Random Naughty Instance #43 - Prangsters' Passions

There used to be this chubby boy (nickname - Litoo) in my neighborhood. He was also in the same school as I was. When I was in 11th grade (16yrs), he was in 8th, and he had a huge crush on a girl in 9th grade.

A bully in the girls class also had a crush on her. Now the bully gets to know about Litoo's unspoken fantasies and is contemplating a duel. All this while, the girl is hardly even aware of her own existence.

Enter Crimson, and his gang of fun-loving prangsters (gangster+prankster) B, P & R. We decide to get Litoo upto the fight. Now Litoo is not only chubby, but huge and gone dumb since being love struck. We motivate Litoo no end to fight for his love. We make him challenge the bully in public (like, school public) for a duel on a certain date and time, while we (big boys) stand next to him so no one dare touch him.

The training period begins. We teach him tricks that we ourselves never knew. I hear the PT teacher mention "solar plexus", and bingo! Apart from the regular areas, we also train Litoo to aim for the solar plexus. Just ONE punch, right at the target and the bully will become a pile of bull crap.

The day arrives, a little bit of crowd has also gathered. Bully comes close. Bully laughs. Litoo is burning with fury. A raging dragon looks like a pussy cat in front of his expression. Litoo closes his eyes, and swings his clenched fist and goes for the kill.

THWACK! A few groans are heard. And a THUD! The bully is down.

Litoo is overjoyed to tears. We go hurray!!!

The little girl still had no clue what the hell was happening.

Random Naughty Instance # 89 - A Matter Of Principals ...& Teachers

I dont know if I have ever mentioned this here, but I came across this gem of a site called Avanoo.com a few months ago. I have been a regular there, and most of my recent posts have originally been published on Avanoo first.
As a blogger, the best thing about Avanoo is the constant stimulation it gives. As a human being, Avanoo has a larger purpose of making the world better. And I am excited about it!
Apart from the amazing variety of interesting minds present at Avanoo, the stimulation is also there due to this concept of creating "projects". Anyone can create a project about something that they are passionate about, or want to discuss and others can contribute.
At Avanoo, everyone shares their worlds this way. So I created this project called "Naughtier Than Thou" , where everyine can share their stories of naughtiness, whether as a child or not! ;)
This was originally posted here.

***

In 9th class, I had a Hindi teacher called MP, who was infamous for her strictness and stingyness in marking her students.
In a school situated in Bangalore (where no one speaks Hindi as their mother tongue) I, hailing from the North (U.P.) with Hindi as my mother-tongue, felt an ego boost in her classes. However, she wasnt the loyal type. Her partiality towards a local girl, who was also the class topper, made MP give me lesser marks than her in the class tests.

I have never been the one to take injustice lying down. And extracting revenge required a mix of strategic planning, stealth, agility and emotional maturity.

I devised a flawless plan to throw ink on her clothes with a leaking ink pen. This was to be done from behind, while she would be entering the class and walking towards the blackboard. A few of my classmates were taken into confidence, and the plan was successfully executed. Not just once. But thrice. My joy knew no bounds and I was sort of an underground hero among my classmates. No one liked her you see.

4 isnt a lucky number for me I guess. Thats the attempt in which my plan failed. She was aware. 3 days of spoilt expensive sarees had taught her to be alert. And this time she turned back instantly. I was quick as lightening to come back to my innocuous position of reading a book. She was confused.
She asked all the 5 boys sitting close to that spot to stand up. She demanded the truth and silence is what she got. No one said a word. She spoke of dire consequences like "zero in a class test". The other boys were quiet, but their eyes were pleading. Not to her but to me. They wanted me to accept my mistake so they are not harmed.

I was in a dilemma. I thought to myself, if everyone remained quiet, nothing would happen. And thats when she pulled a rabbit from her hat. She said that she had a huge dog who could sniff lies and that she would make the dog bite the liar. How did she know I was scared of dogs? And imagine, I actually believed her! The truth involuntarily poured out of my mouth like a flowing river.

She took me to the prinicipals' office and I went back on my words! The principal promised that he wont beat me up if I told him what exactly happened. Lo and behold! I believed him too! A few honest sentences and I heard a loud thwack on my cheek before the pinching pain began to take effect. I was shattered.

Anyway, my Dad is great. He supported me. But told me that I should learn from this mistake and change myself for good!

I changed my school.

:)

PS. If you decide to share yours (whether on Avanoo or here), let me know!

On WIll Power & Reality, Part 2

Its cold, and I am thinking about my theory of will power. Is it possible to change the weather using my will? If all the people in the world willed it together, at the same moment, would it happen? The answere seems no, but thats probably because I am bound by my education, conditioning and current set of perceptions.
Or, may be there are certain things, like mathematics, music and weather, that are an inherent part of the reality of the universe. Whether we exist or not, music remains. Whether conch shells exist or not the fibonacci series remains, and whether clouds form or not, fractals remain.

So our will power possibly cant affect what is beyond us. It can only affect the illusions that we create for ourselves. The illusions called success, failure, ambitions, progress, development, thoughts, philosophy, happiness, grief, love etc. I will refer to them as illusory-reality because I am not comfortable calling them real, but they affect us none the less.

"The human will, in isolation, is absolute and omnipotent. It is limited only by the limits of imagination, which is the origin of all creation. The mind imagines, and the will brings it alive. Every possibility first exists in the mind, and then comes to the real-illusory world."

Quantum reality, they say, is a 'probable' reality. Sub atomic particles are actually not particles, but probablity clouds of 'possible presence' in a given space-time fabric. The moment they are observed, one of the many probabilities is realised, and an illusion of the presence of a particle at that point in space-time is formed.
Our will, I think, is capable of affecting these minute probabilities, thus creating the most fundamemtal level of the illusory-reality that aggregates into what we called day to day life.
Thoughts, which can be considered as electromagnetic patterns travelling through our brain-cells, are the raw material of will. Your will is thus that invisible connection between you and your illusory-reality.

You really can do anything if you will it strong enough. And if you were the only human being in the world, you would actually be God! (in terms of being omnipotent). There would be nothing else that could drive the universe, except you.
But you are not alone. You are surrounded by numerous potential Gods, and each of them has a will working their own way. So if you want something to happen, and your neighboring God does not, its the strength of your will against his that will decide the outcome (assuming you both were the only existing entities). Conversion of your 'will' into 'reality' is only affected and aided/curtailed, by someone else's will to create its own reality. If both wills arent contradictory, they will 'really' coexist. Else they can hinder each other, and even annihilate each others' effects.

The effect of someone else's will, on your reality, is also decided by the extent of awareness that each of you have about the other. So if you are surrounded by people who think and wish good for you, and you are aware of them, good things will happen to you. Similarly, if there is someone millions of miles away, who wishes good for you and you are aware of it, it will help. The same effect will be negated by the presence of people wishing bad for you. And of course, what you wish for yourself and how strongly you do it, is the biggest factor that creates your illusory-reality.

Thus, more people we have thinking in a harmonious manner, constructive intereference of human will happens. Whatever gets ceated, or the reality around us that we live in, is thus a complex dynamic outcome of these infinite interactions and interferences (constructive & destructive) of the innumerous human 'wills' working 24/7.

Lets pause here for a moment and think. Assuming all this theorising were true, why dont people think "good" for everyone in general? Wont it be the most obvious thing to do? How do clashes, violence, unnatural deaths and destruction happen so often? What was that enlightened man thinking when he said love peace and harmony for all?

