From Where I'm Standing

Yet Another Open Letter!

2011-09-16T07:41:00.001+05:30

Unlike this lady Shahana, who wrote an Open Letter to a Delhi Boy, I cannot dare to write on behalf of others. And this blog’s purpose is not to criticize this deeply disturbed lady (there are others doing the same job fabulously, for example: MadMomma, who I think has done her ‘community’s’ image a favour after the damage inflicted by the racist, Ms. Shahana) but her blogpost has divided the ‘www’ into a north and a south, and all this drama raging on blog-o-sphere has managed to topple my personal apple cart. But it is the apple I like to call: ‘Bengali born and bred in Delhi’ that has suffered the worst bruises.

To hell with the South Indians of the South and the North Indians of the North!

I’m a Bengali, born and brought up in the capital city by Bengali parents who’ve spent a greater part of their lives in this city and are currently in mourning (though they won’t admit it) for having to relocate to the motherland, Kolkata. I was born to a fair mother, a brownish father and voila: I look like Complan and I tan purple in summer. I was reared on a very suspect diet of all that was considered healthy in the north and the east and this beauteous mix contributed to a rather healthy (halthy as some well meaning Aunties call it) constitution which is still very much in evidence (the diet also impacted the nature of my appetite such that it leans towards voracious). I can give any South Indians a run for their money in terms of intelligence and I lag behind plenty of highly intelligent North Indians in the same department (OH THE HORROR!!!) And you know what, my Punjabi or UP-ite friends (of the fairer skin and svelte bodies) didn’t make fun of me. Or rag me. Or bully me. And to clarify, I may have a hand full and if I stretch it, maybe two handfuls of Bengali friends while the rest are ‘North Indians’ and a couple of the very best I know are south Indians (fortunately they are unlike Ms. Shahana’s ilk).

And thus I feel left out in this regional debate. I feel marginalized because I don’t come from the North-South extremes of the country (although Delhi is hardly extreme north). This brings me back to the issue of my private woes for not being considered Delhi-ite enough by these uninformed, narrow minded and ever defensive immigrants! What am I? An alien?

It also makes me wonder do other people, hailing from different regional backgrounds, who’ve grown up in Delhi or have constructed a life in Delhi not feel the same way about the city as I do, so they not develop some sort of affinity to the city? Do they not resent the fact that Delhi is characterized purely as a North Indian strong-hold (I admit there are more of them) and mis-characterized as a stronghold of North Indian miscreants?

I cannot write in defence of any Delhi Boy, some of them will have to do it for themselves if they so wish. But about Delhi girls she writes that they are obsessed with designer duds, weight, beauty and kowtow to their husband’s will. The worst part is, according to her (and I do feel resentful towards other bloggers writing for and against) I don’t even qualify to feel offence, since Delhi girls are obviously Punjabi! Oh, and, I like money, I like SUVs, I would love to be able to buy designer shoes (may never be able to fit in their clothes) and I consider Butter Chicken a staple.

Does that make us Bengalis, Kashmiris, Tamils, Keralites, Assamese, Gujaratis, Biharis, Maharashtrians etc societal glitches?

All this bile expunged for systems in the name of homogeneity (regional, cultural, linguistic etc) disturb me. Very much so.

But now I will have some boiled tea, curse Indians in general for not knowing how to brew tea and then forget about all this as I face another day at LSR. Despite Ms. Shahana’s views, LSR isn’t a figment of peoples’ imagination. Neither is St. Stephens Collge. We actually exist. We are very real. And no, our brothers aren’t homicidal and our parents aren’t suffering from brain damage.

Lastly, I would some day like to be able to re-write this blogpost using ‘we’ in place of a lot of the ‘I’s, but I’ll desisted for now for lack of proof!

Fellini and God

2010-11-14T13:39:00.000+05:30

A decorative panel depicting 'Kali' at Durga Pujo Pandal, Mitali Club, Kankurgachi, Kolkata (2010)

God may not play dice but he enjoys a good round of Trivial Pursuit every now and again.
Federico Fellini

I wanted to believe in the notion of God for a convenient period of time just so I could bandy around Federico Fellini's aforementioned quote. But that seemed too much of an aberration. Hence, instead of a Tweet or a Facebook update, I made a confession on Blogspot.

Too New To Be True:Drums at Durga Pujo!

2010-10-16T19:24:00.000+05:30

This Pujo, we came across something new (new for us, this may actually be an old old thing for residents of Calcutta) that jerked us out of tourist-y complacency. The Durga Pujo Pandal at Salt Lake (one of the many Pujos there) not only had a fascinating marquee built to resemble Rabindranath Tagore's residence, but also had a drummer accompanying the 'dhak' players.

What Happens Beside the Ocean?

2010-10-12T19:20:00.004+05:30

I must beg Ronan Keating’s pardon. I don’t feel small beside the ocean. I feel an immense sense of pride and exhilaration in being a creature who posses the ability to appreciate the emotion that backs up the term ‘immense’.

I hope everyone else feels that way too, because it’s an amazing feeling.

It's the same angle. But it changes colour. Hence the 'n' number of pictures.

It's dead. The starfish, is dead. Was dead. To hell with tenses; I saw a starfish.

Mornings can be a little painful on the eyes.

I ate one of them.
Dad ate one of the others.
Mum watched indulgently.

Insect.

Fresh catch,

which Dad decided to buy.

Weirdly shaped temple in a tiny village/town/district (I have no idea and have no intention of causing offence so I just covered my bases) called Contai. We're still wondering if the structure on the left with the minarets is a mosque. Now THAT would add a whole lot to the picture.

Something Fishy On My Way Home

2010-09-04T14:52:00.003+05:30

It's a leaf.

I swear on my toenails that it's a leaf.

Love,

Whale Song

2010-08-30T00:29:00.000+05:30

Almost everything reeks of disillusion.

The closer I am to achievement (of something), the more removed I feel from it.

In a soap induced haze, I may even go far enough to admit that contrariness befuddles me, it does't tickle my senses like it's supposed to.

So I indulge myself and play hide and seek with my many un-dissociated selves.

I regret having burnt up my supply of that fabric called Illusion that Amy March used to such great effect in Italy.

Therefore I resort to Sigur Ros. Icelandic music is something I'm neither expected nor obliged to understand.

What I do realise is that I have odd tastes. Someday, I will burn expensive cigars to perfume my house instead of incense sticks.

Lullaby of the Leaves

2010-05-28T21:13:00.004+05:30

Under The Gun

2010-05-28T12:58:00.005+05:30

To T,

Boston

If only I could've.

Some Enchanted Evening

2010-05-27T10:58:00.005+05:30

Calcutta has its compensations.

Naming of Parts: Nose Cheeks

2010-04-20T21:20:00.002+05:30

(Nosing around in the Ladies' Room)

The nose is a crucial body part. It's the body part that's predominant .....in your face! Literally, figuratively and physically (when you're attempting something interesting).

I sometimes wonder about the Naming of Parts (no relation to the poem).

What would you call the sides of your nose? The puffy little protrusions right at the end of it that either lend character to your nose or detract from it's prettiness?

I decided to call them nose cheeks. If we can have cheeks down under (not geographically but anatomically) and already have a pair in our face, another pair of cheeks wouldn't be amiss.

Nose cheeks.

Wither Woes

2010-04-13T08:03:00.006+05:30

Delhi is Dry.

Drier than packaged cookies.
Drier than the leaves of the plant that a badly chosen gardener murdered with the fertilizer equivalent of slugs.
Drier than the undersides of my feet after I've walked over a pile of hot sand outside a construction site.
Drier than Agatha Christie.
Drier than elbows that have been scraped against un-lacquered cane furniture.
Drier than flowers in a herbarium.
Drier than a freshly starched shirt that's been left out in the sun so long that it's crisp(y).
Drier than burnt toast.
Drier than my mouth when I'm faced with the prospect of studying.
Drier than the nib of my over- worked felt pen.
Drier than my cornea after I've stared at the TV too long without blinking.
Drier than a stock market shark's soul.
Drier than brown paper.
Drier than my withered crops in Farmville.
Drier than dead leaves that, when involved in a furious bump and grind routine, can cause a forest fire.

Commonwealth Games 2010 New Delhi

2010-04-12T17:36:00.003+05:30

"Bus stop, wet day, she's there, I say 
Please share my umbrella .
Bus stop, bus goes, she stays, love grows 
Under my umbrella 
 All that summer we enjoyed it 
Wind and rain and shine 
That umbrella, we employed it 
By August, she was mine."
-The Hollies

Anguish?

