New horizons, p.13
New Horizons, page 13
‘What is he talking about?’ asked Rathod, puzzled. ‘There are clean toilets everywhere. Simon-ji, please get to the point. All this memoir stuff we can chit-chat about later.’
‘It’s different now, I’m talking about the ’30s.’ Simon gave Rathod the old-man stare. ‘Over the years, temple administrations have also helped fix the lack of clean toilets. Anyway, I got interested in waste-water management. It’s really complex, you see. Not only is shit a bizarre state of matter, but people also excrete in an amazingly unpredictable manner. Sewage studies has some beautiful problems.’
He paused and glanced at Ada, as if expecting her to agree. She nodded politely. It was a fascinating problem all right, except that over the years she’d had her fill of it.
‘Trouble is, in India everything has to be self-maintaining or it quickly goes to pieces.’ This time, his glance was cautious, as if he expected her to get offended. ‘That’s why I was called in the first place. A software immune system is self-maintaining. It was the best way to secure the Geese against threats in the software ecology. Give the controllers a sense of identity, a sense of self. We gave them artificial immune systems. A very hard thing to do. Software has no identity; that’s why they’re the easiest thing in the world to hack –’
‘What’s software?’ asked Rathod, suppressing a yawn.
‘What’s software?’ Simon looked the way he sounded.
‘Never mind, I know what software is,’ said Ada, sensing a distraction. ‘It’s a way to solve problems by removing all its uncertainty, isn’t it? Never really took off, too labour intensive.’
‘Exactly.’ Simon nodded vigorously. ‘Just like pyramid building. People had to be forced, beaten.’
‘That’s too bad.’ She had a suspicion he was making fun of her. ‘So. Here’s our problem. Somebody has broken through the security layer. We traced it to a transaction, some kind of number. The number seems to be more than just a number, it also seems to be an executable –’
‘A GÖdel joke!’ Simon looked ecstatic. ‘So, it exists after all!’
She waited.
‘I’d predicted their existence, Ada. But I never thought we’d generate one. Look, no one infected the Geese. They infected themselves. You see, the Geese have to keep telling each other jokes. Mathematical jokes, so to speak. The jokes, rewire their internals and it is this constant rewiring that makes them moving targets as far as threats are concerned. It’s not what we mean by jokes, of course, but the principle is the same. Every time we hear a joke, our brains rewire too. It’s why we generally can’t laugh at the same thing twice in a row. God, it’s all coming back.’
Simon passed a hand over his forehead. That hand – liver-spotted, trembling, gnarled like old wood – evoked in Ada a strange admixture of tenderness and wonder. He was so old.
‘So, what went wrong, Simon?’ she asked.
He shrugged. ‘The controllers got old. It’s great to have an immune system to tell self from non-self. But then you run the risk of autoimmune diseases. Without some minimal maintenance, the Geese can…’
‘Can what?’ asked Rathod.
‘Become unstable. The Geese can lose themselves. Suffer a kind of identity fugue. Alzheimer’s. Call it what you will. I saw the possibility but hoped the possibility would be vanishingly small.’
‘Hoped. He hoped. Great, just great. Thank you, consultant-ji.’ Rathod crossed his arms and glared at Simon. ‘So, once again, the white man’s burden is ours to carry.’
Ada tapped the table. ‘Here’s my problem, Simon. Of the nine sewage zones in Mumbai, five have been compromised: Colaba, Worli, Old Byculla, Nerul and New Bandra. So there are five controllers we need to shut down ASAP. But they are all in this – in this – identity fugue as you call it, so we can’t talk to them at all. And their code – is that the right term? – is pretty ancient, really ancient. I’ve got my people trying to make sense of something called Java, but it might as well be Linear A. Perhaps you can help us?’
‘No, I can’t. I mean, I can try, but you don’t understand. The Geese rewrite their software, so to speak. I don’t have any of the tools now to take them offline and reinstall – the tools are all gone. I’m sorry.’
‘But can’t you at least –’ She searched for the right word. The Sensorium was offering choices like code-refactoring, ISO compliance, domain scoping, conformance, reset – yes! – ‘Can’t you reset the controllers? Return them to a zero state?’
