Originally posted by: IdiotViewer
Arshi... Not entirely sure I can call your lines "broken" today. Fear they might take offense and charge at me... Quite to the contrary, each sentence appears a staccato soldier, ready to take up arms for Kumud, now that circs have deemed such measures necessary. I want to applaud your emotion and passion. If anything, thank you for being entirely true to the ethos of your CB - it is about what you feel, at that time. Your mental notepage made available to all - an entirely gripping narrative of frustrations, and honesty brought really well out... 👏
The press conference, must admit I gave it some other importance... Thought it would be the launchpad for some tangential exciting story development, but it ended out to be a rubberband. Got stretched out to the extreme end, then ended up whizzing back to square. Really, truly, trying upon patience, but in the larger tapestry of SC, not all was for naught, I felt. Watched yesterdays, epi... Then watched today's. In the throes of emotion, passion and anger. Fully ready to committ murder of three fictional characters by the end of it. Then pressed "replay"... In hindsight, this epi was really v clever. Of course, this all is subjective opinion, but... I thought it reached out and manipulated audience perception (to what end, I'm sure the coming week will make clear, some). The tension, the monotony... A million ways to beg forgiveness and a million ways to refuse it... The treadmill effect... Has been building up the entire week, but today, all were subtly asked to cast deciding votes... And the majority winner was clearly Kumud. But in doing so, Saras was shunned. That was the not-so-obvious by-product of endorsing K... S lost out. Today was a play, of two things, two people, against one another. Today, asked one to subconciously take a side. And today, achieved that as well, so bravo to the episode construction, and execution 👏
The obvious dynamic of today's epi, and its end product, was sympathy for Kumud. But the prevailing, implicit dynamic, one that esp impacted upon affectively, was resentment towards Saras. Not "resentment" in its most absolute, per se, but resentment as a building block, made up of many other such building blocks... Irritation at Saras' method's, anger that he is still thinking of himself, astonishment at how he continues to decieve the Dhan's, bewilderment at BD's whole-hearted acceptance of him, the desire to tell him to change expressions everytime he comes in front of Kumud, impatience at the stalker-ish behaviour he is starting to emulate, exasperation at his attempts to elicit an "I forgive you"... The fact that he verbally hijacked nothing less a political press conference to say his piece was a new extreme... All these little things about Saras keep adding up, things that start to annoy. On a treadmill, they would. Somehow, the CV's want to stretch this to breaking point. They want all to hear how the breaking point sounds. And until that, sympathy towards K will keep on increasing, and likewise will, resentment for Saras. All said, I sympathise with K, and the treadmill effect is starting to wear me down as well... But at the same, I strongly resist at casting my lot with either Saras or Kumud, for now. I simply feel I do not have the luxury, nor the character motivations, and justifications, to declare allegiances, yet. All I can do is strive to make sense of the treadmill going nowhere, in the larger fabric of SC. Because once we get off the treadmill, the things learned while on it are going to make sense... That I strongly suspect. But on the flipside, the effect of the treadmill, the montony of it is capable of dulling even the most sharpest of perspectives. That I consciously fight against. In that, I'm a DeterminedViewer.
Saras... How important would an apology be to someone who has both unconsciously and desperately craved validation his entire life? And this is him, begging KUMUD for forgivenesss. It is like the Mother of all Mea Culpa's he is so set by both heart and mind, on issuing. It is not his person, but because Kumud touched and blossomed his inner core, it is his soul that seeks validation, that begs her for a soul-embrace, that entreats her for spiritual respite. Saras may be in hell, but his soul is in an another level of Purgatory. Therefore, his missives are at once, both selfish and selfless. Selfless, because at its core, they are the purest manifestation of pure. And selfish, because S still has his blinkers on. His mission is clear... Wring an "apology accepted" from Kumud. That is all he knows, that is all that is keeping him going. Not realising he is going about doing it the wrong way. Slowly breaking Kumud down, and not for the right reasons. Bur Saras is right now at such, that he can only see one step ahead of him, and his one step ahead right now, is apology. And thus his attempts both self-absorbed, and sacrificing. Because that is who Saras is. A contradiction - like a saintly sinner, or a sinful saint. Two extreme ends of the spectrum exist in one man. That is both his curse and his blessing. He feels. Sometimes too much. He up and walks when he is really needed to stay and he stands his ground, even when he is banished time and again. He moves heaven and Earth when it is really not welcome and neither required, but sometimes, when he is called upon, he is incapable of lifting even a finger. Saras is a product of his circumstances, and those circs were not pretty.