Why dont all the Gods realise themselves and understand each other?
Probably because we all exist at different levels of understanding. And that enlightened man reached a level, from where he could understand all.

~~~End Of Part 2~~~

Letters From The Moon, Part 2

Hi Kathy,

Dont worry. There isnt much white here as might seem from down there. Its all either muddy, dark & cold, or muddy, bright & hot. And the STA's have room color simulation technology, so you could have the shed area in any color you wanted!

Nothing grows on the moon you see. It cant. So I cant teach you much. We tried growing stuff earlier, but there wasnt enough CO2 that the shed areas could release outside. We are still a small community. And keeping the plants inside the sheds wasnt an option because real estate is really touching moon sky.

Also, it doesnt look as beautiful here as it used to from earth. But its nicely exotic. I look forward to the guided tours outside sheds. And there is a small area, away from the craters and debris, where you are allowed to jump around as much as you want. Thats real fun. Gravity inside the shed is modulated. I wanted to lease a non modulated STA. Its cheaper. But Mom & Dad are old and they wouldnt really enjoy it.

I am sure they have told you that you really cant stay down there for long. Its getting warmer and warmer and soon you'll all drown in the melting polar ice caps. So, sure move around a bit, see everything, it wont even take long, cause nothing much is left to see anyway. And then you can plan a trip this side.

Look forward to seeing you.

Best

Crimson Feet,

STA - 1471C

Next to Grungian Crater

Moon

He is ok if she kisses him, but not ok if she laughs with him!

This is not about insecurity or openness. Its about what constitutes infidelity for men and women?

I have a (unproven) theory that, in the heart of their hearts, men fear sexual infidelity much less than they fear emotional one!, while on the contrary, women fear sexual infidelity relatively more!
The idea is that men, unlike women, believe (and rightly so in their case) that uncalled for sexual acts are a spur of the moment thing. It isnt necessarily a display of their intention to betray their current partner, or any symbol of being dissatisfied with her.
Its like, "...i am really sorry honey, this hot blonde just kept looking at me and I was 5 beers down, and trust me she wasnt even as hot next morning, ....you are still the prettiest!"

So, men would be rather forgiving of their women committing adultery and apologising for it, than if their woman was seeking emotional support and security from another man. That, inherently, "writes him off" as her man!
(So, at a not so accurately simplified level, 'he is ok if she kisses him, but not OK if she laughs with him!' )

...that girl is NOT mine because i do her!, she is mine because she trusts me and finds support in me and feels at home in my arms! if she finds these things somewhere else.. i am not her man anymore!

The unfortunate (or maybe not) bit is, that women correlate physical intimacy very strongly with emotional dependance. Which leaves the poor man wondering as to what exactly is she doing? Seeking emotional support or seeking physical satisfaction?

The probable fact is that, 'he' might betray physically but not emotionally, but when SHE betrays, she does it EVERY WAY!

On Will Power & Reality (Part 1)

I am a very strong believer in the human will power. So strong that I at times overexpect from "will", and in the process am let down by it.

Remember the quote by Arthur C Clarke? "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
Now I put this here for three reasons. Firstly, the idea of magic must have existed since a really really long time, simply because we have a word in ALL languages to express it. Secondly, magic always enthralls us and reflects those things that we REALLY might want to do! And finally, whats magical at one point of time, almost always becomes "real" at a later point in time.
Magic is a strange concoction of belief, disbelief, awe, wonder, desires and quests.

Lets look at the way technology has evolved.

• Flying in thin air (for a human being) was considered magical at a point of time.
• So was the idea of touching the moon.
• Controlling any kind of physical activity from a distance, without contact, was magic. Now we have remote controlled mechanisms for almost everything & we also have thinking things (called computers) who can interact within themselves without any physical contact (bluetooth etc)
• Hearing a persons' voice coming out of a small handheld thing, which at times is connected to nothing in the world, and then speaking back to the person in the same "thing"? Wouldnt it sound magical if you were to explain it to your 17th century girl friend?

Doesnt it look like that these things have happened because entire generations of human beings have "willed" them to happen? Of course, there have been well meaning skeptics too, who might have tried to stop these people, using perfectly rational sounding arguments like "this has never happened before!" But they have only managed to add meaning and aura to the word magic.

• Becoming invisible, travelling to future, and making other planets habitable sounds magical to you today??

Now lets look at the way societies have evolved.
From the time of hunting in the wilds for food, man has been seeking better tools to hunt (basically "more comfort"). And we have had the metal ages, to Industrial Revolution, to Information Technology era.

Over the years, everyone has been seeking "development", and thats what has been happening. We have a certain unspoken definition of development, which implies 'more money, more comfort and more entertainment for more people'. And thats what we keep striving for all our lives, and keep getting too.

If you notice closely, you will see a pattern. "We want it, and over a period of time we get it."
I will put it a little differently. "Unknowingly, we create our reality ourselves, as we live it along."

~~~end of part 1~~~

(originally on Avanoo: http://www.avanoo.com/pl/post/3562 )

Are We All Basically Trying To Mate Efficiently?

If you have not already guessed the book I am refering to, 'The Mating Mind' by Geofferey Miller is sort of a revelation, at least theoretically.

An excerpt
"Traditionally, evolutionary theory has explained intelligence as merely a by-product of surplus brain size. But psychologist Geoffrey Miller argues that it actively evolved, like the peacock's tail, for courtship and mating, and thereby shaped human nature.Miller maintains that both human sexes have evolved significant ways of displaying fitness via expression of creative intelligence such as storeytelling, poetry, art, music, sports, dance, humor, kindness, and leadership."

Intelligence is the root "cause" all questioning, imagination, speculation and creation. Its the reason why we can think and talk about conciousnessness, soul and God. Its the basis of self-realisation.

What if all this was simply an evolutionary strategy to attract better mates and thus multiply further into better life forms? (As senseless or sensible as a dogs' evolved ability to sniff, which even by the farthest stretch of imagination, doesnt seem to be affecting the workings of the universe in any way.)
Procreation, is probably the only universally acceptable reason for existence. Simply because death itself is such a stark reality. (I am rather extreme in wondering that "what end purpose does existence itself serve?". Thats deserves a different post.)

All creative activities that human beings indulge in seem quiet unnecessary for survival. Poetry, music, writing, painting.. all art forms, are not naturally adding to making the survival easier. (On the contrary it makes it tougher sometimes, for eg. when you ponder upon the reason of your existence real hard and feel frustrated at not having an answere.)

So are all the creative and intellectual faculties basically directed towards becoming a more suitable potential mate? If it is false, then fine. If its true, then doesnt it undermine the importance of all thought processes that are essentially creative? Doesnt the world seem fabricated? Can survival and procreation actually be the core principles driving the entire machinery of the cosmos?

PS. A rather weak argument that I could think against his theory is as follows. Its interesting to note that the brain (not necessarily mind) is a constituent of ALL organisms. A peacock's feathers (or featehrs in general), on the other hand, are not present across all animals. That gives brain a different status, and therefore weakens Geoffrey's hypothesis.
Also, I would like to know of more animals with an evolutionary drift specifically towards sexual selection. What is a dog's tool? (not that!). Or how do pigeons figure who is a better mate? Isnt everything in the body (and in the human case, mind) leading towards the decision of a better mate, so why the emphasis on intelligence?

Dont Miss Step 4!

A Short Guide To A Common Silly Mistake Men Make

If you meet someone by chance, someone you think is worthy of not remaining just a 'someone', make sure you do something about it. That 'something' can be on following lines -

1. Talk to her
2. Say something nice
3. Introduce yourself, know her name
5. Look into her eyes and smile

Yes. We missed a step. And that step, 4, is a very important step.

4. GET A WAY TO CONTACT HER! --- Which angel will take her phone/email/any contact detail on your behalf Sir? Being mesmerised by her musical smile and the twinkle in her eyes is all good! but kindly remain in your senses just enough to execute step 4!

You know her name, GRT!!! you can orkut it, facebook it, or google it.
But when its a name as common as 'THE', 'AND' or 'ANY' (Pooja, Anjali, Kamakshi, Priya... any other SRK movie name) then you do need the Sir name. And you need her profession (if any), a common friend, her license plate number, blood group, shoe size, length of her hair, middle note of her body aroma... anything! but more information!! more than just a NAME!
(Mr Shakespeare! will you please wipe that 'I told you so' grin off your face?! And thanks for rubbing it in!)

