the characteristics of the arrogant

12.04.2026

S: What do you think of arrogance?

A: What do you mean? Does not everyone hate it?

S: Not at all. The leaders that the people vote in are all arrogant. There is right wing fascism taking over the world right now. The incapable are in power with just bluster and bullshit. How can you say that the people hate arrogance? They love it.

A: The typical jaded view.

S: Do you know the ones? They were and are and will be self-absorbed narcissists, arrogant and preening bastards. Without much to offer. And yet, they find that they have love, adulation, relationships, money, everything.

A: Why not become like them?

S: Don’t you always tell me that I am one of them? That I always boast and strut around?

A: You are not arrogant. You never talk down to anyone. You merely change the canter of the horse for each individual.

S: At the same time, I believe I am the best. That there is no one better. What do you think of that?

A: It comes down to the distinction that they make between confidence and arrogance. A woman will like confidence she says. But not arrogance.

S: The thin line. The line of discretion.

A: Tell me the characteristics of the arrogant.

S: The arrogant cannot listen to anyone else. They are deaf. The arrogant cannot see anyone else. They are blind. The arrogant can only see their own perspective, no one else’s. The arrogant believe themselves to be morally superior to everyone else, that there can be no better way of doing things. The arrogant believe that they are entitled to all the good things in the world. They should be the writers, artists, singers, managers, lovers. The arrogant have had every privilege handed to them in life from birth. They are first born sons. They are born rich. They are born into the dominant culture, the culture of domination. They might be exceptional in some way, like looks for instance. Which have gone to their head.

A: This composite is based on what?

S: A lifetime of looking. Do you not remember that I have been to a grammar school and the London School of Economics? I have studied with the richest people in London and the country and the world. I have worked with many managers over a lifetime. I know exactly what they think – that everything is for them, that no one is better than them. And they will ruthlessly crush real talent when it rises from someone down the food chain that will not kow tow to them. The example is standing before you.

A: How can you fight them if you do not become them? You have to become an authority.

S: If to become an authority means to sell your soul and your identity, it is not worth it. If power comes to evil, then power has to be forsaken. Resistance is honesty, the honesty of humility.

A: You say that you are humble. You have never accepted anyone’s authority or claim to power above yourself.

S: I am named after god. I am god. I am named after The Tiger. I am The Tiger. I am absolute power on this earth. Only The Mother is above me and she dwells not on earth, but in heaven. I am the anarchist. I accept no one above me. I accept no greater earthly power.

A: Is this not arrogance?

S: We come to shades of thought. This is self-belief. This is confidence. I am the splendour of Punjab, of India. I am the son of the soil. I am the champion of the people. I am their ego. Yet, I listen to others. I try to understand others. I try to see through their eyes. I serve them. Because a king does not rule, he serves the people. I come from a Sikh background as well as a Hindu one. We serve the community. We protect the community. And that means putting their needs above our needs. Putting their wants above our wants. They have prayed for a hero to protect the honour of The Mother. And the hero has been born into humble conditions where he has learnt humility. The hero cannot be arrogance. As Gandhi remembered, the leader of the people has abject humility and embraces poverty. He rejects show for substance. And the sin of unjustified false pride for justified recognition of the splendour that is The Mother and her representative on earth, The Tiger.

the history book

11.04.2026

Alfonso and I had spent the day at another attraction, marvelling at the history of technology. We had been amused by one of the volunteers who had quite a quick turn for words and had been answering the questions of Alfonso in a droll and winsome manner. My friend was wearing his usually stunning arrangement of costly materials. This time, a blue blazer with cream trousers and a light flamingo pink shirt.

As we walked together home in the mild climes of April this year, Alfonso was asking me about my writing plans.

‘You don’t have any shortage of ideas, do you?’ he inquired of me.

‘I am the flood. It all comes. Too much altogether. I could write a novel every week. The trick is to have no censor and to let the explosion happen. I write without even thinking about anything. I tap into the unconscious.’

‘And what is the dream of a book that you have at the moment?’

‘Why not write a little heavy tome about history?’

‘What type of history?’ asked Alfonso, looking dreamily up at the clouds in the sky. One of which resembled the buttocks of a goat.

