Tag: Naramsetti Umamaheswararao

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Greetings from Borderless

Auld Lang Syne…

Art by Sohana Manzoor
Courtesy: Suzanne Kamata
Some of our visuals in 2024

As we wait for the new year to unfold, we glance back at the year that just swept past us. Here, gathered together are glimpses of the writings we found on our pages in 2024 that herald a world of compassion and kindness…writings filled with hope and, dare I say, even goodwill…and sometimes filled with the tears of poetic souls who hope for a world in peace and harmony. Disasters caused by humans starting with the January 2024 in Japan, nature and climate change, essays that invite you to recall the past with a hope to learn from it, non-fiction that is just fun or a tribute to ideas, both past and present — it’s all there. Innovative genres started by writers to meet the needs of the times — be it solar punk or weird western — give a sense of movement towards the new. What we do see in these writings is resilience which healed us out of multiple issues and will continue to help us move towards a better future.

A hundred years ago, we did not have the technology to share our views and writings, to connect and make friends with the like-minded across continents. I wonder what surprises hundred years later will hold for us…Maybe, war will have been outlawed by then, as have been malpractices and violences against individuals in the current world. The laws that rule a single man will hopefully apply to larger groups too…

Courtesy: Ratnottama Sengupta
Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
Some of our visuals in 2024

Poetry

Whose life? by Aman Alam. Click here to read.

Winter Consumes by Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal. Click here to read.

Hot Dry Summers by Lizzie Packer. Click here to read.

House of Birds (for Pablo Neruda) by Ryan Quinn Flanagan. Click here to read.

Poems for Dylan Thomas by Michael Burch. Click here to read.

Dylan Thomas in Ardmillan Terrace? by Stuart McFarlane. Click here to read.

Bermuda Love Triangle & the Frothiest Coffee by Rhys Hughes. Click here to read.

Satirical Poems by Maithreyi Karnoor. Click here to read.

Three Poems by Rakhi Dalal. Click here to read.

Manish Ghatak’s Aagun taader Praan (Fire is their Life) has been translated from Bengali by Indrayudh Sinha. Click here to read.

Manzur Bismil’s poem, Stories, has been translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch. Click here to read.

Ye Shao-weng’s poetry ( 1100-1150) has been translated from Mandarin by Rex Tan. Click here to read.

Amalkanti by Nirendranath Chakraborty has been translated from Bengali by Debali Mookerjea-Leonard. Click here to read.

The Mirror by Mubarak Qazi has been translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch. Click here to read.

Homecoming, a poem by Ihlwha Choi on his return from Santiniketan, has been translated from Korean by the poet himself. Click here to read.

Pochishe Boisakh (25th of Baisakh) by Tagore (1922), has been translated from Bengali by Mitali Chakravarty. Click here to read.

Nazrul’s Ghumaite Dao Shranto Robi Re (Let Robi Sleep in Peace) has been translated from Bengali by Professor Fakrul Alam. Click here to read.

Jibananada Das’s Andhar Dekhecche, Tobu Ache (I have seen the dark and yet there is another) has been translated from Bengali by Professor Fakrul Alam. Click here to read.

Tagore’s Shotabdir Surjo Aji ( The Century’s Sun today) has been translated from Bengali by Mitali Chakravarty. Click here to read.

Non-fiction

Baraf Pora (Snowfall)

A narrative by Rabindranath Tagore that gives a glimpse of his first experience of snowfall in Brighton and published in the Tagore family journal, Balak (Children), has been translated from Bengali by Somdatta Mandal. Click here to read.

Dylan on Worm’s Head

Rhys Hughes describes a misadventure that the Welsh poet had while hiking as a tribute to him on Dylan Thomas Day. Click here to read.

Travels of Debendranath Tagore 

These are from the memoirs of Tagore’s father translated from Bengali by Somdatta Mandal. Click here to read.

Two Pizza Fantasies

Rhys Hughes recounts myths around the pizza in prose, fiction and poetry, Click here to read

‘Is this a Dagger I See…?‘

Devraj Singh Kalsi gives a tongue-in-cheek account of a writer’s dilemma. Click here to read.

Still to Moving Images 

Ratnottama Sengupta explores artists who have turned to use the medium of films… artists like the legendary MF Husain. Click here to read.

How Dynamic was Ancient India?

Farouk Gulsara explores William Dalrymple’s latest book, The Golden Road: How Ancient India Transformed the World. Click here to read.

The Magic Dragon: Cycling for Peace

Keith Lyons writes of a man who cycled for peace in a conflict ridden world. Click here to read.

A Cover Letter

Uday Deshwal muses on writing a cover letter for employment. Click here to read.

A Manmade Disaster or Climate Change?

Salma A Shafi writes of floods in Bangladesh from ground level. Click here to read.

Pinecones and Pinky Promises

Luke Rimmo Minkeng Lego writes of mists and cloudy remembrances in Shillong. Click here to read.

 Educating for Peace in Rwanda

Suzanne Kamata discusses the peace initiatives following the terrors of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide while traveling within the country with her university colleague and students. Click here to read.

Breaking Bread

Snigdha Agrawal has a bovine encounter in a restaurant. Click here to read.

From Srinagar to Ladakh: A Cyclist’s Diary

Farouk Gulsara travels from Malaysia for a cycling adventure in Kashmir. Click here to read.

A Saga of Self-empowerment in Adversity

Bhaskar Parichha writes of Noor Jahan Bose’s Daughter of The Agunmukha: A Bangla Life, translated from Bengali by Rebecca Whittington. Click here to read.

Safdar Hashmi

Meenakshi Malhotra writes of Anjum Katyal’s Safdar Hashmi: Towards Theatre for a Democracy. Click hereto read.

Meeting the Artists

Kiriti Sengupta talks of his encounter with Jatin Das, a legendary artist. Click here to read.

The Comet’s Trail: Remembering Kazi Nazrul Islam

Radha Chakravarty pays tribute to the rebel poet of Bengal. Click here to read.

The Myriad Hues of Tagore by Aruna Chakravarti

Aruna Chakravarti writes on times and the various facets of Tagore. Click here to read.

The Year of Living Dangerously

Professor Fakrul Alam takes us back to the birth of Bangladesh. Click here to read.

A Short, Winding, and Legendary Dhaka Road 

Professor Fakrul Alam takes us on a historical journey of one of the most iconic roads of Dhaka, Fuller Road. Click here to read.

