridor. 

(http://www.aljazeera.com/mritems/Images/2011/10/23/20111023144014954734_9.jpg)

Gidhni is closer to Jharkhand and Orissa, ideal place for a game of hide and seek especially if you have a GPS and a car or motor cycle. Kaleido and HoD kept walking for 12 days, enjoying the sun, forest, river, wildlife and of course the river.

A rough area covered by Kaleidoscope and HoD

What face do you wear?

One day, while they have walked for more than three hours covering about 9 km within the jungle HoD felt pain in his left ankle and Kaleido also thought that its better to take some rest and do some focus work with his camera. HoD kept himself busy with his second wife (the GPS) as this one is fresh (newly purchased for the department) and HoD had to explore her beauty (options)… Kaleidoscope and his HoD both did not shave for a few days, had unkempt hair – something that happens when you don’t have actual wife (who will nag to make you do these things) or girls to impress (of course voluntary impressions management) and wore the walk tired faces.

Suddenly both of them heard a sound of a person walking through the dried lives… made them look forward. Three women with tangi (battle axe) were approaching and discovering Kaleidoscope and HoD's faces, stopped for ever. When forerunners stopped there were others following them asking "why do you stop?" They stopped for quite long, so do their followers which is an entire village of Mahatos in search of fuel wood and mushrooms. They did not say a word, nor do they retreat. 

The moment of halt... Kaleidoscope had to shoot it from within the grasses. 

Kaleidoscope with his pea size intellect told them to pass and also mentioned that he and the HoD are not forest department officials and henceforth are not in a position to do any harm. The crowed still did not move a muscle. Kaleidoscope also referred to his identity as a "college master" and that his students are working in the nearby Khatgeria village. One of the younger looking girls managed to smile and said "I also had anthropology in my Under Graduate."

Others were not as comfortable, and the following conversation took place

K: Why were you afraid of us?

Villagers: "you dont look like masters..."

K: so?

V: "so many different kind of people roam around this jungle"

K: What different kind?

V: Jungle party people look similar to you... they also carry bags and phone map (pointing at HoD's second wife, the GPS)

V: "you people should not roam around these forests... these are for us and for different people"

K: Do you fear Jungle party?

V: no, they used to give us medicines... now roads etc. are constructed to kill them... we are getting the benefit...

K: We have heard that Jungle party people are gone, especially after the encounter death of Kishenji

V: We don't believe he has been encountered... he was killed

K: If you do not fear Jungle party, why were you afraid of us?

V: we don't want to witness anything odd... neither do we need to be interrogated by the police... you people better off the jungle and concentrate your work at the village... this place is not for you... you roam around the metaled road... it is safer.

Before Kaleidoscope or HoD could say another word the entire village moved out in search of forest resources. Kaleidoscope and HoD was amazed with their faces that represented/ resembled jungle party... and it was even more amazing to encounter a pupil of anthropology living a life which anthropologists have always been studying and never living.

Kaleidoscope returns home leaving the place he called field with a not to share love-story and still looking for an excuse to go back... 

Post script:

A few shots which Kaleidoscope could take before proposing to the river Dulung for love.

Khanjana beside river dulung

Title me!

They call it tuni ful...

Timed... 

Kaleidoscope's last hope

Kankrajhor... 

Kaleidoscope will remain a walker... even after his legs are gone... 

Focus work

Longing for a home that never exists: (A)historical emotion and return of the repressed

When hostel students organise farewell and freshers' welcome, the hostels are usually transformed to a carnivalsque. It becomes upside down. Pupil suddenly becomes eager to confess, there are boundaries that get dissolved and people like Kaleidoscope often sees naked reality. So once in a programme like this, in a moment when Kaleidoscope's pupil were in a mood of confession, a young boy shouted "if you don't have brother don't make a dummy brother, if you don't have a sister don't make dummy sister." It suddenly opens a window, a nostalgic one where Kaleidoscope can see pupil's longing for a home that never really exist.

What might have happened:

Possibility I:
1. The guy had found a sister (highly probably) in a girl
2. The sisterhood continued for a while and it got broken up

Possibility: II
1. The guy was looking for a significant relationship in an otherwise manly hostel world and he finally ended up in getting a sister (and not a fiancee)
2. Eventually the girl realised the underground demand and they broke up

Possibility: III
1. The guy and girl both seek a significant relationship
2. They found each-other
3. At the end of the year either one (in this case probably it is the girl) got back to the lost home, went back to the real brother (or the sister, probably not in this case), hence eventual painful separation because "blood is thicker than the water."