‘History books,’ I mused, ‘ don’t very often talk about how history has shaped a particular life of an ordinary man. How the personal is the acutely political. Look at me though. First, I have been shaped by the Partition, since my grandmother had to leave the newly created Pakistan for India and lost all of her belongings as a child. Second, my grandfather? He was a child when Independence happened in India. So he became the philosophy of Indian Independence. My mother? She escaped from the forced sterilisation of the poor as a schoolgirl and that is why I was even born in the first place. Then, add on the World War which caused the deaths of the young men and the labour shortage that meant my grandfather was invited to the United Kingdom to work. The new freedoms for women in the sixties meant that my grandmother worked to support the home. I have been brought up as a young man amidst the xenophobia and racism that erupted following 9/11, since everyone took me, with my brown skin, as a Muslim man. Then, look at the thousands of years of caste oppression in India that has made me what I am, as well as the military culture of Punjab, which has always fought against oppression and the tyrant.’

‘Why don’t you write this book and about how history has affected your life?’

‘Because of the igorance of the reader. They would have a Dua Lipa tell them what to read and promote her as an expert, with her lack of any serious credentials or hard work in the subject of literature. Because she is famous and she fits into the majority culture. Whereas I am not included in the majority culture and I do not have fame or connections, and therefore my serious credentials would be absolutely ignored and no one would read or understand anything that I wrote because of their stupidity. I wouldn’t be surprised if the next thing was that Dua Lipa becomes, in their stunted eyes, a ‘literary novelist’ or a ‘poet’. Laughable.’

We walked on together in this life where there was no fair competition, no meritocracy, and no justice. Where the absolutely pedestrian rose to the heights of every endeavour and captured the shallow and undiscerning hearts of what was surely the worse audience in history.

endurance

09.04.2026

A: In your endeavours, when do you accept defeat?

S: I don’t give up. I keep on going. I have never been rewarded for being a genius. Yet, still, I write. I am the writer and the poet. I still orchestrate the dance of the letters.

A: How can you keep on going?

S: The Tiger had a grandfather. A scholar and an athlete. This grandfather who was the top of his class in his university, when he came to this country, he had to work in manual jobs beneath his qualifications because of their racism and hostility. Because he had a family to support and he came from absolute poverty. He had to build everything, the house, the stability. But this grandfather had a dream. The dream of learning. He worshipped the architect of the Indian constitution, one of us, the Untouchables, Dr. Ambedkar. This grandfather believed that we could change the world.

A: And then?

S: The flame did not pass to the son. It came to the grandson, the only one with the same colour eyes as the grandfather. All the talent of the grandfather went into nurturing this grandson. And this grandson? Everything was built for him. He had a stable home and family, unlike his grandfather whose father had left the family to struggle with poverty and malnutrition. This grandson did not have to worry about work or money. The grandfather and the father had built it. His mother cared for the home. After two generations, the Untouchable was free. There was a special duty and privilege for him.

A: And?

S: This grandson was born in special circumstances. Like a god. He is special. He went to the London School of Economics like Dr. Ambedkar. He is a doctor too. He is also a genius. There is a special duty on him for his people, The Oppressed. For The Mother, who they have dishonoured.

A: So?

S: This grandson is the dream of the grandfather, what he has created. He is the dream of India. Of the independence into which the grandfather was born. Do you think that with this history, that this grandson can ever give up? He is The Tiger. He is what the people have prayed for. The history gives The Tiger his endurance. When my grandfather worked as a child, fanning his master, the master took pity on him and sent him to be educated. The promise of education that the young one had has been realised in The Tiger. He is gifted. He sees what no one else can see. He is the guide of this world and the people. And that, my friend, is why he can never fail. Because he can never disappoint his grandfather. Because his grandfather is the independence of India. He is freedom.

giving

08.04.2026

S: You know, I was always taught when I was growing up that charity began at home. I have family that are poor in India. So the money always went to them, not to ‘causes’.

A: Seems to be a sensible thing to do, to send the money back to the family. After all, who else cares about them?