If you dont follow above mentioned steps, you will be agonised unnecessarily. You will think about her and dream in the 'what if' and 'i wish' formats. Its an irritant, easy to ignore if you are not "that into" her. Otherwise, it becomes tough to concentrate on better things like job, money, food, cricket and other women.

You see, its always good to make sure you let a girl know that you like her, the moment you realise that you really like her a lot. And then you must attempt all of the above steps. If she is not in agreement with you, then fine. Thank her for clearing it out and move on. Else, bingo, you have just confirmed the best mom your son could have had, or the most interesting person to go for a walk with late at night, or may be the best no strings attached partner you'd find!

And finally, if you do end up missing step 4, then the only way left for you is to write a blog post. If she reads it, great!
If she doesnt, then kindly move on in life, meet more women by chance, and then just make sure that you follow all the steps, and especially STEP 4.

Stranger Than Fiction

I saw this movie last night. Stranger than fiction.

Earlier, I read a football champion and a wrestler, narrate his experience of coping with the "Central Cord Syndrome", as a result of a wrestling match accident. He explained how the toughest problems in life seem quiet manageable, only if we put them "in a little bit of persepctive"

Expressing gratitude for simplest of things in life doesnt really come naturally to us. Nothing is too big and unsurmountable to die worrying about. And nothing is too small and insignificant to not be thankful for.

Many have spoken about it and felt it. And still, possibly, all of us tend to instinctively forget it.

I love this film for its simplicity, humor, extremely intelligent and engaging story telling and finally for the message. (There is an undertone of 'Douglas Adams' throughout the narrative approach of the film. It only adds to the whole impact.)

Sharing three quotes from the film -

1.
Dr. Jules Hilbert: Hell Harold, you could just eat nothing but pancakes if you wanted.
Harold Crick: What is wrong with you? Hey, I don't want to eat nothing but pancakes, I want to live! I mean, who in their right mind, in a choice between pancakes and living, chooses pancakes?
Dr. Jules Hilbert: Harold, if you pause to think, you'd realize that, that answer is inextricably contingent upon the type of life being led and, of course, the quality of the pancakes.

2.
Kay Eiffel: "If a man does know he is going to die, and dies anyway, dies willingly knowing he could stop it, then, isnt that the type of man you want to keep alive!"

3.
"As Harold took a bite of Bavarian sugar cookie, he finally felt as if everything was going to be ok. Sometimes, when we lose ourselves in fear and despair, in routine and constancy, in hopelessness and tragedy, we can thank God for Bavarian sugar cookies. And, fortunately, when there aren't any cookies, we can still find reassurance in a familiar hand on our skin, or a kind and loving gesture, or subtle encouragement, or a loving embrace, or an offer of comfort, not to mention hospital gurneys and nose plugs, an uneaten Danish, soft-spoken secrets, and Fender Stratocasters, and maybe the occasional piece of fiction. And we must remember that all these things, the nuances, the anomalies, the subtleties, which we assume only accessorize our days, are effective for a much larger and nobler cause. They are here to save our lives. I know the idea seems strange, but I also know that it just so happens to be true. And, so it was, a wristwatch saved Harold Crick."

Not A Mug - A Story

Its a story.
A story of a guy & a girl who met each other at the university declamation contest. The topic was, "Poetry Makes Nothing Happen". She was speaking for the topic and he, obviously, against it.
This is a story where he was so sure that he spoke better than her, that while congratulating her on winning the prize he added, "I spoke better than you, but you won because you could roll those pretty eyes at the judges!"
A story where she was also sure that she spoke better than him. But she fell for him slightly. Only because he had started his speech with the words "Romeo is bleeding...".

She loved it when he smiled. She always wanted him to smile. So she gave him this mug. One of the many "reasons to smile", that she has given him.


He cherishes it all, and he loves to tell everyone this story.

The mug is now around 5 years old. He loves the mug. His days always start with this mug full of tea. He also once executed an unsuccessful sommersault to save the mug from hitting the ground. He felt proud that he saved it. The mug, is his smile.

Its a story from which the music is now gone, smiles feel suffocated and 'life' has entered. The sort of "life" that brings you to your knees. Humor remains though. Its oxygen. So he does try to tell himself, once in a while, that things will be fine. He cant get more humorous than this.

Its a coffee mug but he says he drinks his 'old monk' from it these days. He says he does that only when he misses her.
He drinks from it everyday.

Its a story where an ending possibly doesnt exist. It shouldnt exist.

Its a ...story.

Something Isnt Right

He saw "when harry met sally" for the 8th time... and he saw "before sunset" and loved it!!.. he is reading "love story" again... and he is looking at the stars and wondering if he could catch a falling one!

Something, he thinks, isnt right!
He had known it all along that it was supposed to happen, it was destined. Later if not sooner, it had to reach a particular confirmed state. The only doubt he had was regarding how things will unfold prior to reaching that 'state'.

but ... you know what.. something just isnt right...

...because suddenly he sees it all not breathing. That it actually wont happen, is not something his mind disagrees to. But his gut doesnt sense it! Or may be his gut just isnt sensitive enough.

Erich Segals' Love Story.... Come on now! he thinks that the conversations are smart and funny, and the silences beautiful. Read this (needless to say, this is the first conversatuion between Jennifer & Oliver) --

'What makes you so sure I went to prep school?'
'You look stupid and rich,' she said, removing her glasses.
'You're wrong,'' I protested. 'I'm actually smart and poor.'
'Oh, no, Preppie. I'm smart and poor.'
She was staring straight at me. Her eyes were brown. Okay, maybe I look rich, but I wouldn't let some 'Cliffie' - even one with pretty eyes - call me dumb.
'What the hell makes you so smart?' I asked.
'I wouldn't go for coffee with you,' she answered.
'Listen - I wouldn't ask you.'
'That,' she replied, 'is what makes you stupid.'

and this...

You're gonna flunk out, Oliver.'
We were sitting in my room on a Sunday afternoon, reading.
'Oliver, you're gonna flunk out if you just sit there watching me study.'
'I'm not watching you study. I'm studying.'
'Bullshit. You're looking at my legs.'
'Only once in a while. Every chapter.'
'That book has extremely short chapters.'
'Listen, you narcissistic bitch, you're not that great-looking! '
'I know. But can I help it if you think so?'
I threw down my book and crossed the room to where she was sitting.
'Jenny, for Christ's sake, how can I read John Stuart Mill when every single second I'm dying to make love to you?'

he loves these... and more!!

he wonders as to how does one get to know when its over? Does the fact that one is still considering the possibility that it isnt over, convey something?

Something surely isnt right! ... and then he watches this film, more of a coversation, called Before Sunset...

She ---- "...reality and love are almost contradictory to me.
...but i know its my fault because I never felt it was the right man. But what does it mean, "the right man"? the love of your life, the concept is absurd, the idea that we can only be complete with another person is EVIL! right?
He ---- "I dont wanna be one of those people, getting divorced at 52, falling down into tears and admitting that they never really loved their spouse, and as if their life has been sucked out into a vaccum cleaner.
you know, I want a great life. I want her to have a great life, she deserves that. but we are just living in pretence of a marriage, of a responsibility, you know, all these ideas that people have about how people are supposed to live...
My wife is sitting near and looking at me and i feel i am million miles from her, and i know theres something wrong and that i cant keep living like this. theres gotta be something more to love than commitment.

He --- So, you are just relieved that I am in more deep shit than you are?
She --- yes :)

... so you see.. overload of such thoughts, he is now sure, is what isnt right!

Thoughts On Reality - Triggered by NDE's, Synaesthesia, Bipolarity, Quantum Uncertainity, LSD trips, Brain mechanisms etc.