 A Sombre Start 

Suzanne Kamata talks of the twin disasters in Japan. Click here to read.

Fiction

The Snakecharmer

Shapuray by Nazrul, has been translated from Bengali by Sohana Manzoor. Click here to read.

Significance

Naramsetti  Umamaheswararao creates a fable around a banyan tree and it’s fruit. Click here to read.

Just Another Day

Neeman Sobhan gives a story exploring the impact of the politics of national language on common people. Click here to read.

The Ghosts of Hogshead

Paul Mirabile wanders into the realm of the supernatural dating back to the Potato Famine of Ireland in the 1800s. Click here to read.

A Queen is Crowned

Farhanaz Rabbani traces the awakening of self worth. Click here to read.

The Last Hyderabadi

Mohul Bhowmick talks of the passage of an era. Click here to read.

The Gift 

Rebecca Klassen shares a sensitive story about a child and an oak tree. Click here to read.

Galat Aurat or The Wrong Woman

Veena Verma’s story has been translated from Punjabi by C Christine Fair. Click here to read.

The Melting Snow

A story by Sharaf Shad,  has been translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch. Click here to read.

Conversations

Ratnottama Sengupta talks to Ruchira Gupta, activist for global fight against human trafficking, about her work and introduces her novel, I Kick and I Fly. Click here to read.

A conversation with eminent Singaporean poet and academic, Kirpal Singh, about how his family migrated to Malaya and subsequently Singapore more than 120 years ago. Click here to read.

A brief overview of Rajat Chaudhuri’s Spellcasters and a discussion with the author on his book. Click here to read.

A review of and discussion with Rhys Hughes about his ‘Weird Western’, The Sunset Suite. Click here to read.

Categories
Contents

Borderless, December 2024

Art by Sohana Manzoor

Editorial

‘Footfalls Echo in the Memory’… Click here to read.

Translations

Jibananada Das’s Andhar Dekhecche, Tobu Ache (I have seen the dark and yet there is another) has been translated from Bengali by Professor Fakrul Alam. Click here to read.

Manish Ghatak’s Aagun taader Praan (Fire is their Life) has been translated from Bengali by Indrayudh Sinha. Click here to read.

Manzur Bismil’s poem, Stories, has been translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch. Click here to read.

Homecoming, a poem by Ihlwha Choi on his return from Santiniketan, has been translated from Korean by the poet himself. Click here to read.

Tagore’s Shotabdir Surjo Aji ( The Century’s Sun today) has been translated from Bengali by Mitali Chakravarty. Click here to read.

Poetry

Click on the names to read the poems

Michael R Burch, Farah Sheikh, George Freek, Rajiv Borra, Kelsey Walker, Lokenath Roy, Thompson Emate, Joy Anne O’Donnell, Jayant Kashyap, John Grey, Aman Alam, Stuart McFarlane, Ayesha Binte Islam, Ryan Quinn Flanagan, Saranyan BV, Rhys Hughes

Musings/ Slices from Life

Autumn in Hyderabad

Mohul Bhowmick muses on Hyderabad. Click here to read.

Straight Back Across the Strait

Meredith Stephens gives a vignette of life in South Australia with a sailing adventure built in. Click here to read.

My Patchwork Year

Keith Lyons muses on what 2024 meant for him. Click here to read.

Musings of a Copywriter

In Byline Fever, Devraj Singh Kalsi travels down the path of nostalgia. Click here to read.

Essays

Still to Moving Images

Ratnottama Sengupta explores artists who have turned to use the medium of films… artists like the legendary MF Husain. Click here to read.

How Dynamic was Ancient India?

Farouk Gulsara explores William Dalrymple’s latest book, The Golden Road: How Ancient India Transformed the World. Click here to read.

A Short, Winding, and Legendary Dhaka Road

Professor Fakrul Alam takes us on a historical journey of one of the most iconic roads of Dhaka, Fuller Road. Click here to read.

Stories

Significance

Naramsetti  Umamaheswararao creates a fable around a banyan tree and it’s fruit. Click here to read.

The Dance of Life

Snigdha Agrawal explores ageism. Click here to read.

The Unsuspecting Suspect

Paul Mirabile wraps his telling like a psychological thriller. Click here to read.

Conversations

Ratnottama Sengupta converses with Divya Dutta, an award-winning actress, who has authored two books recently, Stars in my Sky and Me and Ma. Click here to read.

Lara Geyla converses about her memoir, Camels of Kyzylkum, and her journey as an immigrant. Click here to read.

Book Excerpts

An excerpt from Thomas Bell’s Human Nature: A Walking History of the Himalayan Landscape. Click here to read.

An excerpt from Savi Naipaul Akal’s The Naipauls of Nepaul Street, a retelling of VS Naipaul’s heritage in Trinidad by his sister. Click here to read.

Book Reviews

Somdatta Mandal reviews Kusum Khemani’s Lavanyadevi, translated from Hindi by Banibrata Mahanta. Click here to read.

Aditi Yadav reviews Nanako Hanada’s The Bookshop Woman, translated from Japanese by Cat Anderson. Click here to read.

Jagari Mukherjee reviews Kiriti Sengupta’s poetry collection, Oneness. Click here to read.

Bhaskar Parichha reviews Noor Jahan Bose’s Daughter of The Agunmukha: A Bangla Life, translated from Bengali by Rebecca Whittington. Click here to read.

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Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International

Categories
Stories

Significance

By  Naramsetti  Umamaheswararao

From Public Domain

Once, while a bird was searching for food, it spotted a  berry under a banyan tree. As the bird grabbed the berry with its beak and flew, it slipped and fell. The place where the berry landed was a field next to a village. On the same day the berry fell, a strong storm brought rain, causing the soil to cover the berry.

Two days later, the berry rotted, and the seeds inside began to talk to each other.

One seed happily said, “We are alive thanks to our luck! Otherwise, we would have been digested in the bird’s stomach within a week.”

Another seed replied, “That’s true. If we had gone into the bird’s stomach, we would have died. We wouldn’t even have had the chance to talk like this.” The other seeds nodded in agreement.

After two more days, one seed sprouted. The sprouting seed excitedly jumped and said, “Look, everyone! I’ve sprouted!”