Kumud... She tells him to get out of her face, but wills him to stay put in the same place. Unbeknownst to her, this anger at him is giving her strength and adrenaline to get through her days in hell. He is her gunehgaar and she really needs him to be such. His puppy face, his unrelenting attempts, his constant presence both pulls her under and keeps her from falling asunder. Contempt for him, angst at him, sharpens her pain, dulls her weaknesses, makes her blood move, and that is not altogether a bad thing. Instead of merely existing, Kumud is again living, reacting, feeling the prick of concern, that brush of anger... Saras courses through her like life-blood. His "bewafaii" is her crutch. Today, she hobbles along in pain, in torture, but take that crutch away, show her the truth of that cruel night and watch Kumud fall. Into the deep dark abyss of no return. Saras is a double-edged sword for her. The sword that both starts and stems the flow of blood from her death by a thousand cuts. So here's to Saraswatichandra, both the light of Kumudsundari's life and the bane of her existence...
In the past two epis, the spiritual aspect got highlighted... In this, I would defer to smrth (resident CB spiritual and meditation expert) but... If I may, this felt like a move towards the existential... You have the physical and then you transcend that, the everyday becomes more like the Divine. There's the self and there's the soul. The shanka... Calling out to her... For her, she thinks, signifying a new beginning... For him, his attempt of, cleansing his sins, washed away in rain, the night before... But this was also the auspicious sound of awakening. The awakening of their souls. Saras requires claims no longer, he has shifted from the physical, detached from the societal. He is operating on a spiritual level. Na haq ka, na huqumat ka, na saath ka... Mann ke dhaago ka kissa hai yeh. Those spiritual soul-bonds that are not letting go, even though the two people, in front of destiny and cruel circumstance have. Saras has elevated Kumud to the level of the Divine. She is the Goddess capable of giving his soul respite, by accepting his entreaties. There is something v reverential about the way he approaches K. His folded hands, his beseeching gaze, almost as if begging one Goddess to make possible another Goddess to grant his soul release... Thus he again invades, this time the matriarchial stronghold of everyhouse, the kitchen, as though he were entering a temple... And he is. Offering a gift of the Goddess, to his Goddess. Think of Saras as the human devotee and Kumud as the elevated Being holding the key to his spiritual release... So he offers a divine gift to K, in hopes to appease her, but his Goddess again shuns... She refuses to take the Gift from him, and to bless him with it. The divine process Saras initiated, is intentionally halted by Kumud. In a material sense, a divine transaction was kept from happening. And the devotee retreats, unsatisfied, but not less determined. He is determined to stay a step back, till whenever necessary, because he desires to move forth with certainity, with resolve, with a lighter, if not clear conscience and with a soul unencumbered. The next morning, Divine transaction is again offered... again full release withdrawn. Just like his shanka beckoned to her, her voice, snaps him out of his mediation... Which is but a substitute for the redemption his soul actually craves. And she knows that her voice will draw him out. She wants that. On a level that she can't explain. The offering was to Radha-Krishna, deities that Kumud and Saras have identified with on many levels, coincidence that Saras was wearing blue and Kumud, red? This was their moment. A perfect meeting point of souls. Kumud's choice of veneration was not innocent. It was calculated and full of meaning, personal history. I wouldn't call it cruel. But it handed out hope then refused to give blessings. Before he offered forgiveness, an appeasement, he was thwarted. Today, he is asking for a divine gift, but his Goddess refuses to bestow. Gautam really brought out the stunned shock extremely well. The realisation that she would refuse him even the smallest of mercies, and gift; the blow to his soul brought out on his visage 👏
The breakfast sequence, hence, pointed out to Saras where he is going wrong in his marathon apology attempts... K is but a human, a girl he has broken no less, not that she is not worthy of being elevated so, but S is actually really doing K the greatest disservice by putting her on this pedestal... Thus, when he puts his heart and soul into trying, she scorns, and when he is not trying, he scores. Her concern comes out, inadvertently, spontaneously. And that balloons his misplaced faith even further... That a divine apology from the Goddess will be the only and correct the way out, for his tortured soul. And what about her tortured self and soul, in the process? That he is not thinking of, not yet. For to see that, he needs to see K as human, not Divine. When he stops thinking of what she can do for him, then only he will start thinking of what he can do for her. And Saras is not going to start doing that of his own accord. For that, Saraswatichandra needs a trigger. Who better, than Pramad?
