It took me 3 attempts to get my blogname correct. I tried inertiauninterrupted, uninterruptedinertia, unintentedinertia n then eventually I got it right. I laughed. I havent been around on this blog for like ages now (more than a year to be precise) & it is so off my mind that I forgot my own blog name.
There was a reason why I had thought of this name. It had a reasoning for me. I guess am no more in that state of mind anymore. Change I guess.
I was travelling by a taxi the other day. I saw this handsome guy waiting at the signal. I realised I was staring. And then it struck me. Hey, he is not supposed to be my types (or so I believe). Now my type is definitely not the guy in crisp ironed, spotless & bright white shirt. With amazing heart melting sleek leather shoes. Cropped hair with tiny spikes, trendy sophisticated glasses with a briefcase that spelt 'Elite & Corporate'... believe me, that has not been 'my' type ever! Change I guess.
I dont speak the way I used to. I think before I speak now. I dont loose my head that easily now. I am getting a little bit more spiritual now. I have started (trying) to judge people/situations now (I never bothered earlier. Now i cant afford to). It is difficult to hurt me now. It is difficult to impress me now. Change I guess.
A few years back I did not want to be associated with the category that I belong to. The people who work, 9 to 5, slog it out. Party in the most happening places, have friends they air kiss to. Well, I work 9 to 7 on most days & 10 on a lot of days & sometimes even 1 in the night if a boss decided to demand an annual presentation. I do go to some happening places many weekends & I do have a set of people I air kiss to. So I guess am pretty much there where I did not want to be. Change I guess.
One thing I havent changed though. I had decided I am gonna try & be everything that I ever want to be. I still have my friends who will tell me that it wasnt worth loosing a friend over a tiny fight (a fight that lasted more than a month), I still go back home to parents who wake me up every morning & literally drag me to breakfast table. I still have a sis with whom i fight over whose earring is it anyway! I still go to worli seaface & talk drab with friends. I still love my life as much as yesterday. I love this... Change... I guess!
Tuesday, 10 March 2009
Wednesday, 30 January 2008
Late Goodbye
This cold is amazing. Mumbai for a change is actually freezing. I know the reason is something to do with environmental imbalance but I am too happy and can use some overlooking of facts for sometime.
The weather is especially chilly in the last part of the night. 4-5 in the night. The lowest it has gone down to is 10 degress C. I dont like calling this part as morning cause it is NOT morning for me. Well, anyways... as I was saying.... people find heaven in the strangest of places... I found one on the roads of Mumbai at 4 in the night.
My work (these days) is something I would have never known if I hadnt decided to take this detour. Human Factory is what I call my workplace. I love the place. I am able to survive there only because I know it will not last long. Yet I am having a time of my life. Difficult to explain...
But my heaven is not the workplace... its the time I spend travelling back home. At 4 in the night with the chill air all around and the car speeding at 90-100 kmph or is it at the speed of light? I dunno...
The only time before that I have travelled on the Mumbai roads this late and at such high speeds is when I have been intoxicated. Today when I see the street lights streaming above like a sparkling gold chain... and me actually sane enough to see it, I wonder why didnt I do this before. What a dizzy high it is to see a thumping corporation come to a grinding halt.
They say that Mumbai never sleeps. Agreed. Even at that time you will find people & vehicles on the road. But I say Mumbai stands still at this hour of time. I feel this time is created just for me. This time of nothingness is just for me. This time is stolen from somewhere inbetween the past and future, just for me...
The head is buzzing with the inhuman work being subjected for hours. The eyes are stubborn and will not budge to sleep. They want to see. They want to see nothing. Around there are bodies just like mine and thankfully they make no attempt to make small conversations (though there are exceptions of your friendly lech, angry young man, confused lost damsel in distress, talky good friend, dumb workmate.... and a few more). And then the journey begins...
Ears blocked to any interference with headfones and the world just sweeps by like it is the blowing wind itself. The buildings that are meant to be buzzing with activity are somehow as quiet as ghost mansions. Vacant parked cars, silent atmosphere, huge empty roads, occasional sleeping dogs in small lanes (initially they are the ones that follow cars at late nights, but i guess this time they also go and rest). This is pretty much what you will see on the journey. I can never get enough of it.
I close my eyes and breathe the cold air and my hands shiver. Damn even a shawl isnt enough for this cold? Can you imagine this is Mumbai?
Poets of the Fall croon in my head.
It's all a game, avoiding failure, when true colors will bleed
All in the name of misbehavior and the things we don't need
I lust for after no disaster can touch, touch us anymore
And more than ever, I hope to never fall, where enough is not the same it was before
Where do i go from here, i wonder. I do not wish this car to stop ever. I do not wish to go home. Do not wish to tear myself apart from the canvas I now feel a part of. The canvas on which is drawn this long pause in time. The music, the road, the cold and me all are one part, flying somewhere. And everything around is just blur.
Poets of the Fall sing again
Do you breathe the name of your saviour in your hour of need,
And taste the blame if the flavor should remind you of greed?
Of implication, insinuation and ill will, 'til you cannot lie still,
In all this turmoil, before red cape and foil come closing in for a kill
And before I know I am back home, from where I started off today evening. Suddenly the body gives way and all i can think of is sleep. I wonder whether all these feelings were a play of my tired mind? Whether this 'soaring high' feeling is just a ramble of an exhausted brain. Probably. But even if it is so, i can say that I am the happiest when I am on my way back home, listening to Poets of the Fall and enjoying the climate and the speed. I just love this new found time in heaven that I have found that forms an everyday part of my life.
Goodnight!
Wednesday, 9 January 2008
Book Review: The Wind-up bird chronicles - Haruki Murakami
Well now this is one book i have never read before. It puts everything that you have ever read to shame. But at this point i should warn you that you will enjoy this book in its true sense if you are ready to just shut-up and read, ask no questions, flow with the descriptions and plainly visualise each and every word written on those pages (that wont be difficult given murakamis ability to put visualisations in words)
I was suggested this book by a friend and he just told me one thing... the characters of this book will stick with you... i second that now. The characters are so well etched that if asked a question i can tell you how the protagonist would look at it and also the various other characters. However dont be fooled by it. The story will baffle you as it will move ahead. According to me there is no 'unfolding' of the story that we generally come across in other books. this book is a drifter and you drift with it.
Haruki Murakami is a Japanese author and his original works are in Japanese. The Wind-up bird Chronicles is the story of a man named Toru Okada who has recently quit his job and is staying at home trying to figure out what to do next. He stays with his wife Kumiko. This story starts off as a search for their lost cat and ends up as the search for Kumiko.
His search leads to him meeting a variety of characters - an unknown women who calls him up for phone sex, a next door neighbour 16 year old May Kasahara. Mays questions makes him look deeper an deeper within himself. A psychic Malta Kano and her sister Creta Kano. His brother in law Noboru Wataya. A fortune teller Mr Honda. A world War II soldier Mamiya.
Eerie Nutmeg and Cinnamon.
Through out the book Murakami has covered the realities of World War II and infused it so very well in the story. Toru Okada's search can be a metaphor for a lot many things at a time.
This is one book that is bound to surprise you by the time you finish it, not because of the way the end has been written but because of the way it has been able to take you on this journey with Toru Okada.
Rating: 4/5
1 - nice read 2 - good 3 - very good 4 - simply outstanding 5 - Go down on my knees and bow down in awe
Coming up next: The perfect Man - Naeem Murr and The Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry (both Indian Writings)
I was suggested this book by a friend and he just told me one thing... the characters of this book will stick with you... i second that now. The characters are so well etched that if asked a question i can tell you how the protagonist would look at it and also the various other characters. However dont be fooled by it. The story will baffle you as it will move ahead. According to me there is no 'unfolding' of the story that we generally come across in other books. this book is a drifter and you drift with it.
Haruki Murakami is a Japanese author and his original works are in Japanese. The Wind-up bird Chronicles is the story of a man named Toru Okada who has recently quit his job and is staying at home trying to figure out what to do next. He stays with his wife Kumiko. This story starts off as a search for their lost cat and ends up as the search for Kumiko.
His search leads to him meeting a variety of characters - an unknown women who calls him up for phone sex, a next door neighbour 16 year old May Kasahara. Mays questions makes him look deeper an deeper within himself. A psychic Malta Kano and her sister Creta Kano. His brother in law Noboru Wataya. A fortune teller Mr Honda. A world War II soldier Mamiya.
Eerie Nutmeg and Cinnamon.
Through out the book Murakami has covered the realities of World War II and infused it so very well in the story. Toru Okada's search can be a metaphor for a lot many things at a time.
This is one book that is bound to surprise you by the time you finish it, not because of the way the end has been written but because of the way it has been able to take you on this journey with Toru Okada.
Rating: 4/5
1 - nice read 2 - good 3 - very good 4 - simply outstanding 5 - Go down on my knees and bow down in awe
Coming up next: The perfect Man - Naeem Murr and The Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry (both Indian Writings)
Book Review - Center of Everything - Laura Moriarty
This book is about Evelyn Bucknow.. or wait a minute is it about me? Or for that matter is it about you? This book is about every girl (and even boy) who has been a teenager once. There are several characters in this book which are truely one of a kind - Evelyn's single mother, her hard-core catholic religious grandmother, her next-door neighbour first love who also happens to be a small time mall stealer.... and lot many other characters. But in this book the narrators narration is more important than anything else. Its the understanding of the situation by Evelyn that makes this book a worth.
This book personifies my belief that you do not need jazzy words and romanticizing of dreams to come up with a classic. This book is as simple as listening to your friend narrating a story to you.
The book kicks off at a time when Evelyn is 10 and ends when she is 19. the journey is really heart warming. Her flow from childhood to adolecence to adulthood is graphed through various stages of uncertainity, blind belief, numbness and realisations. This book makes you sit up and take a look at life in the most appropriate way - without pretentions, without opinions and without dreamy illusions.
There are many times while reading this book that you want to go and tell Evelyn to take heart, that everything will be all right. The character is so endearing. And sometimes you just want to hold her shoulders and tell her 'grow up!'... she is just like each and every one of us.
A very realistic book from an author who was pretty unknown to me when i picked up her book.
Rating: 2/5
1 - nice read 2 - good 3 - very good 4 - simply outstanding 5 - Go on my knees and bow down in awe
Book Review - The Hungry Tide Amitav Ghosh
Before I begin i'd like to clear that... I am no one to really review any books. all i am doing here is writing my impressioons on the books that I have landed up reading recently. If it makes you pick up that book and read, plz do comment and let me know wht u feel abt it too.
I happened to read The Hungry Tide by chance. I had just finished reading Shantaram by Gregory Roberts and had this urge to read something good again. Tried reading Richard Bransons autobiograhy but Shantaram rang really loud in my head and Losing my Virginity of Branson thus didnt stick much. Amitav Ghosh just stuck in my mind with a solidity of a huge ships anchor.
