The night I met Kaisar Hamid

Picture the Kakoli railgate at 12:30 am December 26th, with the city still sluggish from post-Eid smorgasbording and the convenience of Christmas being a government holiday. All souls are tucked in. Untucked souls are gallivanting at house parties drunk on bootleg vodka. Other untuckeds are in Coffee World, too proud to complain about the price of a latte. Only the guards in their arctic gear are about. A solitary rickshaw waits for a train to pass, heedlessly going CHOO CHOO!!!!!!!! like a wild long-haired man running through a crowd. But there’s no crowd to run through, only the cream soup of cold and fog.

In this show of light-streaks in darkness, a large shape advances. Too fat to stalk, too short to loom, and I’m being kind with the “advances” here since all in all, “predatory waddle” doesn’t really have any style. And I wasn’t really walking with any purpose. Maybe a large shape waddles while scratching its balls (but you can’t see that because he’s got a bitchin’ poncho on). But that large shape, the shapeless hulk, advancing as it were while simultaneously dealing with a testicular itch, is none other than yrs truly, Creative Fellow Arafat Kazi of Bitopi Advertising Ltd.

So it’s midnight, and I’m standing there. Right on the rail tracks actually, because they’re still warm after the passing train and my sandals aren’t doing me much good. Negotiating the purchase of two packs of Benson & Hedges Lights cigarettes from the man called Boss. They call him Boss, he calls me Boss. Like the theme song from Boss Nigger but I think that joke would be lost on him.

Anyway. Midnight. Hulking now, looming over. I buy cigarettes for me and Ammu. Four wheel drive approaches, stops near me. A moustachio’d curly haired face, looking for all the world like an aged matador, or like Athos from The Three Musketeers (haven’t seen the movie, mental picture) peers out and looks at me.

He said: “I am Kaisar Hamid.”

What do you do when an ex-Captain of the National Football Team, longtime Captain of your bitterest foe Mohammedan, says hi to you in the long, dark hours when you’re out by yourself buying a cigarette and there’s not a soul about? I thought of denouncing him by haughtily saying that I was faithful to Abahoni, or even by punching him for the one or two matches he’s won against Abahoni over the years. (Any reasonable judge would acquit me. Any reasonable judge would be bound to support Abahoni.) But then I remembered: Captain of the National Team. Even though the list of National Team Captains that I know include my band’s bassist Farhan and his older brother Fazle, they’re basketball players, not to be held in the same regard or even universe as fuckin’ FOOTBALL. And then I remembered: it’s been years since I’ve cared about football anyway, and plus, I never cared that much.

I look at Kaisar Hamid and said “Assalamualaikum”.

And then that portion of my brain which helps discern reality from that which is not real, of reason from unreason, which in my case is a highly volatile, synaesthetic, arbitrary and frankly temperamental machine, kicked in. Regardless of the many aspects of my life that willfully cock a snoot at the laws of physics and natural aesthetics, there are certain things that should not be. Multilegged creatures dropping from the sky, should not be. Kaisar Hamid should not be wantonly introducing himself to me; he should be pursing his lips at the fat hobo (for Gulshan will one day see the golden day when even beggars can go fat, like in America) and saying “Drive on!” to his chauffeur.

But by the miraculous adipose that flows in my veins, which in my chacha’s case allows him to appear in every one of Sarwar Faruqi’s commercials, stopped this man. The stern eyes that had no doubt stared down Cardinal Richeleu in past lives, battled Scarlet Pimpernels by the dozen and mayhaps even scored a goal or two against Abahoni, was fascinated by the steely lump of stearine solidified in the wintry cold.

I shrugged. I’m fat. Reality is what reality is. Who am I to judge thy grace, reality? Judge Kaisar Hamid not, lest ye be judged yourself by Kaisar Hamid.

Kaisar Hamid is not a man who wastes paragraphs pondering on the nature of his existence. He is, therefore he is. Kaisar Hamid ergo sum. No cogito there. So he reiterated the state of his being.