Well Kaleidoscope can keep on listing numerous permutations and combinations of the possibilities. However, the bottom line is that there are people who continue to seek for the world that never really exist. Kaleidoscope would rather see this as a restorative effort of the people who are born in a nuclear family (or are compelled to live in a nucleus life), miss out relationships which are historically defined as important but absent. The reflective dimension of nostalgia is intertwined as Svetlana Boym sees it not as an individual sickness but a symptom of our age, a historical emotion. As the world evolves to modernity, worlds find new time and space coeval with it. A result of which is longing for not only a space but also for a time. Hence worlds are filled with ancient ghosts, people's restorative efforts and a heterotopic outcome. It is highly likely that it will call for more uncalled for carnivalsques engulfing Kaleidoscope in his restorative efforts and his longing for a imagined home. The hostel boy, the transformed spaces, vanishing places and juxtaposed and nucleus modernity do make a space for the return of nostalgia as repressed are often returned.

Postmodern Travels

Others know a lot about Kaleidoscope's long travel experiences. Some of the facebook posts shows that Kaleidoscope travels with a romantic mood. When his train hops at different stations Kaleidoscope takes snaps. One thing that Kaleidoscope do not report is the postmodern condition in which he travels in the local trains which takes him from Birati to Sealdah and "Super fast" buses that takes Kaleidoscope from Mecheda to Haldia, especially in Mondays.

So here it goes. Monday morning Kaleidoscope says good bye to The Queen at 5:00am. The Queen could only say a few words with her sleepy voice and swelled eyes.

Kaleidoscope boards to a train filled with subalterns. They take revenge by smoking bidis, sleeping on the seats meant for sitting. Some of them goes as far as changing their night dress, i.e. the lungi and wearing the day dress, i.e. Pants before they get down. These subalterns travel regularly. They sit together, literally sleeps on each other. As the train reaches to the Dumdum, some of them are awaken and they happily say good byes, talks to each other with regular slangs, throws sexually charged words to womenfolks who seem to enjoy these chats and travels with them regularly. Most of them gets off at Dumdum or Bidhannagar (ultadanga). These co-passengers are informal sector workers who bring flowers, vegetables and fruits for the urban consumers from remote corners of the urban hinterland. Kaleidoscope increasingly getting a feel that these early morning local trains represents a perfect postmodern habitus. The boundaries [between bodies] are blurred, norms are breached and impositions are compromised.

Kaeidoscope gets off at Sealdah and boards to shared taxi, more popularly known as "Shuttle" to reach at Howrah. When he walks down the pathway from Sealdah station to Mahatma Gandhi Road, jet propelled autos rushes towards Mechua - the fruit market carrying some his co-passengers. In the shuttle, Kaleidoscope presses his body against others as these shuttles must carry more passengers than a car can usually carry.

The train journey from Howrah to Mecheda is pleasant when Kaleidoscope often takes the snaps.

Boundaries do dissolve

Kaleidoscope and his colleagues must loose a number these "Super fast" (popularly Haldia/Mecheda Super) buses in order to secure seats at Mecheda. As these buses are stopped boundaries are dissolved again. Kaleidoscope like others adjusts between the pressing bellies, wallets, mobile phones and reproductive systems. Usually Kaleidoscope sleeps but nevertheless he often remains conscious about the boundaries that continue to dissolves until the bus reaches at City Center. Kaleidoscope finds young girls, college students compromising their bodily boundaries, and limits for an (un)invited postmodern potential of the journey. 

Weird wirelessness

Kaleidoscope finally chooses a wireless 3G network. It gives him speed and mobility. More importantly it makes Kaleidoscope feel empowered and less insecure. Although the decision is taken for the disgusting performance of BSNL over the past few months, at one corner of the Kaleidoscope's (in)sensitive mind his rootlessness, ever commuting experience played an invisible and significant role.

The archaeology of internet use for Kaleidoscope includes the dial up - internetlessness / sybercafeish access - institute based access - wired broadband (and office net) - wireless connection (and office net). The pattern of internet use for Kaleidoscope like many others relates itself with his insatiable dependency over the world of easily accessible and shared information.