Read the synopsis behind the book and on an impulse picked up Amitav Ghosh. It was a very well decision taken. This book made me Amitav Ghosh's fan...
The book is about a lot of things. The Sundarbans of Bengal, the awaiting storm, the tigers, the history, the people and above all the relationships and how they shape the people. Ghosh has beautifully created each character and made them life like. He has put up the negatives of the character first and then their positives. This way we land up appreciating even the small goodness of each character.
The description of sunderbans is so vivid and actual i could nearly smell the wetlands. Amazing is the word. The controversy of the tigers is brought out with such sincerity and delicately, you will be amazed to find yourself thinking about this god-like tiger whos at the same time dreaded and revered.
Indian writings have something in them that rings a bell with me. You will feel the oneness when you read them. Probably because the sources are the same. Not that other writers dont succeed in touching that chord, but Indian writings have this mixture of freshness and antic quality to them. If i have to decribe them in a smell to you, it will be the smell of wet earth on an early cold morning.
This book made my conviction to see India to its fullest even stronger. I believe there is so much beauty right here which we havent yet seen. And the worst part is the ignorance of it too. Well i can assure you The hungry tide will definitely make you want to go and see this beautiful part of India.
I know i havent really done justice to the book here. But will add to it as and when i feel like.
My Rating: 3/5...
1- nice read 2 - good 3 - very good 4 - simply outstanding 5 - Go on my knees and bow down in awe
Saturday, 8 December 2007
All my bags are packed
It rained tonight. It rained with all its glory. I was expecting it somehow. Still for others this November rain seemed odd. I always say the hints are all around us. We just need to see them with open hearts. And hints are what I saw. I knew it would rain. But that knowledge did not take away the astonishment when it ‘did’ rain. I watched it on the window glass and thought of all the innumerable times a poet or a writer wrote about the serene beauty of these tiny sprinkles of life on the window pane. I wondered, did anyone ever write about the chill that accompanies it. Did anyone speak about the frightening thundering that it brings? Did anyone talk about how a sleepless night it is? I guess not. But as they say, why destroy beauty...
So I stood there looking outside my window, seeing something... The reflection of my baggage strew all across my room. Isn’t it amazing I needed to look outside to see the huge pile of my belongings lying inside? Looking inside, there were my belongings, looking through the window it was just my baggage. A single entity without any attachment, without any substance. Looking inside, each bag, each fluttering paper, each clothing and each household item had a story to it. Each had ‘my’ story to it. Each story that I had lived, each story I wished I had lived again, I sat there listening.
Time flew and so did my soaring imagination. I saw the days that had gone by fused them with the days to come. I created a perfect symphony of dreams and reality and imagination. Tonight I could be anything I wished, I could do anything I wanted. Tonight I lived my past and the future I wanted.
The musical rain got me on my feet. The symphony in my mind and the raindrops outside created the tango of fantasy... I danced tonight. Danced for the possibilities and danced for the regrets... I danced.
Suddenly I realised I wasn’t alone. There was someone else outside the window that was dancing too. My reflection drenched in the raindrops on the window pane. It smiled at me when I gaped at it. It smiled at my pile of baggage. In its eyes I saw my belongings transforming to a meaningless crowd of useless and heavy carry-ons. I wanted to stop the transformation. I wanted these belongings to remain the way that they were. Untouched, haphazard and full of past as they seemed to me. But it suddenly struck me that in a couple of hours morning will come and if this baggage is not cleared by then someone else will pack them up for me anyways. Pack up all those memories, those moments and those broken pieces of life I once had. It was then just a matter of time.
I decided to look outside my window for some time. The raindrops crashed on it like little miracles. I saw myself outside the window looking inside. Unchained and free. The proposition interested me more. I wondered then... Are memories slaves of some unarranged baggage? Is my life only what it was uptil this night? The beauty of past is that we can choose to remember the wonderful parts and forget the dark parts. And anyways the view outside my window was beautiful even with the chill and the thundering. Now I just wanted to stand by the window and keep looking outside. Look at all the things there and feel them. Tomorrow I will stand there in the garden and God only knows how beautiful it will look in the morning light. I wanted to be there and imagine what morning would bring... the good with the bad and the ugly.
But some things needed to be taken care of. I sat next to my baggage and started packing them up one by one with utmost care. They still sang the stories that I loved. I cried, I laughed, I got angry and happy with every tale narrated again and again. But this time around they couldn’t drown out the sound of the pouring rain, the thunder and the blowing wind. I don’t know if the weather strengthened or the stories faded but there came a time when all I could remember was just how hastily I packed my bags tonight...
So I stood there looking outside my window, seeing something... The reflection of my baggage strew all across my room. Isn’t it amazing I needed to look outside to see the huge pile of my belongings lying inside? Looking inside, there were my belongings, looking through the window it was just my baggage. A single entity without any attachment, without any substance. Looking inside, each bag, each fluttering paper, each clothing and each household item had a story to it. Each had ‘my’ story to it. Each story that I had lived, each story I wished I had lived again, I sat there listening.
Time flew and so did my soaring imagination. I saw the days that had gone by fused them with the days to come. I created a perfect symphony of dreams and reality and imagination. Tonight I could be anything I wished, I could do anything I wanted. Tonight I lived my past and the future I wanted.
The musical rain got me on my feet. The symphony in my mind and the raindrops outside created the tango of fantasy... I danced tonight. Danced for the possibilities and danced for the regrets... I danced.
Suddenly I realised I wasn’t alone. There was someone else outside the window that was dancing too. My reflection drenched in the raindrops on the window pane. It smiled at me when I gaped at it. It smiled at my pile of baggage. In its eyes I saw my belongings transforming to a meaningless crowd of useless and heavy carry-ons. I wanted to stop the transformation. I wanted these belongings to remain the way that they were. Untouched, haphazard and full of past as they seemed to me. But it suddenly struck me that in a couple of hours morning will come and if this baggage is not cleared by then someone else will pack them up for me anyways. Pack up all those memories, those moments and those broken pieces of life I once had. It was then just a matter of time.
I decided to look outside my window for some time. The raindrops crashed on it like little miracles. I saw myself outside the window looking inside. Unchained and free. The proposition interested me more. I wondered then... Are memories slaves of some unarranged baggage? Is my life only what it was uptil this night? The beauty of past is that we can choose to remember the wonderful parts and forget the dark parts. And anyways the view outside my window was beautiful even with the chill and the thundering. Now I just wanted to stand by the window and keep looking outside. Look at all the things there and feel them. Tomorrow I will stand there in the garden and God only knows how beautiful it will look in the morning light. I wanted to be there and imagine what morning would bring... the good with the bad and the ugly.
But some things needed to be taken care of. I sat next to my baggage and started packing them up one by one with utmost care. They still sang the stories that I loved. I cried, I laughed, I got angry and happy with every tale narrated again and again. But this time around they couldn’t drown out the sound of the pouring rain, the thunder and the blowing wind. I don’t know if the weather strengthened or the stories faded but there came a time when all I could remember was just how hastily I packed my bags tonight...
Did something hit me? part 2
I am not as precise and focussed as I may seem. I falter more often than it seems. I have wanted different things at different times and if you look closely I may seem promiscuous. But again a little closer look will reveal that I have one common thread on which I base my promiscuousness. That common thread is – to be and do whatever I truly believe in at that point of time. I want to give my 100 % if I want something really bad. I land up giving 150%. But don’t be fooled to believe I am your general case of varied ambitious interests. I believe I am as un-ambitious as a housewife of the 1920’s. As un-ambitious as a tired father of the bride, who’s bride is as good-looking as a toad. My ambition is just one. Do whatever I feel truly about. The keywords being whatever and feel... So does that make me a sentimental fool?
I had a dream. An attainable but very difficult one. Nature intervened and gave me something on my lap which was 90% of what I wanted. But what the heck, you are supposed to dream for the sky so that you at least reach the tree top. I had reached the highest treetop in the vicinity. It seemed to all (and therefore to me) the best possible option I could have. I was happy. Or was I? I waited, patiently. Looked all around. What I missed was the dejection, the failed efforts, the pitiful condolences... do I sound like a loser on the loose? What I did get was whispered appreciation of how lucky I was (and therefore I believed I was lucky), little sobbing cries of people who failed and were weary of my reward well received. I had no reason to miss the dream, so I missed losing the dream instead... At least I wanted to have the pleasure of losing my dream... Complicated? It is as simple as animal instinct.
I’d be lying if I said I took this time to prepare of my dream. I didn’t. I gave in to the easier option of being happy with what I had. I did. When I came face to face with the opportunity to look at the fiery gates of my struggle for the dream... I couldn’t hold back. I jumped in the bandwagon. I know what scenario you would expect. I gave up everything to pursue my dream. I didn’t. I kept what I had and went on to achieve what I truly wanted. An added cherry on my creamy delicious cake. Does is take away any bit from my glory? I dare you to do that and if you even think of doing that, I will chop you into tiny pieces and have them myself for breakfast.
Looking back it was as difficult for me to get what I have today as everybody else, only a little bit more difficult. I had other constrains which others didn’t and when I saw everywhere around me, all wondered why did I jump down from my treetop. Why did I take a place in the bandwagon when there was no real need to do that? But I did and today I am where I wanted to be. Up on cloud number nine. And there ain’t no place I would rather be... as said by Bryan Adams. At least for right now. I don’t know later which other cloud I will want to be on. I know someone else would have given a hand or leg to get where I am today. I haven’t. I wouldn’t have. But I have what they wanted and I don’t know for how long I want it either. But I want it now and I have it now. I put on stake whatever I was asked for. I played the game fair and square.
The ecstasy is beyond words. The happiness is real now. I know what has hit me today. Because IT hasn’t hit me, I have banged myself on it.
(The writer is extremely happy and too over excited to bother about the repercussion of putting up posts like these which will be read by people who aren’t exactly as happy about the game results. The writer would suggest – CHILL! And let her enjoy her moment of glory...)
I had a dream. An attainable but very difficult one. Nature intervened and gave me something on my lap which was 90% of what I wanted. But what the heck, you are supposed to dream for the sky so that you at least reach the tree top. I had reached the highest treetop in the vicinity. It seemed to all (and therefore to me) the best possible option I could have. I was happy. Or was I? I waited, patiently. Looked all around. What I missed was the dejection, the failed efforts, the pitiful condolences... do I sound like a loser on the loose? What I did get was whispered appreciation of how lucky I was (and therefore I believed I was lucky), little sobbing cries of people who failed and were weary of my reward well received. I had no reason to miss the dream, so I missed losing the dream instead... At least I wanted to have the pleasure of losing my dream... Complicated? It is as simple as animal instinct.
