Cliches....It once struck me that every good write up will have at least one cliched sentence.....And that cliche.....will be in it's perfect place...That every great writer will know this one thing...where to use a cliche.....or rather...one who knows this will always be a good writer/story teller.....Think carefully ....and you will see it too...How the most cliched thing said at the right time....has the effect it had the first time..with the added advantage that it strikes a familiar note ....making it not alien ...and hence the person becomes more receptive to the narrative...becomes more happy with it's creator......
Life.....(i'm wondering if my readers (note..the infinite paradox) have tired of this one yet ...?))Aah...just that one word....brings to mind...a young man lying down in a field looking at the stars and wondering......a middle aged woman standing in the middle of a busy street or a crowded railway station looking around her at the infinitely many people she sees, or an old couple sitting on their porch watching their(...not a typo !) sun set..... All of them....Sighing.......
We think of those moments when we are really, truly alive...when we wonder ...why we are here...and what exactly it is that we are to do with this 'life' of ours.....when for one moment...we stop and wonder, why we are running hither thither..pretending that we have goals.... and meaning..... and motives..... We stop....and for one moment we realise that we don't know what we want......And then....we sigh.....
In general, i have seen ( and further deduced from my..uhh... ..seeing !!) that people generally life their lives from short term goal to short term goal...... choosing a path and then optimising minor factors in that way of life...to suit themselves....I say...why not choose a perfect path....Most people give very little thought to what they want out of life.....Most people....i agree...do not get the chance.....Necessities of food, clothing and shelter, and upgrades of the same ( !!!!) occupy our minds to an almost parasitic extent.......Unless you are at a certain standard of living..... you 'need' to keep upgrading...to climbing....That much ....everyone will agree on.....but..what is this level.....how much comfort does one really need ? When does need turn into want...quietly, smoothly , almost slyly....fooling us into believing that we need the better couch....or the LCD screen TV.... or the 64 GB ipod touch....How does one know.....??
These question trouble me.....I am 19.With 2 years of graduate school left....I am nearing 'flying the nest time' Very soon...I will be on my own......Don't get me wrong..it's natural..In fact i wouldn't have it any other way......It's scary...but exciting...The questions are troubling...but indeed intriguing at the same time...they scream to be answered.....And i scream back....(as of now....just profanities....but ....very soon...!!)So i start thinking...and what with my exceedingly egomaniacal( Peter griffin would've screamed out loud....(Pardon me...but i consider 'Family Guy' to be an essential part of today's youth culture....!!)) nature....writing !! What would comprise a good life... a happy life...
First of all....One must have a goal......that much is clear....Whatever that goal maybe....it should seem like a lifetime's work at the time of goal-choosing....and till it's achievement should be the guiding factor in all decisions one makes.Also it must be something close to one's heart.....so as to make life meaningful......to give it purpose.....
Secondly.....To live one must have money.....therefore one must work.....( unless of course one has some steady source of income....!!!! Hurrah !!) and since work would generally take up a substantial part of one's day...it should be something one is interested in....and it should produce enough money for one to live on...( start off by considering one's parents'; or rather childhood standard of living( since one is accustomed to it))
Thirdly one must have a hobby (or more than one) different from one's goal....for you always tire of a thing, sooner or later......Something to turn to when bored or frustrated with one's goal......
Next, one must have a confidante.... someone to confide in, when you are tired, worried, sad happy or angry....Because every person loves to give vent to stuff...thoughts, ideas, feelings, emotions etc....You need someone to hear you out...to listen and nod comfortingly....someone to support you and yet someone who will not deceive you even if it is to try to 'protect' you from the world......
Further...you need someone to confide in you(Oftentimes this will be your confidante...but that is not necessary..) It does not matter if the person does not think of you as a 'confidante'....you have to think that he/she is .....that's all..(It's like everyone needs to be loved...but also needs to love...both functions are essential....and hence..to confide and to be confided in are essential to life....)
Finally...your confidante, like your goal, need not be boredom-proof..so you need friends...
Once you have a system in place..then you test it ( It's better to do this in your mind !!...) Experiment with your goal and your standard of living..your hobbies and your free time....your confidante and your friends......and try to get an optimum.....
The possibilities are infinite... One's system may change from time to time...but it's always good to have one at all points of time.....
Well....try my system out...if it works...well i'll don saffron robes and grow a beard (Damn !!).....
PS: How good was my cliche placement ??
PPS:Like skeletor promised.....I'm back !!!
PPPS: Missing a confidante !!!
PPPPS: Or wait...yeah...i confide in everybody.......
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Sunday, March 28, 2010
All around the mulberry bush....and POP !
One of the questions that has been troubling us since the emergence of philosophy and that almost everybody has an opinion on (which more or less qualifies it as a topic for my blog..I mean people who i can show up.....AND people will care..what else could i want) is the one about ethics....People have always judged their lives ( and more often !!) the lives of others, comparing it to some divine ideal....What is good and what is bad....And is the intention what matters or the actual effects caused by your actions ?
ABBTMS(almost the beginning but technically a Mid Post):Yes..Once more..i have managed to select a very difficult question that the whole world has been trying to solve ( unsuccessfully !) for centuries..And once more, by sheer 'beating around the bush'....well actually...revolving about it at a high speed and holding out a stick, whose length is the radius of my orbit minus the length of my outstretched arm....( Yes..i am a techie...They don't call it IIT for nothing...)i will manage to wriggle out and still appear to be a very deep, philosophical, mature individual...while i'm actually...a childish,impulsive,mad person..who writes ABBTMS's in his blogs...!!!
Well...First of all...The question about good and bad has been answered sufficiently well in the book 'Shantaram' by a character called Abdel Khader Khan..He tells the narrator that Whenever one is confused about good and bad one must ask oneself...'If everyone did this..would it lead to a better world ?' and decide accordingly...But of course...there are problems with this understanding...First of all, for the analysis to be exact, all the people should be playing exactly the same part in exactly the same scenario...And in most cases, this is impossible practically..Some situations...in fact the most difficult ones to analyze...are isolated ones that very few people will ever be a part of....Secondly..Most of the times..It is the degree of good and bad that we are analysing and all things are clearly not black or white....In most everyday situations our dilemmas are of the second kind....Where the effect on the world of 2 slightly differing alternatives as performed by everyone in the world must be considered...and that ...is difficult if not impossible..In the more 'Ethical code red' scenarios,the situation is of the first kind, where khan's analysis is absurd....(Statistics will tell you that whenever we are talking about rare situations..data generation is a problem ( because of the rarity) and hence so is prediction...and this is somewhat my point)
But anyway, theories is what we want and not real life solutions..Most people have a good enough ( !!) ethical code that they use as a standard...so what we are actually looking for is a hard and fast rule, a formula.... just to have fun..It's good to know that there is a solution, even if it is impractical and insoluble...It makes us feel safe...that there is some logic, some order beyond things, something that we can understand and react to....
But enough of this armageddonry and chaos rumor mongering( enough for now that is....:P)..I'll proceed to the next section....Intention...
Sometimes, even though our intentions are good, we see that factors beyond our control( or so we think..(If my blog had a theme music...i would play the dark,sinister, 'potential of doom' one form the previous paragraph)) make the effects of our actions bad...( with respect to the 'no action taken' scenario)...This is seen most commonly in slapstick comedy cinema, where, in the middle of a fight, the clumsy henchman waits with a club to hit some one from the opposite side, but ends up hitting 'the boss'( typically bollywood, though hollywood does it's fair bit too)What really matters here, the intention....or the actual actions ?
One one hand, if something bad happens, then the action should be termed bad, for intentions, like potential ( which i ranted about in my second blog) do not affect the world, and hence should not feature in any judgment...On the other hand, how is a person supposed to know the exact effect of his action..With so many factors variable, each one affecting the outcome in a totally different manner, how can one judge...Moreover, how does one judge whose ( why isn't who's used ??!! :P)
action it was that actually caused the outcome...I mean..Petrol being dropped carelessly near a pile of paper and the careless throwing of a cigarette ( in this case, none of the actions are voluntary..but it makes my point) both could contribute to a massive fire, but which one's responsible ?? Also if a person analyses something less than another, is he bad ? Is stupidity a crime ??
In my opinion, Intentions should be used to judge people, for they are a measure of inherent goodness of people, just as potential is a measure of their, well ...potential(:P)(The two judgments are exact analogues..)
Anyway...there...i got away clean..
PS: That was good !
PPS: I'm reading Simone de Beauvoir's 'The Second Sex' and progressing (surprisingly) well.....So stay tuned for some posts on women..
PPPS: I dunno why i said that..'Cause i like to brag( Oh..I read 'serious literature', or 'cause i was too excited about a pending post on 'la femme'....
PPPPS: More of the latter though..the former could have been done on several other occasions....
PPPPPS : Like that one...:P
ABBTMS(almost the beginning but technically a Mid Post):Yes..Once more..i have managed to select a very difficult question that the whole world has been trying to solve ( unsuccessfully !) for centuries..And once more, by sheer 'beating around the bush'....well actually...revolving about it at a high speed and holding out a stick, whose length is the radius of my orbit minus the length of my outstretched arm....( Yes..i am a techie...They don't call it IIT for nothing...)i will manage to wriggle out and still appear to be a very deep, philosophical, mature individual...while i'm actually...a childish,impulsive,mad person..who writes ABBTMS's in his blogs...!!!
Well...First of all...The question about good and bad has been answered sufficiently well in the book 'Shantaram' by a character called Abdel Khader Khan..He tells the narrator that Whenever one is confused about good and bad one must ask oneself...'If everyone did this..would it lead to a better world ?' and decide accordingly...But of course...there are problems with this understanding...First of all, for the analysis to be exact, all the people should be playing exactly the same part in exactly the same scenario...And in most cases, this is impossible practically..Some situations...in fact the most difficult ones to analyze...are isolated ones that very few people will ever be a part of....Secondly..Most of the times..It is the degree of good and bad that we are analysing and all things are clearly not black or white....In most everyday situations our dilemmas are of the second kind....Where the effect on the world of 2 slightly differing alternatives as performed by everyone in the world must be considered...and that ...is difficult if not impossible..In the more 'Ethical code red' scenarios,the situation is of the first kind, where khan's analysis is absurd....(Statistics will tell you that whenever we are talking about rare situations..data generation is a problem ( because of the rarity) and hence so is prediction...and this is somewhat my point)
But anyway, theories is what we want and not real life solutions..Most people have a good enough ( !!) ethical code that they use as a standard...so what we are actually looking for is a hard and fast rule, a formula.... just to have fun..It's good to know that there is a solution, even if it is impractical and insoluble...It makes us feel safe...that there is some logic, some order beyond things, something that we can understand and react to....
But enough of this armageddonry and chaos rumor mongering( enough for now that is....:P)..I'll proceed to the next section....Intention...
Sometimes, even though our intentions are good, we see that factors beyond our control( or so we think..(If my blog had a theme music...i would play the dark,sinister, 'potential of doom' one form the previous paragraph)) make the effects of our actions bad...( with respect to the 'no action taken' scenario)...This is seen most commonly in slapstick comedy cinema, where, in the middle of a fight, the clumsy henchman waits with a club to hit some one from the opposite side, but ends up hitting 'the boss'( typically bollywood, though hollywood does it's fair bit too)What really matters here, the intention....or the actual actions ?
One one hand, if something bad happens, then the action should be termed bad, for intentions, like potential ( which i ranted about in my second blog) do not affect the world, and hence should not feature in any judgment...On the other hand, how is a person supposed to know the exact effect of his action..With so many factors variable, each one affecting the outcome in a totally different manner, how can one judge...Moreover, how does one judge whose ( why isn't who's used ??!! :P)
action it was that actually caused the outcome...I mean..Petrol being dropped carelessly near a pile of paper and the careless throwing of a cigarette ( in this case, none of the actions are voluntary..but it makes my point) both could contribute to a massive fire, but which one's responsible ?? Also if a person analyses something less than another, is he bad ? Is stupidity a crime ??
In my opinion, Intentions should be used to judge people, for they are a measure of inherent goodness of people, just as potential is a measure of their, well ...potential(:P)(The two judgments are exact analogues..)
Anyway...there...i got away clean..
PS: That was good !
PPS: I'm reading Simone de Beauvoir's 'The Second Sex' and progressing (surprisingly) well.....So stay tuned for some posts on women..
PPPS: I dunno why i said that..'Cause i like to brag( Oh..I read 'serious literature', or 'cause i was too excited about a pending post on 'la femme'....
PPPPS: More of the latter though..the former could have been done on several other occasions....
PPPPPS : Like that one...:P
Thursday, March 18, 2010
BFF !!
"I confess....I have wronged you...I should've ...i know...I should've done it a long time ago....Please....Give me one chance..A day's time to make amends. I am, but human.I forgot...." I cowered, tail between legs, whimpering.....
Lockjaw growled......He looked at me with a snarl on his face, the discolouration on his face all the more out of place, unnerving....scary even...Then he stepped back, muscles no longer tense...turned away.....and loped off......
I heaved a sigh of relief.....I knew it had been a big blunder and a narrow escape.How could I have forgotten...All along ...i had been looking at the big picture.....and had forgotten about the small things...the things that really mattered...I had made the crass error of forgetting to write about dogs on my blog (snigger)? And now it had come back to bite me in the butt ( literally !! as it has been all along ( fooled ya !!))
Anyway 'lockjaw' exists..He lives in hostel 9, iit bombay...He's completely white except for a brown patch that covers one of his eyes ( and a bit on his back)....His 'best pal in the whole world' is twyster....who's a mixture of brown and black is constantly twisting and turning in ecstasy.....( at least that's the only way i've seen him.....I'm told...he paints a different picture in my absence ....)Also...another fella that stays with them is silky...(recently named) who's got the most awesome coat....but is really too in love with me....He( or she....really not gone there :P) looks to conserve the number of scratches on my body at each of our encounters....which makes me heave a sigh of relief that swarsandhya's over....( let it suffice that during swarsandhya times...i would have to keep going to hostel nine...)Anyway...coming back to lockjaw...he's probably one of my favourite dogs in the universe( about a billion of those..) He's got an awesome set of teeth and his comical half and half face is like a naughty little pirate's( yes....i know ..i'm beginning to sound like a doting mother in english cinema or Enid blyton...!!!) and his bark..! Oh ! it's truly amazing...Loud and sharp..It's a true 'Arf' not a wussy' wuff' or a girly ' yip yip'....By god man, when he barks...i am tempted to throw my bag off ( yes...sigh...still attending classes...) and run beside him...barking for joy...
Then there's simba....who slept in my ( 'and mine 'Says Dk indignantly) room for nearly a year, would pee sometime during the night, then shake himself( uuurggh) dry and then proceed to another spot....iteratively !!.....Now, he's a fat piggy( bad dog !!) fellow, who's nevertheless adorable ( and i mean A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E) with his sniffling and purring( i swear....)Also there's 'THe Godfather' who's a huge solemn kinda dog...trotting along sedately with his entourage....very much acting the rightful part of the ex-alphamax dog....
A comic pair is that of 'Divyanshu'( named after his yellow ochre coat and it's similarity to a filthy shirt that a friend owns and loves...and wears...too much), a tiny foxy and infinitely spirited dog who's never, ever backed away from a fight and maintains that all of the institute is rightfully his and he works to that end...drinking maybe 10 litres of water a day ( :P) and 'Sharky', who's a big broad faced, short snouted dog, who loves me so much, he tries to rip my hand to shreds every time he sees me.....Their 'playful' banter( comprising mostly snarls and growls) is a must watch .....
I could go on and on about the dogs i've known...'Buck'( of 'The call of the wild' fame), Tigger( from Winnie the pooh)....several dogs called 'Mangy' ( !!!!), my aunt's dogs Goldy, Snowy, Mowgli and Andy....My own, Tinker belle and Patch and others......but then, that would take a lifetime.....and i wouldn't want to do injustice to any of them....or they'd just come after me...like Lockjaw.....
