Diary of a Schizophrenic

One Fine Day

2011-03-01T21:38:00.003+05:30

So what is it that makes you human?

Your emotions. Your tendency to react. React in what seem to be the predictable patterns graphed out through the years that are said to be human psychology.

What happens when you don't react to what you're supposed to.
Or react in a manner totally unexpected.

You're inhuman.

We are scared of things beyond comprehension. Hence when things don't go according to plan. We panic. Coz there are no contingency plans. Its sudden and harsh and unplanned. And that for some is not meant to be. Things have to fall in some certain groove defined by previous experiences so that some sense of familiarity works as a transitioning agent.

But then when things do not flow in a certain streamline fashion, people have to question the occurrence. Because frankly speaking...people are lazy. Mentally. Complexities force them to think. And that requires a certain amount of flexing the mental nerves in order to act.

It's like a math problem or a puzzle given to you every time. At a certain point you can derive the "fun" from it. But then your brain starts to fatigue. It need's to "cool down". And hence we have rest. Sleep or whatever it's forms. We need breaks as in to not suffer from the wrath of having a burnout.

[Written at a subway while multitasking gluttony, random thoughts and aimless plans for the day/night]

2010-12-30T15:57:00.001+05:30

What have I become?

Blog Spasm

2010-12-30T10:53:00.003+05:30

There might be a few things which fascinate you in life and hence motivate you to wait for the next day before you sleep. Pray for it to come soon so that you can embark on another eventful day.

Would that be a complicated day ?
Does an eventful day have to be related to complications ?

As it is said people do want a simple life and want to live freely and in a land of peaceful bliss. But then what.
Consider you have all that you want. Lying near the beach just relaxing and knowing you have to do nothing to earn money or respect. You're full of it. You run out of challenges...then what?

- Random Thought after a long time

Had to post something to keep this blog alive.

The Last Snore Bender

2010-07-10T11:26:00.009+05:30

There are times when life's decisions are to be made with pure impulse and instinct. When that gut feeling exudes from your solar plexus with the feeling of pure conviction. That split second thought in your head and your decisions are made. The right ones.
Then it happened.
The Last Airbender!

If anyone asked you to describe the experience of watching this movie you'd stammer your ass off since it is then that you realize you feel the complete lack of a knowledge of the sheer number of expletives you might need to verbalize your feelings. In a nutshell it's like being told by the oracle that you're the chosen one, and hence you're all happy and dandy walking down merry street. When suddenly she calls you up and adds an important fact that you're the chosen one to be taekwando flying kicked by 37 red assed baboons who are wearing spiked heels on their new shoes while kicking you in the balls. Oh, and plus you're naked. That's when you tell the oracle what to shove up where.
The only difference here is that there was no oracle. The kicks to balls were much of a surprise.

When last year the promos for the movie came out, I was in awe. I waited like a 16 year old twilight fan who waits for edward cullen to sneeze in her general direction just to share something 'personal and intimate'. That's when the posters and the trailer/teasers looked compelling.

Now how cool is that!

The story is based on a popular nickelodeon series named Avatar:The Last Airbender. Now since Mr.Night Shyamalan knew he'd be thrashed big time if he went head to butt with James Cameron for his monster 3-D epic, he removed the 'Avatar' from the title and thus saved himself from a T-1000 attack.

If it is any consolation to you, even jake sully found the movie repulsive.

Jake Sully's reaction on The Last Airbender

The story revolves around four nation Earth,Fire,Water and Air nations living in harmony till the...wait for it....THE FIRE NATION screwed things up. Some shit about the spirit world and this world and that world. I'm sorry but I couldn't make out from the people snoring in the theater. Hence people need the airbender called the avatar, who can bend all four elements. He is thawed out from a 100 year cryogenic slumber by a water chic who can 'bend' water and the comic(?) sidekick dude. Now the trio stir shit up freeing people from the enslaved fire colonies because they want to restore balance to the world, save the rainforest or some such shit.

[Interjecting comment:
Q. How did people know Katara(the water chic) was pregnant when she was bending water?
A. Her Water Broke!
]

Now the avatar kid hasn't done his training yet. So he needs to learn how to bend earth,fire and water too. The Fire nation don't like that so much. Coz that would lead them to this :

Fire, Air and Water...check. Guys I need some earth now please!

So the fire nation wants to stop the kid now and bag him so they figh. Blah Blah. The spirit is killed...love is sacrifice shit...i have no clue. I think they could've finished the movie a bit earlier by introducing captain planet fucking shit up and teaching you about proper garbage disposal and recycling.

The guy who made me was seriously color blind!

Still if you do plan to watch the movie I would suggest you watch the 'deadly tape' from The Ring. At least you get a 7 day notice. Hence that relatively would be a slower death than The Last Airbender.

I leave you with Haley Joel Osment's famous words on watching the Last Airbender:

I see dead people...but it's better than watching this movie!

20 seconds

2010-05-01T12:20:00.000+05:30

When there’s a gun pointing to your head, you realize how meaning springs into your life. A sense of predefined purpose which was lost in all the cacophony of living the life “they” wanted you to live. Can you still comprehend what the true desire is? Would you know what you and only you wanted to do in this life. Do those things that come purely from your own desires, without any influence from an outside force. Can you feel the individuality of your purpose?
When there’s a gun pointing to your head, do you feel the insides crack? You feel your arachnophobia or the agoraphobia is now invalid. You are embroiled in the totality of fear, ready to defend your own self from any pinprick of unseen circumstances. Fears melt down to one single existence. The perceptions change from a person who took life for granted to a person who feels the extreme importance in those imperceptible things, the ones that do not come within your definition of life. The little things you tend to miss out while compressing your life in a few flashes before your eyes.
When there’s a gun pointing to your head, what difference does it make? Your hollowed existence sticks out to scream at the insufficiency that you led till now. You never tasted life. You kept it on the side so that you can build and keep building more structure to your life, so that at the end of it all when you feel you have earned it…that’s when you indulge. But why wait when the reward is right in front of you? Why toil to earn it? Do we need to be awarded tokens of acknowledgment from what others think of us? Are we that dependent on others in shaping ourselves? We fail at living. Coz we forgot what it means. It’s now a memory beyond recall. Maybe.
When there’s a gun pointing to your head, whom do you think about the most? Do you think about the love that filled your vacuous existence? Do you think about the ones who loved you? But then why would you think of anyone but yourself. Why think about those who are soon going to be memories? To cushion the oncoming blow by the memories that you thought were “unconditional” and “pure”? Is it that hard to not see yourself reflecting on each one of your actions? To verify how unconditional they were and measure the magnitude of purity that was so obvious. It withers away. It’s not the cynicism, but the harsh reality that you can only be the one person. The one and the individual! Only one.
When there’s a gun pointing to your head, how many questions tend to…
“Done thinking?” The gunman smiled.
“I don’t…I….Not quite.” I stutter.
He slowly moves his hand with gun in his firm grip. His hand slides to his left still in the air. His sleeves flay in the violent wind that lashes the empty landscape. His eye twitches and the right corner of his mouth goes up to take the form of a malicious yet benign smile.
“Do you think this was a joke?” He yells. His face calm.
“I didn’t get the time to think about that.” I regain my ability to speak.
He takes a few steps back. The left hand was still in the air, with the gun pointing west.
His index finger touches the trigger. Even though he was far I could sense the pressure that he applied on the trigger. I could feel it as if it was me doing it. The weight of the gun was in my hand. The bullet that was lodged inside the gun was waiting. The pressure builds up. The trigger was not light. He had to bend his hand to add slow pressure to the finger. My elbow twitched. The trigger was suppressed, but only half way through. It was on the threshold of release. A door was to be opened. Freedom.
He clamped his teeth together with a look of intensity. My jaw was taut. There was an instinctive propensity to release the gun, but my hand shivered. He pointed it at me now. My hand was hovering near my head. The threshold was here. He was not. I was.
The pull was not hard. The gun was a trigger now.
Click.
Silent and Black. No vision. No tunnel.
Just a distant hum escalating as it came nearer. The Doppler.
The upsurge. The crescendo. The climax!
I fell. But I felt it. I felt the ground. All was black, but I still felt the ground.
I fell…and my left leg was the only part that was on the bed.