I’d be lying if I said I took this time to prepare of my dream. I didn’t. I gave in to the easier option of being happy with what I had. I did. When I came face to face with the opportunity to look at the fiery gates of my struggle for the dream... I couldn’t hold back. I jumped in the bandwagon. I know what scenario you would expect. I gave up everything to pursue my dream. I didn’t. I kept what I had and went on to achieve what I truly wanted. An added cherry on my creamy delicious cake. Does is take away any bit from my glory? I dare you to do that and if you even think of doing that, I will chop you into tiny pieces and have them myself for breakfast.
Looking back it was as difficult for me to get what I have today as everybody else, only a little bit more difficult. I had other constrains which others didn’t and when I saw everywhere around me, all wondered why did I jump down from my treetop. Why did I take a place in the bandwagon when there was no real need to do that? But I did and today I am where I wanted to be. Up on cloud number nine. And there ain’t no place I would rather be... as said by Bryan Adams. At least for right now. I don’t know later which other cloud I will want to be on. I know someone else would have given a hand or leg to get where I am today. I haven’t. I wouldn’t have. But I have what they wanted and I don’t know for how long I want it either. But I want it now and I have it now. I put on stake whatever I was asked for. I played the game fair and square.
The ecstasy is beyond words. The happiness is real now. I know what has hit me today. Because IT hasn’t hit me, I have banged myself on it.
(The writer is extremely happy and too over excited to bother about the repercussion of putting up posts like these which will be read by people who aren’t exactly as happy about the game results. The writer would suggest – CHILL! And let her enjoy her moment of glory...)
Friday, 2 November 2007
Hopefully
Its hope that survives us all. Hope that shines through this all. There is no way to understand or feel the power of Hope without being helpless and vulnerable and lost. You got to reach the rock bottom to know the meaning of the statement - from here there is no way but up!
Hope will find you whether you look for it or not. The time is to be right.... it is the oxygen one needs. Have you ever sat down and listed the various times you relied on Hope? Do that, and you'll be shocked to look at the bullet points.
Dosent Hope then make life as a believers game. What do you hope of? From who do you hope? Most of the time for most people it is God. For some it isnt. Still hope is comman in both parties. You hope from yourself, from circumstances, from other people, from past efforts or simply from nothing concrete. In any case if you hope you are then a believer.. a belief that sometimes you have to look beyond yourself or rather the very obvious and just hope... hope that somehow things will get better.
Hope can be disillusional too. Sometimes we hope to just avert the inevitable. We blanket our woes and worries with hope and disconnet from the reality to live a life on hope. But whos to question a persons hope? Isnt it like mercy killing then? I know the comparison is drastic but think. In mercy killing you end a life based on a persons judgement and then there is an equally strong view point against the exsisting view point. Hope needs no reason. So whos to determine whether a hope is disillusional or not? Who has the right to kill a hope of someone? and yet again who has the heart to see someone ruin themselves on a HOPE that is non existent?
Thursday, 1 November 2007
Sing me a Song - Part 2
Every time I look in the mirror
All these lines on my face getting clearer
The past is gone It goes by,
like dusk to dawn
Isn't that the way
Everybody's got their dues in life to pay
Yeah, I know nobody knows
where it comes and where it goes
I know it's everybody's sin
You got to lose to know how to win
Half my life is in books' written pages
Lived and learned from fools and from sages
You know it's true
All the things come back to you
Sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter,
sing for the tears
Sing with me, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good lord will take you away
Dream On Dream On Dream On
Dream until your dreams come true
Dream On Dream On Dream On
Dream until your dream comes through
Dream On - Aerosmith
I just neednt say more... his words say it all... Some songs lift you up to the clouds and open up your heart to the beauty and reality around you... AGAIN a simple and powerful song... true and real feelings do not need complicated words... what say?
All these lines on my face getting clearer
The past is gone It goes by,
like dusk to dawn
Isn't that the way
Everybody's got their dues in life to pay
Yeah, I know nobody knows
where it comes and where it goes
I know it's everybody's sin
You got to lose to know how to win
Half my life is in books' written pages
Lived and learned from fools and from sages
You know it's true
All the things come back to you
Sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter,
sing for the tears
Sing with me, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good lord will take you away
Dream On Dream On Dream On
Dream until your dreams come true
Dream On Dream On Dream On
Dream until your dream comes through
Dream On - Aerosmith
I just neednt say more... his words say it all... Some songs lift you up to the clouds and open up your heart to the beauty and reality around you... AGAIN a simple and powerful song... true and real feelings do not need complicated words... what say?
Saturday, 27 October 2007
Sing me a song
It's a little bit funny this feeling inside
I'm not one of those who can easily hide
I don't have much money but boy if I did
I'd buy a big house where we both could live
If I was a sculptor, but then again, no
Or a man who makes potions in a travelling show
I know it's not much but it's the best I can do
My gift is my song and this one's for you
And you can tell everybody this is your song
It may be quite simple but now that it's done
I hope you don't mindI hope you don't mind
that I put down in words
How wonderful life is while you're in the world
I sat on the roof and kicked off the moss
Well a few of the verses well they've got me quite cross
But the sun's been quite kind while I wrote this song
It's for people like you that keep it turned on
So excuse me forgetting but these things I do
You see I've forgotten if they're green or they're blue
Anyway the thing is what I really mean
Yours are the sweetest eyes I've ever seen
Your song - Elton John
One of the sweetest n purest romantic song i have ever heard. No play of words for artistic variations... pure SIMPLE feelings... simply put... I guess only elton can do that.
And as far as i am concerned... didnt know wht else to put up n so putting up whts on my mind rite now... your song!
I'm not one of those who can easily hide
I don't have much money but boy if I did
I'd buy a big house where we both could live
If I was a sculptor, but then again, no
Or a man who makes potions in a travelling show
I know it's not much but it's the best I can do
My gift is my song and this one's for you
And you can tell everybody this is your song
It may be quite simple but now that it's done
I hope you don't mindI hope you don't mind
that I put down in words
How wonderful life is while you're in the world
I sat on the roof and kicked off the moss
Well a few of the verses well they've got me quite cross
But the sun's been quite kind while I wrote this song
It's for people like you that keep it turned on
So excuse me forgetting but these things I do
You see I've forgotten if they're green or they're blue
Anyway the thing is what I really mean
Yours are the sweetest eyes I've ever seen
Your song - Elton John
One of the sweetest n purest romantic song i have ever heard. No play of words for artistic variations... pure SIMPLE feelings... simply put... I guess only elton can do that.
And as far as i am concerned... didnt know wht else to put up n so putting up whts on my mind rite now... your song!
Sunday, 14 October 2007
Did something hit me?
The urgency is gone. The pressure is gone. The unknown is now known and the excitement has thus withered off. Yeah there is this new and an equally challenging proposal waiting to happen. But there is a small wait before i can actually take it up.
Things changed for me in a matter of an hour. It took me 2 days for the change to sink in. It is all so surreal. Am so used to putting in my best efforts to get wht i want... cant understand how this just landed on my lap. It didnt give me a chance to show my best to the very least let alone challenge me. The consequence... I doubt the crediblity of whats on my lap (which is stupid coz i always wanted it).... Is it good enough? Could I have got better? Is there anything better than this anyways? Am i thinking too much?
There is this tendency that people have. Most of them. If not most, then a few like me. People like to hunt their rewards. when you see that reward in your hand you want to remember the efforts that you went through to get it. Sometimes then it isnt abt the reward itself but the way to get the reward that becomes important. The process then is the reward.
But then sometimes you let nature takes its course. Flow with it and absorb what it gives you. When i sit back today and wonder what would have possibly been a better situation than the one that i am in now, there is none. Just that it took its own course when i least expected it. When i was ready with a Plan A, plan B and a plan C... Nature took plan D and there i was looking at something which i didnt believe could happen so fast...
What happens, happens for the best. Whatever is to happen will happen eventually. AND I KNOW I AM THINKING TOO MUCH.....
Tuesday, 9 October 2007
We Care
There is a whole generation in the US that can claim to have been brought up on radio, another generation on television and yet another generation on digital technology. In India however one generation itself has been bestowed with all the latest technology at one go. India has been a late bloomer in progress but it is catching up rather fast. We are born in this fast era. In our times things are changing at the speed of light. I see my younger cousins and am baffled at how different their childhood is than mine (and I am not an antique piece myself). It is full of IB schools, television channels just for them, and stores just for them, cutting edge computer technologies and what not. I know of a 5 year old who is so well worse with her PC and she spends hours and hours in front of it. In my school days I used to wait for 7.00 in the evening to see ‘amchi maati, aamchi mansa’. Our generation is having a lot of things on a silver platter. I am not sitting her to judge right or wrong about this fast paced growth. At least not in this post.
The recent Lead India Campaign by Times of India is extremely interesting. A cause very justified and an approach almost good enough. I keep myself abreast of all the happenings of this campaign. Recently, coz I was at home, I saw this ad on Channel V about this program where a bunch of Indian youngsters get to travel all around India and they video tape stuff and make a documentary about India. These people talk about different reasons for being a part of such an endeavour, how they are not really happy with certain situations right now and boy! I wish I was a part of it too. I want to change a few things myself too. The idea in both these cases is the need of youth lead change being extremely important. Both look at attracting the youth with hard hitting realities and with examples of people within themselves who are ready to stand up and make a change. Both urge Indian youth to do something about todays situation.
Well, a different view of this could be that you feel all these are money making gimmicks and nothing works. But I know one thing for sure. If money making was the idea there would have been better choices ( I know what I am saying, I am studying marketing). I’d like to believe that the makers of these kind of programmes see a trend where people are ready to come up and make a difference.
I am not cynical about the situation that is prevalent in India today. According to me things are already looking brighter as far as Indian growth is concerned. Yeah… the inherent problems still remain like poverty, poor education, discrimination, orthodox, population explosion… Like Priyanka Chopra says in the advertisement for Lead India Campaign that we always say tomorrow is a better future for us. Tomorrow there will be no poverty etc. But why tomorrow? Why not today? Why not look at making a change today?
We are not going to solve all our problems at one go. I believe we are on the right road. Youth today is very aware of what powers they have and how to use them. Yes a general apathy is prevalent and these initiatives are I guess just a beginning. The way chosen is good enough. Just that we better not deviate. In spite of all these problems the generation today has a mind of its own and aspirations independent of any pressures. Along with this they have the guidance and resources to just ramp ahead. I see various leaders all around me in their own right. I have full confidence in this product in the form of today’s youth. A little bit of a push and I guess we are good enough.
The recent Lead India Campaign by Times of India is extremely interesting. A cause very justified and an approach almost good enough. I keep myself abreast of all the happenings of this campaign. Recently, coz I was at home, I saw this ad on Channel V about this program where a bunch of Indian youngsters get to travel all around India and they video tape stuff and make a documentary about India. These people talk about different reasons for being a part of such an endeavour, how they are not really happy with certain situations right now and boy! I wish I was a part of it too. I want to change a few things myself too. The idea in both these cases is the need of youth lead change being extremely important. Both look at attracting the youth with hard hitting realities and with examples of people within themselves who are ready to stand up and make a change. Both urge Indian youth to do something about todays situation.