Agenda?

Bitterness?

Conspiracy?

Delinquency?

Mmmmmmm.........

Answer- Photo-opportunity!!!!!

PS- I'd have added a few more possible adjectives, but it messed up my ability to rhyme. So I took 'advantage' of poetic 'licence' and budgeted my verbosity.

I could while away the hours, conferrin' with the flowers, consultin' with the rain.

2010-04-02T08:46:00.003+05:30

This one just baffles me. Does it mean this company's recently orphaned, or that it's run by an orphan or is it a gimmick?

What they say is true, but in all honesty, when I see this in a store that sells handloom, it just sounds like an eyewash so that they can disclaim any responsibility towards quality.

The Dangling Conversation

2010-04-01T19:02:00.002+05:30

Yes, we speak of things that matter,
With words that must be said,
"Can analysis be worthwhile?"
"Is the theater really dead?"
And how the room is softly faded
And I only kiss your shadow,
I cannot feel your hand,
You're a stranger now unto me
Lost in the dangling conversation.
And the superficial sighs,
In the borders of our lives.

-S&G

"Summer Came Like Cinnamon So Sweet..."

2010-03-30T17:06:00.002+05:30

Baby it's(was) Cold Outside!

2010-03-17T18:30:00.003+05:30

Posting pictures of snow in March isn’t appropriate.

It isn’t decent.
It’s reprehensible.
I mean, March should make me break into poetry (even though the thought of me writing poetry gives me the hives) about flowers (primroses?) and green grass and new leaves.
But then again, I’ve always had my issues with time.
It is after all the easiest concept to dispute with and to refute because no one at the end of the day has a clue as to what time is.
I’m 95% certain that someone said time is relative. If someone didn’t, then I’m saying it now.

Dust-Land Should Never be Cleaned.

2010-01-28T15:00:00.001+05:30

Yes, the decision has been made.

It was a brilliant moment. The moment in which I made the decision that is. It’s ironic that it takes so many more moments to actually explain that one moment. I would like to reiterate my deep appreciation for the sheer volume of work that neurons perform in a moment, whereas I use more than my legitimate share of moments to do a fragment of a neuron’s workload.

But coming back to the decision, I will devote half an hour’s worth moments to its description.

Being a photocopier at the CIA is off the cards. As are:
(a) A pastry chef (world renowned, no less)
(b) Traffic police (I used to hold the view that it’d help me absorb the ‘feel’ of the city while standing at a crossroad, my arms akimbo)
(c) A crocodile
(d) Semi Solid (I don’t want to be as irrelevant as a ghost, just with some of the benefits)
(e) A gondolier (Not an option since the oar might just be taller when held upright than I am)
~~(f) Famous~~
~~(f) Rich~~
(f) A moody, grumpy, hunchbacked brilliant gardener.
~~(g) The heir of Gryffindor~~
(g) A politician (I’m way too lazy to work hard at selling my soul. Not to mention, I don’t want to)

I am going to be the creator of a self sufficient unit, dependant on others only for the land and the cash flow. All right, let me rephrase that, I’ll be the creator of an isolated unit that sustains me!

The house must be built of honey coloured stones of indeterminable age. Better still, stones salvaged from some sight of historical significance by shady convict labourers, one of whom was wrongly accused of a crime he never committed. I will of course get him legal presentation and have his name cleared in a landmark judgement; he’ll walk free into the setting sun, his hat sitting jauntily on his head, smoking that one cigar that the rest of the crew would have pooled in money to buy for him. What can I say he’ll be a man of quirky tastes. And maybe, I’ll be half in love with him. His freedom will of course put the building of my house behind schedule, but we’ll manage somehow, fuelled with beer smuggled from the border. It doesn’t have to be smuggled; I just said that for the thrill of it.

During this time, I’ll live in the dilapidated outhouse. It’ll mean an existence plagued by fear of being waylaid by a snake or a spider, but what’s life without a little adventure. It’s not like I’m going to offer to help someone with their tax returns in which case, there would be plenty of cause for prayers.

The house will be surrounded with ancient, gnarled trees that I’ll have rescued and replanted before they were sawed down to make cricket bats. There’ll be several acres of lavender fields to the south, white lilies to the north, red tulips to the east and a vineyard to the west (more cash inflow!). These will of course be worked on by phantom-ish figures that look like they belong to the past. I’ll have to worry about being stabbed in the back with an unwashed and rusty gardening tool that one of them might hide under the voluminous cloaks they’ll wear even in the summer, until a fateful day when they’d save me from a band of robbers after sprigs of my prized lavender for a lavender creme brulee they planned on making to celebrate St. Someone’s Day. That night I’ll sit with those phantom-ish figures around a blue fire drinking moonshine (that we confiscated from the robbers) and then dance around it singing, “Voulez Vous”.

I’ll sit in this brainchild of mine and make a fortune writing historical fiction about the local weathermen. And about bankers {to mollify the banking community} when I’m falling short on paying the EMI for that Bugatti Veyron 16.4 that I’ll never drive because the roads are too narrow to hold the car. After finally coughing up that offending instalment, I’ll cycle back home (narrow roads remember!) and eat a dinner of hot soup and cold garlic bread.

As far as dusting is concerned, it’s a moot point. There’s no such thing as dust. It’s actually gold-dust I tell you. It just adds a glow to things, softens colours, distracts you from life’s miseries when it makes you cough during a pity party etc etc etc. Besides, dusting in the dustland would just put an end to all these pleasant meanerings.

At the end of the day, I’ll stumble up to my room, thrash about in the bed till its messy enough for my satisfaction and each limb is comfortably crooked. Then, I’ll go to sleep dreaming about how my life ‘could have been’ had I not made this momentous decision because maybe, just maybe, the described life only looks good on the new LED screens, when the colour settings are just right.

A Three Minute Affair

2009-12-06T13:52:00.005+05:30

I fell in love on my way to HBO.

There he was, walking down the long and straight (not long and winding, else I’d have broken into song) road. I went rosy eyed. I’m sure my pupils dilated, I’m sure I had a perfectly foolish, beatific grin on my face. I’m perfectly sure the walls would have sniggered at me making a fool out of myself over a man.
Now I knew why poets wrote about cheeks like roses and lips like petals. Or was it cheeks like petals and lips like roses? Be that as it may, if pushed, prodded, cajoled, encouraged and paid handsomely, I could be encouraged to write a poem about him too. No really, I would. About his jaw, his cheekbones, his nose……but as I neared the eyes, MY eyes strayed to the logo on the TV screen and I blanched.

I cringed as realisation dawned that behind those green eyes and between those perfectly symmetrical ears there may be vacuum, or very thick impenetrable bone. Fashion TV isn’t someplace I’d look for love.

I fell out of love on my (now hasty) way to HBO.

PS-I know I’m being a presumptive pig. I mean I know that Fashion does have a lot of intelligent people, but everyone’s allowed a few prejudices. Mine is harmless.
Think about it, I could’ve been propagating vegetarianism here.

PPS- The guy is delicious is he not? My glands demanded that I be honest on at least that count. But I did pick the most flattering pictures. In the rest, he looks like a ten year old who was fed steroids.

I Want To Be a Crocodile

2009-11-17T21:16:00.004+05:30

Photo from-http://mikeandcarol.skovron.com/blog/2008/11/big-trip-2008_21.html

In the last forty hours, I’ve watched The Shawshank Redemption thrice, constantly trying to figure why they made timid attempts to trash the movie by adding those (not) touching little snippets about hope. During the third run, I switched over to Being Jane. She was right when she said that, ‘Bad characters often thrive,’ and Mr.Wisley is equally correct in stating, “The good do not always come to good ends.” So, I like the part better where Dufresne digs a (perfectly) circular hole out of his prison cell and ‘crawled to freedom through five hundred yards of shit smelling foulness.’ I love the part when he adds the finishing touches to his freedom by making a getaway with all of the prison warden’s laundered money. I adore the fact that his victory is so all encompassing. But Red’s little speech about ‘rehabilitation’ and his consequent parole was trite. Nevertheless, I wouldn’t say no to life close to the Pacific in ‘a warm place with no memory.’

Sometimes, I guess familiarity becomes irksome. Because you have to keep acting out of habit to fit the context. You just want to leave that behind. I don’t just want to travel, I want to go somewhere and get lost. Like really lost, with no clue as to where I am, or who the people around me are. I think it would be healthy if some well meaning and motivated person blindfolds me and drops me off in some completely alien context. Perhaps there, I could explore what I really want and build life from scratch. Because I think my dreams have changed, and only a changed context would help me realise them. But you know what they say, be careful what you wish for. And I say, what you wish for, shouldn't bring you to your knees

Or maybe I should just stop watching wonky foreign movies which only make me more morbid than I actually am.