“I am Kaisar Hamid,” he said.

I am an idealist. I don’t accept reality for what it is. Like Christopher Columbus, Galileo, Baldrick—the great dreamers of the Renaissance—I take what life gives me and idealize it. Usually making circular worlds circle each other, with a great big turnip in the middle. But this time, I was ready for reality. I said, “No way, are you really?”, and then peeked through his window for a closer look. The man, for all that he played for Mohammedan, did not lie. He was, actually, veritably, in fact, in truth—Kaisar Hamid.

I felt like I was trapped in Haruki Murakami’s short story, where Frog saves the world from Worm, and must convince his initially skeptic sidekick that incredible though it may seem, he really did exist. Like Frog, Kaisar Hamid was patient re: my skepticism. Larger than life itself, he understood that others, those who did not move in his exalted circles or hear the harmony of his spherely footballs, must react with human doubt when he chooses to manifest himself. So, to make himself clearer, he said:

“I am Kaisar Hamid.”

Take the bull by the horns, my inner voice urged me. You don’t know when the next night will come when, needing a packet of cigarettes, you will venture out into the cold and be greeted by Kaisar Hamid affirming his existence and proving that he too walks with men. So I closed my eyes, held my breath, and shook his hand. His real hands.

Before I could move the topic of discussion from Cartesian elementaries and Biblical eventualities (Who am I? on my part, to be answered by “I am who am Kaisar Hamid”) to the more speculatory questioning of Darwin or, perhaps, Richard Dawkins (How did we get here and what the hell are you doing?), Kaisar Hamid deftly pirouetted on the Sudoku board of smalltalk and—O visionary futurist!—toe-twirled to the question that Douglas Adams ultimately answers from the window view of Milliways: what happens tomorrow?

“There is a BKSP match tomorrow. You will go there.”

I felt like some watcher of the skies when a new planet swims into his ken and starts bouncing up and down. Just to be sure, I asked for one last time:

“Are you really Kaisar Hamid?” I said.

“I am Kaisar Hamid”, replied Kaisar Hamid, who is Kaisar Hamid. His chauffeur rummaged through his wallet and gave me his business card. As you have no doubt been expecting with Pavlovian sureness—yes, it was Kaisar Hamid.

I had finally accepted reality. Now I would rebel. I said, “But Mr. Hamid, how can I go to the match tomorrow? I would love to, but I have a job, you see!”

“Where do you work?” said Kaisar Hamid.

I said, “I work at Bitopi Advertising Ltd, in the Creative Department.”

“I needed one with a body like yours”, said Kaisar Hamid.

I hung my head in shame. “When do you think was the last time I played football?” I said.

Kaisar Hamid looked at me appraisingly. “Still,” he said.

I heard his “Still” more as a command than as an argument. And I saw that it was true—the night was, indeed, very still. You would not have believed that ten minutes ago a train had passed by, or that eight minutes ago an economic transaction had taken place. If I were to tell you that, no more than two minutes ago, a conversation had taken place here, between myself and the famous football player Kaisar Hamid, you would have laughed.

The greatest print ad ever made

My friend, Joe Holmes, is now a horse.

Joe always said when he died he’d like to become a horse.

One day Joe died.

Early this May I saw a horse that looked like Joe drawing a milk wagon.

I sneaked up to him and whispered, “Is it you, Joe?”

He said, “Yes, and am I happy!”

I said, “Why?”

He said, “I am now wearing a comfortable collar for the first time in my life. My shirt collars always used to shrink and murder me. In fact, one choked me to death. That is why I died!”

“Goodness, Joe,” I exclaimed, “Why didn’t you tell me about your shirts sooner? I would have told you about Arrow shirts. They never shrink out of perfect fit. Not even the oxfords.”

“G’wan,” said Joe. “Oxford’s the worst shrinker of all!”

“Maybe,” I replied, “but not Gordon, the Arrow oxford. I know, I’m wearing one. It’s Sanforized-Shrunk—can’t even shrink 1%! Besides, it has Arrow’s unique Mitoga tailored fit! And,” I said reaching a crescendo, “Gordon costs only $2!”