Well, a different view of this could be that you feel all these are money making gimmicks and nothing works. But I know one thing for sure. If money making was the idea there would have been better choices ( I know what I am saying, I am studying marketing). I’d like to believe that the makers of these kind of programmes see a trend where people are ready to come up and make a difference.
I am not cynical about the situation that is prevalent in India today. According to me things are already looking brighter as far as Indian growth is concerned. Yeah… the inherent problems still remain like poverty, poor education, discrimination, orthodox, population explosion… Like Priyanka Chopra says in the advertisement for Lead India Campaign that we always say tomorrow is a better future for us. Tomorrow there will be no poverty etc. But why tomorrow? Why not today? Why not look at making a change today?
We are not going to solve all our problems at one go. I believe we are on the right road. Youth today is very aware of what powers they have and how to use them. Yes a general apathy is prevalent and these initiatives are I guess just a beginning. The way chosen is good enough. Just that we better not deviate. In spite of all these problems the generation today has a mind of its own and aspirations independent of any pressures. Along with this they have the guidance and resources to just ramp ahead. I see various leaders all around me in their own right. I have full confidence in this product in the form of today’s youth. A little bit of a push and I guess we are good enough.
Sunday, 7 October 2007
Desperate Housemates
Statutory Warning: The content herewith is not meant for the weak hearted. Parental Guidance strongly not recommended. Side effects may include heavy vomiting, sneezing and immediate distaste for anything edible.
Let me start by giving you the back drop. The house is huge enough to tire you out completely if you even dream of cleaning it alone all by yourself. The house is occupied by 3 girls (living there without respective families) who are committed to making their life fun and enjoyable. To top it there is pressure of studies and socialising leaving next to nil time for the girls to give their time and energy to the house (or so they believe). This is enhanced by lack of inclination to clean the house any which ways. And the biggest consideration – keeping in mind the money constrains there is no domestic help hired either. The result is rare cleaning of the house.
Disclaimer: The characters in this post are completely fictional (cough cough...) and any resemblance whatsoever to me or my roommates is purely the product of your sadistic mind.
The story begins with the jinxed first night at the coveted house. Whenever anyone shifts in their new house in this side of the world the next morning everyone has one sleazy question to ask – how was your first night? Well the answer in this case was loud and clear – Eventful and out of this world. Why would it not be so? The roommates had finished a whole can of pesticide to kill 1 poor cockroach and in turn landed up vomiting out of their window due to light poisoning of themselves. But the moment of glory was the next morning when they saw the same cockroach which was lost in the wilderness of their suitcases last night, lying upside down, dead, next to the very bed they crashed on after excessive vomiting last night. Yeah that was the jinxed first night...
One of the most stressful and frustrating work for these roommates is called the ‘washing machine revenge’. When the girls do get down to cleaning their house, they do it thoroughly. They clean spick and span under the washing machine outlet pipe, even if it means putting out the pipe off its outlet nozzle. But the washing machine in this house has a mind of its own. It doesn’t like being tampered with. So after the hard days work of cleaning the house, at 1 in the night, the girls bathe and change in sleepwear and start their machine to do some dirty laundry, the washing machine takes its revenge. Mysteriously the filthy, soapy water gushes out of the outlet pipe (which strangely isn’t in the outlet nozzle) and seeps into the bedroom and passage and rallies steadily towards the hall. The girls are up and dead and cleaning the whole house all over again till 3 in the morning. Just that this time round the work is of cleaning is 10 times more strenuous due to the soapy water.
In a scenario like this (scenario of living on your own) one tends to develop a love hate relationship with a lot of living and non living creatures around oneself. For example Fungus. The 3 girls found their very own fungi culture in their unrepaired, non-operational, warm refrigerator. There are certain people in this house who put food items in the fridge, forget that the fridge doesn't work anymore and their noses are blocked to any stench of stale and rotting food. Obviously these people are not the 3 girls themselves. They are the non living creatures (ghosts as most would like to call them) residing in this house even before the 3 girls took over. They are to be blamed for every mishap in this house. Anyways, as I was saying... that’s where they found their first ever self created fungi culture. The green moist layer of fungi on your favourite packet of corn, that unmistakable odour of stale food mixed with that of flourishing fungi... oh what memories it brings back. But determined as they were, the 3 girls, never cleaned the fridge. It was just too much work. The better and an ‘efficient manager certified’ option was to never open that graveyard (the fridge) door ever again. Their secret was sealed forever in their heart and the stench sealed in the fridge.
But as you know nothing can be avoided forever. So the fungi refused to stay in their assigned corner. It spread. They found them in the least expected places (like love notes kept by a lover, hidden). The fungi, accompanied by other ‘unknown to man’ micro organisms, was found on half eaten apples to any food item packaged or otherwise left there for more than a few months, sometimes on jeans where chocolate was spilled and never washed, sometimes on the underneath of a damp suitcase, sometimes on old love letters and sometimes even on sources of water storage. Uff! What a pain to clean them.
But as they say what is life without difficulties and what is life without some fun. And what a great combination it is when one finds fun filled difficulties. What a dumb philosophy... But who cares. We all are still alive and I guess in due course are vaccinated against any germs imaginable for decades to come (See everything has a bright side to it).
Anyways, As I have to now rush to stop the soapy brown water of my washing machine seeping to my hall as there are a few families of cockroaches and fungi unaware of the tsunami that is about to hit them... I am signing off... I am the power of the Universe...
P.S: The views expressed in this post are that of one of the 3 roommates and the other 2 roommates have a legal right to differ with it as long as they do not get verbally or physically violent.
Let me start by giving you the back drop. The house is huge enough to tire you out completely if you even dream of cleaning it alone all by yourself. The house is occupied by 3 girls (living there without respective families) who are committed to making their life fun and enjoyable. To top it there is pressure of studies and socialising leaving next to nil time for the girls to give their time and energy to the house (or so they believe). This is enhanced by lack of inclination to clean the house any which ways. And the biggest consideration – keeping in mind the money constrains there is no domestic help hired either. The result is rare cleaning of the house.
Disclaimer: The characters in this post are completely fictional (cough cough...) and any resemblance whatsoever to me or my roommates is purely the product of your sadistic mind.
The story begins with the jinxed first night at the coveted house. Whenever anyone shifts in their new house in this side of the world the next morning everyone has one sleazy question to ask – how was your first night? Well the answer in this case was loud and clear – Eventful and out of this world. Why would it not be so? The roommates had finished a whole can of pesticide to kill 1 poor cockroach and in turn landed up vomiting out of their window due to light poisoning of themselves. But the moment of glory was the next morning when they saw the same cockroach which was lost in the wilderness of their suitcases last night, lying upside down, dead, next to the very bed they crashed on after excessive vomiting last night. Yeah that was the jinxed first night...
One of the most stressful and frustrating work for these roommates is called the ‘washing machine revenge’. When the girls do get down to cleaning their house, they do it thoroughly. They clean spick and span under the washing machine outlet pipe, even if it means putting out the pipe off its outlet nozzle. But the washing machine in this house has a mind of its own. It doesn’t like being tampered with. So after the hard days work of cleaning the house, at 1 in the night, the girls bathe and change in sleepwear and start their machine to do some dirty laundry, the washing machine takes its revenge. Mysteriously the filthy, soapy water gushes out of the outlet pipe (which strangely isn’t in the outlet nozzle) and seeps into the bedroom and passage and rallies steadily towards the hall. The girls are up and dead and cleaning the whole house all over again till 3 in the morning. Just that this time round the work is of cleaning is 10 times more strenuous due to the soapy water.
In a scenario like this (scenario of living on your own) one tends to develop a love hate relationship with a lot of living and non living creatures around oneself. For example Fungus. The 3 girls found their very own fungi culture in their unrepaired, non-operational, warm refrigerator. There are certain people in this house who put food items in the fridge, forget that the fridge doesn't work anymore and their noses are blocked to any stench of stale and rotting food. Obviously these people are not the 3 girls themselves. They are the non living creatures (ghosts as most would like to call them) residing in this house even before the 3 girls took over. They are to be blamed for every mishap in this house. Anyways, as I was saying... that’s where they found their first ever self created fungi culture. The green moist layer of fungi on your favourite packet of corn, that unmistakable odour of stale food mixed with that of flourishing fungi... oh what memories it brings back. But determined as they were, the 3 girls, never cleaned the fridge. It was just too much work. The better and an ‘efficient manager certified’ option was to never open that graveyard (the fridge) door ever again. Their secret was sealed forever in their heart and the stench sealed in the fridge.
But as you know nothing can be avoided forever. So the fungi refused to stay in their assigned corner. It spread. They found them in the least expected places (like love notes kept by a lover, hidden). The fungi, accompanied by other ‘unknown to man’ micro organisms, was found on half eaten apples to any food item packaged or otherwise left there for more than a few months, sometimes on jeans where chocolate was spilled and never washed, sometimes on the underneath of a damp suitcase, sometimes on old love letters and sometimes even on sources of water storage. Uff! What a pain to clean them.
But as they say what is life without difficulties and what is life without some fun. And what a great combination it is when one finds fun filled difficulties. What a dumb philosophy... But who cares. We all are still alive and I guess in due course are vaccinated against any germs imaginable for decades to come (See everything has a bright side to it).
Anyways, As I have to now rush to stop the soapy brown water of my washing machine seeping to my hall as there are a few families of cockroaches and fungi unaware of the tsunami that is about to hit them... I am signing off... I am the power of the Universe...
P.S: The views expressed in this post are that of one of the 3 roommates and the other 2 roommates have a legal right to differ with it as long as they do not get verbally or physically violent.
Tuesday, 18 September 2007
LOVE... and the 'kick' of it
Love is everywhere. I have experienced it. So is hatred and indifference. It’s what we choose to see that makes the difference. Opposite of love is not hatred, cause even in hatred you have to be attached to that person to hate him/her that much. Opposite of love then, is ‘indifference’. The neutrality or detachment of it makes it even more brutal.
But the question in my mind is, what is ‘love’ anyways!
Define love. One of the most difficult questions to encounter. Love is giving (ahem... the most shallow description ever. If it ain’t selfish, it ain’t love), Love is this overwhelming longing (overwhelming I agree, but longing, not necessarily), Love is when you can't live without someone (Nah, I have seen more than a few cases when love is just letting go [forced or otherwise]), Love is freedom (sounds interesting, but I have my reservations on that. Freedom is not the prerogative of love or vice-versa), Love is when 2 people fit into each other’s lives like 2 pieces of a jigsaw puzzle (Oh yeah, grow up, to all those people who believe this, there is a lot of adjustment, compromise and acceptance when love does mature. And sometimes people do ‘fit in’ fabulously in each other’s lives but there is just no love). Love is habit (wouldn’t have disagreed more. If your love is a habit then I suggest you get over it as soon as possible. Cause this love then is without substance). So what is love actually?