Mark twain said that 'If you take a dog off the streets, feed him and take care of him, then he will not bite you.....and That is the chief difference between a dog and a man...'It is true, that dogs are loyal...But even more basic to their nature is love....All they want is love....They ask nothing form you....but love...Dogs who i've never ever fed food follow me for miles.... jumping with joy everytime they see me... They follow me , through several unfriendly territories....and fight through the hostel 6 dog defenses..to come right upto my room......And these are dogs i've known for a year or more.....I might've fed them three or four times...but the dedication and love they have for me is far beyond the imagination of any human being....They gain nothing from me....Nothing at all.....No stimulating conversation, no favours, just my company....just that...
I never believed in love...I thought it to be impractical....I was asked by a friend, whether i could imagine a loved one, completely crippled and having lost control over all thought and speech..He asked if i could love them, just for them...I replied that maybe the memories of good times spent together would create such a 'love'...He said that i was stalling..that i knew what he was talking about...I thought for a moment and replied....No...It's impossible....I mean..if a person can't think and speak..is he still that same person...that person you once were friends with ??Can love be ...just arbitrary...as a reaction to love ??.....I had answered in the negative then.....but now that i think about it...i was wrong....It would be a great disrespect to my friends.....the furry ones .....It would be a total disregard of the principle that their lives are based on....that love can be reciprocated by just love....and nothing else....In their company....i feel human......
PS: And no...i didn't forget Tuffy...My...dog....my brother....my friend...He's the sweetest, most loving creature i've ever met....Stayed with me and followed me along for more than a year.... Haven't seen him for ages...Wherever he is, i hope he's happy....And yeah...ALL Dogs go to heaven !!
PPS: Ditto for you tigger...
PPPS: Damn...i did it again :P
PPPPS: Woof !!
Lockjaw growled......He looked at me with a snarl on his face, the discolouration on his face all the more out of place, unnerving....scary even...Then he stepped back, muscles no longer tense...turned away.....and loped off......
I heaved a sigh of relief.....I knew it had been a big blunder and a narrow escape.How could I have forgotten...All along ...i had been looking at the big picture.....and had forgotten about the small things...the things that really mattered...I had made the crass error of forgetting to write about dogs on my blog (snigger)? And now it had come back to bite me in the butt ( literally !! as it has been all along ( fooled ya !!))
Anyway 'lockjaw' exists..He lives in hostel 9, iit bombay...He's completely white except for a brown patch that covers one of his eyes ( and a bit on his back)....His 'best pal in the whole world' is twyster....who's a mixture of brown and black is constantly twisting and turning in ecstasy.....( at least that's the only way i've seen him.....I'm told...he paints a different picture in my absence ....)Also...another fella that stays with them is silky...(recently named) who's got the most awesome coat....but is really too in love with me....He( or she....really not gone there :P) looks to conserve the number of scratches on my body at each of our encounters....which makes me heave a sigh of relief that swarsandhya's over....( let it suffice that during swarsandhya times...i would have to keep going to hostel nine...)Anyway...coming back to lockjaw...he's probably one of my favourite dogs in the universe( about a billion of those..) He's got an awesome set of teeth and his comical half and half face is like a naughty little pirate's( yes....i know ..i'm beginning to sound like a doting mother in english cinema or Enid blyton...!!!) and his bark..! Oh ! it's truly amazing...Loud and sharp..It's a true 'Arf' not a wussy' wuff' or a girly ' yip yip'....By god man, when he barks...i am tempted to throw my bag off ( yes...sigh...still attending classes...) and run beside him...barking for joy...
Then there's simba....who slept in my ( 'and mine 'Says Dk indignantly) room for nearly a year, would pee sometime during the night, then shake himself( uuurggh) dry and then proceed to another spot....iteratively !!.....Now, he's a fat piggy( bad dog !!) fellow, who's nevertheless adorable ( and i mean A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E) with his sniffling and purring( i swear....)Also there's 'THe Godfather' who's a huge solemn kinda dog...trotting along sedately with his entourage....very much acting the rightful part of the ex-alphamax dog....
A comic pair is that of 'Divyanshu'( named after his yellow ochre coat and it's similarity to a filthy shirt that a friend owns and loves...and wears...too much), a tiny foxy and infinitely spirited dog who's never, ever backed away from a fight and maintains that all of the institute is rightfully his and he works to that end...drinking maybe 10 litres of water a day ( :P) and 'Sharky', who's a big broad faced, short snouted dog, who loves me so much, he tries to rip my hand to shreds every time he sees me.....Their 'playful' banter( comprising mostly snarls and growls) is a must watch .....
I could go on and on about the dogs i've known...'Buck'( of 'The call of the wild' fame), Tigger( from Winnie the pooh)....several dogs called 'Mangy' ( !!!!), my aunt's dogs Goldy, Snowy, Mowgli and Andy....My own, Tinker belle and Patch and others......but then, that would take a lifetime.....and i wouldn't want to do injustice to any of them....or they'd just come after me...like Lockjaw.....
Mark twain said that 'If you take a dog off the streets, feed him and take care of him, then he will not bite you.....and That is the chief difference between a dog and a man...'It is true, that dogs are loyal...But even more basic to their nature is love....All they want is love....They ask nothing form you....but love...Dogs who i've never ever fed food follow me for miles.... jumping with joy everytime they see me... They follow me , through several unfriendly territories....and fight through the hostel 6 dog defenses..to come right upto my room......And these are dogs i've known for a year or more.....I might've fed them three or four times...but the dedication and love they have for me is far beyond the imagination of any human being....They gain nothing from me....Nothing at all.....No stimulating conversation, no favours, just my company....just that...
I never believed in love...I thought it to be impractical....I was asked by a friend, whether i could imagine a loved one, completely crippled and having lost control over all thought and speech..He asked if i could love them, just for them...I replied that maybe the memories of good times spent together would create such a 'love'...He said that i was stalling..that i knew what he was talking about...I thought for a moment and replied....No...It's impossible....I mean..if a person can't think and speak..is he still that same person...that person you once were friends with ??Can love be ...just arbitrary...as a reaction to love ??.....I had answered in the negative then.....but now that i think about it...i was wrong....It would be a great disrespect to my friends.....the furry ones .....It would be a total disregard of the principle that their lives are based on....that love can be reciprocated by just love....and nothing else....In their company....i feel human......
PS: And no...i didn't forget Tuffy...My...dog....my brother....my friend...He's the sweetest, most loving creature i've ever met....Stayed with me and followed me along for more than a year.... Haven't seen him for ages...Wherever he is, i hope he's happy....And yeah...ALL Dogs go to heaven !!
PPS: Ditto for you tigger...
PPPS: Damn...i did it again :P
PPPPS: Woof !!
Saturday, March 13, 2010
More Angst
As usual...I am writing something....but instead of getting to the point directly...i love to beat around the bush...wander here and there....blow a little bubblegum balloon now and then.....then maybe try to lick my elbow (and i swear ...i have once licked ketchup off it...) ..flex my muscles a bit and suck my tummy in...and put on a face that makes me look constipated and rather like Solomon grundy (http://marvel.com/ Awesome site) than Superman.......and then sometimes i ease into the topic rather elegantly....and sometimes i just come straight out and break the fourth wall (or it's literary analogue....) and introduce the topic..Sometimes i am actually confused about what my topic will be ...and am actually stalling....and thinking at the same time...about what i should write....And actually that's what life is....
(:P)What are we doing with our lives...I mean does anyone have even the slightest idea....or are we just 'err'ing and 'hmmm'ing and waiting for the recess bell to ring ?? I mean, sure, we have goals and stuff...I wanna be rich or famous or change the world ( among the most ambitious and wholesome...) ...But does anyone ever really think about when he will be on his deathbed thinking...."What the hell...Why ?"..." Why did i just go through life...and Why did i just do all that stuff ...Most of it would've made no sense even then, even if i had tried to think about it...."...I mean i'm not talking about very 'high brow' ( and according to me ..more or less meaningless) stuff like 'Why are we here?' ...but rather.... about how we life on a very small scale....making choices that seem right at the time..but are orthogonal or sometimes anti parallel( couldn't help it :P ) to what our final aim is....We should really think about what we want to do ...with life....not in life...but what would be a near perfect scenario that we could live in indefinitely.....Of course what we want to do may change...but our decisions at each point of time ( wait for it... wait for it....) should leave us pointing in the direction of our instantaneous life goal vector ( !!!!! :P)
I know myself that my life goal has changed several times...oscillating, though not simple harmonically, between 3-4 options...but i always make decisions keeping it in mind...And it's worked for me...Of course the relation may not be causal...But at least ill be more like, " I'm dumb !", on my deathbed( at worst) rather than " What the f**k"....(At best)......
Going into the specifics...
A lot of people do a lot of stuff just because it's cool, or because everyone's doing it.....All their lives..all their decisions are made on the basis of social norms..While this may be a safe route in some cases ( and sometimes that's even the motive) many times people just want to be accepted by everyone..they want to be part of a group....I see obvious examples of this everyday and there are definitely others that are subtler...."Why ?" Once....Ask yourself this....How many people out of those are such that you actually care about their opinion..Why is it that if 200 fools get together....they become some super intelligent entity ?....Why do we let out lives be dictated by people who have no stake in it ? We want to play it safe...and we want assurance and acceptance..For once..grow a pair.....Do what YOU think is right ....
I remember reading in 'Chicken soup for a soul' about this kid who once made fun of a girl that other kids always used to make fun of 'cause she used to wear old fashioned clothes..And he says how he regrets to this day,that he did it..In fact...'The Chicken Soup' series has many examples of such confessions where people have regretted stuff they did long ago due to societal pressure.....In this case the result...was a (painful) twinge of regret about not having done the right thing...but in some cases it will be about life changing decisions...and that...is something you do not want to regret......
PS: 'Conformity Is A Disease And Rebellion Is The Cure': I once had a Tshirt that said this..At the time i wore it cause it was anti-establishment and cool...( sigh...the irony...) but now....well...i wish i still had it...
PPS: By the way...i remember asking if my posts were too preachy and pedantic....Yup..they are !!!!
PPPS: Chicken soup is Awesome !!!( both for the stomach and the soul !)
PPPPS: Re: the title...Remember...'Tell me why',' More tell me why','Still more tell me why','Here's more tell me why' and the like.....Well....stay tuned :P
(:P)What are we doing with our lives...I mean does anyone have even the slightest idea....or are we just 'err'ing and 'hmmm'ing and waiting for the recess bell to ring ?? I mean, sure, we have goals and stuff...I wanna be rich or famous or change the world ( among the most ambitious and wholesome...) ...But does anyone ever really think about when he will be on his deathbed thinking...."What the hell...Why ?"..." Why did i just go through life...and Why did i just do all that stuff ...Most of it would've made no sense even then, even if i had tried to think about it...."...I mean i'm not talking about very 'high brow' ( and according to me ..more or less meaningless) stuff like 'Why are we here?' ...but rather.... about how we life on a very small scale....making choices that seem right at the time..but are orthogonal or sometimes anti parallel( couldn't help it :P ) to what our final aim is....We should really think about what we want to do ...with life....not in life...but what would be a near perfect scenario that we could live in indefinitely.....Of course what we want to do may change...but our decisions at each point of time ( wait for it... wait for it....) should leave us pointing in the direction of our instantaneous life goal vector ( !!!!! :P)
I know myself that my life goal has changed several times...oscillating, though not simple harmonically, between 3-4 options...but i always make decisions keeping it in mind...And it's worked for me...Of course the relation may not be causal...But at least ill be more like, " I'm dumb !", on my deathbed( at worst) rather than " What the f**k"....(At best)......
Going into the specifics...
A lot of people do a lot of stuff just because it's cool, or because everyone's doing it.....All their lives..all their decisions are made on the basis of social norms..While this may be a safe route in some cases ( and sometimes that's even the motive) many times people just want to be accepted by everyone..they want to be part of a group....I see obvious examples of this everyday and there are definitely others that are subtler...."Why ?" Once....Ask yourself this....How many people out of those are such that you actually care about their opinion..Why is it that if 200 fools get together....they become some super intelligent entity ?....Why do we let out lives be dictated by people who have no stake in it ? We want to play it safe...and we want assurance and acceptance..For once..grow a pair.....Do what YOU think is right ....
I remember reading in 'Chicken soup for a soul' about this kid who once made fun of a girl that other kids always used to make fun of 'cause she used to wear old fashioned clothes..And he says how he regrets to this day,that he did it..In fact...'The Chicken Soup' series has many examples of such confessions where people have regretted stuff they did long ago due to societal pressure.....In this case the result...was a (painful) twinge of regret about not having done the right thing...but in some cases it will be about life changing decisions...and that...is something you do not want to regret......
PS: 'Conformity Is A Disease And Rebellion Is The Cure': I once had a Tshirt that said this..At the time i wore it cause it was anti-establishment and cool...( sigh...the irony...) but now....well...i wish i still had it...
PPS: By the way...i remember asking if my posts were too preachy and pedantic....Yup..they are !!!!
PPPS: Chicken soup is Awesome !!!( both for the stomach and the soul !)
PPPPS: Re: the title...Remember...'Tell me why',' More tell me why','Still more tell me why','Here's more tell me why' and the like.....Well....stay tuned :P
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Face off !
DISCLAIMER : The following..uh..(write up...article..rant......) thing is very cynical and was conceptualised in a moment of extreme frustration and disgust.... Feelings like these often flare up arbitrarily...with no obvious reason...Something snaps and the facade of the calm,smiling,sophisticated person that you pretend to be, maybe even thought you were suddenly falls away...leaving you angry, disgusted,ashamed at yourself....Then you think, analyse, reason and go looking for the facade....telling yourself never to be spontantaneous or genuine ( couldn't find a thrid adjective here, sorry !! :P) ever again....At least it happens to me...And...like most things...these feelings are considered to be a sign of extreme weakness by some and that of extreme moral strength by others....After the moment has passed i thought about it and realised that things weren't as bad as i had once imagined them to be...but still felt that those thoughts were true enough to deserve lasting (though how lasting i cannot say !!) mention....so here goes...optimists beware...you have been warned...
My literature (or rather 'approaches to literature' as he would prefer to be called..and i understand fully and sympathise with him on that point) prof. once mentioned in class that someone or the other had said that all our life's a drama...it's a role we're playing..fully mindful of the audience and their reactions.....( and no..it's not'All world's a stage' that's by shakespeare and i know that.... XP)And i was like...was he the one they executed....( i mean..obviously i didn't say that but..i definitely thought that..( actually i didn't even think that..but hey..it's a really cool thing to say..!))And that statement really hit me....Not because it was something new..because such ideas..(of intense anger at the world and self righteousness and blah blah blah..) frequently occupy my mind...(self righteousness...blah blah blah indeed !!!) and not because it was a very smart way of putting it....but because sometimes....you have a large bloody pile of dynamite and all it takes is some small stupid spark...And it's happened with me several times... ideas and feelings that have been in you for a long time come bursting out as reactions to very strange and extremely arbitrary incidents....And then there's no wondering....'how the hell ?' but only the boom...Thoughts, feelings and ideas come rushing at you and you feel irrationally sad or happy or scared or ..as in this case...(and i think i said this before :P) angry, disgusted and ashamed......
(MS: If people accuse me of being verbose.....i plead guilty.. and it's fun...I mean i could write everything that i want to say about an idea in one sentence which would run to about 3-4 lines...but without the analogies and the rants and the infinite brackets and the :P's.... it's no fun....don't you agree ??!)
Well now that i've finished digressing ...(at least for now) i'll get back to what i was really emotional and all 'angry,disgusted and ashamed' about (was being the operative word... obviously !!)It's this world...and the way it's turned out....Your always playing a character...judging the reactions of others, changing your story...adding a bit to it, trimming some,lopping some off.....Sweet talking, fake laughing, up sucking (!!) and generally behaving in a way that would dry up an amazed(awestruck rather..) crocodile's tears.... And that's just the dark side....Every moment we say something we're thinking about how people would judge us based on what we just said....they're thinking the same..only they're also thinking about how their judgements would represent their biases and prejudices ..and how they would wish to appear before the world( some biases are cool you see...) We think about what we appear to be rather than what we are and what we should be( and yes..i do believe that there is some idea..foggy(very very...) though it may be...of an ideal we should strive to attain..)And this stunts all personal development..We live our entire lives as mere puppets in the hands of society..which in essence is the majority ( which is stupid and easily led (hint hint !!))and also largely dependent on luck..( The right or wrong set of circumstances can make or break the popularity of an idea or a movement)) and we work towards goals that society sets for us, do things that society decides are right for us and generally become robots...only (and this is doubly worse) we think that we have free will....Our mind works on an algorithm that judges the reactions to our behaviour and modifies them to conform...(nowadays it is believed (and this may be true..that rebellion is the new conformity..but that's just as bad...)