Pramad... In the past two epis his vices, have been made prominent. Countless characters have spoken, and all against him. Khotti kaaki equates him to the useless Yash... Alak warns Sid against not turning like P, and Indresh (damadji) rues the state of P's lifestyle, and shows genuine concern for K (Stupid or not, at least the man has a heart and a conscience 👍🏼)... These are all little red flags for S, designed to get him out of his, me, my, mine state of mind. But S appears to be needing a cannon-ball shot right at his heart, to stop him thinking of the soul and start thinking things at a visceral level. Because what K is going through is impacting her on a visceral level, to make any head way with her, Saras needs to meet her there. At ground-zero.
The entire press conference thus, made sense only if looked at on soul-level... Tighten the optic to only Saras and Kumud... In a roomful of people, in the most public of situations, it was their intimate dialogue... Him, reaching to the threads that still bind their hearts. Him entreating her, again on a level, she is not ready nor willing to accede to quite yet. It was very ambitious on S' part and it also represented the height of his ministrations, to his Goddess. For Kumud, the situation was different. Her coming there, alone, signified her personal failure as a wife, in BD's eyes. Kumud did not live up to her promises today. And once there, the already battered, over-wrought K, was appealed to again, this time in the guise of the common voice... and a brilliant employment of voice super-imposition it was! 👏 Again hands folded, prostrates next to Goddess... But perhaps, over-confident, he gives her a chance. And determined to prove something to herself and to him both, she takes it. Shuns his apologies. Thwarts his attempts. Making this his third strike. The voice of the soul thus reached the common man, but as she looks towards him, sees him intent on supplication, she decides to use the power he has charged her with... His earnestness, at that point, infuriates her, pours kerosene on her rage and resentments... She walks out and his prayers to the Goddess, again and for the last time perhaps, go unanswered.
Alak... Got revealed a bit more today. Her treatment of her husband like a glorified manservant. And most especially, her desire to be both daughter and son to BD... The heir-apparent, the king-maker and also the usurper. Pramad both limits Alak, and his failures validate her even further. She would thus, might not wish, to see P reformed. Alak is entirely content with the status quo and much too immersed in her own aspirations to care a hoot to others, except maybe "Navin"... BuddhiDhan... He admits as much that he has hopes K would be a corrective influence on P. But then, seeing "Navin" he transfers to a different plane altogether! Kudo's to Gautam for that shell-shocked empty expression... Signifying that Saras is now in a place that no one can reach him... 👏 He was repeatedly denied at the level of soul and worldly kudo's mean nothing to him.
Jennifer, for the Radha-Krishna sequence 👏... The "Goddess" bows down to the level of a human, a girl, in the throes of an all-consuming love, the much-beloved pawn of destiny... Kumud... She still views their equation through the optic of thwarted love and broken hearts... Through the prestige of her family... Saras is making her to be the Deity she is not. That she can never be. And by the simple virtue of that, the apology he seeks, he will not get. Not so soon at least. Not while he is thinking only of soul connects. Because Kumud is still aware of the world. Currently the two are on different pages. And as of now, Kumud's page is the correct one to be on... Saras would do best to meet her there...
As she begs the Gods to make him leave, elsewhere in the house he decides the same... Resolved to burn in the hell of his own making, because that will be his penance. But instead Saras is destined for atonement in the same hell Kumud has been pushed into. Now Saras' love and his perspective of Kumud will have to adjust... He will find his Goddess, broken and battered and he will have to live with that. The biggest punishment for him will be to not walk away and doubt that he would, after the precap... As he is set on leaving, wavering intoxicated feet enter the threshold... The marker of Pramad's death re-visited again today, this time with a twist... P, all in black (the Devil in repose?), all shun him, K alone is left to shoulder the burden... he is her obligation and she is chained to him, not the other way around, Pramad. BD diverts blame for his failings as a father on K... Pramad is a landmark case of screwedup-ness, BD sahab, Overnight toh sudhrega nahin.. Kudo's to Alak for speaking up there and then 👏
Final thoughts: The breaking of the bottle, represented nothing less than the shattering of Saras' illusions... He will from now, see P as he really is, no holds barred. Is S ready for that? And is Kumud, ready to permit Saras to view that? If the shanka in the last epi awakened S' soul, the bottle of alcohol breaking (extreme contrast) will waken up his Self... To perhaps be the self-sufficient man K needs him to be right now. What else can propel him to that state, except this, to see her reflected back to him, drenched in the same red that he once was? And to hear her, outright condemn him, as guilty...
Holy cow-u! Another one who makes the 'aapke charan kahan hain' type posts.😛
Agree with Arshi about the name change!
CB found some awesome new writers while I was gone.
Nice to meet you and though I know its a bit late in the day - Welcome to CB.
Pyaar Kii Ye Ek Kahaani
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