Love is an amalgamation of a lot of different feelings. Care & Concern – it binds you by getting you involved in the other person’s life, Physical attraction – we are humans at the end of it. If this ain’t there it is just Care & Concern. Identification – one needs to see a part or whole of one’s self in the other person. This is what makes you relate to another person. Yeah I have seen 2 completely different people fall in love. The identification then lies in the contradiction. Appreciation – if you can’t appreciate the other person in some way or the other, then it isn’t love, it’s just pity/sympathy/empathy. These are the feelings I have identified till now. Am sure there are many more. I am in the process of figuring it out myself.
More often than not, relationships are based on 1 of the above feelings more that the others. Sometimes it’s just plain physical attraction, sometimes a high level of appreciation bordering towards being ‘smitten’... Sometimes there is high degree of identification... resulting in finding someone exactly like u... but then... do these last? I don’t know. I guess ‘love’ has to be a mixture of all the above...
What is love if it binds you or strips you off your freedom? But then again, what is love if it just doesn’t bind you or alter your freedom in some way. Love makes you responsible of/about somebody, love makes you do or not make you do certain things for somebody. The beauty of it lies in this contradiction.
People change in love. People grow in love. People are ruined in love and then again people ruin love itself. Love is what you make of it and what it makes of you.
Special Recommendation: Please do see this movie ‘Love Actually’. It’s fantastic and it comes closest to what, I believe, love actually is...
But the question in my mind is, what is ‘love’ anyways!
Define love. One of the most difficult questions to encounter. Love is giving (ahem... the most shallow description ever. If it ain’t selfish, it ain’t love), Love is this overwhelming longing (overwhelming I agree, but longing, not necessarily), Love is when you can't live without someone (Nah, I have seen more than a few cases when love is just letting go [forced or otherwise]), Love is freedom (sounds interesting, but I have my reservations on that. Freedom is not the prerogative of love or vice-versa), Love is when 2 people fit into each other’s lives like 2 pieces of a jigsaw puzzle (Oh yeah, grow up, to all those people who believe this, there is a lot of adjustment, compromise and acceptance when love does mature. And sometimes people do ‘fit in’ fabulously in each other’s lives but there is just no love). Love is habit (wouldn’t have disagreed more. If your love is a habit then I suggest you get over it as soon as possible. Cause this love then is without substance). So what is love actually?
Love is an amalgamation of a lot of different feelings. Care & Concern – it binds you by getting you involved in the other person’s life, Physical attraction – we are humans at the end of it. If this ain’t there it is just Care & Concern. Identification – one needs to see a part or whole of one’s self in the other person. This is what makes you relate to another person. Yeah I have seen 2 completely different people fall in love. The identification then lies in the contradiction. Appreciation – if you can’t appreciate the other person in some way or the other, then it isn’t love, it’s just pity/sympathy/empathy. These are the feelings I have identified till now. Am sure there are many more. I am in the process of figuring it out myself.
More often than not, relationships are based on 1 of the above feelings more that the others. Sometimes it’s just plain physical attraction, sometimes a high level of appreciation bordering towards being ‘smitten’... Sometimes there is high degree of identification... resulting in finding someone exactly like u... but then... do these last? I don’t know. I guess ‘love’ has to be a mixture of all the above...
What is love if it binds you or strips you off your freedom? But then again, what is love if it just doesn’t bind you or alter your freedom in some way. Love makes you responsible of/about somebody, love makes you do or not make you do certain things for somebody. The beauty of it lies in this contradiction.
People change in love. People grow in love. People are ruined in love and then again people ruin love itself. Love is what you make of it and what it makes of you.
Special Recommendation: Please do see this movie ‘Love Actually’. It’s fantastic and it comes closest to what, I believe, love actually is...
Wednesday, 5 September 2007
The Stranger in my Mirror
I have made friends, acquaintances, boyfriend, soul mates and everything in between. And I had made a stranger in my mirror. I searched in all the people around me the real friend that I could possibly make and I would lie to myself if I said I didn’t quite find someone who came close to being the friend I was searching for. I have found a few. But something was amiss. I wondered what. Until I realised what I was searching for was sitting right in front of me when I sat here staring at the full length mirror of my home.
I sit here today all relaxed and in ‘solitude’. I want no one I need no one. I ran and ran for my dear life. Not running from something or running to something. Just running. Aimlessly. I ran from that stranger in my mirror. Now I run no more. I love this stranger. I need this stranger.
There was a time I didn’t quite like what I saw in my mirror. It was everything I never wanted. I didn’t know then what I wanted. I still don’t. But I went elsewhere to find that something. The love, the gratitude and the comfort. I didn’t see it in my mirror. I thought I will find it in other people. And believe me I thought I did find it outside. Till one day I decided to have a conversation with my stranger in the mirror.
The stranger looked at me and its eyes asked me just one question. What did I ever find with others that I wouldn’t have found here in this 4 ½ by 1 ½ feet of reflecting surface? I had stared back. I didn’t realise the answer then as I usually don’t (I am a real dim wit in such cases you see). But sooner than later I found the answer. It was nothing. There is nothing in this world that I can't find in this reflecting surface and I need not to go elsewhere. I decided to be friends with this stranger.
And over a period of time I have found a friendship that nothing can break or no one can take away from me. I wonder what took me so long to realise this. I see an image of everything I am, everything I can be and everything I will be. It is a comfort zone I searched everywhere. I found here on the wall of my home.
How often do we sit back and have the patience to sit and talk with this image we create in here? It is the most clear and transparent of being I have ever seen. People can't see what I see in this mirror. I like it that way. I want it to be that way. It isn’t perfect mind you. There are ten thousand of things that I want to change and another ten thousand of things I would never change. And that exactly is the beauty of it. I see a person just like me. Issues like mine. Thoughts like mine. Dreams like mine and nightmares like mine too. Who better can understand me but this friend in this mirror?
I love this person in the mirror. It is no stranger to me anymore.
I sit here today all relaxed and in ‘solitude’. I want no one I need no one. I ran and ran for my dear life. Not running from something or running to something. Just running. Aimlessly. I ran from that stranger in my mirror. Now I run no more. I love this stranger. I need this stranger.
There was a time I didn’t quite like what I saw in my mirror. It was everything I never wanted. I didn’t know then what I wanted. I still don’t. But I went elsewhere to find that something. The love, the gratitude and the comfort. I didn’t see it in my mirror. I thought I will find it in other people. And believe me I thought I did find it outside. Till one day I decided to have a conversation with my stranger in the mirror.
The stranger looked at me and its eyes asked me just one question. What did I ever find with others that I wouldn’t have found here in this 4 ½ by 1 ½ feet of reflecting surface? I had stared back. I didn’t realise the answer then as I usually don’t (I am a real dim wit in such cases you see). But sooner than later I found the answer. It was nothing. There is nothing in this world that I can't find in this reflecting surface and I need not to go elsewhere. I decided to be friends with this stranger.
And over a period of time I have found a friendship that nothing can break or no one can take away from me. I wonder what took me so long to realise this. I see an image of everything I am, everything I can be and everything I will be. It is a comfort zone I searched everywhere. I found here on the wall of my home.
How often do we sit back and have the patience to sit and talk with this image we create in here? It is the most clear and transparent of being I have ever seen. People can't see what I see in this mirror. I like it that way. I want it to be that way. It isn’t perfect mind you. There are ten thousand of things that I want to change and another ten thousand of things I would never change. And that exactly is the beauty of it. I see a person just like me. Issues like mine. Thoughts like mine. Dreams like mine and nightmares like mine too. Who better can understand me but this friend in this mirror?
I love this person in the mirror. It is no stranger to me anymore.
Wednesday, 29 August 2007
My Haven
A Cancerian loves his home with a respect bordering on reverence. His home is where he plays, lives, loves, dreams and feels safe. Though he may travel over half the earth in connection with his career, no Cancer person is ever quite happy without a hearth to call his own. Sometime make a point of noticing the expression on the face of a crab who has just returned home from a long trip. Pure ecstasy.
Linda Goodman (in her book ‘Sun signs’)
I am a Cancerian. It’s more a confession than a statement. I love my home. I run to my home when I am depressed or happy or plain confused. But the basic idea being that I run back home. Today when I sit back and think about ‘my home’ there are 2 places that come to my mind.
One of my homes is in the heart of Bombay. It isn’t about the four walls of my physical house but the whole experience of its surroundings. Home for me is the MARINE DRIVE, JJ flyover, Kala Ghoda, Regal circle, Colaba Causeway, Bombay central Station, Flora Fountain and all the lawyers offices of that area (had few of my best clients there when I was in the investment business), dockyard road, Love lane, Clare Road, Nagpada, BHENDI BAZAR and of course my flat at Byculla... I can see train tracks from my place. The train passing by every 3-5 mins (am so used to the noise that I don’t even register how apart they are from each other), the far off ships docking, the bells ringing at Gloria church, the cranky next door old lady, my over nosey yet adorable liftman, irritating and seriously smart bldg school boys (damn I feel a generation gap already), cute bitchy and once again extremely smart school and college girls of my bldg (yet again what was I doing at their age, playing with dolls?)... and most importantly, my family resides at this place... My sistah! Love her or hate her... can't live without her. And when the hell did she get so mature? My mother – she is my best friend and confidant and one of the most taken for granted people of my life. I will make it up someday soon. My dad – serious and sometimes incommunicable, but always manages to put everything in order in the background. We four are a combination that is live firecrackers or the serene and comforting sea... depends which mood you pick on us at.
These are few reasons I call Byculla my home. It is everything I ever wanted and I FEEL at home here. But today when I got to know that after 3 days of staying here 2 more days are holiday for me and I have a choice to stay back for 2 days more, there was only one voice shouting softly in my head – GO back to Nerul, go to Nerul, GO GO GO GO GO...
Second of my homes is in Nerul. It’s been a nearly a year and a half now that I am staying at a rented apartment here with 2 of my class mates. One of them being my best friend. My first impression of Nerul was – its a ‘gaon’! This place has this eerie ability to alienate you as soon as you set foot here. Now I dunno whether it was the rain (it was monsoons when I went there first and rain gets me depressed about life in general) or it was the place itself. The immigrants to this part of the world will agree that this is a place where zombies florish... flourish... that I surely do. Nerul home for me consists of my COLLEGE, my house (the four walls), RD’s (sutta cum chai joint), Rangoli restaurant, HDFC bank ATM (thats my cash source dude, it definitely is home for me), DMart – the local departmental store (this is where a portion of money withdrawn from HDFC goes), Mayors bungalow, Nerul station, the cinema at Sanpada station – it plays the latest popular movies though it resembles a porn theatre (a guy friend once told me that and I shrieked. Nonetheless we still visit it often as it is very light on the pockets)... and a few more things here and there. I wouldn’t be caught dead saying this, but still I will – I love this place. I love it for the solitude and solidarity that it gives me. A great combination. It frustrates and it comforts. It lets me ‘be’ when I need it and gets me so lonely sometimes. I have experienced my freedom and the evils of ‘excessive’ freedom over here. This place is me. But at the end of every week when Sunday approaches... like a spirit being carried in its carriage I drift to Byculla and nothing can stop me. I love coming back to Byculla...