All in all we end up living not as ourselves but what the world wants us to be.....Most of our relationships are not genuine...they're means to an end...the ultimate end...recognition and approval, not by any person in particular , but by the world in general....And genuine relationships are important ..rather essential for a person's true development....And by true genuine relationships i do not mean those relationships where there is no criticism whatsoever of the other but rather where one's only reason for saying a thing is that he/she actually believes it.....And how do you decide who you can be genuine with..Well that's easy (or not..) If you are sure that the other person values genuinity (or genuineness or whatever !) then you can be genuine with him...But again, you will realise that this definition is recursive...You can be genuine if the other person wants to be genuine which in turn will happen if he knows that you want to be genuine and so on....ad infinitum...But generally things are much easier..Some rebellious (or rather non conforming..whatever that may be !) ideas ...when voiced aloud in a seemingly temporary loss of reason will be from a person who still craves genuinity in his life and there you have it... you're off....
A relationship where both participants speak their mind freely knowing that it's one person judging them...not a horde..knowing that whatever prejudices and biases that person my have...they can be argued against, for they are one man's prejudices and not a society's 'etched in stone' 'principles'....(first time..doesn't look to pretty ..but it was necessary.. !)And according to me..Marriage serves this purpose excellently , almost as if it were designed for this...Since in normal society you can't be genuine all the time and even if you're with a person with whom you do share a genuine rapport with but in the company of others you may have to say things that you would not ordinarily..but if you are alone at any time with that person you can explain things to him/her....and this particular requirement is satisfied by marriage, by design ....Therefore your best chance at a tailormade 'as perfect as it can get' genuine relationship is marriage..So choose wisely....
PS: I wanted to write another midscript but it would have been a PMS (!!! :P)
PPS: Of course, in any relationship intellectual compatiblity to some extent is essential but I'm talking about other, hidden requirements...
PPPS: Every time i wrote the word 'relationship' i felt that it would be misconstrued ....so don't !
PPPPS: IIT ( or rather any residential educational program) is an awesome breeding ground (lol) for genuine relationships (oops ...) but it doesn't last forever...People try...but the insti wised up...!!!!
PPPPPS: Oh..and yeah...It's been a long time since i posted blah blah..been busy..blah blah
PPPPPPS: :P !!
My literature (or rather 'approaches to literature' as he would prefer to be called..and i understand fully and sympathise with him on that point) prof. once mentioned in class that someone or the other had said that all our life's a drama...it's a role we're playing..fully mindful of the audience and their reactions.....( and no..it's not'All world's a stage' that's by shakespeare and i know that.... XP)And i was like...was he the one they executed....( i mean..obviously i didn't say that but..i definitely thought that..( actually i didn't even think that..but hey..it's a really cool thing to say..!))And that statement really hit me....Not because it was something new..because such ideas..(of intense anger at the world and self righteousness and blah blah blah..) frequently occupy my mind...(self righteousness...blah blah blah indeed !!!) and not because it was a very smart way of putting it....but because sometimes....you have a large bloody pile of dynamite and all it takes is some small stupid spark...And it's happened with me several times... ideas and feelings that have been in you for a long time come bursting out as reactions to very strange and extremely arbitrary incidents....And then there's no wondering....'how the hell ?' but only the boom...Thoughts, feelings and ideas come rushing at you and you feel irrationally sad or happy or scared or ..as in this case...(and i think i said this before :P) angry, disgusted and ashamed......
(MS: If people accuse me of being verbose.....i plead guilty.. and it's fun...I mean i could write everything that i want to say about an idea in one sentence which would run to about 3-4 lines...but without the analogies and the rants and the infinite brackets and the :P's.... it's no fun....don't you agree ??!)
Well now that i've finished digressing ...(at least for now) i'll get back to what i was really emotional and all 'angry,disgusted and ashamed' about (was being the operative word... obviously !!)It's this world...and the way it's turned out....Your always playing a character...judging the reactions of others, changing your story...adding a bit to it, trimming some,lopping some off.....Sweet talking, fake laughing, up sucking (!!) and generally behaving in a way that would dry up an amazed(awestruck rather..) crocodile's tears.... And that's just the dark side....Every moment we say something we're thinking about how people would judge us based on what we just said....they're thinking the same..only they're also thinking about how their judgements would represent their biases and prejudices ..and how they would wish to appear before the world( some biases are cool you see...) We think about what we appear to be rather than what we are and what we should be( and yes..i do believe that there is some idea..foggy(very very...) though it may be...of an ideal we should strive to attain..)And this stunts all personal development..We live our entire lives as mere puppets in the hands of society..which in essence is the majority ( which is stupid and easily led (hint hint !!))and also largely dependent on luck..( The right or wrong set of circumstances can make or break the popularity of an idea or a movement)) and we work towards goals that society sets for us, do things that society decides are right for us and generally become robots...only (and this is doubly worse) we think that we have free will....Our mind works on an algorithm that judges the reactions to our behaviour and modifies them to conform...(nowadays it is believed (and this may be true..that rebellion is the new conformity..but that's just as bad...)
All in all we end up living not as ourselves but what the world wants us to be.....Most of our relationships are not genuine...they're means to an end...the ultimate end...recognition and approval, not by any person in particular , but by the world in general....And genuine relationships are important ..rather essential for a person's true development....And by true genuine relationships i do not mean those relationships where there is no criticism whatsoever of the other but rather where one's only reason for saying a thing is that he/she actually believes it.....And how do you decide who you can be genuine with..Well that's easy (or not..) If you are sure that the other person values genuinity (or genuineness or whatever !) then you can be genuine with him...But again, you will realise that this definition is recursive...You can be genuine if the other person wants to be genuine which in turn will happen if he knows that you want to be genuine and so on....ad infinitum...But generally things are much easier..Some rebellious (or rather non conforming..whatever that may be !) ideas ...when voiced aloud in a seemingly temporary loss of reason will be from a person who still craves genuinity in his life and there you have it... you're off....
A relationship where both participants speak their mind freely knowing that it's one person judging them...not a horde..knowing that whatever prejudices and biases that person my have...they can be argued against, for they are one man's prejudices and not a society's 'etched in stone' 'principles'....(first time..doesn't look to pretty ..but it was necessary.. !)And according to me..Marriage serves this purpose excellently , almost as if it were designed for this...Since in normal society you can't be genuine all the time and even if you're with a person with whom you do share a genuine rapport with but in the company of others you may have to say things that you would not ordinarily..but if you are alone at any time with that person you can explain things to him/her....and this particular requirement is satisfied by marriage, by design ....Therefore your best chance at a tailormade 'as perfect as it can get' genuine relationship is marriage..So choose wisely....
PS: I wanted to write another midscript but it would have been a PMS (!!! :P)
PPS: Of course, in any relationship intellectual compatiblity to some extent is essential but I'm talking about other, hidden requirements...
PPPS: Every time i wrote the word 'relationship' i felt that it would be misconstrued ....so don't !
PPPPS: IIT ( or rather any residential educational program) is an awesome breeding ground (lol) for genuine relationships (oops ...) but it doesn't last forever...People try...but the insti wised up...!!!!
PPPPPS: Oh..and yeah...It's been a long time since i posted blah blah..been busy..blah blah
PPPPPPS: :P !!
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Musing on the muse.....
Yesterday ....when i sat down to write..without a thought in mind..a friend told me...." Oi ! Are you crazy..You'll just sit down...to write.without anything in mind...just like that..that's just too egomaniacal..!"
"Hell yeah..!"
But seriously...sometimes...you have to manufacture inspiration...pull it out of the air....just imagine it into being...Inspiration is something that man relies heavily upon(and yeah...i know your not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition..but it sounds nice)....Omens, portents, sparks, lit-up electric bulbs in the air, just above your head and about an inch or so to the left of the center-line (!!)Well...I think a lot of people lose out...just because of their insistence upon...omens..and signs...I mean...do you really think that God sits around thinking of complex schemes and contraptions to inspire people..."Hell no !"....All this serendipity stuff....i don't believe...We believe..what we want to believe...creating tedious links between something that happened and something that we want that something to mean....Many people, when faced with the proverbial fork in the road...need a sign to take the one less taken..but easily accept the other one ..in the absence of any inspiration...Now obviously the fact that the other road appears to you implies that you have some inclination to taking it...and the common road..well it's huge..man..a regular thoroughfare..with petrol pumps and a mall and what not..(:P)What i really wonder is ..What did the first guy do ? and how many did it take to make that road the norm?
In my view...each era brought us a different norm..For example...Different ideologies flourished at different times and different parts of the world..at each time...the intellectual crossroads had different thoroughfares....and of course...the path..or paths less chosen..are dependent on the individual...But what i speak of is not ideas but rather..ways of life....Currently..and i would think ever since the downfall of the great empires of yore...the common path has been that of comfort..We strive for creature comforts..(Now i know...that sentence doesn't make much sense..it sounds incomplete somehow..but it's perfect really..I can't think of a better word...)Specifically for me...the path that is the norm is an MBA/entrepreneurial enterprise (Funny how entrepreneurship is the norm for a person in my situation...A lot of people go off the beaten track..and suddenly there are billions of civil contractors (:-P))And i guess, as soon as people meet with success on the path they have chosen...(with measure of success upon total number of people having taken that path as a formal parameter for comparison) that path starts getting press coverage..(:-P) and clearly..here..today..success would be measured in terms of money and fame....because on the whole...this era's norm is wealth and creature comforts...
When we wait for a sign...we are just testing our ability to find tenuous links to our path and expressions of confidence from God in everyday occurrences (!)And people who lack this imaginative ability lose out..and complete the rest of their existence on the highway....thinking 'If only..' ( yeah i know it's cliched..'It's not life..it's merely existence blah blah..' but yeah cliches rock... \m/)And it's kinda like...flipping a coin to decide something..but then suggesting (to yourself) a best of 3 after the result and the best of 'n+2'subsequently till you get the result you desire(:P)....Sadly enough...you realise what you want only after you've flipped the coin...and in life..it's pretty hard to cut through the brush to get to the other road....
Don't wait yaar....
One controversial discussion that automatically follows as a result of the previous one..is the concept of duty....especially to one's parents and well wishers....Were it not for our parents we wouldn't be here..(Maybe they were out of cash !!!!!!! :P)If they had been alcoholics and druggies..we might not even be thinking about stuff like this..(or as my mom likes to say..."You ungrateful wretches wouldn't have the freedom and confidence to think this way !")After all it is true that some basic needs must be satisfied before our minds turn to higher spheres...Only the man with a bellyfull of food and siting on a comfy chaise longue can think about ethics and discuss abstract ideas...Most 'would be philosophers' overlook this fact.So..our parents gave birth to us (our mothers looked like whales for 9 months and endured labour for god knows how many hours and our fathers tried so hard to pretend to feel the pain...they looked constipated...and sometimes even were so... !!),they raised us, educated us, put clothes on our backs and food in our tummies...they deserve our ear....Then again..it's your life..you get only one...you should do what you want..After all..having a child is a choice made consciously by a couple...(uhh...i'm assuming...)And once they bring a child into this world..it is their duty to take care of it...A free willed creature creating something with free will always brings ambiguity into the picture...Once..i was discussing this with a friend and he took the side of duty...remarking how a lot of people of our generation were wasting their lives....Of course, I had to take the other side of the issue..but only for the sake of argument..As i said later..I'm not convinced about either side of the argument...Issues other than logical ones arise in a topic as delicate as this...The audience i'm really targeting comprise the people who di have a clear opinion about this...Think about it...It's pretty gray...
In conclusion, don't wait for a sign...God 's a sadist...!!
Oh..and yeah..look before you leap....Oops..cowdung :-P
PS: I hate the way blogger doesn't convert my 'i's' into 'I's'
PPS: Totally disconnected from the topic at hand..are my comments about the non existent audience of this blog and their intellect still funny..please do get back to me about this..
PPPS: On the other hand...is anyone out there....(echo...)
PPPPS: Maybe someone someday will stumble upon this blog...and deliver me from this island co ordinates 78.6 N and 33.4 E
PPPPPS: I don't know what those co ordinates are..so don't go searching for a globe for heaven's sake...
PPPPPPS: "This is fun !" said red hen !!!
"Hell yeah..!"
But seriously...sometimes...you have to manufacture inspiration...pull it out of the air....just imagine it into being...Inspiration is something that man relies heavily upon(and yeah...i know your not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition..but it sounds nice)....Omens, portents, sparks, lit-up electric bulbs in the air, just above your head and about an inch or so to the left of the center-line (!!)Well...I think a lot of people lose out...just because of their insistence upon...omens..and signs...I mean...do you really think that God sits around thinking of complex schemes and contraptions to inspire people..."Hell no !"....All this serendipity stuff....i don't believe...We believe..what we want to believe...creating tedious links between something that happened and something that we want that something to mean....Many people, when faced with the proverbial fork in the road...need a sign to take the one less taken..but easily accept the other one ..in the absence of any inspiration...Now obviously the fact that the other road appears to you implies that you have some inclination to taking it...and the common road..well it's huge..man..a regular thoroughfare..with petrol pumps and a mall and what not..(:P)What i really wonder is ..What did the first guy do ? and how many did it take to make that road the norm?
In my view...each era brought us a different norm..For example...Different ideologies flourished at different times and different parts of the world..at each time...the intellectual crossroads had different thoroughfares....and of course...the path..or paths less chosen..are dependent on the individual...But what i speak of is not ideas but rather..ways of life....Currently..and i would think ever since the downfall of the great empires of yore...the common path has been that of comfort..We strive for creature comforts..(Now i know...that sentence doesn't make much sense..it sounds incomplete somehow..but it's perfect really..I can't think of a better word...)Specifically for me...the path that is the norm is an MBA/entrepreneurial enterprise (Funny how entrepreneurship is the norm for a person in my situation...A lot of people go off the beaten track..and suddenly there are billions of civil contractors (:-P))And i guess, as soon as people meet with success on the path they have chosen...(with measure of success upon total number of people having taken that path as a formal parameter for comparison) that path starts getting press coverage..(:-P) and clearly..here..today..success would be measured in terms of money and fame....because on the whole...this era's norm is wealth and creature comforts...
When we wait for a sign...we are just testing our ability to find tenuous links to our path and expressions of confidence from God in everyday occurrences (!)And people who lack this imaginative ability lose out..and complete the rest of their existence on the highway....thinking 'If only..' ( yeah i know it's cliched..'It's not life..it's merely existence blah blah..' but yeah cliches rock... \m/)And it's kinda like...flipping a coin to decide something..but then suggesting (to yourself) a best of 3 after the result and the best of 'n+2'subsequently till you get the result you desire(:P)....Sadly enough...you realise what you want only after you've flipped the coin...and in life..it's pretty hard to cut through the brush to get to the other road....
Don't wait yaar....
One controversial discussion that automatically follows as a result of the previous one..is the concept of duty....especially to one's parents and well wishers....Were it not for our parents we wouldn't be here..(Maybe they were out of cash !!!!!!! :P)If they had been alcoholics and druggies..we might not even be thinking about stuff like this..(or as my mom likes to say..."You ungrateful wretches wouldn't have the freedom and confidence to think this way !")After all it is true that some basic needs must be satisfied before our minds turn to higher spheres...Only the man with a bellyfull of food and siting on a comfy chaise longue can think about ethics and discuss abstract ideas...Most 'would be philosophers' overlook this fact.So..our parents gave birth to us (our mothers looked like whales for 9 months and endured labour for god knows how many hours and our fathers tried so hard to pretend to feel the pain...they looked constipated...and sometimes even were so... !!),they raised us, educated us, put clothes on our backs and food in our tummies...they deserve our ear....Then again..it's your life..you get only one...you should do what you want..After all..having a child is a choice made consciously by a couple...(uhh...i'm assuming...)And once they bring a child into this world..it is their duty to take care of it...A free willed creature creating something with free will always brings ambiguity into the picture...Once..i was discussing this with a friend and he took the side of duty...remarking how a lot of people of our generation were wasting their lives....Of course, I had to take the other side of the issue..but only for the sake of argument..As i said later..I'm not convinced about either side of the argument...Issues other than logical ones arise in a topic as delicate as this...The audience i'm really targeting comprise the people who di have a clear opinion about this...Think about it...It's pretty gray...
