fake friends and demob happiness

06.05.2026

S: You know, Alfonso, you are a real friend. You are always reliable. There are no wires crossed with you. It is always comfortable talking to you.

A: Is this a buttering up?

S: Not at all. I am comparing you to fake friends. A fake friend is not dependable. There are always wires crossed with a fake friend. And, eventually if not at first, it is uncomfortable talking to a fake friend.

A: Don’t let these fake friends bother you. They don’t care about you. Don’t care about them either.

S: Because I don’t lie, I don’t expect others to lie to me. To pretend that they are friends. I just can’t believe what users these fake friends are. You help them. You give them presents. You look after them and listen to their troubles. And in the end? They betray you.

A: They are not worth your spit. I don’t know why you worry so much about their betrayals and the fact that they are users. You have seen what they are like. Why be upset about them after that? They are not worth it. You are too good for them.

S: A big heart hurts big time.

A: Harbour your emotions and your investment for those that are worthy of it. You have been told by people that love you that you love too freely. You accept friendship too freely. Learn that they have to prove themselves. You cannot trust others.

S: So you yourself are telling me that you cannot trust other people?

A: Trust is earned. Sadly you have seen what this society produces. There are not worthy and honourable people now.

S: Well let us forget these fake friends the same way that they have forgotten us.

A: Tell me about your day.

S: I went to visit the V and A East. I did the upper ground floor. I went to the gym and pushed some heavy weights and did running on the treadmill, so fast that I went dizzy at the end of it. I shopped at M & S and bought some beef udon noodles for lunch as well as some reduced price Cadbury’s Creme eggs at Tesco’s and reduced price chicken and sweetcorn sandwiches to take around with me tomorrow. I finished the first draft of my dissertation for my Art History degree. So I will take a day off tomorrow before I revise it. I went to the park and smelled the scent of the flowers, watched the work of the bees at the flowers, communicated with nature and admired the flight of the birds. Dinner was chicken biryani, one of my favourite dishes that my mother makes.

A: A good day, forget about the troubles. Live life. It is fuller than theirs.

the nightmare that woke me up

03.05.2026

S: A nightmare woke me up this morning.

A: Really? What happened?

S: When I say woke me up, the nightmare squeezed me into the few seconds before the alarm went off.

A: Come, tell the tale.

S: I was working as the manager of a party. The setting was a big supermarket. Before the party people had arrived, I had to get rid of a big white machine. I was taking it to the charging point, carrying it by myself. I suddenly got called and had to drop it off in one of the shopping aisles before I could take it to the charging point. The first party person had arrived, the organiser. She wanted something in addition to what she had been promised when I tried to give her a warm reception and seemed sulky. She wanted the seating area upstairs which was empty, part of the cafe. It was not part of the contract and had not been arranged. I walked inside past the empty chairs and found myself locked outside. I tried to get back in through the door but the whole of the inside was moving upwards. The door would have jammed the movement as it opened inside and would have been stuck on the frame. I closed it just in time. I waited and then opened it again. Inside, they were shooting an astronaut film and the room was full of astronauts. I rushed past them. I would get into trouble, they would find out that I had disturbed the film. The alarm went off. I woke up from the nightmare.

A: A curious sequence of happenings.

S: Very understandable though. The nightmare is about money. It is based on several of my jobs where I manage events at various venues. But tellingly, this is in a supermarket, where the cultural industries I work in have been transformed into exploitative business and not charity. Some spaces have filming for money. Money is taking over my career when it should be about arts and culture.

A: You are having a nightmare about the commercialisation of arts and culture?

S: Precisely. And not just about the charities I work for. Also about writing. Because the astronauts are there because one of my friends is reading a book about astronauts and I read about the author’s prior book which was self-published and made lots of money too, literature as business. When I, of course, self-publish. The dream is about how my self-publishing is an interruption of work and the whole money making ethos. I am the outsider trying to get in, disrupting everything, the unwanted.

A: What about the demanding customer?

S: The philistine public that will never be pleased. The origin of the nightmare.

convenience in love

29.04.2026

S: The one time that I went on a speed date, all the women could think of to keep on asking about was where I lived.

A: So?

S: It was a question that did not even occur to me. Because all they cared about was convenience in love. Whereas genuine love is decidedly inconvenient.

A: What do you mean?

S: They are born into this country and this culture. And here, for love, for the most part, they want you to be a clone of them. They want you to have the same background and culture. They want you to be in no way inconveniently different. They want you to be local. They fall in love with those that just happen to be around them, whether or not they are suitable. And as to the proposition that love is decidedly inconvenient? The ones that I have loved, I would have to fight for them. I would have to give up things for them. In short, love for me is not easy. For them it is easy. There is no cost to their love.