My safest future occupation is being a crocodile. A lazy one. Not one of those overtly determined specimens that made Michael Douglas’s life miserable in ‘Romancing the Stone’.

(I like the last part:
Jack Colton: Yeah, that poor old yellow-tailed guy... developed a fatal case of indigestion. He died right in my arms. Joan Wilder: I can't blame him. If I were to die there's nowhere on earth I'd rather be.)

I want to be able to bake on a sun warmed rock. It would perpetually be winter, with cold winds blowing through the trees, but the sun would be bright and warm on my scaly back. I’d dream my way through my life, dream a few fish into my jaws and dream a little more. On that well located rock on the waterfront of course. Occasionally hum ABBA. And twitch to the beat expecting the rest of the wildlife to break into chorus and the water to gurgle in time with us.

But, there is no direct flight to Xanadu.
No map to Atlantis.
So basically, I’m stuck in New Delhi with my pipe dreams. That is, dreams of watering plants with a hose. So it is a ‘pipe’ dream. Yes, this is my personal brand of warped humour and I won’t blame it on my cold. It just wouldn’t be fair to Influenza.

Calcutta Chronicles Part One

2009-11-05T09:20:00.022+05:30

I’m happiest when I’m confused. All the problem solving really makes my neurons sweat. So, I think it’s only my grey cells that have muscles.
I made yet another trip to Kolkata/Calcutta and surrounding regions. I experienced parallel emotions. I’m not entirely sure as to what I mean by that. Let’s just say, during this time, I developed the ability to feel twenty different emotions, at the same time, without letting them influence the others. I feel so venerable having not exploded in the face of such complex mental geometry.
The trip started on a rather dramatic mode when looking down, I felt my stomach join the ground staff as I saw two planes crawling onto the runway we’d just vacated. For a second. Then it caught up with the rest of me, restoring equanimity, while I rid myself of the remaining visions planted in my head by an overactive imagination.

Two hours later, on solid ground, when I looked up, I was greeted by a fire breathing cloud.

The highlight of the trip was that I was about to spend my first Durga Pujo (whatever you find in this site, don’t believe all of it, and don’t ignore the unbelievable parts of it) in Calcutta.

It’s that time of the year, when the city buckles under a surge of frenzied humanity. Each neighbourhood’s cultural committee outdoes its own past efforts and those of others. But at times, attempts to dazzle go a little (or very) wrong. There’s a saying in Bengali, “kobi kobi bhaab, chhonder aubhaab.” What it means is, there may be intense poetic feelings, but a complete lack of rhyme, rhythm, meter (and sense). Only in this case, it’s this deep desire to be artsy, but Dad did have occasion to repeat these lines a few times (under his breath). So while it was all spectacular, I think the desire to create something exotic spiralled out of control, leaving me bewildered.

The first stop, was a show-piece Pujo at Salt Lake. This is supposed to resemble a traditional mud hut that’s found in Bengali villages.

Funny, when a few days later, on a visit to a ‘real’ village, this ‘real’ mud house was pointed out to me by a well meaning member of the extended family. “It’s a mud house,” he stressed, “Some people in villages still live in such houses.” Staying in a city doesn’t exactly me an alien. I didn’t say this of course. I smiled and nodded like the angel that I am. An angel who’s been enlightened.
Coming back to this wholly accurate representation of the ‘mud house’, the two busts planted right in front of the ‘mud house’ are those of two very famous Bengalis. The one on the left is Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar (a social reformer whom I like) and the person on the right is Rabindranath Tagore (whom every Bengali is bound to like on principle, who is an alien to me).

To get to the ‘mud house’ over-dressed guests must trudge through sand. Another example of artsy-ness gone wrong. I mean, why would Bengal, have sandy paths? If they were aiming for an element of village-realism (and not paved walkways) mud would’ve been ideal (not that the over-dressed guests would have appreciated it any more than they appreciated the sand).

But one thing that these people got very right, was the idol.

We went onto another Pujo in Salt Lake, in a different block. This too appeared to sport a rustic theme. Although what it was supposed to be (it WAS something) I have no idea. The approach was lined by animal figures of pseudo-terracotta origins, but what was truly inspiring was the location for the floodlights.

Heading out, we encountered a retarded sight. Shashi Tharoor should be ashamed of grousing about his travel arrangements on Twitter. He has a lot to learn about economising.

Next (and last stop for the day) was a Pujo that would’ve made a person praying for amicable Sino-Indian relations weep with happiness. Set in rather shabby surroundings was one of the prize winning pandals, which was sort of Chinese in structure, while the idols inside were specimens of Indian Dhokra art.

A common sight in Kolkata. This, we chanced upon in Golf Greens. It’s by far one of the most fascinating pandals, given the fact that the roof, is made of tiny clay cups, which under normal circumstances (what is normal? Don’t they say all resources have multiple uses) are used to serve tea in.

I’ve been saving the last………..for the last. Dedicated to Birsa Munda, a tribal leader who was dedicated to the protection of forests in the present day state of Jharkhand. While it was wildly fascinating, it also possessed the ability to drive a human being batty. You turn to see this colossal tropical igloo and weirded out poster of hills forming a background and for a moment you ‘wonder’. You really wonder. But there’s no time to follow up on that thought, because the crowd shuttles you towards the leafy dome. An old lady will elbow you in the stomach, but you’ll smile and bear it. Being short, I follow a rather novel approach, I raise the camera high up and just take random pictures in hopes that some of them will turn out right. And some of them did, so I really have to stop whining.

Bah! Humbug!

2009-08-26T19:58:00.017+05:30

To my clone, 'A' and to 'S'. For keeping me sane. Oh, and K, I hope luck attaches itself to you surgically.

So what do you do when your brain is on overdrive because of overexposure to stimulus and due to competitive strands of wild imagination?
You decide to pour it all out on paper. No, that not right. You pour it all out on the keyboard. But. Yes, there always is that ‘but’ (I do hate the but rather strenuously). ‘But’ you realise that what you write sounds like a whole lot of waffle.
That reminded me of a dialogue from Ugly Betty designed to help people write- Open old wounds. If you don’t have any, try killing yourself. If you fail, you’ll have something to write about.
Well, I wasn’t quite that desperate to write. But I did laugh. Quite a lot. But a stubbed toe put an end to mirth.

Sigh.

So I decided on another photo journey, albeit a slightly strange one. I say strange because the content is slightly weird. And no, weird and strange in this case cannot be used interchangeably. I insist that they can’t.

Here goes,

ANOTHER nice view from 'that' balcony. 'That' which I was deprived of by the cruel hand of biology.

Post rain mornings make my

heart -mushy,

brain -fuzzy,

and nose-ticklish

This was my favorite tree in school. Unfortunately, His Highness, The Gardner had certain Basilisk-ish qualities. For instance he had yellow eyes. I took this as a sign of a permanent case of jaundiced soul which is why he tried his hardest to petrify students. So it isn't surprising that I never got to ask what the tree was called.

THIS is why I wake up early in the morning. And this is also why I hate crows.

This leaf likes to stay on top.

WHAT I DID DURING EXAMS-

I stopped and smelt this flower.

This is how I reacted to offers of nourishment.

I serenaded my post-its with:

Dearly beloved are you listening?

I can't remember a word that you were saying.

A rather dangerous state of affairs during exams don't you think?

During preparatory leaves, I also like keeping track of my pencils.

Fast forward to post school days:

Sneaking a picture of school is easier said than done when you come back to visit. Especially when the aforementioned Regent is on a ceaseless rampage.

Height can sometimes be too much of a good thing. Or maybe I'm just prejudiced.

I adore bridges. Of any kind. I don't know why though. It's one of those irrational loves. Or maybe because its one of many man's geniuses that sprout up @ fungi.

Watching as the plane does the 'homing-pidgeon' routine.

Did I mention that I like cranes amost as much as I love bridges? And while I usually reserve the word 'divine' for Gregory Peck, I'll use the term loosely here for the crane.

There's something about signboards. As indicated, the car was about to cover a distance of 450m, but it still gave me a sense of an impending journey. For about two minutes after which I fumbled for change to give at the Toll Gate.

The wordless challenge issued by the cretin in the flashy red tin can wasn't left un-answered by the cab driver. At one point I tried to point out that the car wouldn't take such abuse. That, more than concern for his passenger's life slowed him down.