In conclusion, don't wait for a sign...God 's a sadist...!!
Oh..and yeah..look before you leap....Oops..cowdung :-P
PS: I hate the way blogger doesn't convert my 'i's' into 'I's'
PPS: Totally disconnected from the topic at hand..are my comments about the non existent audience of this blog and their intellect still funny..please do get back to me about this..
PPPS: On the other hand...is anyone out there....(echo...)
PPPPS: Maybe someone someday will stumble upon this blog...and deliver me from this island co ordinates 78.6 N and 33.4 E
PPPPPS: I don't know what those co ordinates are..so don't go searching for a globe for heaven's sake...
PPPPPPS: "This is fun !" said red hen !!!
Friday, January 15, 2010
Beauty..
"There are several things..ideas...words...concepts that we use daily...but we have not yet clearly defined...." said my literature prof. I as always...am short of topics to write on....and this time..i knew i'd hit the mother lode...For when something that's a common concept isn't understood or,as in this case, defined properly..we ....we..uhh...'people who like to go on and on about their views on arbitrary topics that other people should really not give a damn about, but i'm funny and people seem to like what i say so hey!... what the hell !' get the opportunity to wax eloquent...So i was like..cool..I get free topics...Not only that....but i also get the definition of a perfect topic...
On those lines...Beauty...what is beauty ?...Actually..even as i start writing this ....i can see a pitfall...well..a whole freakin' grand canyon as a matter of fact... I know..that i'll 'define' beauty and then go on to describe it...and sooner or later..i'm going to fall headfirst into a topic that i feel very strongly about...but am pretty sure that i have exhausted...whatever material(none..) i had on the topic...'Love' is, of course what i'm talking about...
But anyway..i must chance that..so i think that rather than deleting this or leaving it as a draft(cause i have always deleted my old drafts...) i will continue..and talk about beauty for a while...and let's see where that takes me..And as an extremely verbose friend of mine said ('verbose bad', not 'verbose good'....and some of my readers know who i mean...) i will pursue that flighty temptress ....adventure(which .... in turn he copied verbatim from another very famous book(Parry Otter :-P).....and yeah..reproduction in a pompous voice is another of my friend's talents....:-P)
Well enough of this...uh..well foreplay..as Inspector Clouseau would say..and let me proceed....Beauty... i think would be defined by the presence of a certain quality in an object or individual that makes it pleasing to someone's senses or mind....Again...we indians were right...sometimes..one can sense with the head as well...And as can be clearly seen through my definition( which i feel is quite complete.. and thus that excludes beauty from the said mother lode !) that the 'senser'(lol) plays an important role in this beauty..He has to be pleased, for the object/person to be beautiful....
So let us conduct an experiment ...a thought experiment ..through which we shall prove an important law regarding beauty..First of all let us assume...that the interaction between the senses and the object/person is happening for the first time...not unlike ..pulling aside some curtains..and yelling "Behold!" at the same time...By that logic..the senser..should be more precisely defined as the beholder...and then applying a very simple synecdoche ...of replacing all of the senses with just one (to make the proof statement more..elegant..beautiful dare i say ??)...say...'eyes'...( you see where i'm getting, right ?!) you arrive at one of the most fundamental theorems of beauty...
'Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder'
Now that we have this clear...let's solve some elementary problems.................
Whenever i read of beauty, or hear of it...it is the physical kind...In fact some Post modernist schools of thought..go so far as to replace the old fundamentals by new principles...chief among which is 'Beauty is skin deep' I can see where that comes from.. If one is to define beauty as that which pleases by it's presence alone...and that too..if the "Behold ! Voila!!" part is retained..then the statement that beauty is only skin deep may appear to be true...however..general biases and prejudices... and just a previous knowledge of the object of one's scrutiny..come into play as well...Of course..that is a totally different thing to analyse...However..let us assume the case of an average, unbiased individual..For him, using the second definition beauty would certainly be skin deep....But then again..would it be beauty ?? Wouldn't the very spirit of the term 'beauty' as it is used today (and that is the way it must be studied)be in violation of the fact that it is skin deep ... superficial...I think..that beauty is meant to be something ....that is permanent....unfixed ...changing..Your perception might change..but beauty never will....Hence i move that the previous argument be struck from the record...( But the prosecutor looked at each of the judges to make sure that the comment was not struck from their minds !!(ahh...the idealistic stories of perry mason !))
So beauty..comes from within as well...and one of the traits, that i felt has been vilified today by being called 'gay' by the great dumb cynical snobholes of our generation...(as most things are..!!) is niceness...kindness....Today while entering into a relationship....one thinks of all kinds of virtues and vices..(intelligence, sense of humor, beliefs etc ...but no one thinks about whether that person is nice or not....how he/she treats others..how willing they are to help someone without any ulterior motive...Well..according to me...niceness tops the list of desirable qualities...Often in school...i was reprimanded for using the adjective 'nice' to describe an individual....as it was considered to be very weak, and just barely complimentary( 0.0000000001)But to me..i think it is the nicest(:P starting now..) thing you can hear...Not to hear mothers say it....cause..well...agreed,,sometimes it is used as the compliment ..when there is no other compliment (:P)....and mothers are generally really nice!(the other nice..the good one !!)....But...really...we try to be smart, chic, cool and stuff....for once ..we should try to be nice... and if that's gay...then well...
Your place or mine ??!!
PS: I think my high school teachers will be pleased at the infinite Proverbs/Quotes/Sayings i used !
PPS: To all my nice friends....carry on the good work....
PPPS: I wanted to write more..but ...i started watching family guy ! Seth mc'farlane is GOD.... and so is Kevin smith !!
On those lines...Beauty...what is beauty ?...Actually..even as i start writing this ....i can see a pitfall...well..a whole freakin' grand canyon as a matter of fact... I know..that i'll 'define' beauty and then go on to describe it...and sooner or later..i'm going to fall headfirst into a topic that i feel very strongly about...but am pretty sure that i have exhausted...whatever material(none..) i had on the topic...'Love' is, of course what i'm talking about...
But anyway..i must chance that..so i think that rather than deleting this or leaving it as a draft(cause i have always deleted my old drafts...) i will continue..and talk about beauty for a while...and let's see where that takes me..And as an extremely verbose friend of mine said ('verbose bad', not 'verbose good'....and some of my readers know who i mean...) i will pursue that flighty temptress ....adventure(which .... in turn he copied verbatim from another very famous book(Parry Otter :-P).....and yeah..reproduction in a pompous voice is another of my friend's talents....:-P)
Well enough of this...uh..well foreplay..as Inspector Clouseau would say..and let me proceed....Beauty... i think would be defined by the presence of a certain quality in an object or individual that makes it pleasing to someone's senses or mind....Again...we indians were right...sometimes..one can sense with the head as well...And as can be clearly seen through my definition( which i feel is quite complete.. and thus that excludes beauty from the said mother lode !) that the 'senser'(lol) plays an important role in this beauty..He has to be pleased, for the object/person to be beautiful....
So let us conduct an experiment ...a thought experiment ..through which we shall prove an important law regarding beauty..First of all let us assume...that the interaction between the senses and the object/person is happening for the first time...not unlike ..pulling aside some curtains..and yelling "Behold!" at the same time...By that logic..the senser..should be more precisely defined as the beholder...and then applying a very simple synecdoche ...of replacing all of the senses with just one (to make the proof statement more..elegant..beautiful dare i say ??)...say...'eyes'...( you see where i'm getting, right ?!) you arrive at one of the most fundamental theorems of beauty...
'Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder'
Now that we have this clear...let's solve some elementary problems.................
Whenever i read of beauty, or hear of it...it is the physical kind...In fact some Post modernist schools of thought..go so far as to replace the old fundamentals by new principles...chief among which is 'Beauty is skin deep' I can see where that comes from.. If one is to define beauty as that which pleases by it's presence alone...and that too..if the "Behold ! Voila!!" part is retained..then the statement that beauty is only skin deep may appear to be true...however..general biases and prejudices... and just a previous knowledge of the object of one's scrutiny..come into play as well...Of course..that is a totally different thing to analyse...However..let us assume the case of an average, unbiased individual..For him, using the second definition beauty would certainly be skin deep....But then again..would it be beauty ?? Wouldn't the very spirit of the term 'beauty' as it is used today (and that is the way it must be studied)be in violation of the fact that it is skin deep ... superficial...I think..that beauty is meant to be something ....that is permanent....unfixed ...changing..Your perception might change..but beauty never will....Hence i move that the previous argument be struck from the record...( But the prosecutor looked at each of the judges to make sure that the comment was not struck from their minds !!(ahh...the idealistic stories of perry mason !))
So beauty..comes from within as well...and one of the traits, that i felt has been vilified today by being called 'gay' by the great dumb cynical snobholes of our generation...(as most things are..!!) is niceness...kindness....Today while entering into a relationship....one thinks of all kinds of virtues and vices..(intelligence, sense of humor, beliefs etc ...but no one thinks about whether that person is nice or not....how he/she treats others..how willing they are to help someone without any ulterior motive...Well..according to me...niceness tops the list of desirable qualities...Often in school...i was reprimanded for using the adjective 'nice' to describe an individual....as it was considered to be very weak, and just barely complimentary( 0.0000000001)But to me..i think it is the nicest(:P starting now..) thing you can hear...Not to hear mothers say it....cause..well...agreed,,sometimes it is used as the compliment ..when there is no other compliment (:P)....and mothers are generally really nice!(the other nice..the good one !!)....But...really...we try to be smart, chic, cool and stuff....for once ..we should try to be nice... and if that's gay...then well...
Your place or mine ??!!
PS: I think my high school teachers will be pleased at the infinite Proverbs/Quotes/Sayings i used !
PPS: To all my nice friends....carry on the good work....
PPPS: I wanted to write more..but ...i started watching family guy ! Seth mc'farlane is GOD.... and so is Kevin smith !!
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Kalki ....or...not...
It was a fine winter morning in bombay...The way a winter evening can be fine..only in bombay..Here for us...Winter was more like...Well ....not summer (and believe me...that was a relief...as all my readers who have been in bombay...and another place, during the winter, will know...) So this was a fine winter morning, as i told you.Once again..by fine, i mean the weather.....it was nice and hospitable...but my schedule....well...it was a disaster...3 lectures followed by that bane of all mechanical engineering students....workshop practice..or as it was called, in our sophomore(i love long words, don't you ?!!) year..Manufacturing Processes lab...It was the most mind numbing work that we had ever done and believe me...we were students who had cracked the IIT JEE after 2 (and in some cases 3) years of solving math and physics problems of the same type ad nauseum ( oh..and don't get me started on chemistry !) Those among us who loved to twiddle nobs and watch stuff burn, or wished to release pendulums and calibrate strain gauges.. the work seemed below their dignity...which showed from their rigid postures and disgusted expressions as they haughtily gazed at the cutting tip which spewed out metal ribbons, merrily whining all the time(!!)Those among us who had once looked forward to this course enthusiastically...hoping to see hammers and anvils awaiting us...and molten metal flowing all around(Me!Me!Me!)...rather like that Unreal tournament map...(Don't remember the name...and have absolutely no enthu to google it..) were bored by..this..job that was ...well ..it was downright pansy....
Did i say anything about my department...Oh well...now's as good a time as any other..The mechanical engineering department is the largest in iit bombay..with i think, 103 students...Well ..our professors have devised an excellent technique of instruction....something that they undoubtedly borrowed from Mother nature...Of course somewhat tuning it down...for fear of having the SPCA( Society for prevention cruelty to adolescents(though some think that the A stands for animals !) at their doors...Now..Great Mother Nature usually doesn't give any lessons at all..just takes the exam...Well here in Mech. Engg., we do have instruction (thanks to the SPCA !), but....once the exams (and then the results ) arrive..students realise..that the professors have 'done a nature' on them...for only in the end did one actually realize..what was expected...and how miserably short one had fallen of high standards....Well anyway...Now we had better reflexes, our muscles always taut, some of us having purchased (or invented ) devices that could recognize ( and awake from slumber, a student) if it recognised the word coming from the professor's mouth as 'quiz' or 'assignment'...
Anyway...i am rambling...Digressing from the main topic..the events of that afternoon's workshop class...We all assembled in the Lathe and Shaping section....all of us having postponed our baths ( some for fear of getting dirty and others...with the misplaced hope of the same !!)I was assigned to work on a lathe...to reduce the diameter of a steel (mild steel that too!....boohoo...) from 60 mm to 35 mm...which sounds very 'AWESOME !' but really involved no more manual labour than turning a small handle through several revolutions....So i started doing that...doing each task mechanically...with an extremely bored look on my face....Suddenly (oh yeah...it's always so sudden ! and in several stories...inexplicable as well !!) the whole machine broke and came crashing down on my foot ...I only had time to think...'Oh ..so that's why we're supposed to wear shoes in the workshop..Now maybe the bone will just break and not get powdered..!!' when the whole damn thing hit my foot..broke into two pieces and fell on the floor......I just stared....Then there was a flash of light....and the next thing i know..i was lying down in a room so unbelievably white...that ..well...i don't know..it was very white... okay ..(Sheesh..It's hard to come up with good similes ..)A man next to me said.."Ah.. He's awake.."in an unmistakably south indian
accent...
" Where am I?" I asked
" This is a secret government facility..."
I tuned out...The 6 words i had always dreamed of hearing...finally..albeit..i was usually in Israel and the person telling me was a ravishing dusky goddess named something like Ayala rather than a portly tamil guy in a lungi...but what the hell...
" Pardon me..i didn't hear a word that you were saying...i was..uhh....gloating....."
" Well" he said in a very patient voice " As i said.. you are in a secret government facility...You are also infinitely strong and indestructible..well...nearly.."
" Were there experiments ? Did you f***ing check my tensile strength and other shit like that ??( At the same time looking at my hands..Nope...no marks of hooks or stretch marks or the like...)..Well answer me.."
"Err..Let's not get into that shall we..."
" Why did this happen to me..Why now...and How many others are there like me.."
" As to your last question..you are one of 12 identified in the world and the only one in india..As to the former questions ...we have no idea..."
"Ohhh....Gimme a minute please..."
*** Gloat................***
"So... the other 11...they have the same powers as me ?? Indestructibility ? When do i meet them?...DO i have to train?....Are any of them..uhh...aligned against well...us...? Uhhh..who is 'us' ?"
" Well...The thing is ...Nations across the world... have infinitely many scouts in their own countries to spot..your kind...Most of them till now ...have been very amiable..."
"Not predisposed to World domination and the such you mean..."
"Uhh..Yes..."
" Ok..So tell me..What do i do ?? Join some..uh.. league of..uh.. extraordinary gentlemen?(Hey are there any..superchicks ?) Go to some other country as the cultural attache, but really spy on their government ? Help to build a ginormous (gigantic+enormous) shelter in case of tsunamis or nuclear attack ? "( Much in the fashion of "Lemme at 'em! Lemme at e'm ! Lemme splat 'em !!")
" Actually..you'll be working in a foundry at Rourkela...."
...UNCOMFORTABLE SILENCE...
...VERY UNCOMFORTABLE SILENCE...
" Are-You-Kidding-Me ?!"I yelled...
" No...When the first..super human was discovered...all the nations in the world agreed that the use ( I glared..)..i mean...potential of these individuals in the direction of warfare will not be ...uhh...exploited...Therefore...we have decided to give you work in a steel mill....You will be the only worker there..Your super strength and invulnerability will help you run the whole thing smoothly..Also your pay will be...."He quoted a sum..and even my eyes grew wide....