Seeing the sprout, the other seeds warned, “Pull that sprout back! If you grow, you will change your form and rise above the ground. You will face many hardships while growing. Sometimes, humans might uproot you. Other times, animals might trample or eat you. You must overcome all this to grow into a plant. If you grow, you need sufficient water. If you don’t get enough water, you will wither and die. You cannot endure all these hardships, so it’s better to remain as we are and enjoy our time together.”

The sprouting seed listened but did not respond or pull back its sprout. After a few days, the banyan plant emerged from the soil and began to grow. Its stem grew straight, branches spread out, and many leaves sprouted. Years passed, and it grew into a large tree.

To escape the heat, farmers and travelers rested in the shade of the banyan tree. Animals found shelter beneath it during the night and when it rained. Birds built nests on its branches. The banyan tree provided refuge to many, making the area lively.

Occasionally, indigenous doctors came to the banyan tree to collect its bark, leaves, and buds for medicinal use. Children played in the field, swinging joyfully on swings hung on the banyan tree. The banyan tree felt happy.

Many years went by. One day, a terrifying storm struck. Strong winds blew, and it rained heavily. Many trees were uprooted by the storm, and the banyan tree was among them. The people were deeply saddened by the fall of the banyan tree. The birds and animals living in its branches mourned silently.

After a few days, when the greenery of the banyan tree faded, villagers used axes to cut its branches and trunk for firewood. Everyone who carried the wood remarked, “It was useful even after it died.”

Meanwhile, the remaining seeds in the ground, which had stayed behind selfishly, felt happy hearing their sibling’s praises but were also ashamed. One seed said, “We all made a grave mistake. We remained as we were and couldn’t help anyone. We didn’t do anything worthy of remembrance. Every life should have significance, but our life has been wasted. Although we had a great opportunity to be born, we squandered it. Our sibling, however, did something good. Even in death, it lives on in the hearts and homes of people. Our sibling’s legacy uncovered the true significance of life.”

Hearing this, another banyan seed replied, “Some people also live cowardly lives. They continue to make the same mistake we did. They waste their lives, not realising that a life dedicated to helping others brings true satisfaction. If we understand that helping others leads to everlasting fame and support one another, it would be much better.”

The banyan seeds lamented, “We cannot bring back what has passed, so this is all we have in this life.”

Banyan Berries: Fom Public Domain

Naramsetti Umamaheswararao has written more than a thousand stories, songs, and novels for children over 42 years. he has published 32 books. His novel, Anandalokam, received the Central Sahitya Akademi Award for children’s literature. He has received numerous awards and honours, including the Andhra Pradesh Government’s Distinguished Telugu Language Award and the Pratibha Award from Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University. He established the Naramshetty Children’s Literature Foundation and has been actively promoting children’s literature as its president.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International

Categories
Contents

Borderless, November 2024

Art by Sohana Manzoor

Editorial

Clinging to Hope…Click here to read.

Translations

Nazrul’s Tumi Shundor Tai Cheye Thaki (Because you are so beautiful, I keep looking at you) has been translated from Bengali by Professor Fakrul Alam. Click here to read.

Hotel Acapulco, has been composed and translated from Italian by Ivan Pozzoni. Click here to read.

On the Reserved Seat of the Subway, a poem by Ihlwha Choi, has been translated from Korean by the poet himself. Click here to read.

Tagore’s Phul Photano (Making Flowers Bloom) has been translated from Bengali by Mitali Chakravarty. Click here to read.

Poetry

Click on the names to read the poems

Michael R Burch, Jahanara Tariq, Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal, Shahalam Tariq, Stuart McFarlane, Saranyan BV, George Freek, G Javaid Rasool, Heath Brougher, Vidya Hariharan, Paul Mirabile, Ananya Sarkar, Ryan Quinn Flanagan, Pulkita Anand, Rhys Hughes

Musings/Slices from Life

Pinecones and Pinky Promises

Luke Rimmo Minkeng Lego writes of mists and cloudy remembrances in Shillong. Click here to read.

Elusive XLs

Shobha Sriram muses on weight management. Click here to read.

The Eternal Sleep of Kumbhakarna

Farouk Gulsara pays a tribute to a doctor and a friend. Click here to read.

Musings of a Copywriter

In Becoming a ‘Plain’ Writer, Devraj Singh Kalsi explores the world of writer’s retreats on hills with a touch of irony. Click here to read.

Notes from Japan

In Educating for Peace in Rwanda, Suzanne Kamata discusses the peace initiatives following the terrors of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide while traveling within the country with her university colleague and students. Click here to read.

Essays

The Year of Living Dangerously

Professor Fakrul Alam takes us back to the birth of Bangladesh. Click here to read.

Deconstructing Happiness

Abdullah Rayhan analyses the concept of happiness. Click here to read.

More Frequent Cyclones to Impact Odisha

Bijoy K Mishra writes of cyclones in Odisha, while discussing Bhaskar Parichha’s Cyclones in Odisha – Landfall, Wreckage and Resilience. Click here to read.

Stories

Hotel du Commerce

Paul Mirabile gives a vignette of life in Paris in the 1970s. Click here to read.

Chintu’s Big Heart

Naramsetti Umamaheswararao gives a value-based story about a child. Click here to read.

Headless Horses

Anna Moon relates a story set in rural Philippines. Click here to read.

A Penguin’s Story

Sreelekha Chatterjee writes a story from a penguin’s perspective. Click here to read.

Phantom Pain

Lakshmi Kannan writes of human nature. Click here to read.

Conversations

A conversation with Dutch author, Mineke Schipper, with focus of her recent book Widows: A Global History. Click here to read.

Ratnottama Sengupta converses with Veena Raman, wife of the late Vijay Raman, an IPS officer who authored, Did I Really Do All This: Memoirs of a Gentleman Cop Who Dared to be Different. Click here to read.

Book Excerpts

An excerpt from Vijay Raman’s Did I Really Do All This: Memoirs of a Gentleman Cop Who Dared to be Different. Click here to read.

An excerpt from Rhys Hughes’ Growl at the Moon, a Weird Western. Click here to read.

Book Reviews

Somdatta Mandal reviews The Collected Short Stories of Kazi Nazrul Islam, translated by multiple translators from Bengali and edited by Syed Manzoorul Islam and Kaustav Chakraborty. Click here to read.