It's a flyover in the making. I'm obliged to like it on principle.

One of those moments when you want the 'propelled by the unshakeable desire to reach the destination' kind of driver to please stop. But left with no option, the weary paasenger puts the camera on sports mode.

Yet another 'car' moment.

Bless you, Red light. I was just going to beg.

Bwahahahahahahahahaha! May I switch my mode of transportation gor the last leg of the journey?

This plant must've done something good in it's past life. After all, it had the good fortune to be adopted by me on the day of our college orientation.

The tree that stands

to the immediate left of 'the bench'. This is what I see when I lay sprawled on my back on 'the bench'.

This is 'the bench'. Broken and rather leafy it may be, but it stands in the most secluded corner of the college so it's a nice place to escape too. My, I sound so forlorn when I put it like that, but yes, I like my own company. A lot.

I take photos of birds from my window during Individual and Society class. So much more engaging.

One fine day a butterfly came to rescue me from boredom too. But cell phone cameras are irksome.

To slow internet!

Till when I can write.

For a balcony............

2009-07-17T21:41:00.006+05:30

Size does matter.

Not so much in terms of circumference, but in terms of a body's damned length.

You see XY was an unobtrusively protective father. XX was an equally protective but rather more forthright mother. And xx, well, she was the vertically challenged daughter.

Had her length been more to talk about, she wouldn't have had developed a case of standing up on tip-toe and leaning over the balcony railings.

Now seven years ago, xx's family moved into a lovely apartment.

Very discreetly, xx was assigned the master bedroom with bay windows. xx was of course delighted.

What she later gleaned from XX's more vocal concerns was that she's been given that room because her DNA donors worried that she may not yet be over her 'leaning- over- railings- so- I can-have-a-good view-of the bald neighbour's -pate', they'd distanced her from the offensive projection. Not that xx would be able to see a bald pate from the seventh floor.

So size does matter, a few more inches between the toes and the neck and the given picture would be xx's view from her room.

Sigh.

A FLEETING GLIMPLE OF EVERYDAY THINGS

2009-07-04T20:40:00.013+05:30

Everyday cleaning products.

View on a clear evening. What clouds are these?

Gravity defying bouganvillia.

Don Quixote rescues me from boredom. A kinder Knight there never was.

A was left alone in the car under these creepy trees.

A's favorite pillow case.

A chanced upon a tree suffering from the after-effects of bad karma.

Starters to breakfast!

Hmmm......can I bottle you please Mr.Fire and Light?

Yin

and Yang

Rainy morning.

My life savings.

Tree- What did I ever do wrong to get stuck in the middle?

Maa in quarter of her glory.

T- Match my steps!

A- I can't .I'm 18 and I can hear my bones protesting when I do more than a vague twirl.

T-I bet you can't beat me at this either.
A- Rub it in darling cousin, I'll get my own back when you're older.

AR said to A- You should have powdered your nose a little more, then it wouldn't have looked like a building.
A- Humph!

A displays supreme lack of consideration for rules by looking at the wrong camera.

Painstakingly glorified corner.

"Verbal Jousting"

2009-06-23T08:12:00.011+05:30

The Joyously Sweaty City

All earthlings must be happy today,

After all, it is my birthday.

- Anandi Bandyopadhyay

Pity that chocolate chip biscuits are narrow minded. They head for the same accursed body parts every single time that they're injested. What's odious about this fixed destination, is that chocolate is a universal comfot food. So avoidance causes conflict. Which in some severe cases may serve to fatten wallets of psychoanalysts who'd have to wade through egos and ids that suffer from withdrawl symptoms.

What brought on this desire for a sugar rush? It was the excessive emotional quotient of the status updates on Facebook. I'm fine with angry, sad, wheedling, sullen, mean, dour and even abusive status updates, but the terryfyingly emotional,demonstrative and revealing ones make me nervous. It feels as though they've let themselves open to derision and I'm trying to hand back the ability to scorn or ridicule. After all, I'm perpetually struggling under the crippling weight of rather comprehensively thought out opinions which don't leave the other party much space to negiate or rather even wriggle in. But I really can't work up any remorse about having strong opinions. Apart from the flesh and blood, it's my opinions that make me.

It's rather bothersome that one of my more indomitable constituents is sarcasm. There'a nothing wrong with it as such. I just wish it could come with power brakes. That would put a halt to my wasting my best lines on people who don't get sarcasm. The effect takes a beating when I have look sheepish and explain what I meant. And it really doesn't feel right to use the same line at an altered venue or on a different subject, it would mean betraying my pride in originality.

Esoteric ideas (that baffle me when they occur to me) apart, I discovered something about Grey's evil brother Black. Sodden or soggy black is exquisite. Liquid makes black impossibly blacker and more impenetrable (although the liquid is penetrating) in appearance. That shade is not something manufactured dyes would be able to achieve, no matter how important the designer is. But the sad part is, I discovered this under very unpleasant circumstances. I discovered this when I stood in a rather beastly queue in Calcutta, sweating more in an hour than I would have in a month in Delhi. Black might have been a terrible colour to wear in that kettle of a city, but at least I didn't sport sweat stains.

Another in my long line of discoveries,was that I love walls. I adore them. Not because they afford us much needed privacy or keep the heat out. I love them because one can lean on them when completely exhausted. Of course relief at the walls' presence and it's generosity is bellied when you come away with paint on your back. Despite that, I think walls are wonderful.

On the flight back from the City of Sweat, sorry, City of Joy, I gathered that planes and pepsi don't mix. In additon to slushy feelings from the tummy region, I spent the rest of the flight twitching my nose trying to rid myself of the tingling at the brindge of the nose. I tried to pretend I was Sabrina until laughter threatened, because I really didn't want to be considered a lunatic. I love private jokes. But this was rather too huge to harbour.

City of Djinns felt air conditioned and scented. Inspite of the mercury that refused to budge from 39C.

The backlights of the cars on the highway reminded me of the need for more over-head bridges and winking cigarette butts mocking Ramadoss.

Either X or Y told me there are creatures called Ligers. I didn't quite believe them that lions and tigers would willingly breed. When X or Y supplemented what the other had said, I presumed that this..........procedure was undertaken by scientists whose brains disintegrated in some other equally vile experiment. Wikipedia put it more baldly. They said ligers were caused by accidents involving separate enclosures in zoos.

Some accident.

I'm being swallowed by a boa constrictor

And I don't like it very much!
Oh no, oh no, he swallowed my toe, he swallowed my toe

Oh gee, oh gee, he's up to my knee, he's up to my knee

Oh fiddle, oh fiddle, he's reached my middle, he's reached my middle

Oh heck, oh heck, he's up to my neck, he's up to my neck

Oh dread, oh dread, he swallowed my.... schlirppp!

Butterflies in My Brain

2009-05-26T19:39:00.003+05:30

Dear, dear, how queer everything is today!
And yesterday things went on just as usual.

-Alice in Wonderland

People pop pills, I pop olives. Minus the martinis.

Not that I need cheering up. I’m currently situated somewhere very close to the nadir of despair.

That’s because I’ve put the finishing touches to my land of make believe. It’s a wonderful place to be really.

Built to order. Custom made. Like handmade shoes. Hence, deviously divine.

Versatile.

In Linda Goodman’s words- A wild place where two lilies and seven white roses grow among the iris.

With background scores that engender a great deal of deliberation.

For instance, Harry Nilsson’s Puppy Song made me compile a very comprehensive list of potential pets.

I want a black cat with blue eyes that I’ll call Moscow and a white cat with green eyes called Tuscany. A fish called Melrose. A parrot called Haddock. A doormouse named Shiraz. A dog called Perrier. A tortoise called Speedy, a rabbit called Winnipeg, a horse called Abercrombie, a monkey named Duke, a chimp called Rhett. And just maybe a tiger called Euripides.

There’s a bone deep certainty that they’ll all be even tempered, gentle and charitable paragons of virtue.
(Ha)

I’d of course have to become hugely rich to support such a syndicate and still have a few stray millions left over for me.

And just in case anyone’s planning to sue me for intended irreverence towards animals---This is a make believe world, where humanoids can peacefully co-exist with animals without a full scale power struggle.

But my pining for a parallel universe hasn’t blinded me to my immediate realities.

One of which is that you can find shapes in trees. The same way you look for shapes in clouds.

True, most of the times they look like disproportionately small heads with big hair deprived of styling gel.

Or like a statuesque beauty with an outrageous number of limbs.

Or they look like thin, mutilated warhorses.

Or they look prosperous and potbellied, blessed with a profusion of greenbacks.