I play, live, love, dream and feel safe in both these places.
Home for me is both these places. Equally. For some time now, I need to shuffle between both these places to sustain myself. Nerul gives me my space, Byculla gives me my people, the people who mean the world to me. And for right now this arrangement is perfect. I have developed as a different human with this arrangement. But sooner than later this arrangement is going to give way. My college will be over soon. There will be happiness for I can go back to Byculla and sadness as I will not be a part of Nerul the way that I am now. I don’t know which of these 2 feelings will supersede. I will let myself tell me that then. But whatever the feeling, the fact remains. I will lose the home away from home.
And I will find a new home away from home soon... a third place to fill up this gap. This time if I have a choice I will look out for a home which has a good night club and a multiplex nearby... God hear my prayer! Amen.
Linda Goodman (in her book ‘Sun signs’)
I am a Cancerian. It’s more a confession than a statement. I love my home. I run to my home when I am depressed or happy or plain confused. But the basic idea being that I run back home. Today when I sit back and think about ‘my home’ there are 2 places that come to my mind.
One of my homes is in the heart of Bombay. It isn’t about the four walls of my physical house but the whole experience of its surroundings. Home for me is the MARINE DRIVE, JJ flyover, Kala Ghoda, Regal circle, Colaba Causeway, Bombay central Station, Flora Fountain and all the lawyers offices of that area (had few of my best clients there when I was in the investment business), dockyard road, Love lane, Clare Road, Nagpada, BHENDI BAZAR and of course my flat at Byculla... I can see train tracks from my place. The train passing by every 3-5 mins (am so used to the noise that I don’t even register how apart they are from each other), the far off ships docking, the bells ringing at Gloria church, the cranky next door old lady, my over nosey yet adorable liftman, irritating and seriously smart bldg school boys (damn I feel a generation gap already), cute bitchy and once again extremely smart school and college girls of my bldg (yet again what was I doing at their age, playing with dolls?)... and most importantly, my family resides at this place... My sistah! Love her or hate her... can't live without her. And when the hell did she get so mature? My mother – she is my best friend and confidant and one of the most taken for granted people of my life. I will make it up someday soon. My dad – serious and sometimes incommunicable, but always manages to put everything in order in the background. We four are a combination that is live firecrackers or the serene and comforting sea... depends which mood you pick on us at.
These are few reasons I call Byculla my home. It is everything I ever wanted and I FEEL at home here. But today when I got to know that after 3 days of staying here 2 more days are holiday for me and I have a choice to stay back for 2 days more, there was only one voice shouting softly in my head – GO back to Nerul, go to Nerul, GO GO GO GO GO...
Second of my homes is in Nerul. It’s been a nearly a year and a half now that I am staying at a rented apartment here with 2 of my class mates. One of them being my best friend. My first impression of Nerul was – its a ‘gaon’! This place has this eerie ability to alienate you as soon as you set foot here. Now I dunno whether it was the rain (it was monsoons when I went there first and rain gets me depressed about life in general) or it was the place itself. The immigrants to this part of the world will agree that this is a place where zombies florish... flourish... that I surely do. Nerul home for me consists of my COLLEGE, my house (the four walls), RD’s (sutta cum chai joint), Rangoli restaurant, HDFC bank ATM (thats my cash source dude, it definitely is home for me), DMart – the local departmental store (this is where a portion of money withdrawn from HDFC goes), Mayors bungalow, Nerul station, the cinema at Sanpada station – it plays the latest popular movies though it resembles a porn theatre (a guy friend once told me that and I shrieked. Nonetheless we still visit it often as it is very light on the pockets)... and a few more things here and there. I wouldn’t be caught dead saying this, but still I will – I love this place. I love it for the solitude and solidarity that it gives me. A great combination. It frustrates and it comforts. It lets me ‘be’ when I need it and gets me so lonely sometimes. I have experienced my freedom and the evils of ‘excessive’ freedom over here. This place is me. But at the end of every week when Sunday approaches... like a spirit being carried in its carriage I drift to Byculla and nothing can stop me. I love coming back to Byculla...
I play, live, love, dream and feel safe in both these places.
Home for me is both these places. Equally. For some time now, I need to shuffle between both these places to sustain myself. Nerul gives me my space, Byculla gives me my people, the people who mean the world to me. And for right now this arrangement is perfect. I have developed as a different human with this arrangement. But sooner than later this arrangement is going to give way. My college will be over soon. There will be happiness for I can go back to Byculla and sadness as I will not be a part of Nerul the way that I am now. I don’t know which of these 2 feelings will supersede. I will let myself tell me that then. But whatever the feeling, the fact remains. I will lose the home away from home.
And I will find a new home away from home soon... a third place to fill up this gap. This time if I have a choice I will look out for a home which has a good night club and a multiplex nearby... God hear my prayer! Amen.
Tuesday, 28 August 2007
Expressing one's self
It is so amazing to be able to express yourself clearly. To be able to use words that convey the exact meaning of what you are thinking and feeling.
I have heard this so many times. I used to live by this statement all through my naive college life. I had someone then who made me believe that I was understood. Don’t get me wrong. If you are the one who understands another person or are being understood by someone else, good for you. Just that for me towards the end of it all... I said so many words expressing exactly what I felt that the intensity of it left itself redundant. My expressions were left redundant.
I couldn’t understand it then and a long long time after that. I always believed and to an extent believe it still that I am bad with words. I was told to improve on it; told to express myself more often, without restriction, without any prejudices. I did. It didn’t help.
I was never trying to be a poet, a writer, a literary expert. I just wanted to be understood. I was told to be clearer, more precise. I tried. I guess I tried so hard and so often that the words itself lost its meaning. How would you tell someone more clearly that you are lost, but by just saying you are lost. How clearer can one get with words asking do you love her but by plainly asking whether you love her... I was lost then. But somehow, I could never get anywhere with certain people. I guess I was too complex then. I guess I was with the wrong people then.
Over the period of time in this drive to express myself better I stumbled upon something very beautiful. Silence. The beauty of this is that from this urge to be understood I somehow landed up understanding people. Obviously this simple realisation did not dawn me easily. It took a lot of blank stares from people I believed understood me to a whole array of foot in mouth moments. In both the cases I just looked back and wondered where did I go wrong. I did not see it then, I see it now. Silence is what was missing.
We lay so much emphasis on saying the right words at the right time that we forget to mention the silences at the right time. Everyone around me wants to be heard. I was one of them trying too. But now I want to listen it all out. Listening is so much more difficult when one has so many right words in their heart and so many exact meanings to what they feel. Fortunately/unfortunately for me that was never an issue. And the irony of the situation is that people have started understanding me better with my silences than my words (mostly it is the respect for the unknown). It’s a power beyond explanation and I am exploring it more.
I have heard this so many times. I used to live by this statement all through my naive college life. I had someone then who made me believe that I was understood. Don’t get me wrong. If you are the one who understands another person or are being understood by someone else, good for you. Just that for me towards the end of it all... I said so many words expressing exactly what I felt that the intensity of it left itself redundant. My expressions were left redundant.
I couldn’t understand it then and a long long time after that. I always believed and to an extent believe it still that I am bad with words. I was told to improve on it; told to express myself more often, without restriction, without any prejudices. I did. It didn’t help.
I was never trying to be a poet, a writer, a literary expert. I just wanted to be understood. I was told to be clearer, more precise. I tried. I guess I tried so hard and so often that the words itself lost its meaning. How would you tell someone more clearly that you are lost, but by just saying you are lost. How clearer can one get with words asking do you love her but by plainly asking whether you love her... I was lost then. But somehow, I could never get anywhere with certain people. I guess I was too complex then. I guess I was with the wrong people then.
Over the period of time in this drive to express myself better I stumbled upon something very beautiful. Silence. The beauty of this is that from this urge to be understood I somehow landed up understanding people. Obviously this simple realisation did not dawn me easily. It took a lot of blank stares from people I believed understood me to a whole array of foot in mouth moments. In both the cases I just looked back and wondered where did I go wrong. I did not see it then, I see it now. Silence is what was missing.
We lay so much emphasis on saying the right words at the right time that we forget to mention the silences at the right time. Everyone around me wants to be heard. I was one of them trying too. But now I want to listen it all out. Listening is so much more difficult when one has so many right words in their heart and so many exact meanings to what they feel. Fortunately/unfortunately for me that was never an issue. And the irony of the situation is that people have started understanding me better with my silences than my words (mostly it is the respect for the unknown). It’s a power beyond explanation and I am exploring it more.
Life in songs
Travelling through time... trying to find places/things/people who mirror the essence of me. Found none. Thought of creating it (people too)... couldn’t! I am like the poet who is bad with words. I can feel poems run through me, but can’t pen it down. It’s the highest level of frustration, believe me. It’s like having Office 2007 but having to work with a 98 processor... what a life! Amazing... you know why? Because that passion comes out in ways one can never imagine. It shows through my restlessness, peeps through my silence, blinks through my eyes and whispers through my indifference. One of the best ways I feel I can express myself is through songs.Songs. They are so amazing. I hear a good lyric and it hits me in my stomach, why can't I write something. I have better ideas than that. When I see someone playing the guitar, I WANT to be able to play it. I know I might be able to create melodies. It’s not as if I haven’t tried. I have, a lot (atleast the poems part. Guitar not really, as I don’t have one, but soon I will).
I can attribute a song to different phases of my life (phases in chronological order).
When I was in school – Overprotected
When I was a teenager – Somewhere I belong
When I fell in love for the first time – Love at first sight
When I had my affair – Kiss from a rose
When I realised what love is – Until
When I lost my love – Empty
When I lost myself – Six feet from the edge
When I got a glimpse of the dark side – Zombie
When I found love and let it go – I’m leaving on a jet plane
When I found myself – I’m no angel
I know I am not perfect, but I can smile
And I hope that you see this heart behind my tired eyes
If you tell me that I can't, I will, I will, try all night
And if I say I am coming home, I’ll probably be out all night
I know I can be afraid but I am alive
And I hope that you can trust this heart behind my tired eyes
And life goes on... for every phase to come I will find a song. If for once I don’t, I will make my own. But will have a song no matter what...
P.S. This post was written earlier and within a few days I got a guitar as a birthday gift from my friends and am rite now on seventh heaven. Anyways this is one of the most meaningful gifts I have ever got...