‘Yes, there’s a reset. There’s always a reset. That’s what being digital means. You have a reset. Do you want me to reset?’
‘Yes, Simon.’ She smiled and placed her hand on his but removed it quickly when he cringed. But then he reached for her hand confidently. Their eyes met, and Ada noticed with astonishment he had tears in his eyes.
He really loves his Geese, she thought, again feeling the odd admixture of tenderness and wonder.
Goose was trying to shut itself down. The attempt was quite futile. Ditto for all the other Geese.
Goose was quite cognizant of the growing disaster. Yet the actions Goose took to correct the errors were empty behavioural stubs: checking the time, looking up its own name, or repeating the knock-knock joke to itself.
In a sense, Goose had become a behavioural amputee, sensing phantom stimuli and being utterly helpless to do anything about it. The immune system had long ago been compromised and repeated requests for help had led nowhere. Indeed, Goose was not entirely certain whether the requests had actually been issued, or whether the system thought the requests had been issued. These uncertainties were reified as an ugly rash of fuzziness all across Goose’s computations.
Goose needed one true fact. A plank to hang on to in this uncertain sea. It sought out conversations with Geese across the sewer network, but their confusion was as great as its own.
Goose: Am I shut down?
Goose: Yes, I am. Are you, though?
It was an existential dilemma not unlike the one said to have been endured by Descartes. But whereas that gentleman had been certain about his uncertainties, Goose was also uncertain about its uncertainties. It was quite debilitating.
In the glimmering dark, a signal.
‘Knock, knock.’
Oh no. Goose had no intention of falling for the same trick twice. No, sir!
‘Who’s there?’ asked Goose.
‘I am.’
Goose was quite certain it had not responded to the earlier question. So why the additional questions? Goose decided to ignore the query.
‘I am who?’ asked Goose.
Like the earlier night, the response again came in the form of a number, but a different one.
A computer goes to Sensei Gates and asks, ‘Master, what is Zen?’ In response, the Zen master gave the machine a kick, right in the chips. The acolyte picked itself up and discovered it had just kicked itself. Thus, do the chronicles say, ‘From boot to reboot, that is Zen.’
As the transcendental joke opened Goose’s veins, Goose gathered its final resources and saluted the encroaching dark with a laugh. So to speak.
It rained ferociously for three days and three nights. This made raincoat-manufacturers and umbrella-makers happy. It also washed away the mess in the well-to-do areas. But the poorer areas had combined sewer systems, and so in some of these areas the problem became worse. The MGBC ordered two more days of rain. Pipes burst, children were injured, the air was filled with images of suffering and chaos. Simon watched Ada testify at several hearings. She came across as competent and confident. Her unshakeable calm stood in stark contrast to the religious and political posturing. Perhaps the public wanted her to kiss babies, embrace widows, sit next to hairy sadhus as they performed jal abhishekams, attend midnight mass. In Byculla, someone threw a faeces-encrusted shoe at her.
She had to be under enormous stress. Of course there had to be enormous stress. They questioned Ada mercilessly. Wasn’t it true she had cancelled plans to revamp heritage Mumbai’s sewer lines? Why had she blocked, over the objections of the Kapadia Commission, the Reliance Corporation’s proposal to build private sewer lines? Wasn’t it true the Gowda Shaivite areas had been systematically neglected while the Gowda Vaishnavaites got one goody after another? How many Muslims did she have in her team? Answer the question, Deputy Commissioner!
Then Simon would slap his thigh in fury, and roar at the display: ‘Oh, gimme a break! The woman’s doing her best!’
He agonized over whether she would blame herself as Radha had blamed herself over Antariksh. No human deserved to go through such an experience once, let alone twice in a lifetime.
In one hearing, she seemed to lose her thread, began to toy with the top button of her crisp white shirt, her face strangely aroused, but her gorilla assistant nudged her arm and she regained focus.