S: But yet, causes do exist. So, I cheated. Instead of volunteering money, I volunteered my time, which is free. I volunteered to help all the causes that I believed in. I volunteered in reading clubs for the socially isolated during Covid. I volunteered in after school homework clubs for underprivileged children. I taught English to refugees and migrants. I volunteered in arts organisations, to work on the exposure of Japanese art and art about plants and flowers. I volunteered in a charity for Hindi film music and to spread Indian culture. I volunteer at Kew Gardens, in the art gallery and as a tour guide giving tours in the gardens. I volunteered in the Witness Service in the courts. I volunteer with an organisation that lobbies governments to increase foreign aid spending.

A: You are a busy man and you are socially committed.

S: It counts for nothing. It is always worth saying that. But you know, all this volunteering is never enough. There is so much to do in this world. And yesterday, after considerable reluctance, I decided to give money to a charity. The WWF. To help the poor animals.

A: What was the basis of this decision?

S: I believe that we should all try to save the world in our own way. I am not trained in this field. I am studying Biology but I cannot do anything else much with all the work, study and volunteering that I am already committed to. But my money can do something. So I am giving to them every month. It is time to make all of that money work.

A: The next plan?

S: Investing in sustainable projects.

A: You are about to become a businessman?

S: I am already a businessman with my own business. I am a professional photographer and run a small photography business. But the thought of just making money for its own sake disgusts me. That is why everything has to have a social dimension.

A: Why does just making money disgust you?

S: Because I am Punjabi. I come from the Sikh community. We are heroes. The world looks up to us. And therefore, we cannot become greedy. We are not a Trump who only has greed, selfishness, arrogance and hate. We have altruism, community spirit, humility and love. That is who we are.

A: Give and keep on giving.

S: I am endless. I can keep on giving and giving. And I am generous at heart. Because wealth is not what you have in your pocket. It is wealth of the heart that makes us prosperous in this world. I tell myself one thing: you have to put your money where your mouth is. All that training in thrift has to give way to philanthropy because now I am settled in life and it is the right thing to do. Charity begins at home but it continues out into the world. Money is badly needed to build the future. And I have money. Nothing is worth more than one’s own conscience.

the heaviness of thought

08.04.2026

S: Have you ever wondered, how heavy is a thought?

A: Can you weigh a thought?

S: Sadness is when the thoughts become too heavy. They take on the aspect of concrete. You feel low because you are bowed down because of the heaviness of thought. You feel exhausted with sadness because you are bearing the load of the heavy thought. They say that when you are sad, that you are bearing the load of the world upon your shoulders. That is the heaviness of thought.

A: You are confusing metaphors and language with the reality of an experience.

S: But metaphors, as Nietzsche said, are what make up our reality. Language is what makes up our reality.

A: You are trying to say that the reality of the space time continuum and the very fabric of the cosmos shift when you are sad and emotional?

S: This is precisely what I am saying. Gravity only becomes real when you are sad. Gravity only becomes a factor when you have the heaviness of thought in your head. The mental and the physical planes align in sadness.

A: And when you are happy?

S: Then, gravity disappears. You have the lightness of being.

A: But surely, you have the lightness of being in sadness? Being is so light that the heaviness of thought can wear it down.

S: You have a point. What is this cheap and flimsy, insubstantial life and this mind that is prey to sadness and suffering?

A: Do you make a metaphysical claim about emotions and reality, that emotions shape the reception of the cosmos in the body?

S: It is perception that makes the world what it is, this physical world. This is what the theories in science are at the moment.

A: Your perception is that of the sad man, of the cynic, the pessimist and the realist, of the minority, of the marginalised.

S: Nonetheless, it is a factor in perception. And you have to also remember the power of The Tiger. We are the truth. Reality comes to us in another way, to the community of Tigers.

A: India says be not sad, life is beautiful.

S: The world gives us sorrow. The world straps the load of sadness onto us. In the morning, we struggle to rise with this load. But still we stand on our feet. This world burdens us with cares and the lack of love. Life is heaviness. Still, still, the ambition of the community asks us to work. While we carry this unfair load. The ambition of the community, its hope, they ask us to live. Amidst this death.

the intrusion of sorrow amidst celebration

07.04.2026

S: There we were, celebrating together. It was what was the most momentous time of the day, the cutting of the cake. And then, from the TV blaring in the next room, came the sound. The song about heartbreak from the film ‘Dil’ (Heart).