" We have prepared a cover story for you...You will be accompanied by your control...A Mr. Khanna ...He will be your guardian..till you reach the age of 21......"
" Wait a minute....So i'm supposed to work in a steel mill..using my super strength and invulnerability to scoop big ladles of hot steel and pour them into moulds and stuff like that....and just stay in a town like Rourkela all my life.."
" Well..You'll have a private jet....and an airstrip...and who knows..the political situation may change...."( Democrat in Republican clothing....!)
"And what about my friends and my family"
"Memories wiped clean....They've forgotten that you ever existed"
(Sniff Sniff !!!Oh...screw it ...who am i kidding !!)
" SO...."
I'd have to do some intense physical labour..(though how intense it would feel with my super strength i don't know....)and i would rake in the moolah...
Sigh.....
I was Happy....
****GLOAT.........****
PS: A sequel looks good...
PPS:Thanks to my inspirations..Prof. B Ravi (!),Man pro lab,Steel sterling and some high school geography !
PPPS: A lot of stuff about workshop and the mechanical department was exaggerated....though, of course...some was not.....good luck trying to guess which....
PPPPS: Seriously...please comment on this guys...cause i'm really not sure how it turned out....
PPPPPS: Sigh.......
Did i say anything about my department...Oh well...now's as good a time as any other..The mechanical engineering department is the largest in iit bombay..with i think, 103 students...Well ..our professors have devised an excellent technique of instruction....something that they undoubtedly borrowed from Mother nature...Of course somewhat tuning it down...for fear of having the SPCA( Society for prevention cruelty to adolescents(though some think that the A stands for animals !) at their doors...Now..Great Mother Nature usually doesn't give any lessons at all..just takes the exam...Well here in Mech. Engg., we do have instruction (thanks to the SPCA !), but....once the exams (and then the results ) arrive..students realise..that the professors have 'done a nature' on them...for only in the end did one actually realize..what was expected...and how miserably short one had fallen of high standards....Well anyway...Now we had better reflexes, our muscles always taut, some of us having purchased (or invented ) devices that could recognize ( and awake from slumber, a student) if it recognised the word coming from the professor's mouth as 'quiz' or 'assignment'...
Anyway...i am rambling...Digressing from the main topic..the events of that afternoon's workshop class...We all assembled in the Lathe and Shaping section....all of us having postponed our baths ( some for fear of getting dirty and others...with the misplaced hope of the same !!)I was assigned to work on a lathe...to reduce the diameter of a steel (mild steel that too!....boohoo...) from 60 mm to 35 mm...which sounds very 'AWESOME !' but really involved no more manual labour than turning a small handle through several revolutions....So i started doing that...doing each task mechanically...with an extremely bored look on my face....Suddenly (oh yeah...it's always so sudden ! and in several stories...inexplicable as well !!) the whole machine broke and came crashing down on my foot ...I only had time to think...'Oh ..so that's why we're supposed to wear shoes in the workshop..Now maybe the bone will just break and not get powdered..!!' when the whole damn thing hit my foot..broke into two pieces and fell on the floor......I just stared....Then there was a flash of light....and the next thing i know..i was lying down in a room so unbelievably white...that ..well...i don't know..it was very white... okay ..(Sheesh..It's hard to come up with good similes ..)A man next to me said.."Ah.. He's awake.."in an unmistakably south indian
accent...
" Where am I?" I asked
" This is a secret government facility..."
I tuned out...The 6 words i had always dreamed of hearing...finally..albeit..i was usually in Israel and the person telling me was a ravishing dusky goddess named something like Ayala rather than a portly tamil guy in a lungi...but what the hell...
" Pardon me..i didn't hear a word that you were saying...i was..uhh....gloating....."
" Well" he said in a very patient voice " As i said.. you are in a secret government facility...You are also infinitely strong and indestructible..well...nearly.."
" Were there experiments ? Did you f***ing check my tensile strength and other shit like that ??( At the same time looking at my hands..Nope...no marks of hooks or stretch marks or the like...)..Well answer me.."
"Err..Let's not get into that shall we..."
" Why did this happen to me..Why now...and How many others are there like me.."
" As to your last question..you are one of 12 identified in the world and the only one in india..As to the former questions ...we have no idea..."
"Ohhh....Gimme a minute please..."
*** Gloat................***
"So... the other 11...they have the same powers as me ?? Indestructibility ? When do i meet them?...DO i have to train?....Are any of them..uhh...aligned against well...us...? Uhhh..who is 'us' ?"
" Well...The thing is ...Nations across the world... have infinitely many scouts in their own countries to spot..your kind...Most of them till now ...have been very amiable..."
"Not predisposed to World domination and the such you mean..."
"Uhh..Yes..."
" Ok..So tell me..What do i do ?? Join some..uh.. league of..uh.. extraordinary gentlemen?(Hey are there any..superchicks ?) Go to some other country as the cultural attache, but really spy on their government ? Help to build a ginormous (gigantic+enormous) shelter in case of tsunamis or nuclear attack ? "( Much in the fashion of "Lemme at 'em! Lemme at e'm ! Lemme splat 'em !!")
" Actually..you'll be working in a foundry at Rourkela...."
...UNCOMFORTABLE SILENCE...
...VERY UNCOMFORTABLE SILENCE...
" Are-You-Kidding-Me ?!"I yelled...
" No...When the first..super human was discovered...all the nations in the world agreed that the use ( I glared..)..i mean...potential of these individuals in the direction of warfare will not be ...uhh...exploited...Therefore...we have decided to give you work in a steel mill....You will be the only worker there..Your super strength and invulnerability will help you run the whole thing smoothly..Also your pay will be...."He quoted a sum..and even my eyes grew wide....
" We have prepared a cover story for you...You will be accompanied by your control...A Mr. Khanna ...He will be your guardian..till you reach the age of 21......"
" Wait a minute....So i'm supposed to work in a steel mill..using my super strength and invulnerability to scoop big ladles of hot steel and pour them into moulds and stuff like that....and just stay in a town like Rourkela all my life.."
" Well..You'll have a private jet....and an airstrip...and who knows..the political situation may change...."( Democrat in Republican clothing....!)
"And what about my friends and my family"
"Memories wiped clean....They've forgotten that you ever existed"
(Sniff Sniff !!!Oh...screw it ...who am i kidding !!)
" SO...."
I'd have to do some intense physical labour..(though how intense it would feel with my super strength i don't know....)and i would rake in the moolah...
Sigh.....
I was Happy....
****GLOAT.........****
PS: A sequel looks good...
PPS:Thanks to my inspirations..Prof. B Ravi (!),Man pro lab,Steel sterling and some high school geography !
PPPS: A lot of stuff about workshop and the mechanical department was exaggerated....though, of course...some was not.....good luck trying to guess which....
PPPPS: Seriously...please comment on this guys...cause i'm really not sure how it turned out....
PPPPPS: Sigh.......
Saturday, January 9, 2010
WTF ?!
I read an article in the paper yesterday that was written by some 12th standard student about her JEE coaching class and the intense pressure that was put on the students to clear the JEE.Something about IIT standing for Indian institute of terrorism and not Indian institute of technology....Again, today i saw that the second page of the TOI was dedicated almost completely to teen suicides...And i was thinking "WTF !"
First of all...middle class indian parents are highly enamored with IIT, some to the extent of being so obsessed that they care not what their child wants to do in life...They drive the poor sod so hard, that even if he does get through the JEE, his fundas are all messed up and he can't make full use of the opportunities that a place like iit can give him...And then he spends his life ...always over working....and it was all started by something that their parent's decided they must do..CLASSIC TRANSFERENCE !! And some poor misguided soul blames IIT ...Is it really our fault..Indian institute of terrorism..I mean i understand that misdirected anger could have caused the writer of the article to call IIT ...uh...you know what..but the guys who published it weren't stupid..were they ?I mean..Yeah..none of us is going to write a reply to that(yeah...the writer's email id had been included)...sparking a stupid..but nevertheless hilarious sparring session..Of course it could have been a seriously angry iitian (who, if i had to stereotype..would be 'a gulti(someone from andhra) that thinks he is cool'...(don't get angry yet....i specifically wrote 'stereotype') And yeah..it would most probably be a guy....We're the ones with the humongous egos....And then..what followed would have proved the writer's point... !!
Secondly: suicides !!What the hell man...I mean...I know people will come to me and say stuff like..."You know not what i've gone through.." or " You know where i come from beatch !!You ain't been hurt like i have"( Trying to emulate in writing the typical African-American actors in hollywood films ! )But i can definitely say fo sho(:D) that at 18 i don't see how life can become worthless....It's always better to live than to die..In fact...when it's the worst...Then it can't get any worse, can it ?..and...yeah..life will look up...I mean...by killing yourself, your just eliminating the non zero chance of a happy life...cause once life is over, there's no way you can be happy....It's stupid mathematically speaking...I also understand, that it's not about how much better or how much worse it can get, but rather....how bad it is...I mean..Sometimes...there's this one single point of infinite pressure...which if it were spread over a lifetime , would worry you not...but..right then..all together..is too much...It's probably the biggest flaw that a human being can be born with.. this inability to withstand tension..A stupid or crippled or evil person did draw the short straw..but it will affect them only in parts of their life...Here,this particular defect can cause you, under the right amount(lol) of stress can finish that persons life..Gone, finished, kaput, byebye.....I mean..that's too big a price to pay for one birth defect....I mean...ideally i should blame the people who are dead..but what's the point in that...and the one's to come after them will probably get even more depressed and i can't dare to write another 'Life is beautiful' post or my readers( most of them :P) will kill me....So i blame GOD...I mean..He created them that way...but then...everything that you do can be attributed to Him...If you sing well...well he gave you the talent, If you've worked hard to get a particular job..well.. he gave you that persevering nature and that capacity for hard work...But we can't ( or rather won't want to) do that..We want to claim our successes for our own and yet give God all the credit for our shortcomings...Well...I mean..You see how that's dumb right ??
You also must've noticed my obvious hints...about stereotypes ...That's another thing that i find exceedingly stupid ( yes...i seem to have quite a list don't I ? And it bothers you...well...Bite me !!) A lot of them that i specifically hate(sometimes cause i belong to them and sometimes cause i 'ought' to(!!) and sometimes...uhh..well.. just on prnciple okay !!) are girls, guys, iit guys...Guys are supposed to be all 'not sensitive' and egotist and vulgar and loud and stuff(snips and snails and puppy dog tails (yippeeeee)..Girls are supposed to be all sentimental and delicate and straitlaced and sweet..I mean..I borrow heavily from both...Does that mean i'm gay(or whatever's the accepted term..i mean hermaphrodite is too long.. (:D)) ?!! ((:P)DON'T answer that..!!! Kind of like asking someone...'Do i look like i'm stupid ?')Gults are supposed to be really studious and stuff... ( For those that aren't..i get you guys...It's really frustrating..) Where does all this come from...Once again i get that it's a natural reaction, but at least try to correct yourself by admitting it ...But i guess guys do that more often...cause they have really huge egos....
PS: Hey ! Stop calling me that....
PPS:Actually..I am gay....(SINGLE ROOM ! SINGLE ROOM !)
PPPS: OR Maybe something worse...( Does the government condone homosexuality ??)
First of all...middle class indian parents are highly enamored with IIT, some to the extent of being so obsessed that they care not what their child wants to do in life...They drive the poor sod so hard, that even if he does get through the JEE, his fundas are all messed up and he can't make full use of the opportunities that a place like iit can give him...And then he spends his life ...always over working....and it was all started by something that their parent's decided they must do..CLASSIC TRANSFERENCE !! And some poor misguided soul blames IIT ...Is it really our fault..Indian institute of terrorism..I mean i understand that misdirected anger could have caused the writer of the article to call IIT ...uh...you know what..but the guys who published it weren't stupid..were they ?I mean..Yeah..none of us is going to write a reply to that(yeah...the writer's email id had been included)...sparking a stupid..but nevertheless hilarious sparring session..Of course it could have been a seriously angry iitian (who, if i had to stereotype..would be 'a gulti(someone from andhra) that thinks he is cool'...(don't get angry yet....i specifically wrote 'stereotype') And yeah..it would most probably be a guy....We're the ones with the humongous egos....And then..what followed would have proved the writer's point... !!
Secondly: suicides !!What the hell man...I mean...I know people will come to me and say stuff like..."You know not what i've gone through.." or " You know where i come from beatch !!You ain't been hurt like i have"( Trying to emulate in writing the typical African-American actors in hollywood films ! )But i can definitely say fo sho(:D) that at 18 i don't see how life can become worthless....It's always better to live than to die..In fact...when it's the worst...Then it can't get any worse, can it ?..and...yeah..life will look up...I mean...by killing yourself, your just eliminating the non zero chance of a happy life...cause once life is over, there's no way you can be happy....It's stupid mathematically speaking...I also understand, that it's not about how much better or how much worse it can get, but rather....how bad it is...I mean..Sometimes...there's this one single point of infinite pressure...which if it were spread over a lifetime , would worry you not...but..right then..all together..is too much...It's probably the biggest flaw that a human being can be born with.. this inability to withstand tension..A stupid or crippled or evil person did draw the short straw..but it will affect them only in parts of their life...Here,this particular defect can cause you, under the right amount(lol) of stress can finish that persons life..Gone, finished, kaput, byebye.....I mean..that's too big a price to pay for one birth defect....I mean...ideally i should blame the people who are dead..but what's the point in that...and the one's to come after them will probably get even more depressed and i can't dare to write another 'Life is beautiful' post or my readers( most of them :P) will kill me....So i blame GOD...I mean..He created them that way...but then...everything that you do can be attributed to Him...If you sing well...well he gave you the talent, If you've worked hard to get a particular job..well.. he gave you that persevering nature and that capacity for hard work...But we can't ( or rather won't want to) do that..We want to claim our successes for our own and yet give God all the credit for our shortcomings...Well...I mean..You see how that's dumb right ??
You also must've noticed my obvious hints...about stereotypes ...That's another thing that i find exceedingly stupid ( yes...i seem to have quite a list don't I ? And it bothers you...well...Bite me !!) A lot of them that i specifically hate(sometimes cause i belong to them and sometimes cause i 'ought' to(!!) and sometimes...uhh..well.. just on prnciple okay !!) are girls, guys, iit guys...Guys are supposed to be all 'not sensitive' and egotist and vulgar and loud and stuff(snips and snails and puppy dog tails (yippeeeee)..Girls are supposed to be all sentimental and delicate and straitlaced and sweet..I mean..I borrow heavily from both...Does that mean i'm gay(or whatever's the accepted term..i mean hermaphrodite is too long.. (:D)) ?!! ((:P)DON'T answer that..!!! Kind of like asking someone...'Do i look like i'm stupid ?')Gults are supposed to be really studious and stuff... ( For those that aren't..i get you guys...It's really frustrating..) Where does all this come from...Once again i get that it's a natural reaction, but at least try to correct yourself by admitting it ...But i guess guys do that more often...cause they have really huge egos....
PS: Hey ! Stop calling me that....
PPS:Actually..I am gay....(SINGLE ROOM ! SINGLE ROOM !)
PPPS: OR Maybe something worse...( Does the government condone homosexuality ??)
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Thursday, December 31, 2009
LOVE IV: Someone pleease quantify this !!
I really really really wanted to write something today..on the first...The beginning of a new year marking....a new era in my life...of productivity... grindstones and facial protuberances that have a twin set of apertures and from which disgusting fluids may be secreted (by some) at will.....Of love(i hope) and hope(if nothing else !)....Basically..You get the idea..New year's resolution blah blah yak yak....
MS:I'm serious about this stuff...but hey..it makes for lousy reading !!