“Swell,” said Joe, “My boss needs a shirt like that. I’ll tell him about Gordon. Maybe he’ll give me an extra quart of oats. And, gosh, do I love oats!"

why, indeed, the country?

The GP ad is finally done!

The British have tea and biscuits, Japan has technology, America has capitalism. We Bangladeshis have our country, rescued from the arbitrary machinations of imperialist politics, wrested forcefully from those who would not treat us as their fellow human beings, those whom we had no cultural connections with, who would deny us even the right to speak our language. We have the new-day glory of a country that's not even half a century old, and we have the highminded art that's the legacy of a culture that's been around for thousands of years. We have economic reforms, military coups, political instabilities, corruption, dirty streets, even Nature against us. And at the same time we have the happiest people in the world, we have a country where art and music and literature are considered worthy of dying for, where on the one hand culture stagnates and is held in check by self-appointed guardians and yet, at the same time, we have breakthrough work happening in art, music and literature. We're a country full of religious fundamentalism which at the same time will accept anybody from any religion as its own as long as the love for the people and the soil exist in their hearts. A country, you might say, of contradictions.

Just like every other country in the world.

Where does our pride and patriotism come from? Back in the old days, it was easy. The enemy was the vile Other (not naming countries because my best friend works at Warid!) and our job as Patriot was to literally to wage war and cleanse the country with our bleeding sacrifice. The enemy now is No One. Which is confusing, because we're still not everything we want to be. So the enemy becomes that which keeps us, that which is within ourselves, from being the best that we can be. And what of our pride and patriotism? It's the force which keeps us working towards achievement, both as individuals, and as members of the Bangladeshi community. It's the knowledge that tells us that even though the SIDR cyclone wrecks thousands of homes, we still have one hundred and forty million soldiers fighting against the forces of nature and entropy, working tirelessly to renew their own lives and the lives of those around them. We have two hundred and eighty million pairs of hands that can toil for our country, and for the world.

The new patriotism is recognizing that we are all of us human beings (Banglar Hindu, Banglar Bouddho, Banglar Christian, Banglar Mussulman, Amra shobai Bangali!) living in a world filled with other human beings. Within this world is a tiny bit of space filled with people who are more like us than others, and these people are our neighbors and we are, through causalities beyond the grasp or ability of any single individual, stuck in this ride together. Instead of being patriotism being defined as a common stand against a common foe, patriotism now is defined as a distillation of loving all humans, and loving a specific group of humans more because they're the people that you've shared centuries of history with, and these are the people to whom you turn to for help, and these are your neighbors, your sisters, brothers, your own.

All of this is probably rambling and kind of all over the place. I wrote it to describe my feelings towards the making of this ad (which is one of those things that the whole team did together), for GrameenPhone, celebrating thirty six years of freedom. Joy Bangla!

the brownhouse effect

You know, I've never been able to read one specific part of T S Eliot's Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, i.e. the Sherlockian part, without thinking of farting it up in the winter. Specifically, the lines are:

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,

The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes

Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,

Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,

Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,

Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,

And seeing that it was a soft October night,

Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

(In case you haven't read what is like the most famous poem in the history of English poetry, you should Google it and read the whole thing.)

I always picture the smoke there being like how smells are visualized in the old Tom & Jerry cartoons--poking at someone, wafting in a thin line and leading Tom towards the blueberry pie while Jerry sniggers and magical negroes play mandolins and stereotypes in the background. Which may or may not be how Eliot pictures it. If he's imagining it that way then he's far ahead of his time, because we didn't even have talking cartoons when Prufrock was written. (Correct me if I'm wrong but Prufrock is 1917, and Steamboat Willie is 1928, and that's what really sets off the cartoon revolution, right? But maybe it's all from Punch and I don't know what the fuck.)