How can we be so sure of interpretations of information our brain feeds us with? How do we really 'know' that what we just experienced IS the truth?
What makes us so confident that "pleasent and unpleasent" are a function of the object and not us!?
If I were to change the chemical composition of your brain, you will experience things without them "happening" in the physical sense... For eg. your thoughts, memories, will create realities that might have been a thing of the past, giving you an impression that u just visited the past!

How does the 'outside' person know that he is right and YOU are wrong!? Two people experiencing the same stimulus in radically different ways, create two independent realities for themselves!.. does this mean that "reality" itself is an illusion? its an 'interpretation' for sure!

...are certain people more prone to experiencing 'astral projections' than others? Is it due to the biological/chemical constitution of their body or the "level of evolution of their soul"... what is this soul anyway?! ...during NDEs, the 'other' people that are encountered, are probably in the 'soul' form (pardon me if my thoughts seem too presumptuous)... so even the soul seems to be stuck in a human form, which itself is such a negligible constituent of the enoromous space and universe that exists.... something like this ---

....and either way, if all of us have to perish one by one... and after a point of time, the entire earth will perish and the solar system, does it really matter that i am expressing these thoughts?!?! and that blogging exists? ...that you exist? do we have an answere? (apart from.. ohhh!! u r not supposed to think like that!!)

I am not unhappy or agitated at the thought... I am left wondering, quiet neutrally if I may add. Its like I can amuse myself with the world, knowing that its all quiet meaningless anyway :)

We are so different! We are the same!

"You just dont change." She was exasperated.

"I am sorry if I hurt you but I didnt mean to. And why do you want me to change?" He asked silently looking into her eyes.

"Because you are not the right person the way you are. I wish you were a little different." She was trying to make herself clear. Hopefully.

"Why do you want ME to be the right person, given I am the way I am? You should either not like me at all, or love me for what I am. But I just dont understand why would you ever want to change me, and then love me. Do you really know what you are asking for?"

She knew he was not understanding her again. She felt she should explain further.
"Its because I do love you, but I want you a certain way. You see, you hurt me a lot of times. You should not do that." She was almost motherly in the way she said this.

He stood confused. He knew he had to make her feel 'right' about him, but he didnt know how. He felt 'right' about her. He honestly felt that things were right the way they were. Why couldnt she see that smiles and hurt both are a part of life? Whats more important is that, she will always find him around whenever she needs him.
"But I also make you smile and laugh. I make you feel nice dont I? And 'hurt' is a part of life. Even I get hurt by you, but I never ask you to change. We cant expect things to be hunky dory all the time. There will be issues, its how we hold on and get over the tough times that will make us grow closer." He felt satisfied with his argument and looked at her lovingly.

She was giving up. She had that sinking feeling again, which only happens when she looses something precious. Didnt he see that THIS was one of those 'tough times', and that he was doing nothing to help both of them get through this? How could he argue while she was contemplating parting ways.?
"Theres no point talking to you. You will never accept your mistake and you are always right!"

"Where did THAT come from! I did say I am sorry didnt I? And I meant it. And, why dont you just forgive me for everything? I'd do that irrespective of any amount of hurt you may cause me. I'd always forgive you, for its YOU." There was a tinge of rage in his voice. He was almost shouting and he didnt realise she had shrunk.

"I will forgive you and I'll forget too. But I wouldnt feel anything for you after that. I am scared that you'll hurt me again. I am sorry, but I am like this." She really was scared and a tear rolled down from her eyes.

He stood silent.
He realised he had made another mistake, he had hurt her again.

And he was the "same person"!

Post Internet Neo-Liberal World Guide For Women

I have always been the type with a strong gender bias. I VOCIFEROUSLY support the notion that women are the better race than all other races including 'men' (obviously, as per the MUO ratings [Mythical Universe Organisation], Douglas Adams' favorite dolphins, and the 'intergalactic alien swarm bees' cannot be surpassed by anyone, and women do fail that test there. But thats about it).

I wonder why then, do these women keep attempting to compare themselves against a lowly race of men (who incidently fall even below 'Mongolian Chimps' as per the MUO) and degrade themselves in the process.

With the world changing fast (I couldnt get more cliched than that), I feel that women could do with a guide on "how to be a woman and how to deal with men, in the post internet neo-liberal world". Philogynist that I am, I have taken the pain to devise the guide myself, to make women "future ready". Here goes -

1. Men are still out there to eat you. Trust me they enjoy women more than you ever can. Now they hunt on the net, along with/instead of the roads.

2. There are bigger aims in life than getting a good man for urself. The same does not hold true for men (...their biggest aim still IS to get a good woman. Good woman is defined as any woman ready to accept them the way they are. Of course she should also have a good figure, decent amount of brain, an engrossing blog, love for everybody's parents, and no dogs. Pink accessories are just fine.)

3. Men are out there to eat you. Trust me they enjoy women more than you ever can. (Note: No, this is not a mistake. We do 'lay' 'stress' on important 'points'.)

4. Corollary 1, to 2 above; Your good man will find you. Dont say no to him when he does, just because of the MUO ratings. If you really thought that mongolian chimps are better than men, and feel like waiting for one of those chimps to be all yours, you are probably mistaken. (Note: Read again what M stands for in MUO)

5. Men are out there to eat you. Trust me they enjoy women more than you ever can.

6. Corporate ladders have been easier for you to climb so far. But now prepare for a tough future. Lets not deny it, the men can simply stand there and 'allow' you to climb the ladder, just to WATCH all of you climbing (from below). But this wont last long, soon there will be a LOT of your own types up there and then there wont be any guys left to ALLOW you to climb even higher. Then what? I suggest its high time you start honing your professional skills as per how other senior 'woman' would expect you to behave (this means that 'rolling your eyes' is not going to work any more!)

7. Men are out there to eat you. Trust me they enjoy women more than you ever can.

8. Corollary 2, to 2 above: Parents are still the sweetest people on earth. Even if they are HIS parents!.. Men still want women who can love his parents as much as her own!

9. Men are out there to eat you. Trust me they enjoy women more than you ever can.

10. Men now KNOW all of the 2 secrets that you mysterious women ever had

- You want to be understood while you dont understand yourself, and

- You need to be pleasured (crudely put, men now know where exactly your 'point' is!)

Its been long enough and now they understand. So sit back, relax and let them give you the best time of your life (every possible way). Point here being that, you need to listen to him as much as he listens to you.

11. Men are out there to eat you. Trust me they enjoy women more than you ever can.

And finally, a simple viewpoint that may not humor you, may not be a huge change, but nevertheless, is worth reinforcing.

12. You have a lot more chances of being loved in this neo-liberal world than ever before (derived from point 2 and 10 above). By being loved, I mean being loved your way. The idea is that its still YOU who needs the love and he gives it! All you need to do is be happy, and he'll not ask for anything else.

PS. All men are not out there to eat you.

Marriage - Its Need, Futility & Origin

One of the freakier thoughts that has occurred to me in the past is the possibility that, the only reason for one's existence is procreation and furthering of the species.
That's what all living things do, beyond doubt. They screw!
Every act of life seems to be aimed at this as the final goal. Even aesthetics, mind you. Correlations are deep and intricate, but it should suffice to mention here, that a high aesthetic sense implies a higher level of evolution and therefore a better mate.

Isn't it profoundly depressing to realise that we are all here only because someone screwed someone! I mean, at a fundamental level, do you really believe that, while doing it, that someone and someone were thinking about how a good human being will develop out of their activity?!

Procreation & Marriage
Among human beings, this social function called 'marriage' seems like a vague attempt to cover the fact that at the end of the whole jazz, basically the 2 people concerned are gonna screw away to glory. What other significant difference occurs in their individual lives apart from THIS? (which otherwise cant be achieved in a really good long term friendship with a person of the opposite sex)

So, is marriage some sort of a moral cover up?

I could have said here that I appreciate other animals, for they at least don't cover up. And accept boldly that they need to propagate their species. But they hardly have a choice. And moreover, they don't read this blog.