Actually..I thought bout a lot of different topics to write about..I thought about new year's resolutions...and then about dance and how it is thrust upon people who may not necessarily like it, even though the general populace does....and then go on to how today's world is all about one's impression on others and how the basic reasons for a lot of uncomfortable customs are not examined but ascribe them all to 'propriety'...and how that sucks....But then i thought another sarcasm dripping tirade would totally ruin my happyboy image...so i reined myself in and ventured once more,as i have previously on 3 other occasions into the region of mystery, the cave of alladin...Love and other natural 'calamities' (My image !!)..Now what i started thinking about was Commitment..And for those that thought that my previous post in this vein was 'gay' and all...well this is kind of a critique or rather....a study of motives and reasons....So here goes nothing...
I talked about commitment as necessary, post marriage...That it is essential for a normal, healthy life....Now, i think that there are some people who would have agreed with me without question and others, who would have thought that some ultra conservatives had brainwashed me...I have heard staunch proponents of both arguments...I have a surprisingly ( i think) conservative view but ..again..it's just a totally irrational view..So i thought.. lemme actually look at the how , why and most importantly the gray areas...So ..uhh..Ok..sorry..lost track of what i was going to say for a minute..
Marriage as i deduced ( and i think rightly so) arose from love..People were in love and wanted to formalise it ...legalise it..Me personally; i think it's a great idea so..i guess I'll work with that...Now the main part...the point of contention...is...Does love last forever....? Does it happen only once ? and the like..
Once one gets into a marriage (i know it sounds very ..'not romantic'..but that's just your perception..I'm perfectly unbiased(yeaaaah right...))monogamy is prescribed as a prophylactic to STD's....But then again...the basic premise that the institution of marriage is based upon...is that the two married people love each other...and if that itself is not true...well marriage in it's original, pure form( as i have deduced/assumed)...loses it's meaning...and hence i feel must be dissolved...However...even more basic is the question 'Does love last forever ?' and it's supplementary 'Does love happen only once?' ..Now..Again..here...a lot of guesses will have to be made....for these questions can only be answered by statistics(something..that i like to use in my arguments but have not too much faith in !)..I think that.. love ..as is the loved..is very clearly a geographically influenced phenomenon...There are a lot of people one may like a lot or rather..could like a lot ....but they will be scattered over the world...of course..one's local cultural influences will cause a lot of these people to be nearby ...( of course a complete antipathy towards one's birth-culture( which is very possible) would have the opposite effect.... but frankly there would be others with the same feelings..) Now...if one were to zoom out and view one's life's timeline..we would ( or could) meet people who we connect with at different stages of our life....Which of these people is the most 'in tune' with us..is purely a matter of luck...So first of all ...marriage must be thought out carefully..because no matter how much you love someone...you should keep in mind the fact that you may very well meet someone..even more 'endowed with endearing qualities'(:P)later in one's life...
I have seen happily married couples who are very similar and others who are very dissimilar...Again ...which pairing suits whom better is hard to say..but i would guess that..there would be a golden ratio of similarities and dissimilarities to make the perfect couple (since I'm quantifying similarities here one can safely assume this is all completely hypothetical...:D)So what i would perceive as a similarity dominated couple or a dissimilarity dominated couple would probably be slight disturbances to either side of the golden mean...
Now...how can one judge how perfect one's current pairing is and how likely is the chance of her/him meeting someone even better suited to him..I don't know..But the most obvious solution...that i can see (and I'm sure you can)..that of never committing ...and just going around taking free samples...(hmm..raspberry crush..and uhh....sunshine bonanza...and...mochalicious ..maybe i'll try cashew nut de leche...!!(Drool drool!))...be warned that it would be clearly unscrupulous and immoral to lick the spoon (Wink wink !)Again..to some this may seem like a perfect solution...but i think that..marriage and child rearing would be an essential part of a good life..so ...yeah..i'd have the strawberry shortcake flavour... (a Baskin robbins flavour of the month(Boohoo)...that i..seriously...fell in love with..(Bastards !))
In the case of the marriage decision..i think most couples rely ...at least a bit on the magic part of it..if they haven't been in other relationships before..then the magic part is very clear and easy...you have no standard to compare it with....so it's awesome...no matter what...in the other case..i think there's some other factor forcing marriage sometimes and in others..( maybe) there is the perception of a greater magic...Now..imagine that one (or both) of the participants in a marriage realises after X years of marriage...that it isn't working out...Should one..just get up and leave....I don't think so..I think ...that by marrying him/her... you have signed a covenant....you have made certain commitments and that it should not be too easy for you to just forgot about that..One goood idea woudl be to write down one's lovey dovey promises and 'I'll throw a lasso around the moon' isms...so that ...that magic may be recreated..so that at least ...one will remember that ...yes there was something...Maybe there still is...
P.S.: Today's world spawns a lot of relationships that are mere reactions to a fad...'Everyone does it..so will I'.. These commitments even, according to me should be more serious and better thought out than they are..
P.P.S.:People are so blinded by 'love' that they don't realise that when they say their wedding vows...they're supposed to mean them and think about them...before saying yes..like every promise...
P.P.P.S.:Of course..if one considers the fact that ....even marriage is just a bunch of rules in a game ( a sub game of sorts to life !)...and that some people manipulate those rules for some distant advantage...then yeah...some of those moves may well be really smart....
P.P.P.P.S.:Once again ..I couldn't help jacking up the sarcasm ..
P.P.P.P.P.S.:The probablity bit is really stupid..i mean..what if i'm thinking so much and making so many hypothetical comparisons that i will find her (oops) only when i'm 50 (PROSTATE !!)
MS:I'm serious about this stuff...but hey..it makes for lousy reading !!
Actually..I thought bout a lot of different topics to write about..I thought about new year's resolutions...and then about dance and how it is thrust upon people who may not necessarily like it, even though the general populace does....and then go on to how today's world is all about one's impression on others and how the basic reasons for a lot of uncomfortable customs are not examined but ascribe them all to 'propriety'...and how that sucks....But then i thought another sarcasm dripping tirade would totally ruin my happyboy image...so i reined myself in and ventured once more,as i have previously on 3 other occasions into the region of mystery, the cave of alladin...Love and other natural 'calamities' (My image !!)..Now what i started thinking about was Commitment..And for those that thought that my previous post in this vein was 'gay' and all...well this is kind of a critique or rather....a study of motives and reasons....So here goes nothing...
I talked about commitment as necessary, post marriage...That it is essential for a normal, healthy life....Now, i think that there are some people who would have agreed with me without question and others, who would have thought that some ultra conservatives had brainwashed me...I have heard staunch proponents of both arguments...I have a surprisingly ( i think) conservative view but ..again..it's just a totally irrational view..So i thought.. lemme actually look at the how , why and most importantly the gray areas...So ..uhh..Ok..sorry..lost track of what i was going to say for a minute..
Marriage as i deduced ( and i think rightly so) arose from love..People were in love and wanted to formalise it ...legalise it..Me personally; i think it's a great idea so..i guess I'll work with that...Now the main part...the point of contention...is...Does love last forever....? Does it happen only once ? and the like..
Once one gets into a marriage (i know it sounds very ..'not romantic'..but that's just your perception..I'm perfectly unbiased(yeaaaah right...))monogamy is prescribed as a prophylactic to STD's....But then again...the basic premise that the institution of marriage is based upon...is that the two married people love each other...and if that itself is not true...well marriage in it's original, pure form( as i have deduced/assumed)...loses it's meaning...and hence i feel must be dissolved...However...even more basic is the question 'Does love last forever ?' and it's supplementary 'Does love happen only once?' ..Now..Again..here...a lot of guesses will have to be made....for these questions can only be answered by statistics(something..that i like to use in my arguments but have not too much faith in !)..I think that.. love ..as is the loved..is very clearly a geographically influenced phenomenon...There are a lot of people one may like a lot or rather..could like a lot ....but they will be scattered over the world...of course..one's local cultural influences will cause a lot of these people to be nearby ...( of course a complete antipathy towards one's birth-culture( which is very possible) would have the opposite effect.... but frankly there would be others with the same feelings..) Now...if one were to zoom out and view one's life's timeline..we would ( or could) meet people who we connect with at different stages of our life....Which of these people is the most 'in tune' with us..is purely a matter of luck...So first of all ...marriage must be thought out carefully..because no matter how much you love someone...you should keep in mind the fact that you may very well meet someone..even more 'endowed with endearing qualities'(:P)later in one's life...
I have seen happily married couples who are very similar and others who are very dissimilar...Again ...which pairing suits whom better is hard to say..but i would guess that..there would be a golden ratio of similarities and dissimilarities to make the perfect couple (since I'm quantifying similarities here one can safely assume this is all completely hypothetical...:D)So what i would perceive as a similarity dominated couple or a dissimilarity dominated couple would probably be slight disturbances to either side of the golden mean...
Now...how can one judge how perfect one's current pairing is and how likely is the chance of her/him meeting someone even better suited to him..I don't know..But the most obvious solution...that i can see (and I'm sure you can)..that of never committing ...and just going around taking free samples...(hmm..raspberry crush..and uhh....sunshine bonanza...and...mochalicious ..maybe i'll try cashew nut de leche...!!(Drool drool!))...be warned that it would be clearly unscrupulous and immoral to lick the spoon (Wink wink !)Again..to some this may seem like a perfect solution...but i think that..marriage and child rearing would be an essential part of a good life..so ...yeah..i'd have the strawberry shortcake flavour... (a Baskin robbins flavour of the month(Boohoo)...that i..seriously...fell in love with..(Bastards !))
In the case of the marriage decision..i think most couples rely ...at least a bit on the magic part of it..if they haven't been in other relationships before..then the magic part is very clear and easy...you have no standard to compare it with....so it's awesome...no matter what...in the other case..i think there's some other factor forcing marriage sometimes and in others..( maybe) there is the perception of a greater magic...Now..imagine that one (or both) of the participants in a marriage realises after X years of marriage...that it isn't working out...Should one..just get up and leave....I don't think so..I think ...that by marrying him/her... you have signed a covenant....you have made certain commitments and that it should not be too easy for you to just forgot about that..One goood idea woudl be to write down one's lovey dovey promises and 'I'll throw a lasso around the moon' isms...so that ...that magic may be recreated..so that at least ...one will remember that ...yes there was something...Maybe there still is...
P.S.: Today's world spawns a lot of relationships that are mere reactions to a fad...'Everyone does it..so will I'.. These commitments even, according to me should be more serious and better thought out than they are..
P.P.S.:People are so blinded by 'love' that they don't realise that when they say their wedding vows...they're supposed to mean them and think about them...before saying yes..like every promise...
P.P.P.S.:Of course..if one considers the fact that ....even marriage is just a bunch of rules in a game ( a sub game of sorts to life !)...and that some people manipulate those rules for some distant advantage...then yeah...some of those moves may well be really smart....
P.P.P.P.S.:Once again ..I couldn't help jacking up the sarcasm ..
P.P.P.P.P.S.:The probablity bit is really stupid..i mean..what if i'm thinking so much and making so many hypothetical comparisons that i will find her (oops) only when i'm 50 (PROSTATE !!)
Friday, December 18, 2009
Kota Senti
I was looking at some old pics today....Pics i had clicked in a galaxy far far away a long long time ago...or so it felt(Who am i kidding !!)....I was looking at pics of my stay in kota...Actually ..i had taken my camera there only in the last 2 months ...but the pics took me back...like some old greying 'Nam veteran...I leant back... staring at a point in the distance, transported back...Arriving in kota for the first time...watching my parents' train leave...Scrinching up my face and sniffing loudly...crying myself to sleep, thanking god(and my parents !) that i had a single room....
Tosh....Actually...I spent that first night playing cards...sleeping at 3 if i remember correctly...I remember the first words i said after my parents left...I called up a friend and said " Oye mere dad mom gaye..chal gaandmasti karte hain...!!"
Not to put up some false show of 'big boy' bravado...but i don't think i ever felt alone in my whole stay in kota....I remember many anxious juniors and even more anxious parents coming to me for kota-wisdom later and asking me " What problems did you face?" and me replying ...frowning in concentration.."Uhh...Problems..Nope..can't think of any!!" And y'know..it was true..I took to kota like a fish to water...Oh..the crazy things we did there....I remember this one time..i had gone to the mess wearing this, Quoting my mom.., 'disgusting' sleeveless 'shirt' and a revolting pair of 'shorts'..when one of the mess workers droppped a whole big serving bowl of daal on me..It was thick dal..OH..thick and heavily spiced...And wet....had the texture of vomit....I remember soaking it in a tub and nearly barfing every time i saw that stuff floating around...Needless to say..my mother was over the moon...On her next visit i got an i-pod....
Another barfable incident was my house mate Anup scraping out utensils which had contained chicken (had....) about a month ago...from a foot away...Oh...yeah those were the days yaar..Like the time after marathon watching movies ( 4 i think) all night..me and my house mate Abhisek returned..He was taking a leak while holding our house keys in his mouth ...when...yeah...he yawned....Neither of us remembered the last time we had used the toilet.....for..ahem... the big job ( i found this site with a delightful list of euphemisms..http://www.thechurning.com/2005/10/19/final-round-of-shit-euphemisms/) But we held our noses and fished the keys out with our kitchen tongs...(Needless to say ..we stopped making toast and maggi became a staple..!!)and washed them thoroughly with a hosepipe and the tongs with a soaped up rag.....The keychain ..which was the letter 'S' had to go...It was leather you see....
We had a lot of crazy philosophical talks up there on the terrace...ranging from...Why are we here ? ... somewhere, two hot, smart and funny girls are discussing that 2 guys (like us...!) are discussing that two boys( funny how picky we were... even in our daydreams) are... ad infinitum...
There was this one time that we had this crazy idea...we decided that we would let our freezer get clogged up with ice and not thaw it and then rip out slabs of ice and smash them on the floor..Abhisek's mother had come to visit but I was like a man with a mission...i had to do it..SO i called abhisek innocently as if to ask him about some question i was solving but pointing to the fridge...We pulled out a huge..and i mean big ..gigantic... e-normous slab of ice....grinning devilishly at each other ...we hefted it once...twice and smashed it to the ground...It broke into many small pieces (and some big ones...YAAY !!) with a sound like a pistol shot...Man..that was fun..i mean..i know i'm getting cliched here... but..yeah...it WAS fun...and you won't know what i'm talking about till you've smashed some ice yourselves...
I could go on and on..but..i have to sleep....forget it yaar..I can't help it..i'd probably chuckle to myself for an hour before i fell asleep..I'll go on a teeny weeny bit longer..Like the time The lights went off in the middle of the Loo( yesss..I'm talking bout the dusty winds that we learnt about in tenth standard geography...) and all of us rushed out onto the street..One friend of mine..Who had this habit of roaming about in his room bare chested ran out without putting anything on.. and walked for nearly a mile without realising this ...(it was pitch black) Then ..to make matters worse...a fat friend gave him his shirt as he himself was wearing a vest underneath..which let me tell you was not a pretty sight when the lights cam on.... Or that time when..we all gathered in my room to play cards with my small stereo blaring greenday till it was hoarse..My landlord heard the 'noise' and decided to check on me....He knocked on the door upon which we rushed hither thither...with one of us hitting the lights and another the stereo(Dumb Dumb Dumb...)...some lying down on the bed and the last one: Avi...crouching behind my bed....I opened the door..bleary eyed and said..kya hua uncle..He incredulously asked me..(Duh..the lights and music and sounds of merrymaking were LOUD a second ago) "Kya chal raha hai bete ?"All my 'sleeping' friends 'got up' and started looking at my landlord as if surprised..I said.."Uncle ..ye yahaan padhne aaye hain.."....Up popped avi still holding his cards..fanned out and arranged for easy accessiblity saying.." Haan uncle..Schrodinger's equation bahut tough hai.." That stiffled laughter must have reduced my lifespan by an hour atleast but i would trade a year just to see everyone looking at Avi with ..a look on their faces that i can't describe without grinning widely even now....
A lot of good friends,304( a card game..that i swear...can be played for days on end),cyber cafe nightouts,movies, kilos (seriously) of Ratlami sev bought at the wholesale rate and ch***iyaaps : only 99 photographs...Seems unfair na...
PS:Oh..The joy....
PPS:Abhisek Amit Anup Ardhendu Avi Ayush Rajat Manav Mukul Nikhil Prateek Rohan Siddharth Tapan Tarun Tejas ...THANK YOU !!