But I also associate--once again, always--this stanza with flatulence. Flatus, the exhalation of the gods. Le Pétomane would know what I'm talking about. In my Wikipedia searches for the history of flatulism (professional farting), I came across this amazing man:

Le Pétomane was the stage name of the French professional farter and entertainer Joseph Pujol (June 1, 1857 - 1945).

He was famous for his remarkable control of the abdominal muscles, which enabled him to fart at will. His stage name combines the French verb péter, "to fart" with the -mane, "maniac" suffix, found in words like toxicomane. In English, a translation might yield "the fart maniac". His profession can also be referred to as a "Flatulist" or a "Fartiste."

It's one of my great sorrows that I could not ever incorporate farts into any of the campaigns that I've worked on. The closest I ever got was at a factory tour of a client, where I blamed my own forceful brownouts on my boss. (Not Awrup, who farts perfume and shits roses and pays me too much money to discuss his windbreakage.) My crime eventuated into nicknaming said boss the Pad Patsy ("pad" being Bangla for fart, and a Pad Patsy being someone who gets blamed for another person's farts) and then, at one point, confessing to him in a methane-infused guilt fit that I had blamed him for my own vile flatus. I expected to be kicked out of my job. But my boss then, i.e. Mr. PP himself, is well known for being one of the nicest (among other things, all of them good) people in Bangladesh, and not without reason. He shouldered the blame gracefully and said that I was welcome to blame future farts on him. He also convinced me that he himself had Godlike control over his own sphincter and could fart at will. Cue weeks and weeks of begging to hear the effusions of my world-shaking Slartibartfast employer, until he gently let me down and told me that he really couldn't fart at will. Alas, uni cherechilen pad kom.

The reason why I brought all this up is because I have been farting up a storm today. I think it's the Thursday lunches from Cafe Alpona, who gives us a banquet on the final day of the working week, which encourages overeating and leads me to express my appreciation in ancient manners. Where I sit, I have two copy writers around me, and we now have to work on Saturday because neither of them could take my shit-buffering. (Given the loading time, the load had better be worth it!) And just now, I was about to leave, for pastures greener or perhaps browners, and I just made the stale air uninhabitable for two more colleagues. Sorry guys, I promise we'll deal with Djuice someday. Let me just deal with my own stewing juices right now.

PS: I just had to add that while I was tagging this post and just before I clicked on Publish, I let another one go and boy is it fucking vile. But was it not A E Housman who said that no man dislikes the smell of his own farts?

Indentity CriSiS!!

It all began on the 21st of December 19(censored) at 12:01 a.m. when I was born. Apparently my voice was so loud that the doctor pronounced me a rock vocal then n there. Anyways let's just keep the narcissism away from the table right now.

Where was I? Right! So as I was born (all thanx to my dad n mom for all their efforts), I had to have a name right? This is where all the problems began. My parents are very uncertainty avoidant (not creative) and believe in gender equity (do not really understand the difference)...how do I know?

As I grew up I came to know my two names. My proper name which is "Imtiaz" and my nick name which is "Punom." It wasn't really a problem when I was young n all, except ofcourse when ppl used to call me Punom Dhilon. But since I didnt even know who that was, it didnt bother me much. But *alas* I grew up and came to realise the absolute non-creativity and utter comedy of my two names. My formal name "Imtiaz" is as common as Rofiq, Shofiq, Forid, Hasan or Potol, where as my nick name is that, which belongs to the opposite sex :S

Just when I had made peace with the perils I've had throughout my educational life (including living abroad where NO ONE could even pronounce my proper name properly) and joined Bitopi, the name factor came to the scene once again. The first problem....my official email address.

Anyhow, since there are two Imtiaz's in the office and the original one (me being the second) refuses to be called anything else...and provided the fact that my nickname only confuses me with a number of girls named Punom (which is much more embarrassing), I have decided that I am going to take OLDER Imtiaz bhai's nickname...and thus from now on you all shall know me as "Duke"

- Duke

p.s. No one with the name of Imtiaz or others mentioned were meant any offense or harm through this post. Arafat...need your approval for the post's grammar/spelling etc.