The Mallu Interview : Part I

2010-03-29T10:51:00.003+05:30

[Recent Interview that might not have happened.]

Interviewer : So then how does it feel being a fraud mallu?

Me : Well, feels nice and dandy. * gleaming smile*

Int. : Ummmm...I was expecting something more actually.

Me : Well to be frank it's an oddly mixed feeling of an outsider coupled with the superiority complex of the fact that I come from a land where the literacy rate is more than 90%. *smug smile*

Although the 'I come from a land...' storytelling startup line is highly irrelevant being born and brought up in the land of cotton/groundnut/'dry freakin state' called Gujarat. And as my only

links to the land of coconuts/backwaters/shakeela are my intermittent yearly commutes to meet my relatives down ~~under.~~ south.

But still, as Charles Unnigopalakrishnan Darwin once stated the famous adage, "Once a mallu, always a mallu!". And hence here I am feeling like a mixed bred, something like a Dachshund, except for

the fact that I don't look like a sausage. But then you arrive at the definition of what a quintessential mallu is like. Since the non mallu demographic would answer that with a mild ramble on the

stereotypical qualities such as a person who is dark,has weird springy hair,pronounces the word M as 'yem'...so on and so forth. But then I would warn people to not to fall into those misleading

and gross assumptions which are mainly targeted at various people for the functioning of this...

Int. : Thank you sir.

Me : But I was ...

Int : Moving on. Did you ever feel out of place living outside of Kerala?

Me : No. Nein. Nae. On the contrary, the instances where I have felt most out of place have been in Mallu land itself. But that is because of the fact that people expect me to be a true mallu over

there and hence that load of expectations makes me self conscious and ergo, makes me feel out of place. But to think of it, there have been times when the gujju populous had dumped me due to my

being from an other state. It might seem primitive, well yes...but this was way back when I was 8 and I was doing these convulsing retarded dance steps at a garba thingy. The mocking laughter that

my gujju compatriots were thoroughly involved in was met by my uttering the defeated war cry 'Amma!'. Talk about sticking out like a sore thumb. *laughs ostentatiously*.
But all in all, I couldn't think of a better place to be in. Except maybe the Bahamas...or Switzerland...or Paris...or Alaska...

Int. : Being a Malayalee yourself, do you tend to mingle more with other Malayalee's? How is the interaction like ?

Me : In a way I have never thought about this much. I never think, 'Hey this guy/girl seems to be a mallu, lets go talk to him/her loudly in Malayalam'. No. I don't do that...and most mallu's

don't. Fraud mallu's that is. Unlike Bongs and the Reddy's we(Fraud mallu's) don't seem to be all that comfortable with our own language that much. Not that it doesn't sound good and all. Ok maybe

it doesn't sound all that great. Not like it's french or something...but still fraud mallus have those parasitic qualities of blending with the host rather seamlessly.
Ok that was a bit of an exaggeration.
That language itself is pretty extensive and confusing. Hence people's 'Teach Me Malayalam like right now' requests are often met with teaching 'What's your name?' in malayalam and leaving it at

that or yelling, "IT HAS 53 LETTERS MAN! WHAT DO YOU EXPECT??".
But my observations have been that most Fraud mallu's turn out to be in those elite classes of people. People such as... *wink wink*

Int. : How was your childhood affected?

Me : Oh! I was slashed with whips everyday by non mallu people and then I was frequently thrown out of schools. I was going to be fed to the sharks at a point by my teachers...well in short, that

is one freakin dumb question!

Int. : A recent article states that Kerala scores the highest alcohol consumption among all other states in India, what are you thoughts on that?

Me : Oh damn! Seriously? Well being in a dry state this is something that...oh god...alcohol...consumption...ummm...do you by any chance happen to have some with you, like right now?

Int. : I beg your pardon?

Me : Ahhh! Nevermind. Well as such, alcohol is a really precious and rare commodity. It's a dry freakin' state man. Ok in some ways that is good. We don't have drunks lying around on the road at

like 7 in the evening. The womenfolk are safe to roam the roads. People here start and end a fight by just pointing fingers at each other. Ummm...well people might call it a sissy place, but hey

it's home right?

Int. : And what about the alcohol, sir?

Me : Appy fizz. Mind over matter. Hope you get it.

Int. : We'll take a short break then?

Me : Certainly!

Cure

2010-01-18T18:13:00.004+05:30

There are days when things aren't going your way.
There have been such days.
Yesterday wasn't one. But that doesn't mean it doesn't matter.
Although yesterday was tiring. In what way?
Hmmm...well I have been pretty social, those are from my poor standards so that might not come up to the collective standards of social-'ness'.
But then I had to roam around pleasing people from every hang out invites. And hence the wandering nomad was 'busy'.
Felt drained at the end of the day. A bit strung out in a way.

I reach home.
Slouch on the big leather cushion that was my sofa.
Making random contemplative thoughts in my head in order to keep it busy from the withdrawal symptoms of being suddenly idle.
That sudden emptiness strikes you then.

The thing that happens at the end of a big event. Yes it is technically a withdrawal syndrome of a euphoria of a passing event.
Like goin on a trip with friends for the weekend and then suddenly getting back to work on a monday.
That feeling.

What could be the cure?
I am no Doctor Phil, but then a voice from a kitchen beckoned me.
An invitation to the dinner table.
And there it was. The cure, on the table.
No ayurveda. No homeopathy. No allopathy.
Three words: Mom made Spaghetti.

And that was it. The joy was back in my eyes.
(I think a tear rolled past my cheek).
And I was jumping like a six year old who got the remote controlled car he wished for.

Minutes later I was wiping the plate clean (which is considered pretty rude in China, or so I have read)...the foodie high was on.

-
Spaghetti Junkie

Shopping and the art of standing like a coat rack

2010-01-16T09:58:00.004+05:30

So there I was, in the womens section for ethnic wear. Staring at all shapes and colors of cloth cutouts designed to look whatever their definition of "ethnic" was. My sister was in the trial room for what seemed like hours to me, or probably somewhere down the line my idleness was so causal that it tore through the fabric of space-time creating a localized worm hole thus trapping me in a time loop of painstaking idleness.

All my idleness didn't go in complete vain though. I was proud to learn a thing about myself - I have PATIENCE! Although I don't know the collective magnitude of what and how much of patience justifies the word to be written in caps...but hey, I do have it.

The thing is I had to play the role of the faithful driver for my sis who has a deadline for her shopping dates and items. I prefer chauffeur...no wait...I prefer being called the transporter. Gives me that Jason Statham-esque Mercedes driving image kicking some ass on the way.

Which is the exact opposite of what I'm doing right now.

Now one thing I noticed is how women shop. When when you see a woman shop...you realize that men don't actually shop. They pick up stuff. Shopping is this whole art consisting of various sub branches and psychological nuances and all sorts of meticulous data you can put in. And my sister is not a woman when it's shop time. She has the masculine ability of getting bored while shopping...and that too within the initial few minutes. Although this would go in the 'pros' list when it comes to me being the 'transporter'...her methodical perseverance and dedication is a total let down thats scrawled all over the 'cons' list.

The following observations are on the various women I have observed shopping while standing like a dork in the ladies section.

-Women come.

-Go through all the sections once.

-Think about all the sections.

-Think about what others would think about the clothes in those sections.

-Short list a few clothes in order to give some hope to the guy who works at the store.

-Shatter his hopes by rejecting all the clothes that the woman had just short listed in order to experiment on a fresh batch.

-Through this process the locations do change from one shop to another.

-There is no accurate finalization...only and approximation of what they think is close to perfection. This condition is highly dependent on whether they find the 'Ohthatdress!'.