Human beings, with all their intelligence and years of evolution, are the only species that seem to have an in built control mechanism against 'free and fair sex'. The only biologically and environmentally sound reason for this control that I can think of is, overpopulation. The irony is, that human beings are also the highest in number! what control are we talking here?
I am thus, unable to comprehend, the reasons for the existence of "marriage" as a custom. What does it do? Commitments can happen without it. In fact they do happen without it. Marriages do break. I have known extremely successful live-in relationships, and equally successful marriages. Then where is the differentiator? Where is the need of mandatory marriage (in order to propagate your species)?

Marriage as Celebration
One sane justification of marriage that I tend to agree with is, marriage being a symbol of celebration of commitment, and beginning of companionship! Great.. but why does it then extend into a legal contract? And multiple social obligations? Here is a short hypothetical account of the origin of marriage, with celebration is the premise.

I feel that marriage originated as just an occasion for celebration. Like how you throw a party when you win the 20-20 world cup. It was basically a party, and a symbol of the fact that something worth celebrating has happened in the lives of two people. Soon the trend caught up and these parties became very frequent.
Someday, some smartass who wasn't getting a companion, was too lazy to woo one, and was too eager to wait for the right one, realised that he just had to showcase the symptom (party), and the cause (companionship) will be assumed. So he got another dumbass who wasn't getting a companion and started celebrating. That, I think, was the first day when marriage came into existence!

So, I don't think marriage should be a compulsion. Either social, or moral!
I don't think its necessary for a successful relationship, nor does it guarantee success in any way.

Afterthought
I do realise that these thoughts are too radical. I'd like to tag them as "ahead-of-their-times". But futility if marriage is a question that has failed to lend itself to a convincing answer, at least in my life, so far.

Memoirs Of an Eve Teased Adam

26th of January 2006 was the fateful day. I had been feeling heavy, and all tangled up in the head. So I decided to do away with it all. And emerged out of the amboli, andheri west, local hair salon, with a sunny bright shining scalp. This was the begining of my tryst with my yet to grow hair. I had decided to grow them really long this time, so I thought I might as well start from well... scratch.
While I caressed my smoothness gently, I had no idea of the revelations that were in store for me.

Life was different, life was easy. The feeling of waking up with a 'light head', and the reduction of one physical action, that of combing hair, added to the pleasures of my lazy existence. During the course, I was forced to acknowledge compliments ranging from "cool fauji cut yaar", to "nice spikes man" .. to "aur netaji, tel lagaun?"

The defining moment was when I could tie my first pony tail. And soon, I was an (arguably unlucky) owner of a graceful mane.

Now you may wonder why? Those who have long hair will relate to me (Yes! including girls). Ever since then, I have been getting the looks from various sources - like guys, dumb looking guys, disgusting looking guys, filthy looking guys, smart looking yet ill bred guys, fucked in the head guys, and various other such forms of guys. Lets call these forms FUGGED for easy reference (just for the heck of it).

A typical instance goes as follows, and usually occurs during twilight or night -

Me walking to the neighborhood bhola juice center => FUGGED see from behind, FUGGED focus on my mane => FUGGED think me girl => FUGGED turn back to look at me after crossing me => FUGGED's glance in first nano second, sexually dirty - FUGGED's glance in the rest of nanoseconds, disappointment and 'blaming me for it'.

It was disturbing when I sensed it for the first time. I felt invaded when guys stared at me with such looks.
All you guys, just try imagining another guy lusting for you and looking into ur eyes. Unless you are a different type, chances are that you'll be disgusted.
I felt even more angry when they (FUGGED ones) were disappointed to see a stubble, lack of breasts and other such inadequacies that make a man out of me.

I have now realised what women go through all day. You, as a guy, may not realise it, but your glance is an infringement on her privacy. Its a stare at her physicality and can never be healthy. Dont do it, respect her. You'll be better off for it.

As a shitizen, who is only striving to do ALL of those tiny bits that are within his limited capabilities, I urge all you guys to NOT stare at girls on the street in such lustful ways. Try to refrain from looking straight into their faces, letting them see how disgustingly desperate you are. I look at women too. I relish the beauty from a distance. I agree at times I can get perverted thoughts, but I ensure that I keep them behind an opaque wall.
And more often than not we all should have better thoughts to entertain in our precious minds than a never ending hardcore porn film.

Trust me guys --- there are better vices than letching. Let go.


.

Vague

...And this is when I realise I need you beyond what words can express. I wish you needed me as much.
I dont know how it sounds. The peace shaken within. Thoughts, unsettled enough to spill out, almost unintentionally.

***

A person can never be convinced about something she does not want to be convinced about. And that happens in only two cases :
1. Either she has some other agenda, that is solved through not getting convinced by the stated arguments, or
2. She simply is closed enough, to never see the merit of the arguments presented.

***

I have always had a strange liking towards altruism. I want the entire world to be altruistic, because I think it will get me easy support/help/money. And while this may lead to me being blamed of selfishness, I think thats an altruistic trait, because I sacrifice my reputation to benefit the world.

***

Within all these complexities, where does a simple love story have a chance to survive? A person with such vague thoughts can only be ridiculed. Not loved. And, knowing that he is loved, he does not know what next.

May be a complex love story does have a chance to survive here. Or, if the love story survives, may be the complexities will go away. As someone with a tall hat once said "love is a self organsing principle".

So, give it a shot!

...having arrived

last night must have been the most memorable and fulfilling night of Robin Uthappa's life...

now you may say, what?! this guy still loves cricket? and is mad enough to write about it? and that too about one single new kid on the block, whose success is probably only as real or nebulous as ganguly's patience? (Ganguly is another topic!!!! someday soon)

As i walked to the balcony to get some fresh air, after having shouted and cheered india (from the comforts of our home), i was thoughtless.

...and then, i recalled the first day when i had recieved my first FIRST prize (recitation of "Rana pratap ka Ghoda") .... i can damn bet even today that I had walked out of the school in slow motion!! ... i could feel all eyes were at me, and i was the carefree conquorer of .. well a hindi recitation competition... may be it was the rana pratap effect, or the mere fact that a new girl had recently joined the class and i knew i had made an impression!... but yes... i had felt my self on, i dont know 9 or what, but some CLOUD!

i remembered all those moments, when success, had made me content, and light... when i felt i had arrived (how many times can u arrive in life?!? i dont know)...

robin, had reached a landmark. thumping the air with the fist (and actuallyy bloody being captured in SLOW motion!) ... getting india to victory... well done!

and something in me, could somehow share that moment! ...


i dont know what it feels like to take india to victory... i do know what its like to feel arrived!



PS.
Yesterday, Robin Uthappa scored 47 off 33 balls, hitting 2 consecutive fours in the last over, to beat an english total of 316, with 2 balls to spare, at the 6th one day cricket match between India and England at Oval. This was his first chance to bat in this tour, and first outing in a long time, after the world cup defeat. He has shown character, temperament and skill.

All the best to you. Cheers Mate.

Thank You Effect

There are very few expressions that have as much of a positive, infectious energy as a sincerely written "Thank you note". Do you remember the last one you received? Chances are it was very long ago, and you still have it preserved somewhere. A 'thank you' is an acknowledgement of something that was well intended, a symbol of a smile somewhere, a mark of a world worth living in, if only for that one single moment.

Have you looked into the eyes of a thankful person? They pour out affection, for everything. Would you not feel the world to be a better place, only if you could see it in the eyes of every stranger, that he was thankful for something somewhere?

Why do you think those "thank you" notes after an Oscar/Miss XYZ etc are so long? Not even a single person, who needs to be thanked, should be missed. The feeling of being thankful, I have come to realise, is blissfully fulfilling for everyone.

How often have we been thankful for all that we have? And expressed it too? When was the last time YOU wrote your heartfelt "thank you note"? Why is it rare? Why does it need a reason and occasion?

