Random

It’s winter already. The air is colder and water icy. I had the luxury of a stroll this evening (a rarity in the rarest sense of the word possible) and all the lights and other adorations of neighboring houses gave the feeling like it was Christmas… which made me worry about the environment, bringing the thoughts of global warming etc to my mind. But those thoughts were short lived for I remembered all the Christmases and winters gone by. Christmas holds a special place… perhaps because of all the Archie’s comics I have been reading since I was 7 years old. Back then as a young girl Christmas was magical. The impression, at a very subliminal level, still lives on

I have been listening to Mr. Jagjit Singh a lot lately. And have developed an insatiable appetite for the ghazal “Baat Niklegi”. I have these seasonal bouts of ghazals, while at other times (which I am afraid last much longer), I am so off them that I completely forget, and not deliberately, that there is a side to me that appreciates them. I used to have a double cassette collection of his ghazals and each one of them was the very best. Especially a live performance it had, called “Baju Band”. Sadly, I lost that cassette to a relative who borrowed it to never return, and I never asked for it again. The interesting part is that I never looked for the collection ever again in any of the music shops. Neither did I try searching for the song online. I just began to miss it intermittently, like I am now. Talk about self apathy and a passing one at that… 

Read the front news story today… about “raising the bar” for IIT aspirants. How unfair can it get I wonder! Reminds me of a short story featured in the Sunday Magazine of The Hindustan Times a few weeks back, written by Chetan Bhagat. I had planned to write about the story here then, and also about the writer… but it all just got lost in my head somewhere. It was a very well written piece and very successfully encompassed the current raison d’être of the Indian middle class. Perhaps it would still be available in the HT archives, and should be searchable online.

I am reading Paulo Coelho currently. Actually, that’s part true. One of the books I am currently reading is Paulo Coelho’s. The others are a book by Mark Tully and a classic by Thomas Hardy. The Paulo Coelho book is an experience of sorts. I don’t want to finish the book, because I want the experience to stay on.

The Christmas feeling also reminded me of another post I had written some years back on winters. I hazily remember giving its link in another post before too. Though after reading it I realized the impression I was carrying of the post was very different from the post itself, I’ll paste the link here (again perhaps) anyway. Hopefully if the thought lives on, I’ll write a fresh winter post this season (not that anyone’s waiting for it with fingers crossed… but that was never a reason to write)

The Winter Post

 

Whirled This…

 It’s a weird place, this world of ours. And it’s getting weirder by the day. Its not simple demand meets supply as the books would teach you. It’s not a straightforward two and two make a four either. It’s a world of unending aspirations and unyielding insecurities where demands go unsupplied and all the twos in the world add up to two. It’s a world of conflicts and manipulations, disguises and blatancies. It’s a world where justice is subjective, chivalry selective, benevolence conditional. It’s a playground of the high and mighty and also the conniving mortals adept in the skills of manipulation deemed unhealthy by the now obsolete books of virtue. 

There’s contradiction written all over, look in any direction. Each mortal is wary of the other and aspires to inflict on the other what is his own greatest fear. Success is a hateful unjustified scheme as long as it’s not one’s own. Friends are friends as long as they are usable and as long as they can’t use you. 

Reminds me of a small something I had written ages ago, which doesn’t necessarily fit in, but has a loose connection with the current context. 

“Logic ain’t logical anymore,
The world’s no longer straight.
Love and affection mixed with gore,
That’s my current state.

My eccentricity is justified
At least to me it is.
The loner goes back in her hood,
Let the world enjoy its bliss.”

PS: I know it’s not a balanced view of the world, and my rationality tells me there’s a greater and better world out there than I have hitherto seen. And to be fair, I have seen better than mentioned above. Let’s just say, I had to fill some space here.  

Cheers!

 

Interesting hobnobs…

Casual acquaintance:  Didn’t see you having lunch today? Fasting on Janmashtmi, is it?

 Me (with my most radiant smile): yeah…

Casual acquaintance (with a surprised/amused look): Oh good! It’s nice to start one’s day with prayers. Sort of cleanses you…

Me: Err… didn’t get much time to pray in the morning… so I just sort of thought about God for some time on my way to office.

Casual acquaintance (suppressing the cynical smile): Okay… and you’ve been listening to rock songs since morning, right?

Me (with a sheepish smile): I didn’t realize it was loud enough to sneak out of the headphones…

Casual acquaintance (attempting to end the conversation): Never mind that… but staying hungry for a day is marked devotion I’d say…

Me (in an attempt to be modest): It’s nothing really… besides, I just went to Haldiram’s… they had some stuff for fast takers…

Casual acquaintance (between unctrollable laughter): So, you are fasting for a God you didn’t find time to pray by listening to rock songs since morning and eating sweets and other delicacies from a famous eat out joint! Wah Bhartiya naari wah!

Casual acquaintance leaves as I get back to my “rock songs” sipping flavored milk from Haldiram’s…

Oh and btw… Belated Happy Janmashtmi people…!

 

Sneezy – wheezy – Rainy

I love rains… and I enjoy common cold. A mix of the two is one of the most surreal combinations possible.