A: A mere coincidence.

S: I think not. The other day, by mere coincidence, the film was about heartbreak. Today, the song was about heartbreak.

A: There are many songs about heartbreak. It is just a coincidence.

S: How do you know? How do you know that heartbreak doesn’t just follow me around?

A: Why would it?

S: That is what you would say. You don’t live this life of pain and sorrow.

A: You can find happiness in this life. Right now you are with someone.

S: How can you be sure of love in a life like this? Everything is hard and complicated.

A: Do you think anything easy is worth it?

S: Possibly not.

A: Tell me about this song from this film.

S: The man thinks that the woman has betrayed him. He sings the song of pain. Before his eyes, there flash the key moments of his love with this woman. The moments when he believed that she loved him.

A: Is he trying to relive those moments?

S: Perhaps he is seeing them through pain.

A: What does it feel like to be betrayed by someone?

S: You do not know? It has never happened to you? It is pain upon pain. It is disbelief and shock. It is trauma. It is an open wound.

A: And this wound has crept into your happiness?

S: In this life, all around us there is darkness and pain. For a moment, you think that you have forgotten it. It does not forget you. The past haunts us.

being jilted

07.04.2026

A: We were talking yesterday of the experience of being jilted. You have told me about it happening to you. What does it feel like?

S: You are on a boat in the sea. You think you have love and support from the fellow passenger that you have with you. Suddenly, they are gone. You are abandoned. A part of yourself has died. You are left to continue the journey yourself. You are all alone. You are suffering.

A: And the bed?

S: You are fighting to get up every morning. It is a hard fight. You do not want to get up. There is no point in going on. The one you were with, that you wanted, that was the one that gave colour and meaning to this life. And all the while, you know that you did not do anything wrong. You did not deserve to be abandoned or rejected. It is the unfairness of the thing. It is the meaninglessness of the thing. You are aware now of how expendable you are. Of how harsh and cold and hostile and apathetic this world is. Love has been taken away from you. Someone that thought of you when you were not there is gone. You are not special to anyone. And, out there, something or someone has been thought more deserving of the love that you wanted so badly.

A: Those are the thoughts. The feelings?

S: Nausea. Your stomach is tearing itself apart. When you lie there in the bed, it is like you are living through a nightmare. I am all alone. I am all alone. I will never have love in my life. My love is doomed. In this whole world, there is not one person that will give me love. All that I asked for was love. Life is meaningless when you have to be alone. Nothing is worth it if you have to be alone. All this work that I did, it was for love. Everything has soured.

A: Is there more?

S: Do you want to talk about the mental problems that come afterwards? The medical illnesses? Do you want to talk about how it takes three or more years to get better afterwards? Let us not go into that. Consider the plight of Miss Havisham, the life dedicated to the pain of being jilted and abandoned.

A: And yet, the people here can move from one person to another without any remorse or regret.

S: Because everyone is expendable here. No one means anything. You are punished if you love someone and care for them. Love is suffering. Having a heart in this world is suffering. Being different, too different to be loved? That is suffering. People hate me because I am a cynic, a pessimist and a realist. I see man as a wolf to man. There is the reason. And yet, even though no one should be trusted, we trust. Even though no one loves, we expect love. Because what would life be otherwise? Suspicion, hate, nausea and disgust.

Eternal Beauty: Depression, Paranoid Schizophrenia and Being Jilted in Love

06.04.2026

Alfonso and myself had gone walking a few days ago. We had managed three parks between us, two of them new to my acquaintance. We had met up in the morning at Valentine’s Park in Ilford and then just spontaneously decided to spend the whole day together. The next park had been Seven Kings where we had met someone in the hospital in another spontaneous decision. They were in a sad state. Finally, we had gone down to Hatfield Forest in the evening which we had all to ourselves. It was the first time that I had been there and I saw deer, rabbits, nuthatches, blue tits, great tits, red kites, woodpeckers, swans, duck and geese. Nature seemed abundant there.

