Rain and Deathless Love

It rained through the night, thunder growling romantically in the distance. This morning there was only a drizzle, which is dying away now, but the sky is a promising grey. The garden is burgeoning, drenched. When I came down I heard a hollow gurgling from the kitchen-side windows, and went out and opened the screened well-cover. A steady stream of water was pouring in from the rain-water harvesting system, which the government decreed in August should be installed in every building in Chennai. It's not very sophisticated: drainpipes from the roof-terraces - almost all roofs are flat here - are channelled into the well. Drainpipes that are farther from the well go directly into the ground, through so-called percolation pits - lengths of perforated pipe filled with gravel. It's only the second time since we installed the system that there has been enough rain to harvest.

We saw a classic film on TV: Amar Prem ('Deathless Love') (1971). The hero, Rajesh Khanna, became a terrible ham, but he was very beautiful in his heyday, as was his co-star, Sharmila Tagore.

Rajesh Khanna and Sharmila Tagore in Amar Prem

And because it was a re-make of a Bengali film, they wear Bengali clothes, which make the wearer look dignified, substantial.

Rajesh Khanna is a good man driven by a bad wife to drink and visit a prostitute, Sharmila Tagore. She is not a realistic prostitute, but a courtesan, a prominent figure in Indian literature. She is a tragic figure, and the film is full of rona-dhona, 'weeping and wailing.' In fact, I find the second half unwatchable. But it is full of wonderful songs. The MP3s of two songs from Amar Prem - Chingari Koi Bhadke and Kuch to Log Kahenge -- are available for downloading here. Lyrics to the songs are here.

My favourite song, Yeh kya hua, 'What happened?' includes this verse:

What's the use of complaining
that my heart broke?
It was a toy made of glass -
something was bound to happen to it...