Rakhi Dalal reviews The Long Strider in Jehangir’s Hindustan: In the Footsteps of the Englishman Who Walked From England to India in the Year 1613 by Dom Moraes and Sarayu Srivatsa. Click here to read.

Bhaskar Parichha reviews Mohammad Tarbush’s My Palestine: An Impossible Exile. Click here to read.

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Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International

Categories
Editorial

Clinging to Hope

‘I will cling fast to hope.‘

— Suzanne Kamata, ‘Educating for Peace in Rwanda’

Landscape of Change by Jill Pelto, Smithsonian. From Public Domain

Hope is the mantra for all human existence. We hope for a better future, for love, for peace, for good weather, for abundance. When that abundance is an abundance of harsh weather or violence wrought by wars, we hope for calm and peace.

This is the season for cyclones — Dana, Trami, Yixing, Hurricanes Milton and Helene — to name a few that left their imprint with the destruction of both property and human lives as did the floods in Spain while wars continue to annihilate more lives and constructs. That we need peace to work out how to adapt to climate change is an issue that warmongers seem to have overlooked. We have to figure out how we can work around losing landmasses and lives to intermittent floods caused by tidal waves, landslides like the one in Wayanad and rising temperatures due to the loss of ice cover. The loss of the white cover of ice leads to more absorption of heat as the melting water is deeper in colour. Such phenomena could affect the availability of potable water and food, impacted by the changes in flora and fauna as a result of altered temperatures and weather patterns. An influx of climate refugees too is likely in places that continue habitable. Do we need to find ways of accommodating these people? Do we need to redefine our constructs to face the crises?

Echoing concerns for action to adapt to climate change and hoping for peace, our current issue shimmers with vibrancy of shades while weaving in personal narratives of life, living and the process of changing to adapt.

An essay on Bhaskar Parichha’s recent book on climate change highlights the action that is needed in the area where Dana made landfall recently. In terms of preparedness things have improved, as Bijoy K Mishra contends in his essay. But more action is needed. Denying climate change or thinking of going back to pre-climate change era is not an option for humanity anymore. While politics often ignores the need to acknowledge this crises and divides destroying with wars, riots and angst, a narrative for peace is woven by some countries like Japan and Rwanda.

Suzanne Kamata recently visited Rwanda. She writes about how she found by educating people about the genocide of 1994, the locals have found a way to live in peace with people who they addressed as their enemies before… as have the future generations of Japan by remembering the atomic holocausts of 1945.

Writing about an event which wrought danger into the lives of common people in South Asia is Professor Fakrul Alam’s essay on the 1971 conflict between the countries that were carved out of the 1947 Partition of the Indian subcontinent. As if an antithesis to this narrative of divides that destroyed lives, Luke Rimmo Minkeng Lego muses about peace and calm in Shillong which leaves a lingering fragrance of heartfelt friendships. Farouk Gulsara muses on nostalgic friendships and twists of fate that compel one to face mortality. Abdullah Rayhan ponders about happiness and Shobha Sriram, with a pinch of humour, adapts to changes. Devraj Singh Kalsi writes satirically of current norms aiming for a change in outlook.

Humour is brought into poetry by Rhys Hughes who writes about a photograph of a sign that can be interpreted in ways more than one. Michael Burch travels down the path of nostalgia as Ryan Quinn Flanagan shares a poem inspired by Pablo Neruda’s bird poems. Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal writes heart wrenching verses about the harshness of winter for the homeless without shelter. We have more colours in poetry woven by Jahanara Tariq, Stuart MacFarlane, Saranyan BV, George Freek, G Javaid Rasool, Heath Brougher and more.

In translations, we have poetry from varied countries. Ihlwha Choi has self-translated his poem from Korean. Ivan Pozzoni has done the same from Italian. One of Tagore’s lesser-known verses, perhaps influenced by the findings of sensitivity in plants by his contemporary, Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858-1937) to who he dedicated the collection which homed this poem, Phool Photano (making flowers bloom), has been translated from Bengali. Professor Alam has translated Nazrul’s popular song, Tumi Shundor Tai Cheye Thaki (Because you are so beautiful, I keep gazing at you).

In reviews, Somdatta Mandal has discussed The Collected Short Stories of Kazi Nazrul Islam, translated by multiple translators from Bengali and edited by Syed Manzoorul Islam and Kaustav Chakraborty. Rakhi Dalal has written about The Long Strider in Jehangir’s Hindustan: In the Footsteps of the Englishman Who Walked From England to India in the Year 1613 by Dom Moraes and Sarayu Srivatsa, a book that looks and compares the past with the present. Bhaskar Parichha has written of a memoir which showcases not just the personal but gives a political and economic commentary on tumultuous events that shaped the history of Israel, Palestine, and the modern Middle East prior to the more than a year-old conflict. The book by the late Mohammad Tarbush (1948-2022) is called My Palestine: An Impossible Exile.

Stories travel around the world with Paul Mirabile’s narrative giving a flavour of bohemian Paris in 1974. Anna Moon’s fiction set in Philippines gives a darker perspective of life. Lakshmi Kannan’s narrative hovers around the 2008 bombing in Mumbai, an event that evoked much anger, violence and created hatred in hearts. In contrast, Naramsetti Umamaheswararao brings a sense of warmth into our lives with a story about a child and his love for a dog. Sreelekha Chatterjee weaves a tale of change, showcasing adapting to climate crisis from a penguin’s perspective.

Hoping to change mindsets with education, Mineke Schipper has a collection of essays called Widows: A Global History, which has been introduced along with a discussion with the author on how we can hope for a more equitable world. The other conversation by Ratnottama Sengupta with Veena Raman, wife of the late Vijay Raman, a police officer who authored, Did I Really Do All This: Memoirs of a Gentleman Cop Who Dared to be Different, showcases a life given to serving justice. Raman was an officer who caught dacoits like Paan Singh Tomar and the Indian legendary dacoit queen, Phoolan Devi. An excerpt from his memoir accompanies the conversation. The other book excerpt is from an extremely out of the box book, Rhys Hughes’ Growl at the Moon, a Weird Western.

Trying something new, being out of the box is what helped humans move out from caves, invent wheels and create civilisations. Hopefully, this is what will help us move into the next phase of human development where wars and weapons will become redundant, and we will be able to adapt to changing climes and move towards a kinder, more compassionate existence.