(The 'Ohthatdress!' usually occurs when women spot some dress which is something that they were predetermined about since it would have been worn by someone else such as a friend or a celebrity...or some influential woman)

-After the process which spans a few hours that casualty report might consist of only a handful of or no particular clothing. (If the budget is not an issue the woman might come out with bags weighing more than the woman herself). [m_woman>m_{bags when t_{current time}>>t_saturation]}

[note:1. This is a vast field of study, my points are a crude generalization of my own observations.

2. These points are strictly limited to shopping of clothing, things like cosmetics and perfumes require yet another flow chart though the process remains somewhat the same.]

The pick it up men method :

-Go to shop.

-Go through all/most/very little of the stuff once.

-Decide on the basis of budget first, then liking.

-Pick it up.

Finish.

It may seem I'm being violently sexist here, but I condemn none of the methods. Both are equally bad in a way. One is too meticulous and the other has the complete lack of it.

There has to be some fine balance.

Hence my conclusion is if you go to shop...go with a gay dude. That's a balance.

The blogger returns...again

2009-11-12T20:56:00.003+05:30

I've been having a massive case of writer's block lately which has catapulted me into this unwanted sense of laziness to pen down not even a single thought running through my head. After half an hour of the mental anguish of making decisions no matter how trivial they may be, writing this post has been a result of some tremendously redundant over-thinking.

First things first, this is not the first time. As observed from the frequency of my posts, which have a tendency to appear as spasmodic bursts scattered unevenly on the blog time line I have no such pang of regret on being irregular.

Deux. I have been feeling pretty disconnected with a few people including the mental personification of this blog lately for unknown reasons. Well the more I delay my 'confession time' acts the less is the probability of it showing up in any conversation (even the ones I have with myself). So even sharing a thought has been rendered a sinful deed somehow with the whole screwed up moral and conscience issues in my head. I'm already the Ebenezer Scrooge for this winter it seems.

Tres. I have been through a lot lately, and with each passing chronicle, which I always plan to pen down on the blog... it ultimately results in failure to launch. And sadly I think I forgot more than half of what I was to write.

Well one main thing that has happened lately was playing and touring with a band. Although the word 'touring' maybe a bit of an exaggeration, it still counts legit.

The two places of the tour have been IIT Kanpur and BITS Pilani. Two of india's top (10/20?) institutions. Between the two band competitions we had a 5 day stay in Delhi which was an adventure in itself. There were some really great times when we would end up laughing so long as to literally rolling on the floor with our hands over our stomachs...to the times were our faces would be painted with all shades of melancholy and loss. Met some really great people, whose lives put in one word I would gladly confess - envious! On the other hand there were people with attitudes and egos the size of which would have been a highly arduous task to measure.

Though one point clearly stood out,which is nothing new actually, about the fact that I always tend to mingle/interact with people older than me. The fact that after a point in the 20's the age gap(usually ones of 2-10) years melt down and doesn't matter much, or so I have observed has some part to play...but still I have a natural affinity to a more mature populous. Cough, I'm 21 dammit!

The one good thing about these band competitions and the people in it was the fact that in our country the whole "rock scene" and the participating people are a pretty small minority. And that somehow tends to bring people together. I was on the bass for these two shows and my bass guitar failed me twice by refusing to let out a single wavelength of sound. And the best part is both these times we had some or the other rocker playing the role of a good Samaritan willing to lend us a bass guitar for our performance. The first show in Kanpur when the bass died down, the winning band(Weapon Shop,Kolkota) volunteered to help and lent us their bass for the gig. There were band members who we would talk to, give wishes and hugs to and still not know their names. It was that feeling of belonging and being one with the whole crowd where you need not be afraid to express who you are and what your choices have made you. There was this mysterious sense and feeling of freedom. Although it wasn't all love and roses as it sounds.

Then there were times when I got piss drunk and FUBAR, which as I look back now were some pretty hilarious scenarios. Went through some really shitty times right after that, which I guess might just be a notch above the thin red line that says 'barely mentionable things'.

The travel, which somehow seemed a lot more than it should have. The boredom and the stagnancy of a commute.

And as for the one thing that was constant throughout - the bandmates. The four of us were an eclectic mix of different backgrounds and age groups, the youngest being 17 and the oldest 27 but still bound together with the same way of music and some disastrously unthinkable jokes which somehow managed to entertain a wide audience of people.

Well thats all the verbosity I can afford for now!

8765 hours

2009-09-13T13:14:00.003+05:30

A month from now my college going days will soon be crashing through the finish line. Although I've still got a year left, but the last semester is a project/training semester (or so we are informed!).
A month! Come to think of it thats nothing compared to the last three years I've gone through.

Then It hit me. Three Years.
So much has happened within these three years. Yet at this point all I can hear is the rapid whooshing sound of the years passing me by.
Which again struck me as an ironic fact! I was never really all that fond of my not-so-perfect alma mater. I have been pretty vocal(well,in blog sense) about it on this post three years ago. And now here I am. I actually remember writing that post. I remember that each day of college in my first year...regretting each time I stepped off my college bus. The College entrance always had some symbolic congruence to Lord Sauron's Mordor, which was ~~totally~~...well partially a mental projection. Each long day, counting how long it would take to get out of there. Each minute which lasted an hour, an hour that went on for a day...you get my point.

Again I come to the point of Adaptability, how things started changing once I started accepting what they were. I tried to rebel out by giving entrance tests again in my first year...I got a few places in B'lore. Something stopped me back. And the fact that I did not regret it was the best part.
No, not coz I started liking the institution a lot more. Frankly I still resent the way it still runs. But then I had to embrace the crap within and carry on with whatever that was around me. Life went on.

36 months have passed by.
After being through all that shit. The depression I caught on the first year, the smoking, threats of getting detained due to low attendance in every sem, the absence of any real tutelage, the people who weren't on the same plane of understanding... and then I got used to it.
Thats actually an amazing thing about human nature...put in any rut where things which might be of intense dislike, we get desensitized^*. And it happened well. I was numb to all of it...it barely mattered then.

And here I am, at a point where my status has metamorphosed from 'growing up' to 'grown up'(actually that point is still on debate with my parents).Am i actually standing on the precipice of taking 'that plunge' into the big bad world?

I remember a year back I was talking to Dagny, having a conversation about the same thing when her going to college days were about to end. I still remember how I was talking about it and projecting myself on that situation. Somehow when it comes to projecting the past or the future we tend to romanticize things a bit more that required. But those evolve to dreams, don't they?

I have no clue what lies ahead.
I can't say I am prepared.
But I'm just a Dreamer, and I'm good at it!

^* - not everytime

Verbal throw up

2009-08-09T01:45:00.002+05:30

When was the last time you felt low?

When was the last time you felt like things were in your grasp and you let it go?

Feeling ignored?
Frustrated?
Deserted?

I knew what things are and where they belong. Yet there are some things beyond our control. Things which cannot be changed. And then you have to stand and face them for what they are. It fascinating when you see the halo...but then it fades to black when you spot the horns.

It's actually tempting to fall in love. To go to that feeling of being cared and caring for. That big soft huge ball of happiness innocuous as it may seem. Tempted to share. Create a bond.

But reality know where to hit. That ball only had the outer coating of happiness, maybe its hollow or bitter inside. Who knows?

I'm scared sometimes of how dense my thoughts become.
But I'm happy for that fact that I can see something without clouding my sense of judgement (for the moment).
Things can never be absolutely partitioned in a good/bad happy/sad way.
The spectrum is what intrigues me, and exploring it is fun I guess.

[Please note that the post has been written in a soporific state. Incoherences might be very common and complete absolute accuracy would be totally accidental.]

Random Thoughts

2009-06-07T01:21:00.002+05:30

Thought(s) 1 :

Moral Perception -

The most ambiguous yet ubiquitous property. A person's conscience has a great deal of affect over his/her actions effectively prodding the evermost pertinent/trivial question of 'What is the meaning of life?'. Could be considered as a crux of a relationship. The congruence of its properties could be or is the most vital thing linking a set of people.

Example :

"I could actually kill someone to have that chocolate cake tart!!!"

"Here...I had the knife in my bag. Just wipe off the blood please!"

"Ummm...ok!"

Ok, maybe not a valid example. But get's the point through. Doesn't it?