This is probably the only instance when the latter is the most handsome.

It’s pathetically outrageous that out of the several hundred trees I saw lined up by the roads today, few hundred of them provide sanctuary to very lethal yet dignified and industrious beehives.

All these fluttery feelings were topped off by exposure to an extremely suspect poem.

Oh and lastly, what happens when you get a haircut that leaves you with an accidental fringe, flick, (whatever it's called in stylist jargon) that resemble Scarlett O'Hara, pretty, flighty and damn inconvenient?

You turn up on prime time national television.

And you get to speak.

And then you subside into a mental puddle because of the sheer enormity of it.

Thinking Thrilling Thoughts

2009-05-20T19:12:00.012+05:30

I have to block out thoughts of you so I don't lose my head,

They crawl in like a cockroach leaving babies in my bed.
-Blue October

I could wax lyrical about how entirely wretched I feel in real time. But I’m afraid it would be so truly sincere, that it would come across as fraudulent.

I’ve played snakes so many times that I can now breeze through the motions of all thirty-six levels in my sleep. And beat my own high score. And further compound the cramps in my thumbs. And administer the deathblow to my cell phone’s keypad.

I’ve been scoring off tiny bits from my mouse pad. The explanation for my actions is two fold. First, I’m a fidgety person. Second, circumstances have added to my fidgets. So my mouse pad no longer sports the photograph of a Maserati, but the outline does resemble the borders of France. That’s saying something. And I don't understand why everyone adores the Ferrari. The Maserati's just as cool.

Before this, I always derived some perverse pleasure from looking at a poster of Voldemort on my door. It’s very conveniently located. At knee level. Not that I’ve actually availed the very pleasurable opportunity this provides. But in my warped mood, I just felt a surge of sympathy for the man. He doesn’t look scary or mean. He just looks like a very creepy, diseased and dented boiled egg with nostrils.

The entire problem is that waiting is an arduous task. It gives me ample opportunity to ‘think’. Under normal circumstances (something I haven’t experienced in some time, so it must now be sub-normal if not abnormal), it wouldn’t bother me that I am ‘thinking’ too hard or too fast, whether it’s consciously or unconsciously. But when what is awaited bears immense consequence, like an axe waiting to fall, the ‘thoughts’ that plague the mind are terribly incommodious. Especially because I was born programmed to dismember, scrutinize, analyze and perform many other fierce acts on the subject matter.

So I tried to not think.

That’s appalling sentence structure I know, but that’s precisely what I tried to do.

Instead I ended up thinking about how not to think about what I didn’t want to think about. My train of thoughts screeched to a halt at that deduction with the prerequisite theatrics and flourish.

While thoughts of avoidance are more suited to the present situation, they don’t possess much charm. Especially when they’re in competition with less enviable but far more thrilling thoughts, opinions, apprehensions that form a heady cocktail made further potent by that stray shot of adrenalin and a very freaky form of grief.

A passing thought did occur that maybe I was just working myself up even more to a very terrifying, glass shattering crescendo.

But it really was a passing thought, it flit by and I was back to soul searching.

It’s a daunting and extremely dangerous task. Soul searching when in an emotionally precarious position that is.

Introspection is a wonderful thing. But only to be undertaken on a sunny morning, a nip in the air and glass of orange juice in hand when you’re oozing contentment and goodwill.

It’s injurious to health if one ventures down that path on a very grey evening, with visibly pregnant clouds threatening, when a fine blonde film of dust is forming on dark furniture, spilling…….dust on the house help’s efforts.

Relief however, is present in the form of a gargantuan back-of-my-head. With careful effort and studious concentration, I consigned my rather irksome tribulations to the said back-of-my-head. It’s tucked just away from my conscious.

But unfortunately, such thoughts are permanently in a state of military preparedness, poised to spring to the forefront and devastate the senses.

Hence I have resigned myself to 39 hours of ‘thinking’ very thrilling thoughts.

A Barn Sized Problem

2009-05-14T00:49:00.004+05:30

"I flat-out loved The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. In the end, this isn't a novel about dogs or heartland America, it's a novel about the human heart and the mysteries that live there, understood but impossible to articulate.... I don't reread many books because life is too short. I will be re-reading this one." —Stephen King, author of Duma Key

True that this isn’t a novel about dogs or heartland America.

True that it’s a novel about the human heart and the mysteries that live their, understood but impossible to articulate.

But to re-read it?

That’s where I lost Stephen King.

Like I lost David Wroblewski while reading the story of Edgar Sawtelle.

How I managed to finish the novel after three months of forced on-off reading is beyond me. Perhaps I just wanted to get it over with; perhaps I was in a mood to punish myself. Or maybe I just wanted to get my money’s worth.

There are sad books and there are sad books. But Edgar Sawtelle is one of a kind.

It’s stifling, yet alluring, depressing, yet oddly exhilarating. It’s scintillating in its beauty, stunning as a consequence of the author’s verbosity.

But reading was laborious, what was even more disconcerting was that the book managed to evoke extreme misery without even trying. But it seemed as if every other word, lugged a greater burden of wretchedness than the last.
The author made no appeal for sympathy, empathy or identification with the character, yet I felt as though my own voice had deserted me. I started to feel that if I spoke, I’d break the spell that cocooned me in a haze of gloom. I should have welcomed that idea, but the author, ever dispassionate, managed to command my attention. It seemed imperative, that I harbor this induced bitterness within me, since only that would enable me to continue reading.

There’s no middle ground, no comfort zone for the reader. There are moments of superlative clarity, packs of convoluted emotions, precise, but inexplicable action, tame grief and ardent stupor, and a kaleidoscope of perplexing characters.

Words are powerful. I started maintaining a diary when I was younger, but even at that age, I never wrote about anything unpleasant that happened. There were primarily two reasons for this. First, putting it in writing would mean a final confirmation of the said unpleasantness having taken place. Secondly, I wanted to avoid the probability, that I would read these entries again at a later time and they would evoke disagreeable emotions even at a later time.

So, there have been times when I cried while reading a book. For the oddest reasons. Not because they stir up despair necessarily, but because it seemed like the only reasonable reaction to something deeply ordinary yet startlingly profound in its impact.

But Edgar Sawtelle doesn’t dispense even that little comfort. The woe and dejection this book arouses, strangulates the reader. But not an expert strangulation that would put an end to the distress (eventually), but the kind that leaves you alive, only to deal with pain and a raspy voice and acute anger. Not to mention scars. And the police. And awkward questions. And sympathy.

In my case, the result was an air of brooding and a terrible early morning attitude.

In the simplest of terms- it messed me up.
There are stories that elicit powerful emotions and ideas. One’s that you don’t want to revisit, for fear, that it will reveal something one won’t like. For example, I never re-read Kite runner because I found it emotionally taxing. But it allowed me to feel for he characters, maybe just grudging respect, or consideration or acute disdain. But it let me retain some essence of what had built up inside me as a consequence of reading the book.

But Edgar Sawtelle, left me dry, bereft of any identifiable feeling. It was this inability to wrench any reaction that further infuriated me.

Even in the throes of my worked up rage, I didn’t manage to invoke dislike for the book.

It felt as if someone had snatched away my control over my opinions. A deeper look into my state of discomfiture showed me that the characters are built in such a way that they defy convention and make it impossible for the reader to form an opinion or to judge them. This defeat at the hands of people, who are essentially inanimate, further added to my disquiet.

I can’t like the book. But I can’t abhor it either. It’s a sweeping, lyrical, evocative and sophisticated story that defies any finite description. For that alone I respect it.

But I cannot re-read it. Not because life is short. I’ve re-read A suitable Boy by Vikram Seth, 1474 pages of India undiluted India several times. But because I feel it’s something to be read once, and only once, to be absorbed in its entirety at one go. I feel almost afraid that this terrifying potency and the enthralling grasp of the book might not be present the next time I read it. I’m afraid that it’ll appear just ordinary, thus enabling me to work up that incapacitated dislike.

It’s something I can’t allow. So the book will find a place on my shelf, the closed pages, retaining the death grip on its enchantment.

I’d issued the newest copy of Gone with the Wind from the school library in Grade 6. I read that same copy a zillion times before I had to return the book and get my own copy. But for a while I was fonder of the issued copy. The edges of a much read book turn blackish from use. For me, this was a mark of my attachment to it, my connection to that book. So until the time my own copy grew relatively ragged and ash grey around the edges, I missed the other.

Other books tell the same story.

It’s strange that The Story of Edgar Sawtelle has just a few tell-tale marks of being read. Lesser than is normal. I found this, more than anything else to be extremely revealing.