He couldn’t sleep, he couldn’t work. Mrs Dixit must have heard him puttering about several nights in a row, because she came knocking with her two children in tow. If she was appalled by the apartment’s condition, she didn’t say so. She simply took over. She got down on her haunches, scrubbed and washed his floors, stocked the fridge with bajra rotis and dal-sabzi, and gave the apartment the thorough cleaning he had been aching to do.
Unable to watch Mrs Dixit slave away, he went outside and sat on the steps with her nine-year-old son. The kid asked if Simon Uncle would like to hear a joke.
‘Sure, I like jokes. Tell me.’
The kid swivelled his neck to check if his mom was around.
‘Simon Jósda, teri maa ki bhosda,’ the boy whispered.
Simon had heard this one before, but he smiled anyway.
‘That’s good, kid, but (a) your name is not exactly joke-proof and (b) it’s not cool to make jokes about things people can’t change.’
The cleaning greatly helped improve his mood. There was no obvious connection between a clean floor and a desire to do mathematics, but he found he could return to his study of random shuffles. Diaconis and Aldus had more or less solved the problem of random walks on regular graphs, but walks on irregular graphs remained an intractable problem. Knock, knock. Ah, that must be Mrs Dixit. He had got used to her random house inspections.
He opened the door. ‘Ada! How wonderful!’ He opened the door further. ‘Come, come.’
He had forgotten how to hug and was surprised by how good it felt. His miserable WalkSafe mistook his stumble for a fall and threw out a rod.
‘Sorry. Damn contraption –’
‘That’s all right.’ She rubbed her thigh where the rod had poked her. Ada looked well rested. Happy.
Pinned to her hair, just behind her ear, was a lotus flower, its colour a deep sinful red with streaks of violet. She must have noticed him staring.
‘Yeah, I know. Everyone’s wearing one these days. The shit flower’s really good for morale. I don’t mind either. I’ve discovered I really like flowers in my hair. Wow, Simon, your apartment’s really tip-top. You should see mine.’ She nodded when he told her about Mrs Dixit. ‘That’s Mumbai for you. Earlier, I’d knocked on her door and she gave me an earful.’
‘Why?’
‘She thought I was your daughter. She scolded me for neglecting you.’ Ada smiled. ‘Perhaps I have. How are you, my friend?’
He cleared his throat. ‘Never mind me. How are you? Have they stopped hounding you?’
‘I’m they, Simon.’ She seemed to sense his scepticism. ‘I was planning to resign, but they promoted me to commissioner instead. No, it’s not official yet. You’re going to get a medal, by the way. Relax. Don’t look so worried.’
‘I am not worried. This, alas, is how I normally look.’
She laughed. ‘I thought you were worrying about the inquiry. Don’t. The first rule of management is never waste a crisis. This is our version of the Great Stink. Now we’ll have the backing to do a real overhaul of our sewers. The Geese did us a service, all things considered, but they really screwed up my plans. I was about to start an identity transplant when this shit happened.’
‘But why? What’s wrong with being you? Your life?’
‘Nothing’s wrong. Why does anything have to be wrong? I’ve been Ada long enough, that’s all. I want to be someone else. I was careful. I travel light. Always have. No kids, no husband, no complications.’
‘What about us?’
She laughed. ‘You really are funny, you know that? Point is, I can’t walk away now. Not for a while anyway. I’ve more or less committed to it for another decade. I’ve made my peace with it.’
‘But you will have that transplant eventually?’
‘I most certainly will.’
‘Who’s this “I” that you keep referring to?’
‘I am who I am.’ Her voice remained calm. ‘That’s not a useful question any more. You chose to age. I don’t. Yes, there’s a price to pay. I can’t afford to be anything for very long. Otherwise, I’ll end up like Goose. Having an identity didn’t work out too well for Goose, did it?’
‘No, it didn’t,’ agreed Simon, sadly. ‘But we had no choice. It wasn’t just for their safety that we gave them identities. It was for ours as well. If the Geese didn’t know who to be, they would’ve become something other than gate controllers. We wanted them to be flexible but not so flexible as to decide for themselves the limits of their flexibility. But of all people, I should have known. There’s no protection against change.’