I know it sounds stupid, but I like the sleepy, drowsy disposition that comes with cold. And I like the nasal tone too. I like the slow, sluggish blanket that surrounds one’s actions and thoughts. I like the fact that I can’t speak much, as mostly, I don’t like to speak a lot if I can help it. I like the perennial body ache and the stress on one’s ribs due to excessive coughing.

I like the fact that I can enjoy a hot cup of tea/coffee and even if I burn my tongue in the process (which is a routine ritual when I am having tea/coffee), it makes no difference, ‘cos it all tastes the same! And because of the point mentioned before, my office lunch becomes more edible than on normal days!

Having cold in monsoons makes it all the more enjoyable, ‘cos one doesn’t have to try too hard to slow down a bit to enjoy the downpour. The surrealistic effect of rain is so well complemented by the absentminded state of a cold stricken being.  The erratic sneezing and the lightheadedness it brings is a psychedelic process of sorts.

Getting drenched in a heavy rain in such a state and the numbness one feels with it is insurmountable. And from the time one feels a chilly shiver run down one’s bones after that, to the time when one is dried up and anticipating fever, every moment is so livable. 

Finally, what’s best about cold is the extent to which one appreciates the return of wakefulness and clear-headedness once it has subsided. (I am yet to reach this stage, but I have been through all the rest so far. )

At the cost of sounding more insane than I have already proved myself to be, I’d like to conclude that cold is one of the few harmless indulgences one can enjoy at one’s own expense.

Having said all that I have said… I wish the world a good health, body and mind!

And to all my fellow sneezers… enjoy the lull… Happy sneezing!

 

Yesterdays that were…

It’s amazing what ‘today’ can do to you; add a few years to it. I just had a small walk down the memory lane (sic) yesterday and I was amazed looking at the dates of the photographs, the chat transcripts, the emails… In the small unmindful mind that I roam about with, it only seemed yesterday! And there’s so much that has changed since that ‘yesterday’… things that seemed so mature and important back then, made me chuckle silently at their ludicrousness, and it made me sad to realize that I had, due to some unknown reasons, ‘grown’ out of it…

Why do people grow wise and sad and serious! I remember having a very indulging discussion with a like-minded cousin on this, on one of those seemingly yesterday afternoons… we were lying on the bed lazily after lunch I think, and were in a matching ponderous mood (something that comes easily to people who don’t have much to do or think about otherwise… I used to be so often in that mode till some time back… sigh…).The discussion was an engaging one, where we pointed out the reasons behind this redundant development. But we dozed off before deriving much out of it. What’s interesting was that we never considered ourselves to be part of the ‘people’ we had been discussing. It was conveniently assumed that we were above all this natural phenomenon of ‘growing up’.

Every day that goes by has a story to tell… and every day to come seems so routinely, that it’s hardly given so much thought as should be gone into it perhaps… my wise friend tells me that one ‘should’ not think on the lines of what ‘should be’. So, I’ll let it rest at that. And perhaps it is the best way to live through the present… a lot of foresight doesn’t help in the long run. In fact, my experience tells me that it tends to sap all the joy out of what could have otherwise been a reckless, joyous day. And perhaps that’s the reason why as we grow, and become more circumspect, the potential happy memories of the past to come, tend to diminish with every going day.

Or maybe they don’t. But just that the growing up slows down a bit and so the difference between the past and the present is not as stark as it used to be. Perhaps a few more decades before the realization of another yesterday gone far away dawns…

 

A tiny little something

A friend sent across this link. It was a very refreshing and interesting read. I thought I might as well share it here.

I went on holiday to escape my London-based life of needless anxiety. Tragically, I’ve succeeded

Cheers!

Updated May 28, 2008(5:19pm)
Another one from the same guy and through the same friend… Nightclubs are hell. What’s cool or fun about a thumping, sweaty dungeon full of posing idiots?
I’m a fan!

 

Solitude

“It’s difficult to be what you want to be… especially when you don’t know for sure what you want”

“It’s harder when you want to become what you can’t”

“Oh come on! There’s no ‘can’t’ that can’t be done”

“And who put that idea in your head?” I asked her, amused by the force with which she made her disagreement. I had seen her grow into the wise young girl the world knew her as, from a rebellious tomboy of a kid. The fact that she was like me in a lot more ways than could be pointed out was not hidden from either of us.

I knew the answer to my question. And I could hear it in my head as she frowned, struggling with words, deep in thoughts, not to find the answer but the right words to wrap it in.

“It’s right to an extent, what you just said”, I said to her. I could see that she was not listening… still upset with herself for not finding the words to express what she so strongly felt. “It holds true for people who are willing to try what they want. Not everybody’ wants’ to do that”, I continued. She acquiesced quietly – a trait I could never understand. She agreed to almost everything. And what that made her carry was the burden of her own convictions and beliefs in the form of confused, muffled questions. Was I responsible for it?, I wondered at times… Maybe in a way I was… with my sense of right and wrong, inflexible and mundane ideas about limits and boundaries, I had been a big influence in her being. It hurt me to see her submitting quietly to contradicting views. And I knew it bothered her too. But she was too proud to make it known… and too gullible to stand rooted with her own ideas.