We had gone back to Alfonso’s place where he had cooked me a steak and ale pie with chips and vegetables. And then we had watched ‘Eternal Beauty’, a British film, also about a sad state. The story was that a woman had been jilted by the man that she loved which had caused her to become depressed and also to develop paranoid schizophrenia, with all of the bizarre symptoms that went with it.

Alfonso had remarked that this kind of thing did not happen nowadays. But I knew several people that it had happened to. Many of them were still suffering from being jilted in love.

‘Why is it,’ Alfonso asked me, after we watched the movie, late in the night, ‘that this depression happens to these jilted lovers?’

‘Imagine that you have been passed over for someone else by the person whose opinion you cared about most in the world,’ I said to Alfonso. ‘It destroys your ego and your sense of self-worth. It is one of the most violent psychological acts imaginable.’

‘Do you speak with experience?’

‘Yes, indeed. Knowing that someone rejected your very self. That is the most horrible part. They rejected you entirely, your entire identity. They found you lacking. They preferred someone over you.’

‘But then,’ asked Alfonso, ‘How can you be so confident when it has happened to you?’

‘Because it is my life. Life teaches you to resign yourself to things. I was rejected from Cambridge when I passed the interview. Because I was brown and Indian and an ethnic minority man. They rejected me because of my identity. They put me on the reserve list for top jobs after I graduated from university even though I passed the interviews. Because I was brown and Indian and an ethnic minority man. Relationships? Others chosen over me. Let us not stipulate the reasons as this is the cancel culture. I have lived through it all.’

‘How have you lived through it all?’

‘Because in ‘Eternal Beauty’, the heroine blames herself. The depressed blames themselves. I don’t blame myself. I didn’t do anything wrong. I did everything right. I blame other people. It is other people that are wrong. Not me. I tell myself that I am perfect. That I am good. That I am charming, funny, clever, handsome strong. It is their judgement that is in question, not mine. I don’t subject myself to their violence and the violence of their perception.’

‘Have you ever considered to yourself that you are unloveable? Because no one loves you? Because there is always someone chosen above you?’

‘What is the love of a tyrant and an oppressor? It is not worth having. I don’t want to be loved by the oppressor. Of course, I am loveable. Because I am love itself. I am loveable because I am difference. There are still those that love difference. I am loveable because I am India.’

‘But the reality is that you are not loved.’

‘That is not decided yet. I am still young. I still have life in me. This world is full of bodies and minds. It only takes one person to love you.’

‘Do you ever feel down?’

‘Of course. Just this morning, I lay in bed. I felt exhausted by sadness. There was no reason to get up. I wanted to be away from the world and its hostility, apathy and heartlessness. Away from other people. But then, I told myself that you cannot make anyone love you. You can’t reason any one into accepting difference, accepting me, the identity of The Tiger. The fact is that I love The Tiger. The fact is that The Mother loves The Tiger. I am a god. The Mother is a goddess. This love is heavenly and eternal. Mere mortals cannot conceive of this love or imitate it. Despite the lack of love in this world, despite being jilted and rejected over and over again, I am still here. I am still striving for love for our community of Tigers in this world. I never blame us for the rejections that we get, for how we have to suffer jilting. I never blame us for not being accepted. We are pure. We are strength. We are the truth. We are love. We are loveable people. I do not accept despair. And so, I got up.’

‘Why do you think the heroine of the film had paranoid schizophrenia?’

‘Every time, the world hurt her. When she was a beauty queen, they chose her sister over her as the beauty queen. Her would be husband chose someone over her. Her new boyfriend chose someone over her. Others were living the life that she wanted to live. Others were living her happiness and her dreams. Others had someone. She was all alone. She had no one. She did not have acceptance or love. That is hurt. That is hurt not to be part of the community. They are all against her. And so, is it not natural that she would develop paranoid schizophrenia? When the whole world is out there to hurt you and take away everything from you, love and work, beauty and self, then surely you would fear all, fear this world? It is a natural response to the hostilities of this life. To the attack of the personality and the ego.’

‘Why do you think that the audience roots for this heroine, feels her pain?’