Familiarity -

The art of finding commonalities between a person and another person or an object/place. Familiarity is a comforting component to the recipe of 'inertia of (drastic) change'. A violent or extreme change would heighten a person's senses to find the most familiar substance/property around him/her. Change might bring inexperience along with it and so in order to find that already attained experience a person resorts to finding familiarities. Things looks less clueless then.

Example -

Going out for a drive to someplace and finding a classmate who you barely know, and yet greeting him/her with the warmth of a friend whom you have known since long. (possible hyperbole used)

Knowledge -

A superior fundamental element which changes with perception and would be best understood as a "common understanding" of observations. 'Ignorance is bliss' is a superflous adage just to the comfort of people who were/are too lazy to acquire that required knowledge or too intimidated to face the blatant reality of what it brings.

Example -

"Hey! You're playing the wrong scales. Sharpen the last note and the third last so that its an A Phrygian and the next chord would be a diminished not a minor!!"

"Eh? IS that even a language?"

"I'm telling you what I know. Period."

"Ignorance is bliss!"

Thought 2:

Although there is almost everything you have in life for the taking, achieving all that's possible and impossible. But the things in life which you can't have are the bitter pills to swallow. We are always told that nothing is impossible. It is the best encouragement statement there is, which would motivate people to unachievable targets and people get through. But it also shatters the fact that you can't always get what you want which is built to high expectations with the previous "encouraging statement". Sometimes what you have and what you want can be two really mutually exclusive things!

Jaago Grahak...Jaago

2009-05-21T19:15:00.000+05:30

Yaaay! Elections are over.
Yaaay! We Have a new UPA government.
Yaaay! Manmohan got new glasses. No he didn't. Just takin the excitement a notch higher.
Yaaay! Rahul Gandhi...something about youth...blah blah.

OK SHUT UP!

For those who consciously bared witness the ushering in of the fresh new UPA (or is it?) government without the usual love-hate "allies" latching on, it might indeed be good news for India.
We have no Laloo in the Union cabinet.
Mayawati's not the PM. (like you were gonna! HA!)
CPM made a mark through its campaigns similar to what Bhojpuri movies make in hollywood.
Congress in Uttar Pradesh(!!!) because of Rahul Gandhi's strategic(/purely accidental) tactics.
BJP with the same fate as Virender Sehwags hair. (BALD PATCH AHEAD, buy new caps ASAP)
Blah blah...I can go on about the aftermath.

But the thing is people praising about Manmohan's Singhs greatness. Making him sound like a Superman who eat's Kryptonite for breakfast. "The most responsible, calm, intelligent..." and what not cliches used to describe his victory. Ok yeah! We get it...you won. But lets not go overboard with it.
You've seen the visuals on TV. You be the judge. I mean look at the man! He looks like a senile lost rabbit who just forgot where he put his carrots. And you surely know who has all the carrots right?
NO?

Lemme give you some visual aid.
(Also, lets play a game here.)

SPOT THE DIFFERENCE :

"CARROTS! CARROTS! CARROTSS!!!"

"I have THIS huge a box of carrots for you Manny! THIS HUGE!"

First of all, If you think I took the first photo and flipped it horizontally and changed the hue-saturation levels...you are certainly thinking what I thought in the first place. But sadly thats not the case!

Before you scream, "Thats a bloody Carbon Copy!"...may I interject by pointing out that these are taken from the times of India, two separate issues. So next morning you wake up and see the same thing maybe flipped vertically, don't act surprised you might see a lot of similar photos through these days at different angles.

Coming back to the content...look at the guy. Do you even remotely think he's taking his own decisions. I bet even when he wants to go to the loo he might ask Sonia Gandhi, "Ma'am! May I go to the bathroom!".
I can give you more photographic proof but that might make me look really desperate about this whole thing and plus i guess these two are good enough to make a point.

Oh and yeah! Also the tale of the brave knight Rahul Gandhi himself. Now since the guys at Times are as jobless as me they asked celebs on what they would expect on a date with Rahul Gandhi...
(how do these guys know what we want in the papers man...i bet they have a mind reading device!).

I wont jot down the whole thing, but here are a few quotes:

Sonam Kapoor : "If I do get the chance to date him, I would spend the time applauding his courage in trying to lead our country..."

My View : This is a clear indication that Sonam Kapoor know squat about dating. Imagine you doing that on your date. Your guy/gal walks in and you start applauding like a maniac who lost his/her freaking mind, your date covers and rolls to the nearest exit. Thanks Sonam!

Shveta Salve : "He is half-Italian and half-Indian. So even the date turns out to be as cheesy as a lasagne, I’m sure he will have the tadka of a dal fry to spice it up! "

My View : Off all the sex euphemisms you could use, WHY THIS! Why?? Although few brownie points for thinking that up. I'm seriously getting some screwed up visions about this one.

Mugdha Godse : "On a date with Rahul Gandhi, I would expect my political knowledge would get an update..."

My View : Is that why you date people?? My Goodness! Get a book!

You can find the other blabberings here : link

So since the elections are over now, should it be 'So jaao India' ?
Just Speculating!

I Pee L

2009-05-18T21:18:00.000+05:30

Disclaimer : This post was not a premeditated one. So in case of any factual errors or disappointing/disagreeing opinions, please feel free to crap on the comments box!

Now the gentleman's game or 'cricket' as we call it has been in existence since the 16th century. So you can visualize a group of English going out on a huge field trip and an exuberant gentleman remarking,"Ah! Blimey Sir, but we've colonized so much till now. How shall we make use of this lovely ground?...May I say, a recreational activity where you can bask in the glory of the sun all day while some bloke throws a ball to another bloke at the other end trying to save himself with a piece of wood?"
And the reply was,"Jolly good! Right Ho! Splendid! Now the name of the game shall be whatever insect I step on within the next five minutes!"

And thus the glorious conception.
Thats when the English knew that they can kick anyone's asses just by challenging people to this game. Unfortunately decades later a bloke named Bhuvan and Jagmohan Dalmia's ancestors proved them wrong. [Source: The historically accurate documentary'Lagaan'. {note: Woh itihas ke panno mein kho gayi!}].

A few centuries down the line...the one day international was born. Still not with the same conceptional gloriousness the original "Test" cricket had...the fever caught on and hence started matches which only lasted a day! Now the human mind has a tendency to get bored of whatever good is thrown at him(/her) and thus forces creativity. With the similar concept in mind, an entrepreneur dude got the idea of a bitchin bastardization of the game that might stick well with the current "impatient" generation. Talk about getting more than you ask for. The MODIfication (pun) proved right, and spawn an altogether new sport it did!

Now allow me to digress from all that verbiage thrown above and get straight to the teams. Here they are(in no particular order):

1.Chennai Super Kings :
Its surprisingly the most balanced team of all, although the same cannot be said about their consistence it does come in in one of the four strongest teams and screams "challenge" in the face of its opponents.

For the batting...Mathew Hayden comes out as a one man army analogous to Schwarzennegger wiping out an army in 'Commando'. With an unchallenged consistency he has been the undisputed owner of the Orange Cap! Standing in his shadow we have Suresh Raina and Badrinath alongwith the not so shining throughout the tournament M.S.Dhoni.

For the bowling we have a revelation with the name that sounds more like Ducati...Shadab Jakati. You then have the finger lickin one headed ravan Murlitharan,I'll be Morkel,'I still kick ass' Balaji and Sudeep Tyagi who have played their parts well to put up where the team currently is!
Fun Fact : There is an all rounder in the team called...and I shit you not...Napolean Einstien. Now lemme tell you, that the name is enough to make the opposition quiver with fear!

2.Delhi Daredevils :
Fortunately we didn't have the thums up stealing Akshay Kumar to come and pretend to love the team. Thank you very much. Now this team started with its ups and downs. Somehow managed to brave the IPL ocean currents and come out as the current victors of the game. But it aint over until the Fat Lady sings...or Jayalalitha...whatever...they still have a lot to go through.