Waiting for the water cycle to do it's thing!

2009-05-04T20:19:00.006+05:30

Life is rather like a tin of sardines - we're all of us looking for the key.

Alan Bennet

For a while now, I've been stuck in a limbo. Or in John Updike's words- the ugly middle position.It's not comfortable, this period of change. I remember Nigella Lawson's words as she rustled up a beef stew (it was a segment on comfort food), when she said there's comfort in the familiar.

Given my state of unrest, it would take a swimming pool full of beef stew to calm me down.

An unfamiliar tranquilizer though, might be more effective.

The sky too seems to be facing a conundrum. The ‘to be or not to be’ or ‘what to be’ variety. It seems to have settled for a very interesting shade of grey, shot with blue and tempered with black. Colleen McCullough described the color of Meggie’s gown as ashes of roses. On that note, I’d call this color charcoal blue. I’ve always been fascinated by how grey sets off other colors. It tends to accentuate the vibrancy or visual potency of any other color. This may have a scientific reason, of which I am thoroughly unaware, so to me, this phenomenon is intriguing. It seems as though, by downplaying itself, the color lends life to its brethren.

Opening the window seemed like a bad idea a few minutes ago, because of the dust storm that was threatening. But turns out it was all bark no bite. Rain’s missing her cue, still dithering about in the wings. But the smell of wet mud is beautiful. Pity my nose isn’t a little longer, and then it would’ve helped when I stuck it out of the window to catch the faint smell. The smell isn’t exotic, but it’s refreshing and carries a promise which is heady and puts a beatific grin on my face.

The last few storms gave our neighbors reason to consign their wind chimes to some corner in a box. But a bamboo chime still seems to be braving the rough gales. The sound of a wind chime is beautiful, but that of a bamboo chime, is gorgeous. The slightly hollow notes have a haunted feel about them. Contained, yet rousing.

The Beatles are going on and on about Lucy in the sky with diamonds. The refraction is definitely lighting the sky up just about now, in a lightening and thunder routine. But I’ve seen the kind that forks and twists and rips the sky into two in a burst of brilliance, so this fails to inspire, and fortunately or unfortunately I can’t go into raptures about it.

The sound of multitudes of leaves slapping into each other is uncannily similar to the sound of rainfall. It seems to be taunting all those in wait. Or maybe, it’s just a very complex case of transference.

The lights just went out. Pity it won’t last for ore than a minute. These brief cuts are the only time when we get plunged into the dark. Otherwise, even in the middle of the night, the room’s aglow with lights from street lamps. It’s striking. The blindness of these few precious minutes.

Patience is not one of my many virtues (I do really have many virtues!). I can conjure it from time to time, but now is not one of those moments when I feel like exerting myself. All this waiting has made me turn to Harry Potter. Fantasy does have its many uses.

To substitute for a real deluge, I’ll probably curl up and re-read the parts where Peeves pelts the students with water balloons in the Great Hall and where the younger Creevey brother falls into the lake and is (apparently) pushed back into the boat by the Giant squid. Or the Quidditch match with the ‘rouge’ bludger, or the one with the dementors. It may be a comedown, but I’ve always set great store by the written word.

I dare not leave the window open when I’m not in combat position to deal with any stray bugs seeking shelter from the rough weather. I’m a coward I’ll admit it. Not phobic. But just short of it.

But there is hope for tomorrow, that I’ll wake up to a myriad of blues and greens.

Ramblings of a Mutant Grey Cell

2009-04-25T23:08:00.008+05:30

"The only horrible thing in the world is ennui, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness."
-Oscar Wilde

Boredom is fascinating.

I’ve claimed to have been suffering from acute boredom on numerous occasions. But even in these moments, I’ve never been listless.

Just languid.

Today’s a perfect evening to be bored.

Daytime activities had caused sensory overload, leading to semi-shutdown.

A bug just destroyed my concentration. I detest bugs. Their presence necessitates violence and the squashing causes a disgusting squelchy sound which puts my dinner at risk of being summarily ejected.

So, I stuff my index fingers into my ears and gently tread on the creature.

I could get back to my subject, but the icy cold blast of the air conditioner is directed to the back of my head.

Having decided I was bored, and that nothing short of a natural disaster would rouse me, I was just about to convince myself to go to sleep, when I had the proverbial ‘Eureka’ moment.

I’d decided to analyze why I was bored.

But I was stalled by the snappy retorts my mind generated as a particularly insipid song came on.

Honey honey, how you thrill me, ah-hah, honey honey

(Think Monroe clones. Cabaret dancers. War Paint)
Honey honey, nearly kill me, ah-hah, honey honey

(Why didn’t he???)
I’d heard about you before

(And you’re still here?)
I wanted to know some more

(Did you have a deathwish?)
And now I know what they mean, youre a love machine

(So was Rasputin)
Oh, you make me dizzy
(Nauseous would be appropriate)

Honey honey, let me feel it, ah-hah, honey honey

Honey honey, dont conceal it, ah-hah, honey honey

(Pure cunning)
The way that you kiss goodnight

(the way that you kiss me goodnight)

The way that you hold me tight

(the way that youre holding me tight)

I feel like I wanna sing when you do your thing

(Why am I still listening?)
I dont wanna hurt you, baby, I dont wanna see you cry

So stay on the ground, girl, you better not get too high

(Very High School Musical 2)
But Im gonna stick to you, boy, youll never get rid of me

Theres no other place in this world where I rather would be

(How about good old Bedlam)

Honey honey, touch me, baby, ah-hah, honey honey

Honey honey, hold me, baby, ah-hah, honey honey

(thoughts have been censored)
You look like a movie star

(Plastic Surgery)
But I know just who you are

(I know just who you are)

(Thank God)
And, honey, to say the least, youre a dog-gone beast

(Voila!!!!!!!)

So stay on the ground, girl, you better not get too high

(Brilliant comeback)
Theres no other place in this world where I rather would be
(After all that you know?)
Honey honey, how you thrill me, ah-hah, honey honey

Honey honey, nearly kill me, ah-hah, honey honey

I heard about you beforeI wanted to know some more

And now I know what they mean, youre a love machine(fade)

FINALLY!

Inspiration struck in the form of Google. I google everything. Including my own name.

Till last month it would display my school post.

Now. Nothing.

But I still do it.

Regularly.

There’s something to short sentences, they seem to have that ‘I’m-so-cool-I-don’t-need-to-be-verbose’ thing about them.

The first result (as it usually is these days) was an article on Wikipedia.

Apparently, the word boredom was first used by Charles Dickens in Bleak House. The book just went up a few notches in my estimation.
Further persual revealed that there are three types of boredom:

(a) times when we are prevented from engaging in something
(b) when we are forced to engage in some unwanted activity
(c) when we are simply unable, for no apparent reason, to maintain engagement in any activity or spectacle

No offence to existential psychologists, but any layman could have told me that. This killed any further interest in this particular article, until my gritty eyes zeroed in on the words- BOREDOM PRONESS SCALE.

But it wasn’t hyperlinked, so my spurt of humor turned tail and ran.

Backspace to search results. The very next result led me to a rather juveniele site boredom dash busters dot com.

It offers a wide range of ‘engaging’ games. Games. To BUST boredom.

For example:

Bathroom Habits Survey A funny, interesting survey of about how different people go to the bathroom. Find out what strange habits other people have when going pee or poop.

Which Fantasy/SciFi Character Are You? - A personality test that matches you with a popular fantasy or science fiction character.

Clean your screen with The Slurps Hey does your computer screen get dirty? Why not get a Chihuahua that will clean it for you. Also there are terriors and poodles for your cell phones.

Name Decoder - Find out what's inside your name.

Budapest Defenders - This is fun for hours. shoot and kill the incoming units before they hit their destination. –

School Wars - Realtime Strategy Game - Fight for turf, grow your gang and knock out the other gangs. –

Juggler - Move your mouse to catch the balls as they fall. Much easier then trying to juggle for real. –

The idea of performing a jig on my temporarily straight jacketed intelligence for the sake of dispelling boredom seems harsh, not to mention disloyal.

So I backed up hastily. Not that any of these boredom busters could’ve charmed me into lingering.

The loading of the page had an inverse effect on my already dwindling curiosity.

A huge yawn was in order.

A vicious bid at scrolling brought me to the bottom of the page, where I found searches related to boredom.

Very reluctantly, I clicked on ‘things to do when you’re bored’ and then hit back almost immediately.

The book results for my search was a lot more intriguing.