PPPS:If i have missed anyone out...SORRY and THANK YOU !!!
PPPPS:I must have an eye infection...Better go wash them...
PPPPPS: OOH and Pyaaj ki kachaudi..
PPPPPPS: Junta please add items....
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Arbit: Title track...
My later stuff has been very sentimental..and probably not 'readable' unless you know me...and i really want this to be something that is general..that is ...enjoyable to anyone who chooses to read it...So i think i should stray back into the field of...well not me....Sol et's pick up the hat and randomly pick a chit...hmm...let's see...aah...that one..(nice texture ...i must remember to ask mom where she bought this paper..)
So without much ado, but to the long and loud fanfare of trumpets, followed by cymbals, then a triumphant drumroll....let's open it...aah... oh..uhh....(Damn !)...'8 on 30 in PH 105( midterm marks....)' ..(Bloody hell ! I thought i threw that away !!)..Sorry...That must have gotten in there by mistake...Let me take another one out...Oh..Yeah..that's good..That'll do..
"SUCCESS AND HOMOSEXUALITY "
Yeah...Not exactly connected are they....Quite the 'Chalk and cheese'..(Actually more like 'Chalk and 'antelopes shot in such a manner that their femur is still intact but my is their hamstring a bloody mess' ') But hey..I can work with that...Don't exactly have to use them in one sentence, do i ?!...So let's talk about the second first...Homosexuality.....Lot of issues her.. 'Choice or genetic' , Homophobes , Friends coming up to you and telling you that..., then back to homophobes (!!!!) etc..
Let's proceed logically....Animals know by instinct that they must enter into sexual union (SWIVE !!(British for...SPLAT !)) to propagate their species...Passed on to humans....Humans start communicating better...forming ideas..discussing ...Find common ground with other people....Start having friends.... Separately (!) start enjoying sex....start associating pleasure with person who is the other participant....Maybe they're having sex with them because they like that person in the first place ( have stuff in common..)...Love...Marriage....Heterosexuality= Norm.......................................PAUSE.............................................................................................................
Now if we think clearly, an orgasm (pleasure associated with SWIVING !!) can be experienced by either sex without the involvement of a person of the opposite sex....Now you like/love having someone with you whom you like/love (whatever you like/love to call it...!!) ..The idea of male/female(equivalently female/male ( women's lib !!)) conjugal relations arises only as a need for reproduction..Assume you are a person of sex X and you love/like person A(sex X) more than person B(sex 'not X')..and you want to spend your life with A but won't mind a kid with person 'B's 'component' (hahahaha!!!!) and assuming A and you are interchangable ...that it B and A are on good terms too.....Why the hell should any other bloody person have a say about it.......
I believe that a person can swing any way she or he wants to...As for why people are in general heterosexual...Maybe...it's been bred into us over the generations.....We associate chilbirth( only possible with 2 people of opposite sexes) with sexual intercourse (SWIVING !!), sexual intercourse with pleasure and assume the transitive causality to hold ( A and B happen togethe....B and C happen together hence A and C happen together (and C cannot be cause by anything else)) But what really happens is that .... sex leads to pleasure..and sex..with the added condition that the sex of the two participants be different ( or atleast two of the many participants (hey..you can do what the hell you like !) ) be different leads to conception...with a lot of other conditions(teenage boys snigger...teenage girls blush...) that are force majeure ( not controllable by man)..So basically....Re-lax.....Unless your friend has a crush on YOU..In that case..you should tell him/her that ...ya..Dude/Girl..I DON'T swing that way yaar......
Part 2 :SUCCESS...
What is success....Success is happiness.. PERIOD
PS: And happiness includes a good night's sleep...so yeah..take a hint.....
PPS: Of course...SUCCESS elaborated...would be somewhere in that hat of mine.... (!)
PPPS: To understand my thing for the (SWIVING !!) read 'The man from St. Petersburg' by Ken Follet
PPPPS: I'm not a homophobe......but that doesn't mean you get any ideas ...(STAY IN THAT CLOSET !)
PPPPPS: (SWIVING !!)
So without much ado, but to the long and loud fanfare of trumpets, followed by cymbals, then a triumphant drumroll....let's open it...aah... oh..uhh....(Damn !)...'8 on 30 in PH 105( midterm marks....)' ..(Bloody hell ! I thought i threw that away !!)..Sorry...That must have gotten in there by mistake...Let me take another one out...Oh..Yeah..that's good..That'll do..
"SUCCESS AND HOMOSEXUALITY "
Yeah...Not exactly connected are they....Quite the 'Chalk and cheese'..(Actually more like 'Chalk and 'antelopes shot in such a manner that their femur is still intact but my is their hamstring a bloody mess' ') But hey..I can work with that...Don't exactly have to use them in one sentence, do i ?!...So let's talk about the second first...Homosexuality.....Lot of issues her.. 'Choice or genetic' , Homophobes , Friends coming up to you and telling you that..., then back to homophobes (!!!!) etc..
Let's proceed logically....Animals know by instinct that they must enter into sexual union (SWIVE !!(British for...SPLAT !)) to propagate their species...Passed on to humans....Humans start communicating better...forming ideas..discussing ...Find common ground with other people....Start having friends.... Separately (!) start enjoying sex....start associating pleasure with person who is the other participant....Maybe they're having sex with them because they like that person in the first place ( have stuff in common..)...Love...Marriage....Heterosexuality= Norm.......................................PAUSE.............................................................................................................
Now if we think clearly, an orgasm (pleasure associated with SWIVING !!) can be experienced by either sex without the involvement of a person of the opposite sex....Now you like/love having someone with you whom you like/love (whatever you like/love to call it...!!) ..The idea of male/female(equivalently female/male ( women's lib !!)) conjugal relations arises only as a need for reproduction..Assume you are a person of sex X and you love/like person A(sex X) more than person B(sex 'not X')..and you want to spend your life with A but won't mind a kid with person 'B's 'component' (hahahaha!!!!) and assuming A and you are interchangable ...that it B and A are on good terms too.....Why the hell should any other bloody person have a say about it.......
I believe that a person can swing any way she or he wants to...As for why people are in general heterosexual...Maybe...it's been bred into us over the generations.....We associate chilbirth( only possible with 2 people of opposite sexes) with sexual intercourse (SWIVING !!), sexual intercourse with pleasure and assume the transitive causality to hold ( A and B happen togethe....B and C happen together hence A and C happen together (and C cannot be cause by anything else)) But what really happens is that .... sex leads to pleasure..and sex..with the added condition that the sex of the two participants be different ( or atleast two of the many participants (hey..you can do what the hell you like !) ) be different leads to conception...with a lot of other conditions(teenage boys snigger...teenage girls blush...) that are force majeure ( not controllable by man)..So basically....Re-lax.....Unless your friend has a crush on YOU..In that case..you should tell him/her that ...ya..Dude/Girl..I DON'T swing that way yaar......
Part 2 :SUCCESS...
What is success....Success is happiness.. PERIOD
PS: And happiness includes a good night's sleep...so yeah..take a hint.....
PPS: Of course...SUCCESS elaborated...would be somewhere in that hat of mine.... (!)
PPPS: To understand my thing for the (SWIVING !!) read 'The man from St. Petersburg' by Ken Follet
PPPPS: I'm not a homophobe......but that doesn't mean you get any ideas ...(STAY IN THAT CLOSET !)
PPPPPS: (SWIVING !!)
Friday, November 13, 2009
Death a la Heidegger
Just yesterday, a friend of mine( Divyanshu AKA Bihari AKA Bubbanshu) asked me and some others a question...'If you knew that you had just one month to live....what would you do ?' Actually his question was 'If the world was going to end in a month, what would you do ?' which i misunderstood to be the first question..
But anyway..both questions are equally interesting and require much questioning and soul searching..so i thought hey...lemme not study for my end semester exams (which, by the way are to begin on Tuesday) and write bout this, so that (PLEEEESE) someone reads it and ..i dunno...doesn't study for his/her endsem exams too...so that his endsem preparation would get screwed due to a lot of soul searching and self inspection ( which, i would have done before posting this... so less closer to the endsem(and of course everyone knows that study time varies as an exponentially decreasing function of time left for the exams !!)) so i would fare better in my exams ( we have relative grading here in iit (for all of you (much)lesser mortals with (much)greater sex ratios !!))So basically...yeah...i'm an RG( one who exploits the RG (Relative grading) system)
Leaving aside these trivialities, let me get to the question... or rather questions... Firstly :"If you knew that you were going to die in a month what would you do ?"As soon as I think about dying that too within a time period as small as a month there's a mixture of feelings inside me just bursting to come out...There's sadness, a weird kind of something that feels like pride and a strange nostalgia...I feel sad knowing that a month from now.. Sumedh Shrinivas Ranade will be no more, i will be gone, kaput, finished...A month from now i will be just a box of ashes....(Waiting for this to sink in, with a sombre look on my face, my eyes scan the audience for people wiping tears from their eyes...) (Disappointed... i go on.. !)I feel proud (not so much now !) knowing that there will be people who will still remember me(more fondly perhaps(a la Michael Jackson !)) whenever they laugh , or cry...I also look back and smile sadly, the hint of a tear moistening my eyes...a lump in my throat ...every particle of my body happy... completely happy, for that one moment.....the sum of all the happiness that was in my life.....Then my thoughts jerk back to the present and i think ..'Well, now i have really embarrassed myself in front of my audience !!'(I can hear them... "Wuss ! Wuss!!")...What would i do..
I'd sit up all night talking to friends...not just talking but listening, hearing, crying, laughing and hugging..I'd stay up late till the early morning (!!(credit to Aselin debison)) just reliving all of the moments...the fun that we had...In the morning..I'd bid them farewell... one last time....telling each of them that i love them, that i enjoyed every moment that i spent with them....and it would be true... all of it... it was fun....I'd leave with some clothes and my guitar....Catch the first rickshaw i see and go home...climb up the stairs slowly...savouring every moment of it...then stand in front of my door and put my finger on the bell....not removing it till i saw one of my parents standing in front of me...I'd hug them and tell them that i loved them, not caring if there was anyone watching....I'd stay home for a week...doing nothing...just taking it all in..HOME...My parents,my sister, my room,everything....I'd tell my sister that she was important to me, (Read:that i loved her( but it was getting a bit repetitive!)) and that though i thoroughly enjoyed all our fights, i didn't really mean all that mean stuff i said to her.....I'd stay for a week...just talking to people on the phone and eating every meal possible with my family...talking and listening but mostly just looking and sighing...Then I'd take off ... go to Goa , all by myself...I'd sit in some shack on the beach, reading , singing, listening to music and just looking at the sea....I'd also probably write something similar to this particular post, but longer...something that i hope people will read...But it won't really matter....'cause it's really meant for me..I'd read it again and again...Laughing and Well..Laughing...
When i have just one or two days left, I'd call all of my extended family there and a have a grand dinner on the beach..with all the jokes and the laughter and the aagraha (forcing food onto others when you serve them...after all there's a limit to what your fridge can hold..)!Then I'd walk on the beach alone ...strumming my guitar..singing all the songs i know.... I'd feel all of those songs..even the romantic ones..for though i have not loved...i can feel the 'might have' nostalgia (which is a bit like excruciating pleasure)...then I'd lay my guitar down on the sand and walk on the beach ... wetting my feet a little every now and then (to get the sand off..!)and wait.....
Now imagine....If the whole world was ending and everyone knew it......Would the people i want to spend time with , want to spend time with me ?( scanning the crowd again for guilty faces...)
Do you mean as much to a person as he(or she) means to you ? Are you important to people ? If a 'very close friend' wrote this...would you feature in it ? Tough questions...huh...Think about it...
PS: There are people who will appreciate what i have written and there are others who will scream "Wuss !! Wuss!!"The first may be genuine or they may be faking it because in some life paradigms(their's) it is acceptable to be senti...
The second, i believe are just posing....then again...their reply to this would be"Bullshit !!!"To each his own...for me..i say F**k You..
PPS:All the senti i have written above is punctuated by jokes...i mean every bit of both...the jokes are the just part of my' "Wuss!Wuss!" 'facade that i wasn't able to throw off, but that's good cause otherwise this post would get really boring...
PPPS:I love you all !!
PPPPS: But i'll love you more if you post comments (Wink Wink...)
PPPPPS: Really......
PPPPPPS: I would have the same answer even if the whole world was ending...i thought that came out through the post...People may not agree to my plans but bloody hell...you can't decide every single thing after considering what everyone else thinks/will do
PPPPPPPS: I believe fully (or strongly hope atleast !)that my plans will materialize....after all i'm asking people for just a day...surely i'm that important to people and...fact is....the people who come are the people who i really want to be there...... It is my whole hearted belief that true love/caring is reciprocated equally
But anyway..both questions are equally interesting and require much questioning and soul searching..so i thought hey...lemme not study for my end semester exams (which, by the way are to begin on Tuesday) and write bout this, so that (PLEEEESE) someone reads it and ..i dunno...doesn't study for his/her endsem exams too...so that his endsem preparation would get screwed due to a lot of soul searching and self inspection ( which, i would have done before posting this... so less closer to the endsem(and of course everyone knows that study time varies as an exponentially decreasing function of time left for the exams !!)) so i would fare better in my exams ( we have relative grading here in iit (for all of you (much)lesser mortals with (much)greater sex ratios !!))So basically...yeah...i'm an RG( one who exploits the RG (Relative grading) system)
Leaving aside these trivialities, let me get to the question... or rather questions... Firstly :"If you knew that you were going to die in a month what would you do ?"As soon as I think about dying that too within a time period as small as a month there's a mixture of feelings inside me just bursting to come out...There's sadness, a weird kind of something that feels like pride and a strange nostalgia...I feel sad knowing that a month from now.. Sumedh Shrinivas Ranade will be no more, i will be gone, kaput, finished...A month from now i will be just a box of ashes....(Waiting for this to sink in, with a sombre look on my face, my eyes scan the audience for people wiping tears from their eyes...) (Disappointed... i go on.. !)I feel proud (not so much now !) knowing that there will be people who will still remember me(more fondly perhaps(a la Michael Jackson !)) whenever they laugh , or cry...I also look back and smile sadly, the hint of a tear moistening my eyes...a lump in my throat ...every particle of my body happy... completely happy, for that one moment.....the sum of all the happiness that was in my life.....Then my thoughts jerk back to the present and i think ..'Well, now i have really embarrassed myself in front of my audience !!'(I can hear them... "Wuss ! Wuss!!")...What would i do..
I'd sit up all night talking to friends...not just talking but listening, hearing, crying, laughing and hugging..I'd stay up late till the early morning (!!(credit to Aselin debison)) just reliving all of the moments...the fun that we had...In the morning..I'd bid them farewell... one last time....telling each of them that i love them, that i enjoyed every moment that i spent with them....and it would be true... all of it... it was fun....I'd leave with some clothes and my guitar....Catch the first rickshaw i see and go home...climb up the stairs slowly...savouring every moment of it...then stand in front of my door and put my finger on the bell....not removing it till i saw one of my parents standing in front of me...I'd hug them and tell them that i loved them, not caring if there was anyone watching....I'd stay home for a week...doing nothing...just taking it all in..HOME...My parents,my sister, my room,everything....I'd tell my sister that she was important to me, (Read:that i loved her( but it was getting a bit repetitive!)) and that though i thoroughly enjoyed all our fights, i didn't really mean all that mean stuff i said to her.....I'd stay for a week...just talking to people on the phone and eating every meal possible with my family...talking and listening but mostly just looking and sighing...Then I'd take off ... go to Goa , all by myself...I'd sit in some shack on the beach, reading , singing, listening to music and just looking at the sea....I'd also probably write something similar to this particular post, but longer...something that i hope people will read...But it won't really matter....'cause it's really meant for me..I'd read it again and again...Laughing and Well..Laughing...
When i have just one or two days left, I'd call all of my extended family there and a have a grand dinner on the beach..with all the jokes and the laughter and the aagraha (forcing food onto others when you serve them...after all there's a limit to what your fridge can hold..)!Then I'd walk on the beach alone ...strumming my guitar..singing all the songs i know.... I'd feel all of those songs..even the romantic ones..for though i have not loved...i can feel the 'might have' nostalgia (which is a bit like excruciating pleasure)...then I'd lay my guitar down on the sand and walk on the beach ... wetting my feet a little every now and then (to get the sand off..!)and wait.....