“I know you don’t agree with me on this… why can’t you just say as much… no questions asked!” She looked at me quizzically wondering how much more I knew about her… she opened her mouth to speak but a knock at the door interrupted our little conversation.

“Hey! You’ve been locked in there long! Any plans for dinner?”

“In a minute!”, she called back, as I quietly proceeded into the oblivion of her reflections.

——————————–

Inspired from a small conversation of two kids I happened to overhear.

 

A little nothing…

Came across an interesting link while going through other interesting links.

Thought I might as well share it here for nonchalant passers by and more importantly to keep this little corner in the cyber space I can claim as mine, going….

If a tree falls in a forest riddle

 

The Dots…

It must have been a while I guess, since I had been staring at the table cloth, sitting at the dining table. At least the exasperated call of my name that finally made me look up suggested so. I was supposed to say something sensible I assumed, in the ongoing conversation. Without a clue of what I had missed all this while staring at the table cloth I mumbled something about doing the right thing at the right time, even if one doesn’t feel too good doing it. I didn’t miss the cold stare I got from across the table, but it’s been a long time since I have trained myself to avoid that. Realizing I could again excuse myself from the drab of hollow words, I got back to the table cloth again.

I think we bought it about a year back. And though it was laid on the table in circulation with the other table cloths, it had been laid out pretty often. But until now I had never observed the detailing of the design on its white base, specially those tiny white dots on golden background on the sides. I tried to imagine how it would have been when we had bought it. Look at the cloth, the color, the design, compare with a few around, and buy it. Once bought and home, lay it on the table to a few careless glances at something out of routine in the room until it too becomes  part of the routine. I then tried to imagine the feelings of its creator. He must have given the greatest of care to the minutest of details. The cloth, the colors, the overall design, the orientation of each and every tiny petal printed on the cloth, and those white dots on slight golden background on the sides that forced me into thinking so much. What did he do it for? If only he knew that on a plain dry day, a loner trying to shut a few people and voices out of her mind would by chance notice his long created design, would he have taken so much pain? Probably it’s way too pointless to be even pointed out. Probably, even the creator made it to be simply laid on a table unnoticed. After all it’s just a table cloth, not a deep meaning painting by one of those famous painters. That would have been treated so much more differently. Every stroke scrutinized and delved over by the art lovers. Every aspect of the painter’s intent discussed.

“Look, I would never approve of it and that’s that. Please try to make him understand it’s so wrong of him to even think of all this!”… I had missed the part before this, but was expected to speak something now, the paragon of wisdom that I am. I don’t understand if it’s right to judge everything as right or wrong. I don’t even know if there’s a thing that’s universally right or wrong. I don’t know if it’s right to do something that’s said to be right even if it devastates your world. Something inside tells me its not, but the voice is too muffled to be clearly heard, so I’m not sure. The eyes were probing into my own, and I had to deliver an answer. “Of course”, I said, looking across the table, confronting the cold, defiant stare for the first time.

Defiance is good I thought to myself, approvingly. It’s indicative that one’s still alive, can speak and be heard…

 

As Mumbai Burned…

I feel ashamed, humiliated and helpless. What has unfolded in Mumbai in the last couple of days has left me wondering if the reason why I happen to be alive is something as fickle as my own callous fate… That if all that happened in the last three days in Mumbai repeats itself in some other part of the country, it would find us just about as vulnerable and unprepared as we have proven ourselves to be. That we would lose out more Karkares, Salaskars, UnniKrishnans, glued helplessly to our television sets, or worse, hoping for a rescue in the midst of capricious bullets and grenades.

It’s a national shame to let a conspiracy of this magnitude realize and grip the very soul of our country. I’ve been hearing about martyrdom stories for the last three days. It’s unfortunate that the best of our men lost their lives fighting not on a hostile border, but in the womb of the nation, combating infiltrators in hotels and houses. What makes it worse is the fact that all this madness could have been avoided, had we learnt from the innumerable incidents that preceded this one. But for that to happen, we needed to look beyond our religious divides, beyond our state divides, beyond our caste divides, in short, beyond our inane trivial-mindedness. But, it seems like pettiness is so much a part of our being, that it takes the iconic Taj burning to make us all shut up and take notice of how we are betraying our motherland with all this meaningless bickering.

I have been following the news very closely. But, with all due respect, I haven’t yet seen, read or heard the Prime Minister’s address to the nation. I flip the newspaper page when all it has to offer is some politician’s comments on the happenings in Mumbai. I change the channel when a news channel talks about some politician or the other addressing the media. In my own skewed sense of understanding, I find our so called leaders worse perpetrators of terror than those who terrorized the nation for the last 60 or so hours. 

More than the casualty rate, it’s the emotional impact that makes this attack unprecedented. A lot is being said in various forums, and a lot of furious voices are raising questions, demanding immediate answers and changes. What remains to be seen is whether the lessons learnt by this mis-happening lead to unprecedented measures too. What remains to be seen is how long the memory of the shock and trauma every Indian experienced in the last 60 hours, keeps him from focusing on the pettiness that surrounds him.