Thank you all for pitching in with your fabulous pieces. There are ones that have not been covered here. Do pause by our content’s page to see all our content. Huge thanks to the fantastic Borderless team and to Sohana Manzoor, for her art too.

Hope you enjoy our fare!

Mitali Chakravarty

borderlessjournal.com

Click here to access the  content’s page for the November 2024 Issue

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READ THE LATEST UPDATES ON THE FIRST BORDERLESS ANTHOLOGY, MONALISA NO LONGER SMILES, BY CLICKING ON THIS LINK.

Categories
Stories

Chintu’s Big Heart

By  Naramsetti Umamaheswararao

Chintu, a fifth-grader, was known for his intelligence beyond his years. Every day, he walked a mile to school by himself. When his parents offered to accompany him, he confidently replied, “I can go by myself. I’m grown up now.” Since their village, Seethanagaram, was a small town, there wasn’t much fear of children being abducted or harmed, so his parents didn’t object.

One day, Chintu woke up early and set out for school earlier than usual. He packed a small spade, a water bottle, and his books into his schoolbag and slung it over his shoulder.

His mother, who had been observing him, asked, “Why are you leaving so early? There’s still time for school.”

“I have some work, mother. I’ll tell you when I come back,” Chintu replied.

On his way to school, Chintu spotted some discarded mango seeds. He carefully picked out the good ones and walked a little further from the road. Using his small spade, he dug holes and buried the seeds. Then, he poured some water from his bottle over them.

As Chintu was about to leave, an old beggar woman sitting under a nearby tree called out, “Come here, boy.”

Chintu approached her and greeted her politely.

“I saw you planting those seeds. That’s a good deed. But who will water them every day?” she asked.

“I pass this way to school every day. I will water them,” Chintu replied.

While talking to the old woman, Chintu noticed she looked weak and was coughing frequently. Concerned, he asked, “Do you have a fever? Have you eaten anything?”

“I don’t have the strength to move. I haven’t gone anywhere and haven’t eaten anything either,” the old woman replied.

“Oh no, that’s not good,” said Chintu, opening his lunch box and offering her some food.

The old woman hesitated. “You’ll be hungry in school. Don’t worry about me, son. I’m used to this.”

“Don’t worry about me. My friends will share their food with me,” Chintu reassured her. He then gave her water to drink and asked some passersby to help take her to the hospital before heading to school.

After school, on his way back home, Chintu saw a small puppy being chased by a big dog. The puppy, terrified, ran in search of shelter, letting out pitiful cries. It squeezed through the gate of a house, but the house dog barked at it, causing it to retreat. The puppy then ran into an alley, where a pig scared it further. Not knowing what to do, the puppy let out a helpless whimper.

Seeing the puppy in distress, Chintu took out his spade and used it to chase away the big dog. He picked up the trembling puppy and comforted it, saying, “Don’t be scared. I chased it away.”

Just then, a woman from the house across the street came outside and noticed the puppy in Chintu’s arms. “Its mother died in an accident while crossing the road. You can take it home if you want to raise it,” she said.

Without a second thought, Chintu took the puppy home.

When Chintu’s mother saw him with the puppy, she frowned. “Why did you bring a puppy home? It will make a mess everywhere. Leave it where you found it.”

“Poor thing… its mother died, and a big dog and a pig were chasing it. It was so frightened. Let’s take care of it for a while. We can let it go later. First, give it some food and milk,” Chintu pleaded.

“You seem to be taking on more responsibilities than necessary. You should be focusing on school, not trying to act like a grown-up,” his mother scolded.

“But if everyone thought that way, who would help those in need? Grown-ups can’t always do everything, and if kids aren’t allowed to help either, then who will assist those in trouble? Remember when you asked me this morning where I was going early? Let me explain now. I heard my teacher say that many people throw away mango seeds after eating the fruit. He said they shouldn’t go to waste. So, I buried some seeds by the roadside, and I’ll water them every day. There was an old woman with a fever under a tree. I gave her my lunch, and she was so happy. She blessed me,” Chintu said, his eyes wide with excitement.

“Is that so? You did a good thing. Keep helping others whenever you can. I’ll get some food for the puppy. Don’t worry about it. We’ll take care of it for a while and then find it a good home,” his mother said kindly.

“Let’s do that. I didn’t tell you this morning because I thought you might scold me. But now I know you’re kind-hearted and will understand. From now on, I’ll tell you everything I plan to do,” Chintu promised.

“You’re my precious child,” his mother said, hugging him lovingly.

From Public Domain

Naramsetti Umamaheswararao has written more than a thousand stories, songs, and novels for children over 42 years. he has published 32 books. His novel, Anandalokam, received the Central Sahitya Akademi Award for children’s literature. He has received numerous awards and honours, including the Andhra Pradesh Government’s Distinguished Telugu Language Award and the Pratibha Award from Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University. He established the Naramshetty Children’s Literature Foundation and has been actively promoting children’s literature as its president.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International

Categories
Editorial

Where Are Those Happy Days?

From Public Domain

Festivals are like friends.

They bring hope, solace and love to those who believe in them. But, when the structures holding the fiestas in place start to crumble, what do we do then?

Our lives have moved out of wilderness to cities over centuries. Now, we have covered our world with the gloss of technology which our ancestors living in caves would have probably viewed as magic. And yet we violate the dignity of our own kind, war and kill, destroy what we built in the past. The ideological structures seem ineffective in instilling love, peace, compassion or hope in the hearts of the majority. Suddenly, we seem to be caving in to violence that destroys humanity, our own kind, and not meting out justice to those who mutilate, violate or kill. Will there be an end to this bleak phase? Perhaps, as Tagore says in his lyrics[1], “From the fount of darkness emerges light”. Nazrul has gone a step further and stated clearly[2], “Hair dishevelled and dressed carelessly/ Destruction makes its way gleefully. / Confident it can destroy and then build again …Why fear since destruction and creation are part of the same game?”