And why, more often than not, we choose to "blame for what went wrong" rather than 'thank for what went right'? Are we inherently a thankless bunch of souls, who don't give a damn to what's happening right in our lives? Are we always looking for catching collars rather than patting backs? I cringe at the thought, and I want it to be shoved aside as a symptom of a malfunctioning neuron in my brain, that needs repair.


I thank my family, for making me all that I am and for giving me everything that I ever wanted.
I thank my friends, for the learning, unlearning and relearning I have had with them, through them.
I thank those media professionals, who genuinely entered the media world to make a difference, and are still not driven by TRP's.
I thank that English teacher, who made me read The Hitchhikers' Guide To The Galaxy, as my first book.
I thank that old man, who was shouting slogans at a traffic signals, urging everyone to follow the traffic rules.
I thank that stranger, who had my laptop returned to my address when I had...(well lets leave it at that :) )
I thank all those individuals, who are trying to make a positive difference to the world around them, in their own small way.

I thank all the good people, simply for being good!

Thank You ALL!

bombay to noida - part 1

the best part about moving from bombay to noida has been the drastic changes in my travel routine...

local train ---> royal enfield thunderbird

1hr 17 min one way ---> 17 min door 2 door

expensive cab rides ----> peaceful bike sojourns

cramped roads with pollution ----> wide roads with pollution ;)

saturday night frenzy ---> weekend travel to dehradun/rishikesh/chandigarh/lucknow etc


... i like to have my sony thump crooning my fav number rt into my brain during these peaceful bike rides to and fro bet home and office... a few days ago i saw an old man shouting through a handheld loudspeaker on a red signal on my way back from office... his shirt read "follow traffic rules" / "yatayat ke niyamon ka palan karein" ... he was old but looked ferociously serious about what he was saying... i cud only 'see' him, untill i switched the thump off and tried to 'hear' him...too much noise.. cant pick a word... the seconds remaining on the signal were getting closer to zero, and throttles were being pulled... he looked back, and with a thumping conclusion to his speech, moved aside to let the traffic pass...

bet sector 29 and 58 in noida, there are 5 to 6 traffic signals, and rule violation is so rampant, that when i decide to stop on a red light, i feel i'll cause an accident cause EVERY commuter is passing by and im the ONLY one standing... still.. proudly as yet, i DO STAND, when the light is red... of course! the worst part is when MY signal is green and i find commuters ready to bang into me irresepctive of their situation in life and on road!

...the old man seemed hesitantly proud of himself... he seemed to feel "ignored" yet having the conviction to keep doing what HE felt was a good thing to do... may be he had had a tragedy in his family... may be he was mad!.. while passing him i wanted to catch his eye and nod approvingly.. he never looked AT anyone.. he was staring blankly into nothing... and i felt him to be more alive than most of us commuters...


i think he shud know that his effort isnt going waste!

.. in that direction there... dust it plz!!

...and i suddenly realised i am keeping my blog too clean.. i mean no bold statements, no controvertial innunendos, no sexual provocations or LSD rantings... good nice practical or philosophical thoughts.. sometimes lacking depth, but NICE nonetheless!!

i guess its gonna continue that way... u see certain things are to be DONE.. not written about ;)

have pondered over quiet a few things lately...

1. what goes on in a woman's mind when she realises the first physical signs of aging on her face
2. whats up with these social networking sites!! how many? how long? and how?
3. is Pulp Fiction better cinema than Godfather? (Sholay surpasses both and is above the league. case dismissed)
4. the legal process for starting a company in India ( ;) )

5. but what has really mattered is that i have realised how directionless / multidirectioned can a peacefully comfortable life be! .. or vice versa!!

yes! everybody is f****d up sometime... for sometime, and life does seem directionless, but does life really need a direction at all?!?... from all that i have understood, it 'probably' needs some support (from the 3 Fs --- Family, Friends & Fools... interestingly, they are also the ones who lend u money to start ur first business venture) ... but thats about it.. rest is what u experience.. so keep up with the experiencing!..

hey!... as long as you can keep a "smiling mind" and spread the same, who cares what the ultimate question to the ultimate answere, 42, is?

sleepy now!

nite

Martin Scorsese's Tribute To Michelangelo Antonioni

NINETEEN-SIXTY-ONE ... a long time ago. Almost 50 years. But the sensation of seeing “L’Avventura” for the first time is still with me, as if it had been yesterday.

Where did I see it? Was it at the Art Theater on Eighth Street? Or was it the Beekman? I don’t remember, but I do remember the charge that ran through me the first time I heard that opening musical theme — ominous, staccato, plucked out on strings, so simple, so stark, like the horns that announce the next tercio during a bullfight. And then, the movie. A Mediterranean cruise, bright sunshine, in black and white widescreen images unlike anything I’d ever seen — so precisely composed, accentuating and expressing ... what? A very strange type of discomfort. The characters were rich, beautiful in one way but, you might say, spiritually ugly. Who were they to me? Who would I be to them?

They arrived on an island. They split up, spread out, sunned themselves, bickered. And then, suddenly, the woman played by Lea Massari, who seemed to be the heroine, disappeared. From the lives of her fellow characters, and from the movie itself. Another great director did almost exactly the same thing around that time, in a very different kind of movie. But while Hitchcock showed us what happened to Janet Leigh in “Psycho,” Michelangelo Antonioni never explained what had happened to Massari’s Anna. Had she drowned? Had she fallen on the rocks? Had she escaped from her friends and begun a new life? We never found out.

Instead the film’s attention shifted to Anna’s friend Claudia, played by Monica Vitti, and her boyfriend Sandro, played by Gabriele Ferzetti. They started to search for Anna, and the picture seemed to become a kind of detective story. But right away our attention was drawn away from the mechanics of the search, by the camera and the way it moved. You never knew where it was going to go, who or what it was going to follow. In the same way the attentions of the characters drifted: toward the light, the heat, the sense of place. And then toward one another.So it became a love story. But that dissolved too. Antonioni made us aware of something quite strange and uncomfortable, something that had never been seen in movies. His characters floated through life, from impulse to impulse, and everything was eventually revealed as a pretext: the search was a pretext for being together, and being together was another kind of pretext, something that shaped their lives and gave them a kind of meaning. The more I saw “L’Avventura” — and I went back many times — the more I realized that Antonioni’s visual language was keeping us focused on the rhythm of the world: the visual rhythms of light and dark, of architectural forms, of people positioned as figures in a landscape that always seemed terrifyingly vast. And there was also the tempo, which seemed to be in sync with the rhythm of time, moving slowly, inexorably, allowing what I eventually realized were the emotional shortcomings of the characters — Sandro’s frustration, Claudia’s self-deprecation — quietly to overwhelm them and push them into another “adventure,” and then another and another. Just like that opening theme, which kept climaxing and dissipating, climaxing and dissipating. Endlessly.Where almost every other movie I’d seen wound things up, “L’Avventura” wound them down. The characters lacked either the will or the capacity for real self-awareness. They only had what passed for self-awareness, cloaking a flightiness and lethargy that was both childish and very real. And in the final scene, so desolate, so eloquent, one of the most haunting passages in all of cinema, Antonioni realized something extraordinary: the pain of simply being alive. And the mystery.

“L’Avventura” gave me one of the most profound shocks I’ve ever had at the movies, greater even than “Breathless” or “Hiroshima, Mon Amour” (made by two other modern masters, Jean-Luc Godard and Alain Resnais, both of them still alive and working). Or “La Dolce Vita.” At the time there were two camps, the people who liked the Fellini film and the ones who liked “L’Avventura.” I knew I was firmly on Antonioni’s side of the line, but if you’d asked me at the time, I’m not sure I would have been able to explain why. I loved Fellini’s pictures and I admired “La Dolce Vita,” but I was challenged by “L’Avventura.” Fellini’s film moved me and entertained me, but Antonioni’s film changed my perception of cinema, and the world around me, and made both seem limitless. (It was two years later when I caught up with Fellini again, and had the same kind of epiphany with “8 ½.”)