Monday, 30 July 2007
Chasing Freedom
There was a time when i never understood why i was constantly being told not to do things and even to do certain things. A flood of directions for every step that i took, for every thought that i nursed. It was irritating and constraining. The only direction that i could look at was up and i wasn’t very happy being the only person being looked down on. From those days itself i had one thing clear in my mind... i am gonna search for my freedom. I made mental notes for my definition of freedom.
To do what i like ONLY
The only person i reason to is myself
I take full responsibility of my actions - consequences being good or bad
Run in the opposite direction at the slightest clue of dominance
Stay on my own (very imp)
Learn about life the way i choose to
Try everything at least once (everything meaning Everything)
Well, staying alone didnt happen then, but the rebellion definitely crept in. Then started the time which i would like to call as experimentation.... i wanted everything. Anything new and different i wanted to know it... i believe i got to know a lot of things that way.
Everything was fine. I was doing all that i ever wanted. Perfect... not quite it. But as u always know... when in that moment one never knows what is missing. It is always on the hind thought that one realizes what went wrong. Today when i look back (not that far back really) i see the missing chords. I had all what i wanted. Infact i have. Then what was missing? Freedom i guess...
What is freedom? It is everything that I mentioned above and much more. Freedom is not the wind under ur arms on board titanic. That is good weather. It is not just your holistic thoughts thrown all over the place. That is arrogance. Freedom is not the capacity to be alone whenever you wish to. That is basic hygiene space. For me freedom is so much different now. It is all in your head.
For me all that I have ever asked for has come with a price tag attached to it. And my pursuit for freedom too was no exception. But as they say one needs to decide what all in life is worth paying that price. I have made my decisions in the due course. And what I realize is that freedom is not a moment from whereon you change your way of dealing with this world. It is more of a continuous realization that a lot many things are under your control and an equal many outta ur control.
Freedom is gonna be an everyday battle. That is infact what makes it so special. But what I do believe I have come face to face is a tad bit of maturity to understand my freedom a little bit better. I am free and have always been so. And this realization came when I stopped running behind my freedom.
To do what i like ONLY
The only person i reason to is myself
I take full responsibility of my actions - consequences being good or bad
Run in the opposite direction at the slightest clue of dominance
Stay on my own (very imp)
Learn about life the way i choose to
Try everything at least once (everything meaning Everything)
Well, staying alone didnt happen then, but the rebellion definitely crept in. Then started the time which i would like to call as experimentation.... i wanted everything. Anything new and different i wanted to know it... i believe i got to know a lot of things that way.
Everything was fine. I was doing all that i ever wanted. Perfect... not quite it. But as u always know... when in that moment one never knows what is missing. It is always on the hind thought that one realizes what went wrong. Today when i look back (not that far back really) i see the missing chords. I had all what i wanted. Infact i have. Then what was missing? Freedom i guess...
What is freedom? It is everything that I mentioned above and much more. Freedom is not the wind under ur arms on board titanic. That is good weather. It is not just your holistic thoughts thrown all over the place. That is arrogance. Freedom is not the capacity to be alone whenever you wish to. That is basic hygiene space. For me freedom is so much different now. It is all in your head.
For me all that I have ever asked for has come with a price tag attached to it. And my pursuit for freedom too was no exception. But as they say one needs to decide what all in life is worth paying that price. I have made my decisions in the due course. And what I realize is that freedom is not a moment from whereon you change your way of dealing with this world. It is more of a continuous realization that a lot many things are under your control and an equal many outta ur control.
Freedom is gonna be an everyday battle. That is infact what makes it so special. But what I do believe I have come face to face is a tad bit of maturity to understand my freedom a little bit better. I am free and have always been so. And this realization came when I stopped running behind my freedom.
If it is the end
When will be a day when you can say that you are ready to die? When will it be when you can just close your eyes and say that you are done with all that you had to take from this world and given all that you could? Do you think such a day will ever come in your life? Does a feeling like this have to mean that you are suicidal? Suicide is such a negative term. Couldn’t there be a time when you happily and full of content feel that you are ready to accept that you have done all that you wanted to do? It need not be the act of ending your life. It is just a feeling of content, happiness, so full of life that it wouldn’t matter whether there would be another day or not. Suicide is helplessness, contempt, failure, loss of hope. What I am talking about is content, happiness and serenity. A sort of abundance of it. At that moment you realised that IF you died there was no reason for you to turn back and change something in what you have already created. Yeah you live the next day and create new purpose for life. You live the usual way. Unravelling other things in life. But that moment that passed by was different. You knew that there was so much more left to see in this world, but it didn’t matter. You were content with what you had in your hands right at that moment. The feeling of peace so over whelming that it just didn’t matter whether the world was topsy turvy the next day. It wouldn’t matter if this was the end...
If you have never felt this way... its something that you missing big time. Its is just a moment, that might strike you when you least expect it. But it is the moment when you are really happy. And if it dosent strike you even after a lot of efforts, try getting stoned or high on dope. I guess that will work too.
Saturday, 23 June 2007
Women Drivers...
Now that I drive... though only since a short time, I can and I will comment on the different types of drivers on the roads of Mumbai city. There are two types of people in this world and so are there two types of drivers – Men and Women...Initially (when I did not drive) I hated women drivers myself. I believed they are a misfit in cars and on roads and that when I am behind the wheel, I will change the story. So now that I am behind the wheel, I understand what really goes in the minds of the women who drive. Below are just a few happenings and my justifications for the same.
1) Her car speed will either be below 40 or above 80. Nothing in between. To top it she will never let you over take her either. And if you try to she will give you a look that says... bloody lecherous rash driver. Just can’t let a ‘women’ drive in peace.
Justification: We are safe drivers that’s why the speed of below 40. And as far as the speed of 80 goes that is for the runways only (runways for us are the 1 feet space between our car and the front car at the traffic signal). The fact is we never bother whether someone over takes us or not. It's just that when your car increases its speed, it gets us disoriented and we feel you are trying to show off your driving skills and put us down. Now that is something that we don’t like.
2) Honking is her birth right. If u hear a very noisy car from a distance know that the wheel is ruled by a lady.
Justification: We know (though we will never accept) that our driving sucks, big-time! We care for your safety so we honk well in advance so you have your time to flee the road and be safe.
3) If you are moving in from the side, she will not slow down, ever. You will have to break and wait for your brother to give you some space to join in. What would she have lost if she would have just slowed down a little?
Justification: Well, She never really knew you wanted to move in. She didn’t see you either. If she would have seen you she would have surely slowed. The key word being ‘if’. And to make sure she sees you in a light traffic road, you better be listening to Abhishek’s interview on radio with full volume, or use her technique of honking like a madman or use a bolder method of passing a sleazy comment and then get her attention to you.
4) Why can't they never park properly? It is always parked such that 3 other cars will not be able to move without her car moving first.
Justification: Reversing and forwarding is a pain and also very time consuming. When we have to shop, every minute counts and every minute wasted on parking the car properly leads to lesser minutes to devote to criticising our girlfriends new buys. By the way, who told you we know to park and any which ways, how long are we gone, not more than 4-5 hours. That much anyone can wait!
All in all we women are patient drivers with firm belief in our driving skills. We will never land up killing anyone (coz we never drive at higher speeds. Even if we bump someone he might just fall on the road, get up, curse and move away). We are high nosed and that’s the reason why most of us are unable to see the cars moving in from the sides (try holding your nose up high and then looking around and you will understand what I am saying).
And the best part, women drivers confuse each other too. The other day when I was driving, this car from behind was honking like crazy. That car was in the other lane slightly behind mine. A slight turn of my car n there the cars horn went. I slowed thinking it might want to move ahead but even that car slowed. By the end of it I was so irritated I just slowed and further slowed so that car could go ahead which it eventually did. And yes that was a women driver!
From this post you must have concluded that I am anything but a feminist. Well I don’t know what I am. Still trying to figure that out. All I can say is that I believe
I don’t know if women are better than men, but what I do know is that women are no worse.
1) Her car speed will either be below 40 or above 80. Nothing in between. To top it she will never let you over take her either. And if you try to she will give you a look that says... bloody lecherous rash driver. Just can’t let a ‘women’ drive in peace.
Justification: We are safe drivers that’s why the speed of below 40. And as far as the speed of 80 goes that is for the runways only (runways for us are the 1 feet space between our car and the front car at the traffic signal). The fact is we never bother whether someone over takes us or not. It's just that when your car increases its speed, it gets us disoriented and we feel you are trying to show off your driving skills and put us down. Now that is something that we don’t like.
2) Honking is her birth right. If u hear a very noisy car from a distance know that the wheel is ruled by a lady.
Justification: We know (though we will never accept) that our driving sucks, big-time! We care for your safety so we honk well in advance so you have your time to flee the road and be safe.
3) If you are moving in from the side, she will not slow down, ever. You will have to break and wait for your brother to give you some space to join in. What would she have lost if she would have just slowed down a little?
Justification: Well, She never really knew you wanted to move in. She didn’t see you either. If she would have seen you she would have surely slowed. The key word being ‘if’. And to make sure she sees you in a light traffic road, you better be listening to Abhishek’s interview on radio with full volume, or use her technique of honking like a madman or use a bolder method of passing a sleazy comment and then get her attention to you.
4) Why can't they never park properly? It is always parked such that 3 other cars will not be able to move without her car moving first.
Justification: Reversing and forwarding is a pain and also very time consuming. When we have to shop, every minute counts and every minute wasted on parking the car properly leads to lesser minutes to devote to criticising our girlfriends new buys. By the way, who told you we know to park and any which ways, how long are we gone, not more than 4-5 hours. That much anyone can wait!
All in all we women are patient drivers with firm belief in our driving skills. We will never land up killing anyone (coz we never drive at higher speeds. Even if we bump someone he might just fall on the road, get up, curse and move away). We are high nosed and that’s the reason why most of us are unable to see the cars moving in from the sides (try holding your nose up high and then looking around and you will understand what I am saying).
And the best part, women drivers confuse each other too. The other day when I was driving, this car from behind was honking like crazy. That car was in the other lane slightly behind mine. A slight turn of my car n there the cars horn went. I slowed thinking it might want to move ahead but even that car slowed. By the end of it I was so irritated I just slowed and further slowed so that car could go ahead which it eventually did. And yes that was a women driver!
From this post you must have concluded that I am anything but a feminist. Well I don’t know what I am. Still trying to figure that out. All I can say is that I believe
I don’t know if women are better than men, but what I do know is that women are no worse.
Thursday, 21 June 2007
Answers
(view the first post before reading this to understand this post better)
With so many questions running through my head and the kind of thinking that goes behind answering those questions it's inevitable that you do reach the next logical step – the ANSWERS. We all find answers, some sooner than the others. Some find it within themselves; some find it in their day to day lives. Some answers just stare at you when you least expect them, some come face to face after a lot of penance and toil while some others bump into you just by chance! But I believe you find them one way or the other.