A: They also give their hearts.

S: But with many, many conditions. I give my heart unconditionally. I am actually a hero in love.

A: What do you mean by that?

S: The story of Hero and Leander. He swims every night across the dangerous Hellespont to see her. The story of Romeo and Juliet. He fights with everyone to love her. The hero of the love story loves one that is inconvenient. His love is inconvenient. His love is not lazy. His love is hard, hard work. That is why I am the hero. Nothing comes to me easily. I fight for everything tooth and nail.

A: They do not see you as the hero. They see you as the villain.

S: In this world, if you are a real man, if you are Indian, if you are Punjabi, if you are The Tiger, this world sees you as the enemy. Because you expose their corruption through your desires and your very being. They would destroy the desire and love of The Tiger. That is what they ask him to do, to kill his love. That is their biggest demand. Yet, still, The Tiger is love. He is named after the god of love. He is love. And that is why, in reality, they are the villains and he is the hero. In this love story, The Tiger is the hero. Because The Tiger accepts inconvenience, difference, the war that is love. If in love’s war, each lover is devastated, devastated, The Tiger accepts devastation. Even if he can never win in love, The Tiger loves. Because the love of the god is endless.

the usurper of happiness

27.04.2026

S: You know, others are enjoying the happiness that is supposed to be ours.

A: In what sense?

S: I will only speak of my own case. If anything was actually fair, I would be a household name. After all, I am a genius. I would be feted everywhere. I would have whatever I wanted. Instead, there is this. The ones that are enjoying the rewards that I should have had, they do not deserve them. They should be mine.

A: You say this with complete assurance and humility of course.

S: We have spoken of this before. I have complete confidence in myself. You know, no one can match me in a fair contest. It is just a fact. They cannot outperform me. Therefore, if anyone is chosen above me for anything it is because of the wrong reasons. Who can write, think or create better than me?

A: But because you have a chip on your shoulder, you are not chosen.

S: Who has put this chip upon my shoulder? It is them. I know that they are unfair. Because of how they have treated me and my talent and brilliance. They have never been just. They cannot be just. They give lip service to the ideals of meritocracy but they have no meritocracy. Only mediocrity and this popularity contest that they have.

A: How can you get back the happiness that is supposed to be yours?

S: There is no way. Relationships, opportunities, friendships, whatever it is. You can never get them back. Because you have been passed over out of caprice and injustice and there is no way of getting any of those things back. Because they will not come out of their inquity. They are monsters.

A: Hanging on to the things that should have been yours, hanging onto your humilation, these are not good traits.

S: They can forget because there is not this accumulation of ills. I cannot forget the mountain of injustice. I cannot forget how they have stood in the way of all my ambitions and dreams, the disappointment that I have had to live with, how they have cheated our dreams and destinies. I cannot forget or forgive what they have taken away from me and us.

wanting the world

20.04.2026

A: I think it is true of you to want the world.

S: I don’t think so. I imagine that you are referring to my ambitions?

A: Yes.

S: I do not want the world. That is the mark of the coloniser. The imperialist.

A: But you want the whole world to love you and to fall at your feet.

S: Victory is won over the heart. Not over land.

A: History would say otherwise.

S: In any case, having looked at the world, having explored the world, I no longer want the world. It is a detestable and disgusting thing this world.

A: What do you want then?

S: I don’t want to impress them. I am much better than them.

A: But come, tell me what you want?

S: In many ways, I want only to destroy them. Have you ever read ‘Perfume’ by Suskind? In the end, he no longer wants the love of the people. It is not enough. It is nothing.

A: What does the genius want?

S: The genius wants above all things to play the game. And I do play the games. Several games. Art, writing, music, song, photography, scholarship.

A: But you have often enough told me that you play to win. There is no winning in these games that you are playing.

S: You are wrong. I am winning against them. They would have me, through the conditions they impose, to do nothing and to be no one. To have no voice, body or soul. Every time that I make something, I am preserving Punjabi culture. I am preserving and transmitting to the next generation the spirit of The Tiger. I am winning. I always win. Because to be the authentic self is to win. To be a man is to win. To be a god? Is that not winning? The People, The Oppressed, they have chosen this champion. The one with the gift of the mind. The one with the gift of strength. The one with the gift of endurance. The one with the gift of talent. The one with the gift of genius. The one that is the champion. They have chosen the one that wins.

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.’