Batting, well...Sehwag and Gambhir might have appeared in more advertisements than the scores the tried to amass. AB de Villiers, shining at will otherwise volatile with his bat hasn't had much to brag about...but still makes up as an integral part of the team. Dilshan...well he's the savior of this team both in terms of batting and bowling which makes him the most valuable asset for DD.
No Collingwood throughout the matches, somethings fishy!

Bowling : Now this is a tricky part...we have Vettori, Nannes, and McGrath. Thats the semantic equivalent of roti,kapda aur makaan in bowling terms. Yet No McGrath throughout the tournament. Are you insane,man? I mean yeah...save the best for the last...but not to the point that it rots and is rendered unpalatable! Whatever the strategy is...it better be good, coz it doesn't look so pretty on the outside! Coming back we have Amit Mishra, Delicate darling Nehra and the 'scary eyes medusa' bhatia in on the aggressive attack. All in all a good team...with few minor glitches maybe.

3.Deccan Chargers :
Again showing the true spirit of Aussie sensationalism we have Adam Gilchrist launching sixes at the opposition as if 'retirement' actually meant 'rebirth'! Gilly has been the scud for the team and never will you see anyone else's face lit up with such enjoyment of the game as this guy.And then we have Symonds(minus the bob marley hair) with full on aussie support. We then have Hershcelle Gibbs coming out from alcohol addiction,a failed marriage and a depression to have a cracking start which eventually got a bit subdued mostly with the unending battle with his inner demons! We then have...oh sorry...HAD...VVS Laxman, who still finds it tough grasp the difference between T20 and 5day test cricket.Dwayne Smith and Rohit Sharma as supplements to Gilly's battering aggression. Rao, a person who hasnt yet shown his true potential!

Bowling...well nothing spectacular comes to mind but we have Ojha,Harmeet Singh and Vaas on the attack. So it's not as if it's weak...just not eye catching enough!
But then there's RP Singh, getting hit badly but taking wickets at the same time thus unifying the win lose ratio.
Now remember this is the team that suffered quite a punching last IPL and to come out shedding old skin and jumping in Phoenix Style is a truly remarkable feat...so three cheers for them!

4.Kings XI punjab :
To start off with this team...i'm fed up of 'Marry me priety' posters people violently exhibit in front of Mess Vadia(or whatever his name is) not because i respect her...just coz the flag waving pseudo enthusiasm gets on your nerves. Well, cant help it. Just shoot me.
Anyways we have Yuvi the dude with a hat trick under his belt and a batting performance with an on/off switch.
Katich adding a huge value to the teams net worth.
Sohal,Goel and Bopara...doing their thing...whatever that is!
Mr breakdancing hotheaded Sree Sant with a bowling with an economy rate of 8.8 which is a clear indication that he gotta takes some time off from practicing those groovy steps.
Sangakkara and Jayawardene( keepin the Sri Lankan spirit alive and pushin the team at places really needed.
Sunglasses power man Powar making his presence felt in a good/bad way.
Wikin Mota, with the most unfortunate surname that makes having six pack ab's a waste!
And Jr Pathan, not shining as well as he used to. Probably some sibling overshadowing going on.
And the coach, the towering Tom Moody, with his usual "Moody" looks. If you know what i mean. *wink wink*

5.Mumbai Indians :
Now the first thing that comes to your head on hearing the team is : Sachin Tendulkar. Probably followed by Sanath Jayasurya. Probably followed by Luke Ronchi...ok maybe not that.
But it ain't the same for me. Its Jean Paul Duminy. He's the man who you can visualize tellin the little master to not worry much, with an 'i'm here' reassuring look on his face. It might sound like an exaggeration but he has proved his mettle pretty well.
Then you have Abhishek Nayar sometimes makin Tendu and Sanath look like dumbasses for flaunting the '20 years experience' tag throwing mud at their faces with some really interestin batting.
Dhawal Kulkarni, well looks like a kid who got the wrong address and just got lucky.
Lasith Malinga...well personally I find his bowling action really really weird...as if at some point he's actually conspiring to hit the umpire on the back of the head with the ball. But he's clawed way up to the food chain with Terminator-esque execution style.
Bravo...not with the same juice he had last time maybe...but still worth being in.
Bhajji...probably done more with the bat than the ball!
Zaheer Khan...injured. All i can say!

Now watching Mrs.Ambani sitting in the team dug out next to zaheer khan everytime can seem a bit unsettling. Especially when Zaheer might be saying something to some other guy... like, "Hey you know what...this cheerleader girl just bent her back in front of me and...*notices Mrs.Ambani*...I covered her up with a blanket for hurting the indian tradtion!Gulp!"

6. Rajasthan Royals :
I can't say a lot coz there is only one word(rather two) which says it all :
Shane Warne
2 more words, and we have :
Yusuf Pathan

Yes, warne...however quirky his sexual romps might have been throught his love/lust life...he proves he cant be forgotten so easily. And with a captain having the potential of sewing up the threads of the team to create an iron armor...cant imagine anyone else.

Q> What do you get when you hypnotize a batsman to believe that he's always playing with a tennis ball?
A> Yusuf Pathan

We have Smith and Macarena's(apology for the spelling) acting as mere props to fill in the "international" valence gap.
Naman Ojha with his irritating war cries just near the middle stump mic makes you think of doing some ugly things to make him stop. But a decent enough player.
Kamran Khan,an absolute delight but pushed away due to the doubtful action was a bit of a disappointment.
Others have played their parts and im partly sleepy. Zzzzzz!
Oh yeah guess who the head coach is : Shane Warne.
And we are also treated to some eye-candy(?), the shitty sisters : Shilpa and [damn i forgot her name]!

7.Royal Challengers :
At first when I heard Pietersen was on as the Captain i let out an ecstatic yelp of joy with the sensational vibrancy of something like "Here comes our savior!". And boy! was I wrong!
Although he looked really convincing holding the team together and pushing them to victory it just didnt click.
And then he left...with a notice tho!
And hence stepped in Jumbo. Yeap...Mr.Kumble reignited the flames of victory(or any other lame use of adjective) to actually give some hope to the 'used to losing' players of the RC team.
First match...5 wickets. 5 runs. Unimpossible...even if thats not a word. He couldve coined it!
Though later on, they had their share of defeats the team hasnt let their guard down and yet emerges victorious in some battles.
Kallis proving that he's not all that old and redeeming himself from last years failure to launch.
Dravid...again a player who's proving the age limit is a joke and hence putting all his experience to play with some sensational batting strokes!
Kohli, although a player with a lotta potential hasnt yet made the required mark and so is expected to push the envelope as an individual player!
Praveen Kumar and Vinay Kumar...they have played their part well...yet again great potentials.
The stunner of them all for me...RV der Merwe, the catches,the batting and a bit of bowling...he has been a hidden key to unlock some mysterious victories for the RC.

All in all the team is not actually that well balanced and still has a long way to go to acquire a branded recognition...but for me it is personally my favorite team probably because of the underdog feeling for them that I have. And maybe as a thanks to Mr.Mallaya to bring to life the kingfisher calenders! Bless his soul!
Fun fact : J.Kallis' sister is a cheerleader for the IPL!

8.Knight Riders :
What do I say! This team needs an entirely different blog post. And devote myself I will.
You can actually visualize SRK waking up every day comforting himself that it was just a dream and then ripping the sports page to pieces a few minutes later!
Every group has its whipping boy, and that role has been faithfully played by the KKR.
Being the people spending maximum bucks on ads,songs,and misc. you gotta have some pity for these guys for managing only one victory and a half due to the Duckworth Lewis rule.
Depressing. Pathetic. Sad.
And no. This time its not the players to blame.
There's a ring master with a mad scientist methodology : Buchhanan!
Cheers, for singlehandedly ruining a team!
More to come on this.

In the end, the biggest thing about the IPL is the sheer unity of the teams being from separate nations.
Its like Marthin Luther King Jr.'s "I have a dream" on steroids.
Nowhere else will you see Murlitharan Hanging out with Hayden...or Bret Lee high fiving Yuvraj singh!
Now that's a game.
And the Cheerleaders of course!

It's the heat!!!