Now imagine....If the whole world was ending and everyone knew it......Would the people i want to spend time with , want to spend time with me ?( scanning the crowd again for guilty faces...)
Do you mean as much to a person as he(or she) means to you ? Are you important to people ? If a 'very close friend' wrote this...would you feature in it ? Tough questions...huh...Think about it...
PS: There are people who will appreciate what i have written and there are others who will scream "Wuss !! Wuss!!"The first may be genuine or they may be faking it because in some life paradigms(their's) it is acceptable to be senti...
The second, i believe are just posing....then again...their reply to this would be"Bullshit !!!"To each his own...for me..i say F**k You..
PPS:All the senti i have written above is punctuated by jokes...i mean every bit of both...the jokes are the just part of my' "Wuss!Wuss!" 'facade that i wasn't able to throw off, but that's good cause otherwise this post would get really boring...
PPPS:I love you all !!
PPPPS: But i'll love you more if you post comments (Wink Wink...)
PPPPPS: Really......
PPPPPPS: I would have the same answer even if the whole world was ending...i thought that came out through the post...People may not agree to my plans but bloody hell...you can't decide every single thing after considering what everyone else thinks/will do
PPPPPPPS: I believe fully (or strongly hope atleast !)that my plans will materialize....after all i'm asking people for just a day...surely i'm that important to people and...fact is....the people who come are the people who i really want to be there...... It is my whole hearted belief that true love/caring is reciprocated equally
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Yesterday...
Yesterday morning i woke up early.....early for me that is.....Somehow i woke up a full hour earlier than i usually do...( that my alarm is set for !!) Now i am by nature, very optimistic and a great believer in portents...So i decided that the fact that i awoke early meant that it was supposed to happen .....that i was supposed to attend the class i usually miss and that today was going to be a wonderful day..That everything would go right..(!)-----------------------------
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Yes yes...i can see what you are dying to say..."Pah !!".You laugh at me... Snigger even, at my (misplaced) faith in Life and my misinterpretation of what was probably some insect that probably went up my nose and woke me....but then that's your problem...and anyway i bet you're dying to hear what happened next....----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Well, the day proceeded normally , no surprises or unexpected good fortune... I didn't find any money fallen on the ground, nor was i visited by an alien race that granted me super powers, and even the food in the mess was bad....In fact, i spent my afternoon studying for a quiz that was to be held in the evening..Furthermore i screwed up the quiz and was busy all evening, reaching my room only at 12 30 am...
Now i can see you......not sniggering and smirking but wearing full grins that make you look like Satanic priests....thinking..."HAH !!" But the fact is that you miss my point....that i forsee what your reaction is going to be...so as is obvious, i do hold the ace...it's just my hole card ! (google: blackjack !!)Fact is if a cynical pessimistic person went through a day like mine...he would probably have been infinitely depressed and well..... cynical ! But us optimists....well we get through the day...hoping for more.... wishing for more....and you know..maybe ...at the end of the day we do get that....So it's easier for us to get through the tough bits of meat that life dishes out...
Personally if you ask me, all pessimists, just put up a show....acting all cynical, but underneath hoping for something good to happen and believing with all their heart, that it will...And i know that pessimists feel the same about optimists...that really... we are cynical killjoys who just conform to social norms by behaving all happy go lucky and hopeful.....That we just put on a smile....For those who do...STOP !...And for the many, i'm sure, who don't.. CHEERS !
PS: Isn't it obviously better to be happy always, than mistrusting and sceptical about everything...
PPS: And i'm talking about and to the smart optimists here, the ones that know it's OK to cry sometimes....
PPPS: I seem to be getting more senti (that word comes with a lot of prejudice ,...rather let's just say... meaningful !(which again comes with a lot of bias !!(That makes me neutral..on the fence with my anti inflammatory cream !!!)))Well....I had an epiphany...what can i say...
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Yes yes...i can see what you are dying to say..."Pah !!".You laugh at me... Snigger even, at my (misplaced) faith in Life and my misinterpretation of what was probably some insect that probably went up my nose and woke me....but then that's your problem...and anyway i bet you're dying to hear what happened next....----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Well, the day proceeded normally , no surprises or unexpected good fortune... I didn't find any money fallen on the ground, nor was i visited by an alien race that granted me super powers, and even the food in the mess was bad....In fact, i spent my afternoon studying for a quiz that was to be held in the evening..Furthermore i screwed up the quiz and was busy all evening, reaching my room only at 12 30 am...
Now i can see you......not sniggering and smirking but wearing full grins that make you look like Satanic priests....thinking..."HAH !!" But the fact is that you miss my point....that i forsee what your reaction is going to be...so as is obvious, i do hold the ace...it's just my hole card ! (google: blackjack !!)Fact is if a cynical pessimistic person went through a day like mine...he would probably have been infinitely depressed and well..... cynical ! But us optimists....well we get through the day...hoping for more.... wishing for more....and you know..maybe ...at the end of the day we do get that....So it's easier for us to get through the tough bits of meat that life dishes out...
Personally if you ask me, all pessimists, just put up a show....acting all cynical, but underneath hoping for something good to happen and believing with all their heart, that it will...And i know that pessimists feel the same about optimists...that really... we are cynical killjoys who just conform to social norms by behaving all happy go lucky and hopeful.....That we just put on a smile....For those who do...STOP !...And for the many, i'm sure, who don't.. CHEERS !
PS: Isn't it obviously better to be happy always, than mistrusting and sceptical about everything...
PPS: And i'm talking about and to the smart optimists here, the ones that know it's OK to cry sometimes....
PPPS: I seem to be getting more senti (that word comes with a lot of prejudice ,...rather let's just say... meaningful !(which again comes with a lot of bias !!(That makes me neutral..on the fence with my anti inflammatory cream !!!)))Well....I had an epiphany...what can i say...
Friday, August 28, 2009
BLAH
I am drunk(Ola! Harshad,Potty, Pranay and Vaid...)........To be precise...i have imbibed some alcohol...Though i had never thought about it before this...now...i am sure that i want to write something while i am in this condition or state...whatever you wish to call it...First of all, let me describe this state to you..Those that have been there (here ?) and done this...reminisce ...and the rest .....Well... i will describe it as accurately as i can without making a fool of myself !! First of all, i am completely in control of all my actions...I am of course feeling a bit light headed..and happier than normal..(a fact which some friends of mine believe to be impossible..) In fact, i feel more in control of myself than normal for the simple reason that i feel obligated to prove my high capacity to imbibe alcohol(a parameter very foolishly and illogically assumed to be a sign of manliness) not just to others but also to myself.....I also am in the habit of giving my more irrational feelings (such as love.....actually...only love !!) more of a free hand while my consciousness roams about .... stumbling and rambling merrily ! While there are many people who regard the capacity to drink large amounts of alcohol as a great virtue...there are also the people who consider it a sign of great weakness, if not a sin......Others relent somewhat and consider smoking and further drugs as sins....
I personally,was a staunch believer in teetotalism before i went to college...I maintained from my tasting of alcohol that it was a highly disgusting and definitely non potable beverage and that i would continue to drink the likes of coca cola till death...College set in and the lifestyle there caught up to me, as it does to everyone....My opinion of alcohol was that it was good...if it were ingested in reasonable quantities... As long as one did not lose control completely...the feeling of moondust and teddy bears (!!)was....just great... i also discovered that i could hold my drink really well....due to both genetic and environmental influences (wink !!(:-P))Then finally one day....i bit off too much more than i could chew and.....as is logical ..... puked... The loss of control was too scary for me.....and i gave up alcohol....
This is the 3rd time i have drunk since that day...the first time being 3 months after the day of my bheesma vrath....(!)And i realised that i had lost the taste ....i had stopped liking (or rather hating less than liking the high !!) the taste of alcohol....
But these personal and senti things left aside (i was just rattling out facts to gain back my sense of balance and control...so i would be able to write more than gibberish.. !!) let us get to the crux of the issue.....A friend of mine chided me for smoking as i did (barely...) sometimes when i was drunk (which shall be hereforth defined as having imbibed alcohol.....)Later when i gave up alcohol completely he said that what i was doing was nonsense and that this was too extreme a measure to take...Why i wonder...Both affect a person's health in the long term and due to their containing addictive substances...both could destroy a person's life...Agreed ciggarettes are more addictive than alcohol...but then is not the cutting out of both these mind altering substances a good thing..in fact the best thing to do...So i should drink and be merry but a ciggarette now and then is bad ....Isn't that rather hypocritical ??
Speaking of hypocrites, what about vegetarians...they cry out about animals and how we kill them to satisfy our own carnal natures....well then isn't killing mute, dumb plants even worse...And if the indignant reply to this would be (as it often is, and i have asked a lot of people !)that since i can't hear them, i don't feel bad....then my reply would be..." Then Sir...the fact is that i don't feel bad when i eat animals "....(of course, as compared to that delicious succulent breast-piece of lamb !!)...
Well...as the more rigid puritans would believe (and....of course as any person who has done 'shieat' (as the african americans would say !!!!!! lol)...will tell you that it is our greatest pleasure to behave , in our 'drunken stupor' as we would be expected to behave by our prissy acquaintances ! (sorry guys !!)) one is in a pedagogical mood when intoxicated...that is highly eager to preach about life and other highly significant things....So....once again... confirming your belief...i will proceed....
I believe that one should live life as if one had nothing to lose. Voice your opinions out loud...
At worst, If you are wrong, you will realise it and will also have had the satisfaction of having expressed your opinion. Life is too short to be unhappy long... so laugh often.... if it seems as if everything is going wrong ...... remmeber every valley is spanned by mountains on both sides and that the descent must stop somewhere....What doesn't kill you can always make you stronger provided you are willing to learn from it.... The rough translation of a cheesy line from a bollywood movie that i nevertheless like says "Laugh and be merry, cause who knows, tomorrow may never come..."...
Today's cynical world often mocks optimists, considering them to be hypocrites who just smile because it's socially more acceptable....Bull Crap i say...Firstly...the world has become highly pessimist and cynical...secondly...there aren't too many things that really warrant that glum look....Smile when you are happy and when in doubt think about the good times...those to come and those that have passed....and grin like an inebrieated babboon (Let 'em wonder!!)And thirdly...'SOUR GRAPES'.... Just because you have nothing to smile about doesn't mean that everyone who's smiling's just putting it on....
Also...the troubles that most people commit suicide over...Money and Love.... are two of the most trivial things that could ever be....Money....A common means of exchange for goods.... Work hard and the money problems will get fixed.....As for love....it is a wonderful feeling...but in the end there is no one more important than you.... "There is nothing to live for.. " Why ! That's rubbish....live for yourself, even if everything in the world is destroyed ... Suicide is just a great bloody middle finger to oneself.....
Thus endeth my 'Fundae' of life...Those that find them cheesy and optimistic....well i'll just ask them if they can give me another set of rules, so to speak, by which they have lived their life and never had even one dull or depressed moment....Cause i haven't ....so there ....!!
PS: Thus, I continue my tradition of writing postscripts...
PPS:Forgive the i's.... i have no office suite...
PPPS: In accordance with the 'fact' that we drunks are senti..i present to you....'Blah'...
PPPPS: Actually we also take the opportunity to do stuff we've always wanted to and felt scared of people's reactions, because now.... it's all attributed to the effect of alcohol...
PPPPPS: Cheers !!
Friday, August 14, 2009
US: EVERYONE'S SCARED OF THIS POST !!
I couldn’t resist it…(The title, I mean….)Having written something about the unknown(delightfully devilish, I would have myself believe…but nevertheless, rubbish that exists…(Point is…I wrote )) entitled ‘Them’, which schizophrenic demented megalomaniac could resist writing something (powerfully moving or sarcastically cutting(oh…I dunno I’ve just started haven’t I ), but once again …. Something…) anything… and giving it the title ‘Us’? Who, I ask you? Who?
For all of you still thinking (and I hope that my readership, comprising the foremost brains of my generation (this time I really died laughing) will not fall in this category !)just one word folks: Rhetoric….(OK I’m done pissing off what might be my only reader !)Not me, for sure…..
Us …We….A generation of suck ups, manipulators and two faced hypocrites... (Yes…I can hear you saying …. “Really! You too!!Oh my God!! And to think I went to all that trouble…!!”)That’s us….All that we do focuses on the ego…everything…we look at ways to bolster it and think so far ahead it would baffle Kasparov…Telling slightly varied stories to different people to generate the approval and respect (which is in turn fake …) that makes our day…That one extra fan on orkut….that makes u scream out loud and decide to have that extra cookie…as a celebration…Pathetic…all of us….( only it’s ‘packs of cookies’ in my case !)
Just today…I was chatting with a friend and the topic came round to why I wasn’t on facebook…I replied…I hate social networking sites in general…I just joined orkut to keep in touch with friends who were leaving from kota….I received the ‘hmmm really’ reply…Then I replied….trying to (and maybe succeeding) be funny that, no,…I luurrrrve orkut…I’d be a zombie without friends….if it were not for orkut…sitting in a corner whimpering and drooling, my legs drawn to my chest…. I cut myself every time I lose a fan or a friend…..and worst of all I actually add people that send requests such as ‘Wanna meet a fraandly cute Punjabi boy’……That took care of the conversation….but I wasn’t satisfied….you know people this isn’t what other people want to hear…What they want ( and what’s true) is ‘Ohh… whenever orkut shows me ‘page loading…’…there’s this anticipation …this…glow in my chest…just waiting to see if that brown haired girl scrapped me or maybe to see if that senior in my wing commented on that photo, you know, the one in which I’m surrounded by vodka bottles….The truth is that…every time I see a photo comment the glow stays with me for a day….a much awaited scrap…gets stomach’s sucked in and heads held just a teeny weeny bit higher….’
Yep …that’s us…our friends lists on social networking sites…are full of people we despise and ridicule…And we never send people friend requests …we wait for them to come…making it, in the end…just a bloody stare down contest….Friends…It should be ‘People we barely know through 2 common links…or maybe 3 if he/she is really cool’ Approval and liking is something all of us crave…and we secretly hate those that prance around, telling merry stories, spewing out stolen puns and jokes…Our status messages…oh…. if dogs had an attention span of half the time that we use in thinking up status messages…they’d probably have learnt our language by now….All the clichéd stuff we do believing that we will be perceived as being cool….it makes me laugh….
And this is just the cyber world….In the real world…we do things that are equally suited for a satire…That’s why satires have gone out of fashion…it’s just like our everyday life…so boring….The passing on of stories…and representing them as one’s own…the long words and impressive phrases that are bandied about…..the names of books that we once saw on the editorial page of some newspaper….all these float around the air, are heard and then repeated countless number of times..….i’m sure if we wrote the autobiography of the book ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’ since the time it appeared (along with a review (and this is important !!)) in TOI we would find that it had travelled all around the world and gone in so many twisted overlapping loops that it would be impossible to find an equation or even several, plotting it’s course….Just murmurs and whispers can make or break impressions…and the fact is, that we have gotten so confused about why a certain thing was said and what effect was it meant to have, that we often think over the most mundane and innocent of statements as though they were octopule entendres…..
Our ego is destroying us…Mr. Gold… (As Guy Ritchie would have us believe) has won……
PS: If you read through this and feel that certain phrases seem as though I have revealed myself and my egocentric pathetic activities unknowingly….be warned that I have read through this post 4 times searching for such clues and have placed these in specific places to katao your chu**ya !!
PPS: Or maybe I just wrote that post script coz it was easier than reading through this highly ego bashing thing….
PPPS: 4 sounds much more believable than 6 or 7 times and so much more impressive than 1 or 2 times
PPPPS: This work is the required analogue of an axiom…..it reveals its purpose and content doubly…through it’s actual content and the very fact of its existence….!!
PPPPPS: Am I cunning and poltu( iit lingo for whatever i wrote above,...) ... or am i just a brilliant satirist... i dunno... Which would make me more impressive?!
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