‘Do they though? Or do they find humour and entertainment in her suffering? The audience loves the spectacle of suffering which they have created through their lack of love, through their intolerance and non-acceptance of difference. Yet there is a paradox in difference. They have to monitor difference. Because it could become accepted.’

‘You identify with the heroine?’

‘Do you know something about the heroine? Even though this world is what it is, she dares to love even though she knows it will result in the destruction of the self. Because she has the heart of The Tiger. She will love. She will love with everything. She will think of nothing but love. Because she is the lover.’

‘You say that you are the lover.’

‘I believe. Knowing what this world is, I still believe that it is love that is victory, strength and fate. I believe that it will be the reign of love.’

‘You believe that because you are full of love, that you are loveable. Maybe it is the case that because you are full of love, in this world of hate, that you are unloveable.’

‘I am in the game. We will see what happens in this game. At the moment, I have some love. I have wrenched it from a world that says have none. I have fought for it.’

‘Keep fighting for it. You are love.’

‘Love is war and war is love. The warrior is a lover and the lover is a warrior. In ‘Eternal Beauty’, the heroine rends the wallpaper from the walls. She tears at the structures that enclose her, that trap her soul. She has the claws of The Tiger. She is the lover and the warrior. Love has taught us to fight.’

the addictions of writing

02.04.2026

The sun was breaking out over the houses in my street. I had woken up and lain in bed, running my mind over the infinite business of this life. And then, the call from Alfonso had come. On occasion, he would sometimes wake up even earlier than me, however early I could manage to do so.

Alfonso asked me, ‘Why do you write so constantly?’ I imagined him there at home, perhaps sitting in front of a small and nutritious breakfast, perhaps with a newspaper beside him to be savoured at length.

‘It is an addiction.’

‘Why is it an addiction?’

I searched for an answer. What had that child that wanted to become a writer seen in it? I tried to reimagine myself as that young and voracious reader. Of course, the first addiction had been reading. I had devoured books constantly. The joy, the escape, the stimulation to the mind, the love of the good story. The love of the good story had been instilled in me through the stories that my grandfather gave me. Yes, in fact, everything went back to my grandfather, this educated, cultured, wonderful man that had nourished my love of narrative and wisdom. I wanted to be the storyteller, just like my grandfather. It was the family tradition. We are Indian. We follow the family traditions. I said so much to Alfonso.

‘You desperately want to become your grandfather. Can you not become your own person?’

‘There is this phrase ‘role model’. Am I not entitled to choose and follow my role model?’

‘Of course you are. If you find good, why would you not want it for yourself? All I am asking is, have you reconsidered your motivations for writing and for this addiction that you cannot control?’

‘It has not taken over my life, has it? The routine of writing a few times a day. It is not all that I do. I do many other things.’

‘It has gotten you into much trouble.’

‘My middle name is ‘Tiger’. If I were not to get into trouble, I would not be writing properly. The one that points out what is wrong with this world, he will always be in trouble. They cannot brook just criticism.’

‘You should relax your critical attitude.’

‘They that hurt me hurt the community. They that exclude and reject, they should be criticised. Their selfishness, greed, racism and intolerance should be criticised. The way that they have exploited the people and the world should be criticised. The way that they judge unjustly should be criticised. Their worship of money above all things should be criticised. Their rape of the planet should be criticised. This is why the writer is here. The writer is freedom. That cry for freedom, for The Revolution that has come from the lips of Punjab, that is why the writer is here. My grandfather was born in the time of Independence. I carry the torch of freedom. That is why the writer is here. That is why the writer is addicted to writing. Because writing is freedom. The expression of our self. The writer wants to be the grandfather, the storyteller of freedom.’

Was it enough for Alfonso? It was enough for myself. There is a reason in all things. And the best reason. Because, alongside freedom, there was love. Love for the storyteller. Love for my grandfather. He had given me love. And I? I had given him love back. That was why I was the writer. Love is something that you can never have too much of. It is love that is the addiction.

nothing in particular

01.04.2026

Already, it was April. The year was passing quickly. Everything was so fast nowadays. You would blink and you would miss it, that was the pace of life nowadays. We were talking about nothing in particular. Alfonso was lounging about, although he always lounged about with a certain style. He was wearing a cream suit with a pale green shirt and the top buttons were undone. I had been telling him that there were those that would listen avidly when I relayed our conversations about life and things. They were always eager for the next installment for their own unknown reasons.