Over the years Kaleidoscope's archaeology includes increasing detachment from his earlier roots followed by a series of suffocating and painful nights to a wireless void. Kaleidoscope asks itself why should it be a part of such a void? Does it have anything to do with his commuting experience, lack of focus on the list of things that he should be doing or is it simply the result of increasing detachment from the symbols that used be significant for him?

While Kaleidoscope remains clueless, the whole paradigm of invisible patterns of actions - (the very pattern that determines Kaleidoscope's taste, feel, ways of being and doing) smiles.  The harder Kaleidoscope tries to break down the signs to find out underlying significations the smile becomes a laughter - louder laughter. Kaleidoscope - like many others remains one dimensional - looses the imagined capacity for being an actively constructing agent and becomes part of a high-speed, rootless wireless network surrounded by the same void that Kaleidoscope once tried to break down.

What does skin have to do with transfer and posting?

Kaleidoscope as many others travels frequently to a distance place to work on to sustain. People, of course including Kaleidoscope's colleagues who commute like kaleidoscope wear a tanned skin, unkempt hair, air stroke face, dull neck, wet clothes, often swelled eyes which are never compensated with sleepy blue nights. They use body sprays and shampoos to repair the body in which they live in.

Imitations and failures: Kaleidoscope noticed a few of his colleagues who are now transferred, wearing loud make ups. They strongly believed that it helped them save their skin from the road waste that Kaleidoscope and the like wears each time they commute. Well Kaleidoscope is not a person who can wear and carry a loud make up (Kaleidoscope is consciously not  a homophobic). Kaleidoscope does not have a dupatta with which he can cover up the skin and hair. He tried and failed to follow what the other person from another department does, covering his head with a handkerchief, although the other person continue to loose his hair. So, Kaleidoscope's skin, hair and face bears the marks of the so called "C-zone", in the never quite clear division of zones according to the posting.

The others: After the transfer of Kaleidoscope's colleagues who have successfully saved their skins from the C-zone effects there was a period of communism - all wore more or less C-zone skin. Suddenly with the new transfer policies several A-zoners are now sharing the baton in the orchestra of higher education in C-zone. They are the others. They wear city skin, hair and clothing. They commute either by the AC bus or by Goddamn expensive cars, they continue to wear the city bound professorish skin, but how long is a question.

Once Kaleidoscope and several others
(KB, KP, SB, AP, SC)
 had to travel by a truck to reach to teach
(Photo credit: KB!)

So next time you need to find out Kaleidoscope in any of the conferences or get-togethers you must seek:

A. Tanned Skin
B. Unkemped Hair
C. Unpressed Clothing
D. Swelled eyes


You find one, ask him straight... "Are you Kaleidoscope?" Even if the answer is no, it is a Kaleidoscope...

Mind and making it up

Kaleidoscope is indulging his Procrastinating self for quite some time now. He is continuously deferring his pending tasks of writing things up, collecting stuffs for future reading and making of list of what to do next!

The distance between Kaleidoscope's mind and making it up is causing only silence. In between he has been reading a lot... mostly unsystematic reading... Anandabazar - Frontline - Study materials - Partha Chatterjee - Telegraph - A few Xerox copies - Television...!

The percentage of keeping an eye on the study materials is low enough to ignore that Kaleidoscope is a PhD student at some University under some one who is always sending study materials and inspiring him to keep on working...

Kaleidoscope have thought out several plans to make him mind up for a full fledged push in the acceleration device that can make his PhD thing move. Making up mind has never been so hard!

Kaleidoscope gives excuses to himself with his long lasting journey, pile of answer script evaluation, preparation of lectures for his classes, giving time to his co-habitation and so on.

Now that Kaleidoscope has not been working for the thing he loves the most - he must worry...! and start planning before it is late. :(

Commodities in "Co" words: the Habitus and the Continuity

Compatibility, co-operation, co-habitation and co-construction - in sum, words with "co" occupies important position in the each of the domesticated selves in and around the world of Kaleidoscope. These "co" words add newer dimensions, colours and textures to Kaleidoscope's world as well. Since, Kaleidoscope likes adding dimensions, colours and textures to life, he is expected to enjoy this part of his being.

(2012 World Press Photo Contest Winners: 1st Prize Daily Life Stories: Marco leads Monica from their bedroom to the living room in Buenos Aires. Monica was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Alejandro Kirchuk)

The problem is created by unrecognised entrance of invisible hands through reflecting mirrors of the shopping malls, sexy appearances of other beings everyday, everywhere, available better living devices: and the list is every increasing, multiplicity of options and supposedly taken for granted hike in ways of being. Kaleidoscope dislikes, hates, and yet adopts them at the expense of his deferring 'base' and ever procrastinating aims.