And yet, destruction hurts humans. It kills. Maims. Reduces to rubble. Can we get back the people whose lives are lost while destruction holds sway? We have lost lives this year in various wars and conflicts. As a tribute to all the young lives lost in Bangladesh this July, we have a poem by Shahin Hossain. Afsar Mohammad has brought in the theme of festivals into poetry tying it to the current events around the world. In keeping with the times, Michael Burch has a sense of mirthlessness in his poems. Colours of emotions and life have been woven into this section by Malashri Lal, Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal, Fhen M, Shamik Banerjee, George Freek, Matthew James Friday, Jenny Middleton and many more. This section in our journal always homes a variety of flavours. Stuart MacFarlane has poems for Wordsworth… and some of it is funny, like Rhys Hughes’ poem based on photographs of amusing signposts. But then life has both sorrows and laughter, and poetry is but a slice of that as are other genres. We do have non-fiction in a lighter vein with Hughes’ story and poem about pizzas. Devraj Singh Kalsi has given a tongue in cheek narrative about his library experiences.

Suzanne Kamata has written for us about her visit to Rwanda. Farouk Gulsara has pondered over humanity’s natural proclivities.  Wiccan lore has been discussed by Rajorshi Patranabis. And Snigdha Agrawal has tuned into humour with her rendition of animal antics that overran festivities. Ravi Shankar, on the other hand, has written about the syncretic nature of festivals in Kerala. Professor Fakrul Alam has given a nostalgic recap of Durga Puja during his childhood, a festival recognised as an “Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity” by UNESCO, and known for its syncretic traditions where people from all backgrounds, religions and cultures celebrate together.

Festivals have also been taken up in fiction by Tanika Rajeswari V with a ghostly presence hovering over the arrangements. Paul Mirabile has taken us around the world with his story while Saeed Ibrahim writes from his armchair by the Arabian sea. Sahitya Akademi winner for his children’s stories, Naramsetti Umamaheswara Rao, has showcased peer pressure among youngsters in his narrative.  

Two stories have also featured in our translations. Christine C Fair has rendered Veena Verma’s Punjabi story about an illegal immigrant into English. Hinting at climate concerns, Sharaf Shad’s fiction, has been translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch. Tagore’s powerful poem on Africa has been brought to Anglophone readers by Debali Mookerjea-Leonard as well as his inspiring lyrics, Andhokaarer Utso Hote (From the Fount of Darkness), by our team. Nazrul’s vibrant lyrics, Shukno Patar Nupur Paye (With Ankle Bells of Dried Leaves), has been rendered into English from Bengali by Professor Alam.

Our reviews explore immigrant stories in fiction with Somdatta Mandal reviewing Ammar Kalia’s A Person Is a Prayer. Bhaskar Pariccha has written about Selected Works of Vyasa Kavi Fakir Mohan Senapati, edited by Monica Das. Fakir Mohan is a legendary writer from Odisha. Meenakshi Malhotra has discussed a book on another legend, Safdar Hashmi, one of the greatest names in street theatre in India. The book is by Anjum Katyal and called, Safdar Hashmi: Towards Theatre for a Democracy.

Our book excerpts usher good cheer with a narrative by Ruskin Bond from Let’s Be Best Friends Forever: Beautiful Stories of Friendship. And also hope with a refugee’s story from Ukraine, which travels through deserts, Italy and beyond to US and has a seemingly happier outcome than most, Lara Gelya’s Camel from Kyzylkum. This issue’s conversations take us around the world with Keith Lyons interviewing Lya Badgley, who has crossed continents to live and write. Malashri Lal, the other interviewee, is an academic and writer with sixteen books under her belt. She travels through the world with her poetry in Mandalas of Time.

Huge thanks to the Borderless team for putting this issue together – the last-minute ties – and the art from Sohana Manzoor. Without all this, the edition would look different. Heartfelt thanks to our contributors without whose timely submissions, we would not have a journal. And most of all we thank our readers – we are because you are – thank you for reading our journal.  As all our content, despite being indispensable, could not be mentioned here, do pause by our content’s page for this issue.

We wish you a wonderful month!

Cheers,

Mitali Chakravarty

borderlessjournal.com

[1] Tagore’s Andhokaarer Utso Hote (From the Fount of Darkness)

[2] Nazrul’s Proloyullash translated by Professor Alam as The Frenzy of Destruction

Click here to access the content’s page for the October 2024 Issue.

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READ THE LATEST UPDATES ON THE FIRST BORDERLESS ANTHOLOGY, MONALISA NO LONGER SMILES, BY CLICKING ON THIS LINK.

Categories
Stories

The Mango Thief

By Naramsetti Umamaheswara Rao

Ricky was a boy known for his mischievous nature. Though he was in the eighth grade, he had the sharpness and boldness of someone older. Ricky rarely attended school, preferring instead to roam around the fields beside the road, cutting sugarcane and plucking groundnuts, causing damage to the crops.

In his class, there was a bright and studious boy named Anand. Ricky thought it would be advantageous to befriend Anand to get his notes. The next day, Ricky brought some guavas he had stolen and offered them to Anand, saying, “These are from our orchard. They’re very sweet; take them.” Although Anand initially refused, Ricky insisted and placed the fruits in his hands, and Anand, not wanting to seem rude, reluctantly accepted them.

Over the following days, Ricky brought sugarcane and groundnuts, further solidifying their friendship. Ricky began inviting Anand to accompany him when he went out, and Anand, hesitant to refuse, would often join him. Their classmates noticed this and warned Anand, saying, “Don’t hang out with him. Being with him could get you into trouble.”

But Anand dismissed their concerns, thinking, “I’m a good person, so nothing bad will happen to me. Maybe Ricky will change for the better.”

One day after school, as they were walking home, Ricky suggested they enter a mango orchard along the way. Anand hesitated, knowing it was wrong, but Ricky was persistent. Ignoring Anand’s reluctance, Ricky said, “If you’re so scared, stay here. I’ll go in alone.” Ricky then climbed over the fence, entered the orchard and began plucking ripe mangoes, stuffing them into his school bag.

What Ricky didn’t know was that the orchard’s caretaker had been keeping a close watch. He was already angry about frequent thefts and was determined to catch the thief red-handed. Seeing Ricky pluck the mangoes, the caretaker approached the tree with a stick in hand and shouted, “Hey, you little thief! Come down! I’ll teach you a lesson!”

Ricky, momentarily startled, quickly regained his composure. He was used to such situations. “What can you do?” Ricky challenged, “You’re all alone, and there are two of us. We could easily overpower you, and no one would know.”

The caretaker, growing more furious, demanded, “Where’s the other one?”

Ricky pointed towards Anand, who was outside the fence, and said, “He’s waiting over there, keeping an eye out for me.” The caretaker, not seeing clearly, took a couple of steps to get a better view and thought he spotted someone. But when he turned back to the tree, Ricky had already jumped down and escaped.