The people Antonioni was dealing with, quite similar to the people in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novels (of which I later discovered that Antonioni was very fond), were about as foreign to my own life as it was possible to be. But in the end that seemed unimportant. I was mesmerized by “L’Avventura” and by Antonioni’s subsequent films, and it was the fact that they were unresolved in any conventional sense that kept drawing me back. They posed mysteries — or rather the mystery, of who we are, what we are, to each other, to ourselves, to time. You could say that Antonioni was looking directly at the mysteries of the soul. That’s why I kept going back. I wanted to keep experiencing these pictures, wandering through them. I still do.

Antonioni seemed to open up new possibilities with every movie. The last seven minutes of “L’Eclisse,” the third film in a loose trilogy he began with “L’Avventura” (the middle film was “La Notte”), were even more terrifying and eloquent than the final moments of the earlier picture. Alain Delon and Ms. Vitti make a date to meet, and neither of them show up. We start to see things — the lines of a crosswalk, a piece of wood floating in a barrel — and we begin to realize that we’re seeing the places they’ve been, empty of their presence. Gradually Antonioni brings us face to face with time and space, nothing more, nothing less. And they stare right back at us. It was frightening, and it was freeing. The possibilities of cinema were suddenly limitless.

We all witnessed wonders in Antonioni’s films — those that came after, and the extraordinary work he did before “L’Avventura,” pictures like “La Signora Senza Camelie,” “Le Amiche,” “Il Grido” and “Cronaca di un Amore,” which I discovered later. So many marvels — the painted landscapes (literally painted, long before CGI) of “Red Desert” and “Blowup,” and the photographic detective story in that later film, which ultimately led further and further away from the truth; the mind-expanding ending of “Zabriskie Point,” so reviled when it came out, in which the heroine imagines an explosion that sends the detritus of the Western world cascading across the screen in super slow motion and vivid color (for me Antonioni and Godard were, among other things, truly great modern painters); and the remarkable last shot of “The Passenger,” where the camera moves slowly out the window and into a courtyard, away from the drama of Jack Nicholson’s character and into the greater drama of wind, heat, light, the world unfolding in time.

I crossed paths with Antonioni a number of times over the years. Once we spent Thanksgiving together, after a very difficult period in my life, and I did my best to tell him how much it meant to me to have him with us. Later, after he’d had a stroke and lost the power of speech, I tried to help him get his project “The Crew” off the ground — a wonderful script written with his frequent collaborator Mark Peploe, unlike anything else he’d ever done, and I’m sorry it never happened.
But it was his images that I knew, much better than the man himself. Images that continue to haunt me, inspire me. To expand my sense of what it is to be alive in the world.
















Michelangelo Antonioni

















Martin Scorsese


Source - NewYork Times & Financial Express

Eugenio's Love Song

The hotel at Aguada beach
And Oberoi's Bogmalo
Are quiet out of my wallet's reach
Esmina Carvalho.

But there is a little tavern
Known as Lover's Nest
Under the shady palms of Verna
Where you could be my guest.

The old cook Joe
Whom there I know
Has an eye with a merry twinkle
And I could order Dobrado
And a plate of mussel and winkle.

I can't afford no richer meal
'Cause am no princely fellow
So will you make a lifelong deal
Esmina Carvalho?

A Datsum or a Mercedes
Or other expensive car ---
I never possessed one of these
For flimsy sure they are.

I do own a Beauty Black
An Indian motorbike
And it can carry you on its back
Anywhere you like.

I can't afford a richer ride
'Cause am no princely fellow
Say then will you be my bride
Esmina Carvalho?

(from Goan Vignettes & Other Poems by Ashok Mahajan)

convenient unsocial love

.

...a certain able bodied being with a penchant for indulgence, recently put my mental peace at risk... the idea of "convenient love" was thrown open for my analysis and contemplation by this modest self proclaimed urban ascetic...


Cut 2

7 relationships, 3 amorous movies and almost 5 years have been kept in perspective...

...see, i achieved self conciousness very late.. i dont remember much of the first 13 odd years of my life, and the need to analyse 'morality' came even later...

so what is "convenient love" (CL - acronymifying convenient love!) and whats it got to do with "morality" ?!?


Cut 3

she has known him... she is friends with many... she cant say no to her parents... she is a nice girl... she is confused... she needs someone... she needs noone.... she connects with him... she is falling for someone else... she experienced this for the first time... she has different priorities... she is done with all this... she cant compromise... she cant compromise again... she is hurt... she needs him... she cant take him anymore... she has a golden soul... she seeks golden souls... she seeks loneliness.... she... lives!

cud i have replaced all these "she's" with "he"?!?!....

---- "...do you believe thats air you are breathing?" - Morpheus


Cut 4

CL is about constricting your love with social boundaries... going only upto an extent that society allows you... u do everything that makes others feel that u have not broken any social rules... u probably are right?! u fear the stigma and the complexity of it all...
when you make a P&L account of all possibilities and evaluate the optimum loss and go for it... the economic quantity of love is all that u end up delivering... even to urself!!!

i assume morality to be a social code of conduct and not an individual one... u for sure compromise on morality when u indulge in convenient love... thats the other side of P&L... u give in to the moment as an individual.. and then go back to the one with whom you are "supposed" to be...socially...

...or u chose to fulfill a certain percentage of your needs from one relationship and for the other set of needs, u look for more CL relationships.... the catch is... u always make urself belive that its love... whether CL or not... its love...




Final Cut

we struggle.. we crawl on ur knees and beg to be "amoral".... the action potential travelling thru our synaptic nodes does not allow multiple relationships... wud it be better?... wud it be chaotic??,,, are we slaves of a new type of tyranny... neither feudal, nor colonial,..... but ... moral??,,, am i exaggerating.... or is it just those amorous flicks speaking thru my gut!!?...

i know i am not gullible..

i wish i was below the line of fatality... i wish i had neither explored chomsky nor read freud.. neither heard of existentialism nor tried to question moral codes...

i wish i had never experienced true love... !!

...true unsocial love!!

Cerebration: about cats, auras and life's quests...

any debate on quantum physics always excites me way more than my immediate preceding debate on quantum physics!!.. and so on...

..my drifting thoughts and settled emotions found a new company in the form of my recent quantum cogitation... "what is the schrodinger's cat experiment exactly trying to say?" she asked.. and the smile on my face was neither a sufficient answere nor by any means apt (especially as this duologue was being effected through wireless mobile technology)... and then followed a series of conjectures and interpretations about uncertainity, probability and the status of the observer as a "part of the system" or "independent of the system"... this led to further discussions on the basic nature of matter and energy...


"why all these curiosities?" i asked, pleasently surprised by the sheer unexpectedness of it all... "am reading this book you had suggested, 'In search of schrodinger's cat'... And I also got the other one 'schrödinger's kittens and the search for reality'... u know i see auras right.. i feel quantum physics can explain auras..", the sparkle in her voice was almost luminous...
"are aura's more like energy waves or are they corpuscular?" she asked... i explained to her the duality of light and the possible duality of every other energy form...and she wondered, like a little child, that what if thought is also an energy form and, possibly an aura is the external manifestation of the person's thoughts...

cud be!!... and thats the beauty of quantum physics... possibilities and probabilities are infinite... but reality is still not defined...


we cud attempt to decipher the basic nature of thoughts (whether energy wave or particle wave) through some far fetched extrapolations... the way two energy waves interact with each other is very different from the way two particle waves do... the phenomena is called interference... interference is not supposed to happen with particle waves (do note that light exhibits particle wave nature, as well as interference pattern)... now, if two thought waves were energy forms, then we wud observe constructive and destructive interference... this wud inherently imply that two thoughts can either kill each other and lead to nothing or can have synergy and create something totally new...
on the other hand.. if thoughts were particles, they may just hit each other and bounce back having made no difference to themselves or the environment... so do u have ur answere?!!?.. possibly not... :)... and yes! the uncertainty of the situation intensifies the quantum reality of the answere...

the conversation went on... a little bit of string theory, details of the heisenberg uncertainty principle, and a few pinches of einstein were thrown in for good measure...

and then it ended... it was forced to end... wireless networks were weak...

the silken threads proved to be as strong as bonds of steel... life seems to be edging forward pretty fast... and quests are the fuel...

may thoughts find their destinations without having to journey though words... may life's quests never end!