Alfonso had just recommended a hotel to me for a trip that I was set on doing abroad. It was a special place and I had special plans there.

Alfonso drawled, ‘Why do you want so much to escape London? I thought that you loved London’.

I thought for a moment. I was remembering what life had been like before London, when I would only enter the city to visit my grandparents. ‘Life in London is very beautiful. But there is a world outside. There are many places outside of London. After all, it is not the world.’

‘After all, it is not the world.’ Alfonso mused. ‘But has not London become the world now? Is not the whole world like London, touched by London, a part of London?’

‘In many senses,’ I said, having considered it, ‘you are right. There is very little difference between places in the world and they are all touched by London and the West. But still, there remains that little bit of difference. And it is our duty to learn that difference and to extend it and extend it. Because there cannot be the rule of the one. There has to be difference. And I am difference.’

‘Difference is a word that you use often,’ Alfonso said with a touch of grandeur. ‘Does anyone really know what difference is? You like to say that difference is yourself. But how much are you difference and how much are you something of the same? You would have yourself as an original and the world as a copy.’

‘What is this world but a tired copy?’ I asked Alfonso. ‘Do you not tire of the grey? Do you think that a real original can exist in this world of the fascimile, of the fake?’

‘Somehow,’ archly said Alfonso, ‘you survive as an original.’

‘It comes at a price,’ I returned. ‘There is much suffering in being original.’

‘You are not a penniless starving artist in a garret,’ spoke Alfonso. ‘In fact, you have more than enough. Your belly is full.’

‘It is not what I am worth that I am rewarded with.’

‘Take what you can get.’

‘This heart craves honour.’

‘This honour that you want,’ said Alfonso, ‘it is only possible on the battlefield or if you change the world.’

‘The world is there to be changed. She is there for the turning.’

‘That is your mistake.’ Alfonso looked at me keenly. ‘What is it that fills you with this optimism, this belief in your own power to transform reality?’

‘You know my beliefs,’ I said. ‘I believe in destiny. I believe that I am destiny. I believe that I am god born upon this world. That I will answer the prayers of the people for justice and transformation, for good over evil, for love and belonging and happiness. I believe that the tears of the people should be wiped away. That there will be real diversity and inclusion in this world. I believe that the warrior will bring real peace and joy to the people. I believe that the hero has enough strength in him, that I have enough strength in me. I believe that one that wants something bad enough, that works bad enough for it, that this limitless energy and aspiration that is in me, it will come to fruition.’

‘But at the same time, you are a pessimist, cynic and a realist. You believe that man is a wolf to man.’

‘There is a difference between knowing how things are and a deluded hope. There is a difference, also, between a can-do attitude and absolute negativity. There are those that have fought before me. They have given us our hard-won rights. And it is up to us to keep fighting for them, to fight and fight and fight.’

‘You have always lost every battle.’

‘But that is not to say that I am not right. This whole world is against me. Nobody is pleased with me. Because I do not accept the rule of the majority. I do not accept dishonour. I am the greatest and the best. I am the splendour and the pride of Punjab. I am The Tiger. Why should they always have what they want? Why should they be the ones that decide? I am the one that will have what I want. I am the one that will have what I decide. Who has been able to stop me? I am the poet. I am the artist. I am the photographer. I am the writer. I am the historian. I am the journalist. I am the truth. I am justice. I am right. I am strength. I am resolve. I am revenge. I am The Tiger.’

Alfonso sighed. He believed that I always ended on a boast. But why not? There were others singing my praises but still I sang my own. What I believed was inside me, which was god, that had to be recognised in this world. There was so much good that came from me, that transformed the reality around me. I had not lost every battle. I had won many. There were so many that I had touched, that I had given to. I was aware of my own power. And, I was the culture. I was the learning of Punjab, of India. I was six thousand years. I was greatness. If it did not come out, who would know what we were? Who would know the reality of the god?