The caretaker, enraged, thought, “Not only does this kid steal, but he also dares to threaten me?” He chased after Ricky but couldn’t catch him. Frustrated, he decided to catch the other boy instead, thinking it would lead him to Ricky later.

Ricky saw the caretaker running towards Anand but chose not to warn him.

Anand, seeing the caretaker approaching, remained calm, thinking, “Why should I be afraid? I haven’t done anything wrong.”

But as soon as the caretaker reached him, he grabbed Anand’s hair and began hitting him on the back. “Why are you hitting me? What have I done? I didn’t even enter your orchard,” Anand cried.

The caretaker slapped him twice and said, “You dare ask what you did? No shame? You came here to steal, sent your friend inside, and stayed outside to keep watch? Come with me, I’ll tie you to the tree. You two have been stealing my mangoes every day. I won’t release you until my boss arrives,” he said, dragging Anand inside the orchard.

Despite Anand’s protests and pleas of innocence, the caretaker refused to listen and tied him to a tree.

Passersby noticed Anand tied to the tree and, shocked by the sight, informed his parents. They came and freed him, explaining the situation to the villagers. Anand insisted that he hadn’t done anything wrong.

The villagers scolded him, saying, “Your mistake was befriending a bad boy. What else did you expect?”

Regretful, Anand lamented, “Despite my friends’ warnings, I knowingly continued my friendship with Ricky. I’ve learned my lesson. I won’t make this mistake again.”

Naramsetti Umamaheswararao has written more than a thousand stories, songs, and novels for children over 42 years. he has published 32 books. His novel, Anandalokam, received the Central Sahitya Akademi Award for children’s literature. He has received numerous awards and honours, including the Andhra Pradesh Government’s Distinguished Telugu Language Award and the Pratibha Award from Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University. He established the Naramshetty Children’s Literature Foundation and has been actively promoting children’s literature as its president.

.

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International

Categories
Editorial

And Wilderness is Paradise Enow…

Prayer Wheel at Nurulia, Ladakh. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
We lock eyes, find glimmers
of smiles, trust our leaders.
We break bread with strangers
because there aren’t any.

--Imagine by Miriam Bassuk

Imagine the world envisioned by John Lennon. Imagine the world envisioned and partly materialised by Tagore in his pet twin projects of Santiniketan and Sriniketan, training institutes made with the intent of moving towards creating a work force that would dedicate their lives to human weal, to closing social gaps borne of human constructs and to uplifting the less privileged by educating them and giving them the means to earn a livelihood. You might well call these people visionaries and utopian dreamers, but were they? Tagore had hoped to inspire with his model institutions.  In 1939, he wrote in a letter: “My path, as you know, lies in the domain of quiet integral action and thought, my units must be few and small, and I can but face human problems in relation to some basic village or cultural area. So, in the midst of worldwide anguish, and with the problems of over three hundred millions staring us in the face, I stick to my work in Santiniketan and Sriniketan hoping that my efforts will touch the heart of our village neighbours and help them in reasserting themselves in a new social order. If we can give a start to a few villages, they would perhaps be an inspiration to some others—and my life work will have been done.”  But did we really have a new social order or try to emulate him?

If we had acted out of compassion and kindness towards redefining with a new social order, as Miriam Bassuk points out in her poem based on Lennon’s lyrics of Imagine, there would be no strangers. We’d all be friends living in harmony and creating a world with compassion, kindness, love and tolerance. We would not have wars or regional geopolitical tensions which act against human weal. Perhaps, we would not have had the issues of war of climate change take on the proportions that are wrecking our own constructs.

Natural disasters, floods, fires, landslides have affected many of our lives. Bringing us close to such a disaster is an essay by Salma A Shafi at ground level in Noakhali. More than 4.5 million were affected and 71 died in this disaster. Another 23 died in the same spate of floods in Tripura with 65,000 affected. We are looking at a single region here, but such disasters seem to be becoming more frequent. And yet. there had been a time when Noakhali was an idyllic vacation spot as reflected in Professor Fakrul Alam’s nostalgic essay, filled with memories of love, green outdoors and kindnesses. Such emotions reverberate in Ravi Shankar’s account of his medical adventures in the highlands of Kerala, a state that suffered a stupendous landslide last month. While Shafi shows how extreme rainfall can cause disasters, Keith Lyons writes of water, whose waves in oceanic form lap landmasses like bridges. He finds a microcosm of the whole world in a swimming pool as migrants find their way to New Zealand too. Farouk Gulsara muses on kindness and caregiving while Priyanka Panwar ponders about ordinary days. Saeed Ibrahim gives a literary twist to our musings.   Tongue in cheek humour is woven into our nonfiction section by Suzanne Kamata’s notes from Japan, Devraj Singh Kalsi’s piece on premature greying and Uday Deshwal’s paean to his sunglasses!

Humour is wrought into poetry by Rhys Hughes. Supriya Javelkar and Shamik Banerjee have cheeky poems that make you smile. We have poetry on love by Michael Burch and poetry for Dylan Thomas by Ryan Quinn Flanagan. Miriam Bassuk has described a Utopian world… but very much in the spirit of our journal. Variety is brought into our journal with poetry from Jackie Kabir, Jennifer McCormack, Craig Kirchner, Stuart MacFarlane, George Freek, Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal and many more.

In translations, we have Nazrul lyrics transcreated from Bengali by Professor Alam and poetry from Korean by Ihlwha Choi. We pay our respects to an eminent Balochi poet who passed on exactly a year ago, Mubarak Qazi, by carrying a translation by Fazal Baloch. Tagore’s Suprobhat (Good morning) has been rendered in English from Bengali. His descriptions of the morning are layered and amazing — with a hint of the need to reconstruct our world, very relevant even today.  A powerful essay by Tagore called Raja O Praja (The King and His Subjects), has been translated by Himadri Lahiri.

Our fiction hosts two narratives that centre around childhood, one by Naramsetti Umamaheswararao and another by G Venkatesh, though with very different approaches. Mahila Iqbal relates a poignant tale about aging, mental health and neglect, the very antithesis of Gulsara’s musing. Paul Mirabile has given a strange story about a ‘useless idler’.