Cerebration!


Celebration!!

on a personal note - let me propose

i want to fall in love... i have felt it before but have almost forgotten the feeling... i want to fall again... after a long time... i feel superkicked by merely imagining the possibility... i'd like to write for someone... a letter to my lover... say, we have known each other long enuf and cant help but decide to spend together this one single life that we have... still we wud know that this moment of decision is glorified by the bubbles of "being in love with someone", which is much more ephemeral than "loving someone"... we know that we also connect with each other at a level beyond these thoughts... so i'd like to write a letter to her... while she is trying to call me to tell me what she feels, i am totally oblivious of it all, and am penning down my feelings for her... we both feel the same... it will read something like this...

awake since 3 am… its 6 now… 4 missed calls from you didn’t wake me up…. cleaned up the room and took a shower…. had some fruits, and now… writing after a long time with so much of peace around… you know that 2 to 6 is possibly the only time when this stupid city isn’t moving, shouting or choking itself… u know it better!
with VH1 in the background and lights off, its just the right time and mood to make me susceptible to weakness and life… so, inadvertently I have been thinking of you since I woke up… and I realize there isn’t too much I wanna say to you these days… except.. lets get real and get married… I mean, to each other :)… I now feel that we wont need to "make it work" or smthng like that… I see us together… u’ll live ur life ur way, n so will I, my way... and we both will still have each other around whenever we want… free of any restrictions.. our marriage will be more like two friends sharing their space, thoughts, emotions, life and learning…

.. we will pursue all our interests and share our excitements... we live a new life everyday... and while we r living, if someday u feel that u shud have our baby... we will…. then we will be a little more than just frnds... and start a whole new world from scratch... by then we will be the same soul living in two bodies...
our instincts will guide us thru it all... at least urs will do a better job… we wont need to think.. it will just happen… most of it..

I don’t see u as a different person, leading a separate life… even if u r far away from me… distant from me in any way… I will always feel ur existence and u will feel mine… there is something more than the complexities of human and social unrealities that binds us…

I don’t have too many words these days to share with you… u know this is a short one compared to what we have been writing for each other… there is neither an expectation from the future, nor any sense of planning that I am used to indulging in…

there is just a soft touch of ur presence in my life..
somewhere…

and I am content!

closer to nothing ....contd

survival has never been a priority for me... but that 60 min of battle against fading away, did make me realise the importance of good health... is that it?!?! ... no more to take from a near death experience.. no earth shattering insight?.. no ultimate sense of peace and tranquility??!

i'll lower it a bit more... there is not even an urge to feel grateful to the person/persons who were with me during the ordeal... who sort of "saved" me... i love them all.. more today than before... and i am glad about it... i am "excited" about whatever happened.. i smile more often now... cause all the negative emotions have suddenly lost their significance... but gratitude seems irrelevant.. almost demeaning... i was not scared to die..so i am not grateful for being alive... but i am glad i found friends due to this ordeal.. knowing genuine nice people is the biggest earning a man can have...

i must say that i am not an ingrate... also, under normal circumstances i have been grateful to people who have gone out of the way to help me... and even i am used to going out of my way to help others... but that day was different... that day had a significance simply by having started as just another day and ending similarly... in between life balanced itself precariously... by the end of the day.. i was a happier person...


after i was brought back from to the room, i slept... woke up at 6 and felt like having tea... CME has a lovely tea/snack/juice kinda multiutility area... i walked to the place and then towards a lake... sunsets at the CME manmade lake are lovely... very very lovely.. slowly the realisation of the earlier happenings of the day came to me... it started sinking in ... i met the doctor again.. i told her that saying thanx may not be enough because.. i possibly don even realise the gravity of what had happened, but she could always count on me under any circumstances.. for life... and then i walked away... staring into the setting sun next to the lake..


i called "her".. she did not pick up...
i didnt call again


i didnt call mom dad.. no one...


i felt peaceful, happy and incomplete... but happy!
:)

G157, EODE, CME, PUNE - Closer to nothing

Anaphylaxis… an acute systemic severe allergic reaction.. the most severe type of anaphylaxis—Anaphylactic Shock—will usually lead to death in a matter of minutes if left untreated…

... is it possible to laugh within an hour of having cried because ur body had just refused to hold on while ur will battled with every breath to win the war against a strange helplessness to breath freely?.. Isnt it only fair to realise that life is so important that one must not spend time getting concerned about smaller things like death, future, taxes, sadness and may be ‘life’ itself..?.. and .. is it possible to not feel any sense of deep gratitude, superficial or otherwise, towards a person who saved your life? ?

I felt the proximity to the infinite void recently… I was close to the most scary “nothing” an average human soul can experience… if faith and reincarnation are not on ur side, then death is an absolute end….

it all started with a harmless request of a group of friends who had just prepared some fresh water fish… I had never tried rohu before (and never will…, ahem!)… within a minute my eyes were red.. and within 5 min I cud not breathe… i had the better side of probability in my favor.. I was within 10 min of an MI room (Medical Inspection Room, in armed forces), there was a doctor in our group, and I was surrounded by really nice people….

…by the time i was taken to the MI room.. every breath of mine seemed to demand more effort than I wud put into running a marathon… energy was running out of my body at a rapid pace and I felt helpless…

… fear of something severe had just stuck.. my helplessness was more about not knowing whats happening to me rather than the physical symptoms… a single tear and several marathons later, my will started giving way… I cud hear sounds of phone conversations… adrenaline injection being explained to the chemist and the urgency of the situation being conveyed with harsh words… my lungs were going numb and heartbeat seemed to be goin slow… i was slowly fading away without realising it…

...A needle felt itself on my forearm.. it hurt slightly… and many moments later...I don’t know how many… i felt my heart alive, breathing, while my body had betrayed my will… I cud feel the stillness of death in my limbs while my heart, like an old dependable house care employee, began to carry on with its chore of pumping blood into the frame called body… I realised I was back… back from don know where.. but back for sure...

“Thanx !”... I cud manage a smile while uttering the strangest thanx of my life, to the doctor friend who had “treated me” … she was concerned… almost sure that I cud have crossed over to the other side…

I had just been treated for anaphylactic shock…

Next post… Reflections on this experience.. especially on the lack of a sense of gratitude

life in bombay...

U are scared of that needle poking into ur finger to draw out blood for testing…. When it happens… u bear it… u don’t really love it but u don’t hate it as much either…

U hate that filthy muddy puddle out there in that smelly corner of the cowshed… and then u r pushed into it … to clean it… u start getting used to it .. after a point..u don’t love it but u don’t even hate it as much…


U have to clean your own toilets…. U r doing it for the first time… u cant stand the thought of the filth… but u cull up all the courage and do it…. U don’t love the experience but u don’t hate it as much as u though u wud…


--- fill in two or more such filthy instances from your personal expereince ---



U are in Bombay for the first time… u don’t have the patience to wait inside ur auto while u r sweating and getting late… u cant stand the number of people u are forced to see in one go at dadar station… and the number of people who squeeze themselves thru the small stairway leading to the equally unheavenly exit of the station… some months pass… u have been in Bombay long enuf… and now .. u may not actually be in love with these inhuman conditions but .. then u don’t hate it either..


This is not a happy ending… just in case...