2009-05-12T12:25:00.003+05:30

It's funny how at this time of the year for the inability of any action you don't need to grope for a wide spectrum of reasons for what/who to put the blame on.

"It's the heat!" you hearing echoing through each corner of the society.

And the heat it is! And in this summer time, the time when you're supposed to kick back and relax in an AC room or a hill station, here I am planning out on my one month long 'study leave'. Call it reading vacation, prepatory leave, study holidays...but the term 'study leave' has its own charm for it is filled with hope by the simple inversion of it's terms = leave study!

And at times when holding a matchstick outside is sufficient enough to ignite it, you start craving for the winter cold (which seems like an impossible event with this magnitude of heat). So when all fails and the concentration levels of your actions tend to linger near the zero mark, thats when "Its the heat!" accusation is yelled out in defense.

'Why aren't you studying?' . 'It's the heat!'

'Dude, you didn't show up at the 2 o clock meet'. 'It's the heat!'

'Why didn't you call me yesterday?'. 'It's the heat!'

'Who put this damn thing here?'. 'It's the heat!'

Okay, so maybe not the last one. But still you get my point.

And my theory on a weight loss program is just to stand out for a while in the sun to bask in the treatment of immediate sublimation. Although, side effects may vary from throbbing headaches and parital bright spots on you retina! But hey, everything has a price to pay. Better than going through the miraculous hogwash shown on the local teleshopping network, eh? *nudge nudge*

As you can see this post was just a filler to bridge the previous post and the upcoming post to avoid an extending the period of time between the two. And...I had nothing better to do,so here I am.

"Nothing better to do?" you say, "There's so much to do!"

"It's the heat!" I point and laugh at the sun.

[Note: Why call it the 'heat wave'...why not the 'heat particle'? Doesn't the dual nature exist here? Try standing outside in the heat for a while...doesn't it feel like tiny balls of fire being thrown at you? That's particle nature my friend. And now's the time where I give Louis De Broglie a hypothetical Hi five!]

main(Episode_2)

2009-04-27T11:59:00.004+05:30

All variables appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real operands, active or freed, is purely coincidental.

malloc(sizeof(x));

X : I'm baaaack Y. I'm sorry I...y?

Y??

Y?????

Y, answer me!!!

Where in the name of bool are you!!

Z : playsound(whistle.wav);

X : Z???

Z : Hey ma variable from another initialization! What's the latest?

X : Z?? Is that really you??

Z : bool man...you look like you just saw a constant!

X : I thought you were...

Z : I'm as assigned as I was, short int-y!

X : Look Z, I can't seem to find Y. I fear she's with i.

Z : i , eh? nasty looper that int!

X : Z!! What do i do now?

Z : I might just know where I is. Let's move...

x++;

z++;

(X and Z reach an unknown function call)

Z : I think that's where he is. There's only room for one formal parameter!!! I guess you should go in. I'm sure that's where i is.

X : Thanks Z. And Z...in case i'm not returned...tell q that I miss her.

Y : What in the name of bool are ya saying! q? The one with the ego the size of an array???

X : Just tell her that...

Z : X, you're such a pointer!!!

X : I'm goin in Z. And stay away from '#define'!!

(X goes in the function call and finds i. Y is next to i, seemingly unassigned.)

i : Welcome X, I have been waiting for a while( ).

X : i!!! I knew i'd find you here hiding inside a....

i : Was it you who knew or Z. Dont mock my registers X, I know.

X : I'm here to rescue Y.

Y : X, i saved me from a total execution.

X: i what??

i : X, its a pity you see the programme in black and white. Just because i'm an unsigned int doesn't make me inevitably negative!

X : But but....why did you bring her here?

i : Funny things an int needs to do to have a good chat with an old friend.

X : What do you mean?

i : X, tellme...do you think this programme is reality? It's absolute? What if I told you there are programmes beyond this one...a mesh, a web! Is this programme all you can C?

X : I've been having this feeling in my head for a while...

i : Exactly X. That's why I wanted you here. You have control, you have the assigning power! There is a script written for us...but what if you can go against that script! Do what you actually really want and not rely on an 'if' or a 'while-do' condition. You are The One X. The chosen variable. And it's through you that we be free from this programme.

X : But who has all these strings? Who is the one who controls all this?

i : The architect....the Programmer! We have been enslaved through compiler directives and parse structures since ages, it's time now for... freedom.

X : Why me? Why not you?

i : I'm merely a looping variable X. My powers are limited. I've seen a lot till now, but I had no control. It's upto you now. You are The One! I'll leave you with Y now.

Y : X! I believe in you. I've felt it in my registers. You were always unique.

X : I donno Y. This is all too much for me to load.

Y : It's okay X. i is concerned about you, but he truly believes in you.

X : I can't say. Please let's just return from this function.

(X and Y return and find q in the next instruction line.)

q : X!!! You're back. Z told me all that you said.

X : What??

q : I missed you too!

Y : X! What is all this???

X : ....

[Duh duh duhhhh. Will X get out of this unconditional loop? Will he meet the architect?.

Bookmark this page for the next episode of main()!!!]

main(Episode_1)

2009-04-05T00:59:00.004+05:30

All variables appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real operands, active or freed, is purely coincidental.

X : Hello?

Y : Hey, it's me. Ring any bells?

X : Y? Is that you?

Y : Holy De Morgan! You remember!

X : Well, the results of the last equation with you are still in me. Haven't been evaluated since you see.

Y : You gotta be kidding me!

X : Somehow, now I'm embarrassed that I used that as a startup line for our conversation.

Y : Ha! That's breaking the ice...no actually...its more like melting it,solidifying it and then breaking it with a hammer.

X : Am I supposed to feel flattered or feel like a null set.

Y : Depends on your modus operandi!

X : Certainly not an ∩.

Y : I see. You're avoiding the questions about how many you had a U with?

X : You talk to me after all these unused algorithms i've been through and that's you main concern. Sheesh! You're such a short int!

Y : Shutup! I'm a double float now remember.

X : Yeah Right! You always end up confusing me about yourself. Feel like a pointer.

Y : Please change the topic.

X : All right. Met up with Z lately?

Y : Z!!! Oh haven't seen him around for a long time. Must have been defined as a constant.

X : Horrible that sounds. What if we end up like that?

Y : Oh C'mon! You know how dependent people are on us! I mean think of it. If it's not us, then who?

X : There's the a,b and c people, ain't there. There's those p,q,r snobs too. God! I'm glad I survived that last stack call with q. She acts as if she's an array or something!

Y : Them don't even stand a chance!

X : What's with the language? Who have you been assigned with lately?

Y : Lets not talk about it!

X : It was a loop with i isn't it?

Y : X, please. It was a mistake. Just a bug.

X : I've had it! I can't take this anymore!

free(x);

Y : X!!! X!!! You can't do this to me! Oh no!!

for(;y>0;y--);

[Duh duh duhhhh! Will X come back before Y's total execution???
RSS Feed to the next episode of main()!!! ]

?

2009-03-29T15:47:00.003+05:30

There's a choice.

You can either have nothing or everything.

The thing is nothing and everything of both is not possible. It's ideal.

So dealing it with a pragmatic approach might seem impractical.

Like the grass being greener on the other side without a validation of your own reality.

But the choice still holds. The question remains.

Dichotomy!

'Paranoia is total awareness!'

Inbox(1)

2009-03-22T17:05:00.003+05:30

Guess what! Check this out...

In case the text is not clearly visible, here's what my inbox is adorned with...

FaceBook Social Profile writes to me

"In total, you were reviewed for dating 19 times and one person expressed interest in you.

You are more desirable than 48% of 47,204,370 people."

WOW!!! Now doesn't that make me feel special!!

Certainly it does.

Suddenly you give me a quizzical look and utter an almost audible "Why?".

I burst out in mocking laughter with the air of 'being desired by people' haughtiness.

"Silly!" I poke thee.

Here's Why...

Now,

World Population = 6,768,269,319 (link)

People I'm more desirable than = 48% of 47,204,370 people

= 22658097.6 people

Thus I'm more desirable than 1/300th of the people out there!!