Funny thing are these answers. Have you ever wondered how certain answers are never satisfactory, some answers just bring back the joy in your life? Some others make you want to ask a few more questions while some answers make you wish you had never asked that question...
Exceptions are always there of questions that cannot be answered. It's the process then that matters. The process of finding an answer. We all do that. Flow through life looking for answers of questions that blind us. That is a part of our life. The other part being making choices.
It's this constant state of questioning and answering that makes life more interesting and worthwhile. When the questions diminish, the answers stop flowing in and the whole cycle of life stagnates. What is life if one accepts everything as it is? When one decides there is nothing more to find out in life or worse that he knows everything that he needs to know in life. Rarely will we find people blatantly vocal about these thoughts or even aware of it. It's the way they conduct their life that make us wonder, when did they stop asking questions!
I wish my brain never stops questioning me, my every thought. I do take for granted some thoughts, but what the heck! I am still learning.
P.S: This post was for all those concerned souls who wished to know what happens with so many questions in my mind. How do I ANSWER those questions… I hope u now understand the full circle.
With so many questions running through my head and the kind of thinking that goes behind answering those questions it's inevitable that you do reach the next logical step – the ANSWERS. We all find answers, some sooner than the others. Some find it within themselves; some find it in their day to day lives. Some answers just stare at you when you least expect them, some come face to face after a lot of penance and toil while some others bump into you just by chance! But I believe you find them one way or the other.
Funny thing are these answers. Have you ever wondered how certain answers are never satisfactory, some answers just bring back the joy in your life? Some others make you want to ask a few more questions while some answers make you wish you had never asked that question...
Exceptions are always there of questions that cannot be answered. It's the process then that matters. The process of finding an answer. We all do that. Flow through life looking for answers of questions that blind us. That is a part of our life. The other part being making choices.
It's this constant state of questioning and answering that makes life more interesting and worthwhile. When the questions diminish, the answers stop flowing in and the whole cycle of life stagnates. What is life if one accepts everything as it is? When one decides there is nothing more to find out in life or worse that he knows everything that he needs to know in life. Rarely will we find people blatantly vocal about these thoughts or even aware of it. It's the way they conduct their life that make us wonder, when did they stop asking questions!
I wish my brain never stops questioning me, my every thought. I do take for granted some thoughts, but what the heck! I am still learning.
P.S: This post was for all those concerned souls who wished to know what happens with so many questions in my mind. How do I ANSWER those questions… I hope u now understand the full circle.
Tuesday, 19 June 2007
Summer Project!
Have you ever seen a small kid chew more than it can eat?
Well I am that kid. DNA showed me 2 options. A small chocolate gooey pastry and an orange cheese cake (both from 210 degrees. The best cake shop at churchgate)... chocolate gooey I had already had before (and it was small) so I choose a huge chunk of Orange cheese cake. Just to try it out. When I was asked to cut out a piece for myself I cut a huge one. I was greedy. And to top it I stuffed myself with all of it in one go. I was stuck. Stuck with lotsa cheese cake in my mouth... Can’t eat it, can’t throw it out (throw it out coz it tasted yuck!). Not even mentioning the amazing calories that come with it. Before I get side tracked with the cheese cake imagery, I’ll come to the point. The cheese cake is my The great Indian Summer project. Stuck with it for life and death.
What is a summer project.
Professor: Where you get your first tryst with corporate life.
Placement Co-ordinator: It's a waste of my time
Parents: Whatever it is, should be back by 7.00 in the evening
Friends: Who cares! What’s your pay like? No pay, cool join the gang!
Me: Uhhh!!! Hmmmm....... I think...... I dunno... lets go there and see!
So now that you are clear as crystal with the summer project funda let me take it forward.
May ‘07
1st week: Didnt know who to talk to. By the end of it I and my boss decided on a topic only to realise a couple of other summer trainees already savaged my meaty project around a month back. So next Monday I was as clean a slate that I could ever be.
Next week: The boss decided a project and explained me the concept which till date (project submission this Friday) I have no clue about. I like sheep in the herd, nodded along.
This continued for the next 2 weeks without any issues. It was a comfortable stay at DNA with rounds of coffees and other unmentionables* throughout the days. Endless chattering and office gossips took up a lot of my time. And before I could realise a month was over! And to top it all I got my heavy stack of 500 rs notes as summers internship stipend... Yipppeeee, not bad at all!
June ‘07
4th June is what I call the day of Happy Realisation (1st, 2nd and 3rd were Friday, Saturday and Sunday, no work happens on these days). Happy realisation happened because it was then that it touched my ever so naive brain that the summer trainees before us have made PRESENTATIONS and left! LEFT! To leave this coffee vending machine dominated office you need to PRESENT your project and sumbit a HARDCOPY of it too. Well to do all this u need a PROJECT... and I have none. I HAVE to make one.
That was the time that I sat down and took note. Of all the things I had to do and all the things I did not understand. Well the latter had the maximum bullets. But there was no time to UNDERSTAND my project! None the less I continued till what has come the last 2 weeks of my so called summer project. The boss has spoken now. Project analysis by end of this week i.e Friday (coz Saturdays we don’t work u see). And I am as screwed as the screw on your coffee table. And with all this pressure and tension and stress the only thing that I can feel passionate about is writing this post here. I sat to do my work and here I am, doing something much more creative. Atleast thats wht I suppose. So wish me luck and I go for slaughter this Friday!
*= to know more about what are the unmentionables call me!
Well I am that kid. DNA showed me 2 options. A small chocolate gooey pastry and an orange cheese cake (both from 210 degrees. The best cake shop at churchgate)... chocolate gooey I had already had before (and it was small) so I choose a huge chunk of Orange cheese cake. Just to try it out. When I was asked to cut out a piece for myself I cut a huge one. I was greedy. And to top it I stuffed myself with all of it in one go. I was stuck. Stuck with lotsa cheese cake in my mouth... Can’t eat it, can’t throw it out (throw it out coz it tasted yuck!). Not even mentioning the amazing calories that come with it. Before I get side tracked with the cheese cake imagery, I’ll come to the point. The cheese cake is my The great Indian Summer project. Stuck with it for life and death.
What is a summer project.
Professor: Where you get your first tryst with corporate life.
Placement Co-ordinator: It's a waste of my time
Parents: Whatever it is, should be back by 7.00 in the evening
Friends: Who cares! What’s your pay like? No pay, cool join the gang!
Me: Uhhh!!! Hmmmm....... I think...... I dunno... lets go there and see!
So now that you are clear as crystal with the summer project funda let me take it forward.
May ‘07
1st week: Didnt know who to talk to. By the end of it I and my boss decided on a topic only to realise a couple of other summer trainees already savaged my meaty project around a month back. So next Monday I was as clean a slate that I could ever be.
Next week: The boss decided a project and explained me the concept which till date (project submission this Friday) I have no clue about. I like sheep in the herd, nodded along.
This continued for the next 2 weeks without any issues. It was a comfortable stay at DNA with rounds of coffees and other unmentionables* throughout the days. Endless chattering and office gossips took up a lot of my time. And before I could realise a month was over! And to top it all I got my heavy stack of 500 rs notes as summers internship stipend... Yipppeeee, not bad at all!
June ‘07
4th June is what I call the day of Happy Realisation (1st, 2nd and 3rd were Friday, Saturday and Sunday, no work happens on these days). Happy realisation happened because it was then that it touched my ever so naive brain that the summer trainees before us have made PRESENTATIONS and left! LEFT! To leave this coffee vending machine dominated office you need to PRESENT your project and sumbit a HARDCOPY of it too. Well to do all this u need a PROJECT... and I have none. I HAVE to make one.
That was the time that I sat down and took note. Of all the things I had to do and all the things I did not understand. Well the latter had the maximum bullets. But there was no time to UNDERSTAND my project! None the less I continued till what has come the last 2 weeks of my so called summer project. The boss has spoken now. Project analysis by end of this week i.e Friday (coz Saturdays we don’t work u see). And I am as screwed as the screw on your coffee table. And with all this pressure and tension and stress the only thing that I can feel passionate about is writing this post here. I sat to do my work and here I am, doing something much more creative. Atleast thats wht I suppose. So wish me luck and I go for slaughter this Friday!
*= to know more about what are the unmentionables call me!
Monday, 18 June 2007
Questions
My head if full of Questions.
Why is my car not starting? Why do i have to go to office?
Does happiness always have to be selfish?
Why did that jerk delete my files? Who took my sharpner?
When will they understand what i mean by freedom?
Cant she see me walking on the road?... Women drivers!
Am i beautiful? Am i mad?
Why does mac d's get me so nostalgic? Why cant i remember where i saw him last?
Why dont i get a chance to travel by trains anymore?
Why do people percieve silence as submission?
Is it wrong to go numb about things that hurt you a lot?
Why does the beggar, asking me for a penny, not invoke any sympathy in me? Am i dead?
When will people realise that they need to walk on the foothpath and not on the road?(drivers like me can get them killed man!)
What does rain bring with it that makes me so ecstatic?
and many many more...
(i tell you about all these questions cause i will be speaking about such questions only in my forthcoming entries)
Questions make me think, they make me wonder. They get me irritated and they get me tired. They make me silent and sometimes make me want to catch somebody's collar and ask, Why me? Sometimes they restore the peace in me, sometimes they help me silently bear the torture of indifference.
And more practically, questions sometimes take up so much of my time, i suddenly realise that i just slept through my entire class...
that i spent the entire day with myself! Weird things are these questions... they make you and they break you. but whatever be the case they are a part of us (most of us). And for those who do not have them, get a life!
Why is my car not starting? Why do i have to go to office?
Does happiness always have to be selfish?
Why did that jerk delete my files? Who took my sharpner?
When will they understand what i mean by freedom?
Cant she see me walking on the road?... Women drivers!
Am i beautiful? Am i mad?
Why does mac d's get me so nostalgic? Why cant i remember where i saw him last?
Why dont i get a chance to travel by trains anymore?
Why do people percieve silence as submission?
Is it wrong to go numb about things that hurt you a lot?
Why does the beggar, asking me for a penny, not invoke any sympathy in me? Am i dead?
When will people realise that they need to walk on the foothpath and not on the road?(drivers like me can get them killed man!)
What does rain bring with it that makes me so ecstatic?
and many many more...
(i tell you about all these questions cause i will be speaking about such questions only in my forthcoming entries)
Questions make me think, they make me wonder. They get me irritated and they get me tired. They make me silent and sometimes make me want to catch somebody's collar and ask, Why me? Sometimes they restore the peace in me, sometimes they help me silently bear the torture of indifference.
And more practically, questions sometimes take up so much of my time, i suddenly realise that i just slept through my entire class...
that i spent the entire day with myself! Weird things are these questions... they make you and they break you. but whatever be the case they are a part of us (most of us). And for those who do not have them, get a life!
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