Boredom - by Alberto Moravia, Angus Davidson, William Weaver - 340 pages
Boredom: The Literary History of a State of Mind - by Patricia Ann Meyer Spacks - 316 pages
A Philosophy of Boredom - by Lars Fr H Svendsen, John Irons - 180 pages

The second book seemed promising. Literary history of a state of mind.
The description stated- This book offers a witty explanation of why boredom both haunts and motivates the literary imagination.

Is that why I’m still bothering? Is boredom the aphrodisiac of wannabe literary paragons? Is it a state of overwhelmingly latent creativity?

I was wondering whether I was making sense. Unconsciously, I’d bothered the ‘shift’ key one too many times and sticky keys came on.

It’s a sign.

I should let boredom go. Let sleeping dogs lie.

But searches related to boredom grabbed my eyeballs again.

One said ‘boredom cures’.
Does that mean boredom cures something or does that mean cures for boredom?

It’s sad we’re past the days when Wren and Martin lorded over grammar and punctuation. Such quirky conclusions would never have occasion to emerge.

I vowed that I’d ditch my dalliance with boredom. I’d just check ‘things to go when you’re bored.’ That and no more.

I skipped the first few and clicked on geocities.

Had I possessed a weaker constitution, I would’ve dropped dead. Because pity for the people involved would’ve robbed me of lifeblood/ lifeforce take your pick.

And I don’t even have a piece of clothing spotted with Caesar’s blood to sustain me.

So I’m giving up.

But I did learn something very important.

Not really.

I’m just being ostentatious and portentous to add glitter to the end credits.

The best cure to boredom, or listlessness, or black humor, or towering rage is Google.

I can practically hear my search engine sing:

If you change your mind,

Im the first in line

Honey Im still free

Take a chance on me

If you need me, let me know, gonna be around

If youve got no place to go, if youre feeling down

If youre all alone when the pretty birds have flown

Honey Im still free

Take a chance on me

Gonna do my very best and it aint no lie

If you put me to the test, if you let me try

Take a chance on me

(thats all I ask of you honey)

I'd have felt better about this post had it been conceived during the witching hour.

But no such luck.

I need to find a four leaved clover.

Getting Drunk on Non-Alcoholic Beverages:A Thought Experiment

2009-04-19T00:01:00.004+05:30

The only thought experiment I truly pursued was Scott Adams’ God’s Debris. Intriguing piece of work.

But it has nothing to do with my own thought experiment, except perhaps with the part where I filch a part of the book’s name in order to add character to my title. It’s strange really how hard I find it to name a piece. I’ve been known (to no one but myself) to give up writing about something simply because I was too exhausted by my efforts to think.

But as an author in my Grade 12 English textbook said- ‘Not even a stuka bomber can distract me.’

Research on moral development for my psychology project led to an interesting quote by Mark Twain (who does have a penchant for saying what all of us think, but are too afraid to say) - “Morals are an acquirement- like music, like a foreign language, like piety, poker, paralysis- no man is born with them.”

Wise words.

And in general societal terms I am amoral when it comes to alcohol. (I also enjoy passive smoking. Especially because Papa’s brand of tobacco had an alluring woodsy flavor that borders on being vanilla, but just stops short)

For the following reason.

I always found Dad’s after work relaxation techniques incredibly fascinating. Apart from everything else, it included cleaning and tending to his innumerable (beloved) pipes and nursing his drink.

As opposed to the genial, boisterous and generally exuberant atmosphere in our residence, evenings at a friend’s house were rather somber, where family members tread carefully once the head of the household returned from work. He was irritable, snappy and quick to offence.

He didn’t drink or smoke.

Now in no way am I saying that only alcohol engenders good humor. But my six year old mind fell back on age old tactics of associated learning and I deduced that a reasonable dose of ethanol worked wonders for a man’s temperament.

I have never felt any pangs to consume alcohol. I like being in control and my eighteen year old brain is acquainted with the not-so-rosy effects of alcohol on the human nervous system.

But the idea of intoxication is captivating. On paper, the idea starts off innocently enough, a series of very innocuous changes such as lowering one’s guard, feeling limber, happy, sappy……………..

But more often than not, the likes of Captain Haddock loom large in my field of vision.

The imaginary visuals of lifting a cut glass specimen does seem supremely exotic. A realistic view is usually obliterated by more exquisite frames from black and white movies where a fair maiden with white gloves that went past her elbows and satin heels would delicately help herself to some champagne from a flute that is a refractive wonder. It enables the man with a smirk and slicked back hair leaning lazily against a piece of exquisite furniture to single out the aforementioned woman.

There’s something truly decadent and hedonistic about enjoying the dizzying range of effects of alcohol. Not all. Just the first few. Because excesses lead to hangovers. And hangover’s a bitch.

So they say.

And I’m rather inclined to believe it.

I’d honestly hoped my very limited exposure to the substance would clear away some of these concepts or misconceptions whichever may be the case, that plagued my highly alert mind.

The occasional ministrations of cognac with hot water and lemon drove away any traces of a troublesome bout of cold. But first hand experience of drunkenness still eludes me.

But I did almost discover that one can feel high simply by a thought experiment.

It started by choosing a goblet as the desired glassware for consuming chocolate flavored soy milk. And the choice of music included- Bubbly (Colbie Caliet- do not attempt unless you can stomach a healthy shot of estrogen), Wicked Little High (Bird York), Life Could be a Dream (the Crew Cuts), The Boxer (Simon and Garfunkel ), Thank you for the music (ABBA), Across the Universe and Norwegian Wood (The Beatles, the latter even refers to wine), Changing partners (Patti Paige), anything by Cliff Richards and DEBUSSY!

There’s no physical resemblance between wine (good or bad, red or white) and chocolate milk (soy or otherwise).

One is red, or crimson or some equally seductive color or some precarious shade dallying between transparent and yellow and the other is a colloidal brown (and the heavier chocolate particles tend to sediment and sink to the bottom of the glass).

So looking at the liquid will not evoke any revelation.

But the fact that you’re holding that delicate bit of glassware and not a sturdy glass that would suffer endless punishment alters the way one treats the beverage, no matter what it may be.

Run your finger along the luscious curves of the goblet and then along the fragile stem and the entire perception of the resident liquid changes. The pace, the enjoyment and the consideration that is extended to the chosen drink is also affected simply by a modification in perception and approach to consumption.

By the time the play list ran its course, drinking chocolate milk had definitely turned into a heady experience as opposed to a routine action aimed at further solidification of bones.

Another incapacitating cold brought on another occasion to consume alcohol, even if the quantity was purely medicinal. The timing too was perfect. Three weeks before my exams. What better time to drown in the smooth, golden depths of cognac.

A carefully measured amount was poured into the snifter. Warm water was added and so were lemon drops. I nursed the infusion till it was stone cold, hoping that I’d performed all the motions a seasoned drinker (drunk???) would perform, ranging from sniffing to twirling and swallowing with a studied look of pure bliss on my face.

And I honestly do believe that I felt as though my joints were greased by the time night fell. I almost believed that my head swam. I almost believed that my eyes were going wonky.

The latest in the series of my experiments was drinking Sprite in a beer mug. I persisted with the slow and steady form of consumption even after the fizz had performed a speedy defection. I even hunched over the mug trying to summon dejection from somewhere near my big toe to fit the desciprtion of a generic beer guzzler.

Alfred Doolittle’s rendition of ‘With a lil’ bit o’ luck’ seemed to be the perfect accompaniment. So did Stereophincs’ bartender and the thief.

I’m not the only person who felt this way apparently. Jug Suraiya had written a rather foggy short story called- A Tika for Jung Bahadur, in which a very sorry excuse of a director sits drinking plain soda in a bar, hoping that observers would think of it as vodka and tonic.

The illusion does last.

It does.

Until even the average experimenter discovers that his/her cognitive skills are as active as ever.

CONCLUSION- It’s simply too much hard work to evoke intoxication. I managed to enjoy and spice up the consumption of the mundane, but I came no closer to getting drunk. I merely suffered from exquisite delusions of grandeur, until I lost the zeal to keep up the pretense.

Until I fence with the real thing, I’ll just stay high on life. Or the weather. The shapes in the cloud. Birdsong. Book dust (I’m certain it’s as potent as cocaine). Unfermented grape juice.