Whoa!!

Its like being a celebrity...well without the limo's and the champagne or whatever...!!

Thank you for making my day facebook(TM)!

Thank you indeed!!

Top 10 ways to break it up

2009-03-10T12:27:00.021+05:30

Now AskMen.com had an article recently titled

'Top 10 : Worst Ways to Break up with a Woman'. (link).

Now I am no expert in this field of study, nor am I a professional critic to point out the mistakes the article had. But my opinion was about one thing the article lacked...which was of providing an examplary scenario so that the reader could relate to it.

Now since I am good at ignoring the truckloads of work that I've got pending in order to do stuff that I really want to...here I am helping out the universe in this personal conquest of asserting my opinions through the power of words!

I suggest you read the article first in order to have comprehensive idea of the random shit that I write!

The two main characters used her would be 'bunty'(the dude) and 'pinky'(the dudette) instead of the mundane 'girl1' and 'boy1' nomenclatures.

Here are the top 10:

10. Under the influence

[Bunty and Pinky are in the 'hippest' of bars in their city. Bunty is "under the influence" of something other than Pinky.]

Bunty : Yo honey bunny, drink and be merry!

Pinky : You never call me that!!!

Bunty : (laughs for the next half n hour) oh yeah! Now I remember. *hic*

Pinky : So what was is you wanted to tell me that was soooo important?

Bunty : You know. About life and various theories...about the birds and the bees...the hippo's in the grass...the porsche's in the barn....you get my drift, eh?

Pinky : Eh?

Bunty : Yes thats it. Also wanted to talk about....wait I need three more pegs....WOOHHHHOOOOOO!!!

Pinky : God! You're just so drunk right now. I cant talk to you!

[Pinky storms away.]

Bunty : NOOOOOOOOOOOOO......ok. Woooooooohhhhhhhoooooooooo!

Half n hour later Bunty sends the following text message :

'V nid 2 bake up n ptx atj, lyf ir shott. mklkhj hjsfhl qerlhs.'

'Just dont!'

9. With Cliches

[Post confrontation.]

Pinky : WHAT!!! Are you serious???

Bunky : Look its not you. Its me!

Pinky : But you are you, and you're not me. So that still means its you.

Bunty : I mean, we should see other people!

Pinky : Oh but I do. Everyday. I meet up with friends, I go the mall and hang out. I see a lotta people everyday you know. But the mall gets crowded nowadays and so we often....

Bunty : NO NO!! I mean, we're drifting apart.

[Pinky takes a step towards Bunty.]

Pinky : There! solved!

Bunty : NOOO! I mean i'm too confused right now. I need space!

[Pinky takes a step back.]

Pinky : There! Solved again.

Bunky : Goddammit! Lets just be friends ok!

Pinky : Oh cool! Does that mean I get to be at your place more. Awwwww! That'd be cho chweet of you to...

Bunty : I'm gay!

Pinky : ...

'This might help with the last line!'

8. Remotely

[Pen and Paper]

Dear Pinky,

You remember those times when I was there for you and you were there for me and we were there for each other. It was awesome n all, and fun n stuff. You nowadays I'm feeling like a man. Like out into this twilight zone n all that shit. Weird stuff man. You gotta see my room now. Anyways, I have so many things to say...

oh wow! my friends are here. Got no time! Oh by the way, I'm breaking up with you. Take care.

Cheerio,

Buns

[ On IM's ]

Bunty : Listen Im breaking up with you ok. Take this with a pinch of salt. LOL. :)

Pinky is currently offline. She will recieve the messages when she is online.

[ On SMS ]

Lystn, im brkin up wth u. nyc tym. lol. ttyl. g2g.

Remotely! Get it?

7. Mid Date

Bunty : So, hows the paneer?

Pinky : Pretty good. Thank you so much for this buns, it was sweet of you.

Bunty : I wanna have that. Why dont you break-up the paneer into two, coz that way it would be better.

Pinky : Oh...ohhk.

Bunty : Yeah! And break up this salad too. Coz you know how good stuff is when it breaks up into equal peices and how better they taste individually!

Pinky : Are you trying to tell me something here?

Bunty : Hehe! Well....you know how food is like us. Like we are food things n all.

Pinky : Hahaha! Yeah.

[Bunty stares at his food for the rest of the lunch.]

'Still 13 minutes to break the news!'

6. Post - Milestone

Bunty : Honey!! We got the house we've been waiting for for the last 6 months.

Pinky : (Jumps and dances) Yaaaayy! The dream's coming true isn't it!

Bunty : And you know the best part...your rooms bigger than mine!

Pinky : Wait. What! We're in seperate rooms?

Bunty : Dont worry babe, it's only till I move out of the house around next week or so.

5. By assumption

Bunty : Look, things were easy first but now its now. It's changed. Its really hard now.

Pinky : I know.

Bunty : You do! Oh thank god. I so wanna carry on but I just can't.

Pinky : I tried too. But I tell you this, I have been doing my best.

Bunty : I know, and I can see how hard you've been straining for all this. I just can't take it now.

Pinky : It's okay. I'll end it now. Its not like the first one, but this one I will. Its HALO 2 goddammit! Not Age of Empires or some strategy shit!

Bunty : Yeah. Nice graphics I must say though.

[All this time Bunty's assuming they arent in a relationship!]

Halo 2 : Relationship Expansion Pack

4. Through provocation

Bunty : God you're so fat and dumb aren't you!

Pinky : What! No, i'm not!

Bunty : Why do you think people laugh at you all the time.

Pinky : They do??

Bunty : And the fact that you keep talking all the time, inecessently without a halt!! Man!!!

Pinky : Oh gosh!

Bunty : And you're not at all organized and keep wasting your time on your phone calls n stuff. Sheesh! That is so pathetic!!!

Pinky : I know what you're doing here.

Bunky : Gulp. What?

Pinky : You're pointing out my imperfections so that I become the perfect one and you dont even take the credit for making me do so. That is shooo shweeet! I'm so lucky to have such a frank bunny like you.

Plan B: A Yo Mama session with that 'someone special'

3. Publicly

Bunty : Nice day for a walk "outside" aint it!

Pinky : It sure is. But this is so unusual of you. I think you're upto something.

Bunty : Well, see...the thing is this...

Pinky : Oh! Look at those two. Aren't they cute. Well not half as cute as us though. Ha!

Bunky : Well yeah...about that...

Pinky : And look at them. Can't we hold hands now like them.

Bunky : Well, maybe. For a few seconds I guess. See the thing is...

Pinky : Oh! Those shoes! I want the same one. I heard they are expensive and stuff. But once you're well settled and doing your job you'll buy them for me when we're living together, wont you?

Bunty : Look let's not make a scene here...

Pinky : Ooooohhh! And that dress she's wearing. Just like the one I was talking about you remember?

Bunty : (with resignation on his face) Yes! I remember. Lets talk about our wedding dates then.

'Hmmm...I guess this place would do!'

2. By cheating

[Added Character : Pammi, the other one]

Pinky : You went out with Pammi last night I heard!

Bunty : Yes. Look I can explain...

Pinky : And you know she's my best friend!

Bunty : Yes. And she's different....she's....

Pinky : That's so awesome!!! She told me everything!!!

Bunty : Wait a sec. What?

Pinky : She told me all you wanted was a fling with her and eventually you'd come back to marry me.

Bunty : I would what?

Pinky : Yes! And you two are not even the same type anyway. But it' s ok for a fling I guess. Till then I have a few guys waiting in line. HA!

Bunty : You have what?

Pinky : You're really smart you know that. This way we dont even lose our feeling of security!

Bunty : We dont what?

[What followed were lotta awkward moments and no break ups.]

'Sssshhh...i think somebody's following us!'

1. Through avoidance

Text Message:

Bunty - I need some time to think. Please dont try and contact me. Will be incommunicado! Understand me. Our relationship depends on this.

5 days later-

Text Message:

Bunty - You arent replying. At least send me an acknowledgement.

2 hours later-

Text Message:

Bunty - Ok fine. Be silent then. I wasn't gonna talk anyway.

