Ta dhin dhit ta dhin...
I was a 6 year old child when I felt the call of wild freedom entering my body with a loud sound of a drum played by a black skinned shaman dancing in a jungle of my childhood just outside the middle-class window of security and order. My face against a cold glass and fear in my mother's heart. Did she feel then that this sound shall accompany me throughout my life?
Dha Tete Tha tete...
I was eleven. 34'51N 5'44E Biskra. Algeria. Africa.
He was a boy who had nothing and having nothing is the most precious possession of those who dare to dream. And so he would often dream to the rhythmic sounds that his fingers produced on a huge metal can that would keep upside down by the wall of the house facing my window. Did you know that sounds can sometimes speak more than words? Did you know that the innocence of childhood nurtures your being more than language you speak? Everyday I would wait for the magic concert below my window. Every day we would roam around happily in our small oasis of freedom and integrity. One day a boy drew a sparrow and said it reminded him of me. And the next day he gave me a drawing of the same bird with 3 words written underneath... I love you... The innocence and freedom of childhood.
But another voice said it would rather breed Arabian horses than Arabs and some of the childhood dreams were broken by an unknown till then word 'racism'. The fingers on a metal can against shiny middle-class drum kit of strictly fixed rules of behaviour obeyed under the supervision of an opera conductor.
Dhit ta dhene ta a...
The wedding processions in Delhi are full of the sounds of incoherent drumbeats, trumpets, and bursting of crakers. Sounds loud enough to awaken the dead and make them stand somewhere in the corner of the street shouting at the crowd to become silent and allow them to sleep in their dreamless reality.
Ta hatha jhom...
I love you. Ta dhing... (She turned her face away.) But I lo... Ta dhing ta (She turned her face the other side) I need... Ta dhing tat ta (She bent forward holding her stomach) Do I...
and then the Tandava dance started...
A bird spread its wings and flew away from a white sheet of paper...
