The Goat-Spy Letters — VIII

In which Jassasa clandestinely visits a servant of science and reports on the prevalent fashion of hairy-noir

Dear Master,

As an exercise in political pulse-taking, I recently made a clandestine visit to a much maligned peace activist and servant of science who is kept under solitary confinement here. He will be, if there’s any justice in the world, given a double Nobel for Peace and Physics next year.

I found the prisoner busy writing on a pad which he hid under his mattress when he heard me enter his cell. But when I introduced myself to him as Master’s agent, he became at ease at once. He awaits Master’s advent eagerly and promises to do his bit to help Master’s cause. He told me that he does not put too much store in the human species and is convinced that it is irrevocably wicked. Worried for his personal safety, and doubtful that peace would ever prevail among the humans without free and ready availability of the ultimate weapon to all, he adopted for his motto, No Nation Left Without A-Bomb, and selflessly supplied the necessary expertise and goods to anyone who called out to him for help. This introduced a degree of sobriety in international diplomacy and greatly reduced the risk of nuclear war, which is why he is universally hated by the world’s warmongers. He is known here as the Father of the One Bomb, but that is only because his modesty does not allow him to boast of his powerful and wide-ranging paternal instinct. I got a hint when he asked me with a wink if I really thought the Indians were clever and capable enough to have made the bomb on their own.

Later, he took out the writing pad he had hidden, and showed me the detailed proposal for a new project that is keeping him busy. Apparently, he got involved in it after reading many reports on the rising trend of bullying at school. The proposal calls for a grass-roots level, nationwide programme called No Child Left Without A-Bomb so that the trend can be reversed.

We discussed Master’s imminent arrival and the state of the nation for some time. When the dinner hour came, he took out his cutlery and offered to share his pillow with me, but I declined and left. He asked me to write letters to the editors to bring his plight to public notice, which I promised to do. Talking to him has cleared up my mind and convinced me that no problem is too small for which a full and satisfying reply cannot be found in the nuclear solution — his ready answer to any question ever articulated or conceived, which is why he has earned the nickname of Answer-to-da-Question Khan.

In an earlier letter, Master had inquired about the latest fashion trends so that he could arrive with an appropriate wardrobe. The fashions come and go but there is a certain aesthetic called hairy-noir which is forever in vogue. It is witnessed in a variety of genres, styles, mediums and trends and has come to define the national audio-visual identity. One witnesses its influence in various manifestations, right from the layout of the front page of Urdu dailies, to the tone and tenor in which the talk show participants conduct public discourse, to the very latest fashion in nose-hair, to the manner in which softer emotions are communicated between the sexes, to the cut of designer vestments. I sent some samples separately by parcel post which will give Master a flavour of the place and open a window into the soul and disposition of the creatures from whom a large body of saline water has thus far happily shielded him. Upon Master’s arrival on these shores, I will have his current wardrobe altered in the current style. Master will also need private classes to adopt it in social discourse too, in order to sound logical and convincing.

PS Just received Master’s aerogram and the two urgent requests. Alas, there is no dental floss to be found here. I make do with cat gut; making hygiene with one hand and music with the other.

As to the relationship between the political parties, they are in line with the law: Consummation is always followed by ritual bloodbaths.

Presaging more, Jassasa

Published in The Express Tribune, July 13^th, 2011.