I (don’t quote) warble-
“The Lord above made liquor for temptationTo see if man could turn away from sin
The Lord above made liquor for temptation -
But
With a little bit of luck,
With a little bit of luck
When temptation comes you'll give right in………”

Google Search

2008-12-11T22:38:00.004+05:30

BLASTS: Can't put it more simply

2008-09-13T23:00:00.006+05:30

For the first time since its conception a wonky news channel flashed the words BREAKING NEWS for an appropriate purpose and not for a sleazy tid-bit released some five days ago. Serial blasts rock Delhi. Instinctively, some appropriate sentences declaring shock and dismay rolled out, accompanied by a generous sprinkling of expletives. Uncensored videos of dead bodies and blood flashed on the screen, while the newsreader wailed and trilled. Other channels yielded no more. The only thing left to do was to sit and wait for shock, anger, resentment or any feeling to settle in. But it didn’t come. It was expected. With the festive season in the offing, it was expected, not dreaded that fireworks of a different kind would take place. It was the dawning of this knowledge that was overwhelming and scary than the actual occurrence. “It was a crude bomb, a crude situation and a crude………” Funny they said that because the way the officials dealt with the situation was crude too. Shivraj Patil gave a predictable reaction, his speech punctuated by promises of compensation and aid for the victim’s families from both the State and the Central government. But none of this is new. Delhi saw blasts in 2005. Nothing changes. Lessons remained unlearnt. The same scenes were played out, played out so perfectly that it seemed like a much rehearsed or much performed play. Seven years, 2 days ago, the WTC was attacked. Very solemnly we observed a few minutes of silence to mourn for the dead. A spark of resentment rose, because we’d never done something similar for those who died almost every other day in our own country. Today, I realized that it wouldn’t be feasible for us to do that, because if we did attempt it, we’d have to go mute for an indefinite span of time. The phone rang; a usually happy voice had taken on a funeral tone. Her parents had been at one of the sites, thankfully came away unscathed, but left them shaken anyway. The emotions that had refused to materialize despite grand efforts, finally oozed out, accompanied by the need to see punishment. Tolerant nation my bloody right foot, I wanted to see these people busted. I wanted to see capital punishment. Someone came up with a deeply satisfying idea, “Why don’t we just castrate the bastards, they’ve already done half the job on themselves…” Disgusting the idea may be, but it struck a chord. For a while. Then my rampant thoughts were claimed by sanity. Sanity, reemphasized that this would happen again. Sanity encouraged me to go watch people huff, so that I could exercise my resentment, passively of course. The bomb diffuser being used by the NSG, resembled something out of Dexter’s lab, it even let out a bluish smoke, evoking spurts of laughter. Laughter gave way to hysteria, which quickly deflated into melancholy and then finally settled into a comforting morbidity, which suited the occasion. And then words came, whizzed through the brain. But it isn’t the best time to write, because all that flows out is too honest and too furious and sincere to the point of blatant mendaciousness. Maybe, we should have our own Ku Klux Klan. Take the responsibility into our own hands. Or give the military free reign for a while. Maybe. All throughout this heady harangue, I keep thinking of something I read in the book, Shantaram, “I don’t know what scares me more, the madness that smashes people down, or their ability to endure it” But it’s this endurance that’s heartening because it’s the only thing standing up to these maniacs. Its human resilience that ensures recovery. Maybe. I say maybe, because I’m not sure that complete recovery can be achieved. The scars do remain. And I’m glad they do. Because they’re a constant reminder of what we are up against and because it would be a crime to forget. Elie Wiesel puts it very succinctly, “ To forget would be not only dangerous but offensive; to forget the dead would be to kill them a second time.”

Who's Who

2008-09-07T13:42:00.004+05:30

Tragically, today we exist without living; constantly trying to apprehend what creation we will next have to acquire to remain CONNECTED.

I am not Anti Technology. Technology is the greatest and most profound proof of man’s genius. But, unfortunately reverence for technology has regressed into mere gadgetry and gimmickry. But the more seemingly connected we get, the more disconnected we truly are.

Like Pygmalion have become obsessed with our own creation and have gone further to offering ourselves up as slaves. We have almost been transformed into a “Borg” like mixture of human and machines. The technologies that started out as aides to our existence have become vital necessities for us to trudge though everyday life, to make up for incompetence. Technology has changed the pace of our lives, we strive for immediacy. Consequently, we tend to attack symptoms as opposed to addressing true problems, and apply Band-Aids to pacify the moment as opposed to tourniquets, which are actually needed. We are easily satisfied with solving small problems as opposed to conquering major challenges. The mind is left craving for stimulation, for freedom, for any form of poetry in life and most importantly human companionship. It’s actually not the dependency on technology that disturbs me. We have incorporated it into our lives, but we’ve not acquired the requisite knowledge about whatever it is we use. It just emphasizes the futility of introducing any more to the world. We don’t deserve it. We don’t know how to use it. Because of this uninformed yet starstruck way of employing technology, we do it’s bidding instead of the other way around. Technology is designed to allow men to work without acquiring skills (this does not mean I’m saying go dig for oil even if you have drilling machines). It’s helping justify lack of ability, it fills in the gaps, and it helps rationalize lack of training. Technology saves the day.

What if someone pulled the plug on our technology? Would engineers still know how to draft products? Would we still know how to ship a product or process an order? Would our financial transactions come to a halt? Would man’s capability to entertain and be entertained end? The answer, unfortunately, is yes. We are being driven by technology as opposed to the other way around.
And for the finishing touches, no entourage from Galt’s Gulch or Mulligan’s Valley is going to come to our rescue, because so far, I haven’t found the answer to ‘Who’s John Galt?’

I'M TRYING TO THINK OF A SMART NAME, BUT NOTHING SEEMS TO BE WAITING IN THE WINGS

2008-09-07T10:25:00.003+05:30

The Nuclear deal finally passed, Kapil Sibal and Ravi Shankar Prasad sparred on national television (the latter chose to hide his mortification behind a façade of blustery bravado), Brijesh Mishra called the N-Deal a step in the right direction, Washington sent some impressive statements and India was left disenchanted by China (what’s new). Pranav Mukherjee’s statement was pitched at us again and again and again. Historical judgment, it may be, landmark judgment it most certainly was.

What dampens the fervor is that not many actually understand the ramifications of the deal, and yet guided and supported by sheer aggression, continue to oppose it. In a while, I will not be able to recall the scenes from Vienna with as much accuracy as I will be able to recollect each rash, uninformed and inexplicably damaging statements uttered by the politicians back home.

BJP, a party that went into hibernation after the elections, jumped right back into the political foray with more alacrity than ability or vision, let alone a shred of reason. Advani dithered, slithered and displayed a lot of. ……attributes, but no political acumen.

But acumen, rationalization, debate, discourse have never exactly been required in India politics. It’s more of a shouting match, where the usually invisible, peripheral parties make their presence known in the polity.

There’s an old lawyers adage that, when you have the facts on your side, hammer the facts. When you have the law on you side, hammer the law. And when you have neither, hammer the table. Now rational I am, educated and liberated I am. But even then I wouldn’t bet too heavily against the last action. Simply by virtue of the FACT, that you may not be able to hear any of the facts or the laws when the ogres start banging the table.

What is excessively funny, moronic and absurd, is that these people can’t even sabotage right. Remember Shogun (James Clavell), where Toranaga condemns Ishido, for failing in his plan of having Toranaga assassinated. ‘So foolish to fail, terrible to fail, neh.’ A samurai would impale himself upon such; I can only hope that the aforementioned morons do so. But then again, if they had such sensibilities, this discourse and many of the kind, would never have come into existence.

Then there’s the COMPOSITION of the parliament. But that’s another story…………

Testing Waters

2008-09-01T23:02:00.003+05:30

10:11:12
A nagging interest, a boring evening and a pretty bad coffee, landed me not with the proverbial headache, but with a blog. Creating a blog was simple enough, given the highly, greatly, even overtly simplified instructions. But once there, I had no clue what to do, rather write. What the hell would I write that didn't end up being a stylized version of a certain Bhagat, who's shot to great heights ( HOW). But the time of the night proved to be inspiration enough. But just enough to launch myself into this, because I'm really not enamored enough to extrapolate upon exactly how profound it was to have started writing at such a.........'time'.

What is intriguing is that I'm still awake, I’ve gone 36 hours minus sleep. One with the nocturnes, namely, dogs, grasshoppers and colicky babies. I sit, trying to listen to the sounds of the night. I hear the hum, the roaring hum of say 500 ACs, barks of the aforementioned dogs and creaks and squeaks from the weird expats camping in the apartment directly over ours. The delights of community living.

Asokamitran did say that everytime he looks at his old writings he finds only typing errors. So I'm going to post this before sense (good, bad or cowardly) prevails and I feel tempted to refrain from posting this.