The core question is "Can he isolate the entangled invisible hands, co-words, and his presentable self  - in sum his habitus?" The answer is NO. "Is it possible for Kaleidoscope to overthrow the invisible hand?" the answer is most probably NO, "Can he manage to survive without the additional parts which would then be thrown away with the hand?" the answer is obviously NO.

It actually does not matter! 

My Space, Your Space and Blurring Boundaries

While Kaleidoscope increasingly disassociates himself from his research self, he finds it easier to maintain the balance between work and the world. However with this shortcut method the boundaries between his space and the space he shares with the rest of the world is increasingly becoming blurred. Whenever, he finds his research self lying somewhere in the corner, the requirement a clearer blurring boundary is felt strongly. So the meeting between Kaleidoscope and his research self takes on the following resolutions:
1. There should be a compartmentalisation between these two selves. The self which is Kaleidoscope should devote towards the rest of the world and the Research self with the research.
2. Even if the demands of the two are contradictory and hard to meet, both the self should try to do their best to compensate each other.
3. Whenever, Kaleidoscope is travelling towards his workplace, he must allow his research self to make most out of it.

This results in sleepless nights... tiring bodies... headache... anxiety... Furthermore, none of the purposes are served effectively.

... now its no more "don't worry"

STOPERGEIC

When Kaleidoscope writes on his lethargic self, he mentions about his wish to lengthen his infancy. However, he fails to address his privileged social selves. First Kaleidoscope is a male entitled to numerous privileges. Second, he belongs to "not so bad" material world as economics things are settled. Kaleidoscope worries about another room and not about a missing roof! Now he has a less challenging "descent" job.

This is a phase when Kaleidoscope thinks he will grow. But he sees something like this.

Kaleidoscope can visualise the blue infinity, but its beyond the STOP. This is not some reified situation which compels him to stop. This is his well known lethargic self, which he defines as stopergic. Its his lethargy which compels him to stop.

Kaleidoscope is trying to analyse a very rich, but considerably boring 3000 pages transcript. He is failing again and again. To legitimise his failure he keeps on deferring the process!!

He knows that its just a button he needs to press. Something like this

However, its just not happening. He wishes to see beyond the stop sign. But somehow for last one month its just not working.

As Kaleidoscope's economics is secured, he might not get enough kick from basics.

Kaleidoscope is kinda concerned!

Put off until tomorrow

Kaleidoscope is essentially lethargic. He belongs to a group which defines lethargic as being Lyad! Kaleidoscope knows, he belongs to this extended family of Lyad.

One of his favourite lines: "Will do it tomorrow"

Now when Kaleidoscope is given the world filled with practical people with practical goals... material pursuits... he speaks nonsense regarding his love for the material which is immaterial to many...

He is reminded "GROW UP!" again and again.He thinks for a while about his ungrown self, a song plays in his ears

"Give me another chance I wanna grow up once again!"

Kaleidoscope smiles and proudly declairs according to his conscious self (Which usually sleeps)

"I will grow up tomorrow"

Sun burn

Kaleidoscope feels a burning sensation at the back while he takes long lasting bath in the sea. Despite of repeated request to cut short the bathing period the Kaleidoscope hears the sea's call like this (well not the sound but you have to feel the call anyways) ...

and Kaleidoscope is, after all kaleidoscope. So it is a situation where the one who stands within the water always wins so Kaleidoscope does.

After his return Kaleidoscope finds the burning sensation persists and within a few days a layer of dead cells comes out of his shoulder. It is the result of preliminary sun burn.

Kaleidoscope's dad being a musician roams around the city attending and taking classes everywhere of a city which is blessed with hot and humid weather. Today he is having the same problem in his hands and feeling the same burning sensation in his cheek. It is reddish and gives you whole lot of irritation.

TO THE GURU:

Yes, kaleidoscope has an information guru, the google. It says, both Kaleidoscope and his father are exposed to too much UV rays.

See:

http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/sunburning

THE CONCERN:

Kolkata is having average temperature now a days around 35 - 38 degree Celsius and its not unusual.

So, why all of a sudden sun burn? Should Kaleidoscope assume that ozone layer is vanished?