A short story collection has been reviewed by Rakhi Dalal, Swadesh Deepak’s A Bouquet of Dead Flowers, translated from Hindi by Jerry Pinto, Pratik Kanjilal, Nirupama Dutt, Sukant Deepak. Somdatta Mandal has written about a book by a Kashmiri immigrant which is part based on lived experiences and part fictive, Karan Mujoo’s This Our Paradise: A Novel. Bhaskar Parichha has reviewed Ayurveda, Nation and Society: United Provinces, c. 1890–1950 by Saurav Kumar Rai, a book which shows how healthcare was even a hundred years ago, politicised. Meenakshi Malhotra has reviewed Anuradha Marwah’s novel, Aunties of Vasant Kunj, of which we also have an excerpt. The other excerpt is from Mineke Schipper’s Widows: A Global History. Ratnottama Sengupta converses with Reba Som, author of Hop, Skip and Jump; Peregrinations of a Diplomat’s Wife.

We have more content that adds to the vibrancy of the issue. Do pause by this issue and take a look. This issue would not have been possible without all your writings. Thank you for that. Huge thanks to our readers and our team, without whose support we could not have come this far. I would especially like to thank Sohana Manzoor for her continued supply of her fabulous and distinctive artwork and Gulsara for his fabulous photographs.

Let us look forward to a festive season which awakens each autumn and stretches to winter. May we in this season find love, compassion and kindness in our hearts towards our whole human family.

Have a wonderful month!

Mitali Chakravarty

borderlessjournal.com

Click here to access the content’s page for the September 2024 Issue.

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READ THE LATEST UPDATES ON THE FIRST BORDERLESS ANTHOLOGY, MONALISA NO LONGER SMILES, BY CLICKING ON THIS LINK.

Categories
Stories

Imitation

By Naramsetti Uma Maheswara Rao

Public Domain

“Mom, if you stick this on your head, your splitting head will heal. Here, take it and stick it on,” said four-year-old Ravi, handing over a roll of round plaster.

“Who told you to stick this for a headache?” Rajani asked in surprise, not quite understanding what he meant.

“Earlier, you told the neighbour aunty that your head was splitting. That’s why I brought it. Whenever something in the house tears, Dad sticks it with this. You should stick it on your head so it doesn’t split,” Ravi replied innocently.

Rajani laughed at her son’s sweet words. As a festival was on in the village, Rajani had invited her parents, siblings, and their families to her home. With everyone staying at her house, her daily chores had increased. Even though she woke up at dawn to start working, she couldn’t finish everything. Just then, the neighbour had come asking for a loan of some sesame oil.

“No matter how much I do, the work never ends. My hands are hurting, and my head is splitting,” Rajani had told the neighbour.

Ravi heard these words, and to help his mom, he brought the plaster his dad used to stick his brother’s torn books. He told his mother to stick it on her head to ease her headache. Now, Rajani understood the situation and laughed at her son’s cleverness.

“Why are you laughing? Won’t the headache go away if you stick this?” Ravi asked innocently again.

“You don’t stick plaster for a splitting head. A splitting head means I have a headache. If I apply Amrutanjan[1], it will go away,” Rajani explained in a way he could understand.

Rajani shared the incident with the rest of the family, and they all had a good laugh. 

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That afternoon, the family sat down for lunch. Rajani served a curry made with chicken eggs to everyone.

“What is this?” Ravi asked. Rajani replied that it was a chicken egg.

“I want a donkey egg,” he said.

At first, Rajani didn’t understand what he meant. Everyone else also looked at Ravi with interest.

“There’s no such thing as a donkey egg. There are chicken eggs and duck eggs,” his grandmother tried to explain to Ravi.

“No, there is. I want that one,” Ravi insisted, starting to cry. No matter how much they tried to explain, he didn’t stop crying.

Ravi’s father suspected that someone must have mentioned it, as kids don’t come up with these things on their own. He took Ravi close and gently asked, “Who told you about a donkey egg? Tell me, and I’ll ask them to bring it for you.”

Hearing this, Ravi’s face lit up, and he pointed to his grandfather.

Everyone’s attention turned to the grandfather. “Did you tell him about it? Is there such a thing as a donkey egg?” everyone questioned him.

“Hold on! Why would I tell him that? Give me a moment to think,” the grandfather replied, trying to recall the incident. After some thinking, he remembered something.

That morning, one of the workers had done a job incorrectly, and in anger, the grandfather had said, “Is this how you do it? This is not a donkey egg!” Ravi, who was sitting on his grandfather’s lap at that time, heard these words. He had asked what a donkey egg was, but his grandfather, in his irritation, didn’t respond.

After learning the real story from the grandfather, the rest of the family laughed. Ravi’s father lovingly explained to Ravi that there’s no such thing as a donkey egg and that it was just an expression his grandfather used. It took some convincing, but eventually, Ravi understood.

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Ravi also had an elder brother named Ramu, who was eight years old. Whenever Ramu came home from school, he and Ravi would fight over something or the other.

One day, as soon as they returned from school, they fought over the TV remote, leaving Rajani, already exhausted from housework, feeling more frustrated.

“I told you to change out of your school uniforms and wash your hands and feet when you come home. I’ve kept snacks on the table. Instead of eating, why are you fighting? Behave, or I’ll smack you with a hot spatula,” Rajani said.

“Mom, I want that. Don’t give it to my brother. Spank me now,” Ravi cried, running to his mom.

“What did you understand? Do you know what a spank is?” Rajani asked, calming down.

“Oh, I know. It’s a hot pancake. I’m hungry. Please spank me quickly,” Ravi said innocently. Hearing his sweet words, Rajani’s frustration disappeared, and she laughed wholeheartedly.

She kissed Ravi on his cheek and said, “Wait. I’ll get you the snacks,” and ran to the kitchen.

Rajani realised, “We shouldn’t use such words in front of children. They can misunderstand and repeat them in front of others, causing embarrassment.” From that day on, she learned to be cautious with her words around Ravi.

[1] Balm for healing headache

Naramsetti Umamaheswararao has written more than a thousand stories, songs, and novels for children over 42 years. he has published 32 books. His novel, Anandalokam, received the Central Sahitya Akademi Award for children’s literature. He has received numerous awards and honours, including the Andhra Pradesh Government’s Distinguished Telugu Language Award and the Pratibha Award from Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University. He established the Naramshetty Children’s Literature Foundation and has been actively promoting children’s literature as its president.

.

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International