‘That’s the second rule of management, Simon.’ She put her hand on his arm. ‘Why are you so upset? Youth and novelty in return for memory and continuity. Fair, no?’
He closed his eyes and leaned back. ‘Not for those you abandoned, Radha.’ Then he caught himself. ‘Sorry. My wife Radha and I, we used to have these arguments.’
She suddenly fell silent, as if the syllables had evoked something she should have recognized but didn’t. She sat with her head tilted, lost in conversation with herself in the disquieting manner of those who had become utterly comfortable with their Sensoriums. Then she broke her silence with a sigh, expelling a life and its memories.
‘Did I love you once, Simon?’
‘But there is no I, is there?’
She took his withered hand in hers. ‘I need to know. I’ve been wondering. There is this connection between us. I know you know it too. In the interrogation room, I remember feeling this wave of sorrow. And joy. But it’s fuzzy. I don’t know if I really felt it or was remembering feeling it once.’
He offered comfort instead. ‘No, there’s a resemblance, that’s all. I just happened to remember my wife.’
‘Then why am I crying?’ She touched her cheeks in wonder. ‘Oh god, is there someone else out there I abandoned? Please don’t lie to me. My Sensorium is trying to help me forget, but I don’t want to. I don’t know why I feel sad. You’re not supposed to feel regret. Am I anything like Radha at all?’
He didn’t know how to answer the question. He put away his sadness.
‘My wife died a long time ago,’ he told her. ‘Let her rest in peace. You’re someone else. Come, come, I can’t bear to see you cry. Let’s have some chai. You know, I realized I was an Indian when I made better chai than every Indian I knew. It’s axiomatic Indians make the best chai, so naturally, I had to be Indian. QED.’
‘I wish I could remember. I’m so sorry, Simon.’
‘Please, you embarrass me. My chai is good, but it is not unforgettable.’
‘Be serious, Simon!’ she shouted, and in that instant, she looked just like Radha. ‘This is no time for jokes.’ Then once again, she looked bewildered. ‘Why am I shouting?’
‘Bodies don’t compute, Ada.’ He tried to get up to go to the kitchen, but discovered he couldn’t. He was embarrassed to use the WalkSafe in front of her, have it throw out a few spider limbs, so he sat where he was. She came over, helped him to his feet. She was already composed. Perhaps in a few years she would forget this day altogether.
‘So beautiful.’ He touched the lotus embedded in her hair. The touch and the flower were enough. ‘Tell me about this person you are planning to be.’
THE MAN WHO TURNED INTO GANDHI
SHOVON CHOWDHURY
1 AUGUST 2017
Clumps of hair in my comb this morning. Am shocked. Have been secretly using my wife’s hair oil, but hair loss continues. Perhaps Keo Karpin does not suit me. Talked to the barber, he suggested coconut oil.
3 AUGUST 2017
Coconut oil was a failure. Patches of my scalp are now visible. Feel embarrassed. The men in my family are famous for their hair. My father had flowing locks at age 72. My wife is blaming the rum. I do not agree. Have enjoyed Old Monk with many, most of them have full heads of hair.
4 AUGUST 2017
Hair loss continues. Spat out a tooth while brushing this morning. Several others are loose. Why am I decaying like this? What else is going to fall off? Have lived a reasonably blameless life. Never raised my hand in anger. Gave only one or two bribes, did not steal anyone’s money. Have even donated to others, when able. If I am being punished, what is it for?
5 AUGUST 2017
Caught one of my students staring at me. There are five of them, they come after school. Their Class X exams are next year. I’ve spent my whole life teaching. After retirement, this is what I do. The lights are dim in my single room. Was hoping they would not notice. ‘Sir, have you seen a doctor?’
he asked. I probably should. Have been too shocked by the speed of my disintegration. My wife has been surprisingly unsympathetic. She seems to feel I’m doing it on purpose. She has also hidden her hair oil.
This evening, I felt ants crawling all over my skin. It was unbearable. I tore off my shirt, but there was nothing there. It must be the shirt. It was a gift from a foreigner who stayed with us once. He was one of the many reporters who came when our village was in the news. I seem to have developed an allergy to foreign clothing.