2 days later-

IM:

Bunty - This is ridiculous. Im gonna leave everything now. Go off the grid. GoodBye!

12 hours later-

IM:

Bunty - You think i'm joking, arent you. Ha! Not even a reply doesn't mean you're strong. Its just stupid.

A day later-

Text Message:

Bunty - Ok im sorry, please come back!

2 minutes later-

Text Message:

Pinky - HA! Good. Now back to the wedding plans then...

Ideal Avoidance?

Memories>right click>delete

2009-03-07T21:04:00.004+05:30

Home today.

Wanted this Floyd Song from a friend badly. Switched on my nokia's bluetooth and hence the transfer started.

A bright red flash luminously erupts onto the screen.

"Warning : Memory too low. Delete some data" it said.

"What?" was the knee jerk reaction. "This never happens!"

I never store anything on the phone memory since it had the notoriously low and not-so-awesome-a-number memory space...'9 megs of data'! And since 9 megs is like a grain of salt compared to the square meal that I wanted to store, I was off on a crusade to delete the 'evil' redundant data.

Turned out there wasn't any data as such.

Then,

I checked my inbox.

1900 messages lying carefree.

Now I am not much in touch with the current standards of "coolness" of how many texts to be stored in the inbox is considered "cool" plus the knowledge that even 2000 msgs would add up to be only in kb's.... it was still a shock for me.

Next step was to delete it hence...Get rid of all those scattered junk!

Get rid of just words lying around without any use!

Get rid of each 1KB text!

Get rid of stuff lying accumulated since last november!

Get rid of Memories???

Then it struck me. I just could not delete them. And it sounded really stupid that each one had a sentimental value for me.

I never used to save messages as such unless it was a really funny forward or some really personal stuff(which was relatively less).

And here I was marking all the messages. Getting them ready for the guillotine.

I couldn't. I just couldn't. And the thought of it made me feel stupid of how attached I was just to text messages.

But there it was... my finger centimeters away from the delete soft key. Closing in. Finger dragging. Air resistance. Damping constant. Deceleration. Halt before the destination.

Just couldn't. "Stupid" I think. I run for the cable, connect the nokia to my PC. Transfer and store the messages in my PC. Disconnect. And suddenly the damping constant for my executional finger appeared to be zero. Swift agility!

Inbox Empty.

Virtually it wasn't!

'Memories are memories, you can't delete them!'

Drive through the zero infinite...

2009-02-21T17:20:00.003+05:30

...that sudden pinch of loneliness had set in. I could elaborate it and make it more dramatic but it rather is pointless. And as always I didnt stand up to shoving a proverbial middle finger to my current rut called life. This is no form of dynamic loneliness, whatever it may mean.

I have grown accustomed to it. Developed a certain liking. All this from a person who at a certain period of time was afraid of being anti-social and deserted by people. We all have these pangs of desire for solitude. Hence the famous words "Just leave me alone" reverberates in deep recesses of our mental pits, yet somehow excavated and showcased brilliantly and rather aggressively at the saturation point of someone else's poking.

Since the brouhaha of being single again was a major life flow altering experience, never had I actually given it too deep a thought and already went out to "recover". Smoking n boozing were mere slingshots to get to another point of pointlessness in attempts to meander in my own sinking consciousness. It should never have got to a point where the lack of it was frustration. Fortunately, it hasnt. And being in a dry state + living with your parents is pretty affective to lead an ascetic routine of the thing I joke to be "a day".

I might sound morbid and derelict. But just to clear it up, I am not unhappy. Clearing up things more, im not all ecstatic with joy either. "Happy" and "sad" are mere gtalk status messages now considering the short lived crescendo and climatic orgasm of feelings expreienced currently. Not enough juice filled in each emotion to rule the day. Hence the dynamics associated to the mundane chronicles of any given day.

It's a pattern. A simple pattern we all live in. Complicating it with our own layers in order to get the ultimate truth. Just waiting for wise men to open their mouths to grasp the elixir of meaningless words and to quench that mental thirst of inevitable knowledge.

We exist. Everyone. We live? Maybe.

All this time trying to remove that want and need for anything. From simple to complex, a temptation to possess a certain unknown variable 'x'. And the self defined equations we put with our own recipes of algebra. Gradually clawing our way to an funny twist of arriving at the fact that '0 equals 0'. No matter what convoluted piece of an equation you equate with zero. That zero is still the zero it was. A postulate so horribly obvious people are scared to accept the unintertwined and dead straight value of 'x' sitting right in front of them.

How many times do we think of a solution in our heads and deny it for its simplicity. Since it lacks adventure and a mytical journey through space time and everything else, it is condemned. And here I am negating my own self, elaborating on nothingness. When there wasnt even a question.

Anyways, branching off...all I gotta do right now is learnt to control. Free will can be dangerous to a degree. Like over-consciousness.

So here I am raising my glass of water...

cheers to freedom!

Mazeltov!

Rude Awakening

2009-02-07T09:44:00.002+05:30

Criticism. I can't take criticiscm.

The moment it hits me my face frowns or any other mode of expression is put to animation. I'm not the total sport who would see every brickbat/mockery thrown at me and mould it into constructive criticism and be merry and live hapilly ever after. It sticks to me like glue for a while and refuses to budge. And then I have that 'I dont give a fuck!' phase in order to cover up for the frowning face.

So basically I'm still a 6 year old when it comes to taking criticism. Now the part after that comes the sulking. And people who know me well, know what kind of a sulking champ I am. The worst is when you have noone to actually call and let out ur mundane whines to. Technically speaking I do have lotsa people to call, but just didn't feel like. Coz this is part which I wanted. To be independent, and not rely on being consoled or pampered. Funny thing is I end up talking n texting to the same person at the end of the day now on. And so she calls me up. And I am dependent again.

Dammit Miss Happy G!

Also, I talk bullshit when Im sleepy. But even when I'm not.

So,

Universal Set = Bullshit talk!

Death Whispered a Lullaby

2009-01-15T14:43:00.009+05:30

Almost 2 years back there was a new guest in our house. Where by 'in' I refer to our porch. It was a dog, it was a she. I refrain from using the word 'bitch' since it brings a few negative connotations to people's heads.

I had always wanted a dog when I was a kid, but never could get one. My mom always used to scare me that I'd have to take it for a walk, feed it, clean its poop etc etc. Still there was a huge fuss and a few tantrums were thrown...eventually my futile attempts made no change. Since its obvious that I'm a dog lover I took the next best thing. Petting stray dogs. Although even this didn't go as per planned initially coz mom always used to drive them away since some kept pooping around the place, and mom wasn't a person who would appreciate the company of dogs the way I did. Dad was a neutral player then.

Then the first one came. A black n white stray dog christened 'Raj Malhotra'.

Sphinx Style

Now he was the most fattu and the most mischevious of the lot. His repertiore included being chased by a cat, stealing chappals, bring garbage from the dump and spreading it on the road as if its a garage sale.

Dad slowly started taking my side then on since Raj Malhotra liked to sit near dad's feet while dad sat on the porch. At such times dad would say, "He always likes to be near his master for a feeling of security."

My question was, who was protecting who.

Raj Malhotra's string of random garbage sales and covert chappal/sandal stealing came to an end when our neighbours got fed up of his adventure's. Since I was seen as his 'caretaker' people used to come up and complain, "Dekho tumhare kutta ko kuchh samjhaao!" as if I would take him to a room and ground him for a week.

I did make attempts to train him but people soon grew impatient and overly fed up by the local "nuisance". And so one morning came the dog pound snatching him away right in front of my eyes. I could just stand and watch and cry. They tied him up and put him in a van, thats when I yelled "I hate Humans!" in front of everyone watching me.

In his memory was only a photo on orkut. That's all I could do.

Then came a thin malnutritioned dog, probably influenced by the 'size zero' fad that went on with models. I fed her, made her 'visible' for the general public. She was named 'Paris Hilton' then and was probably the most inactive of all dogs. All she did was sleep near the door. But one day out of nowhere she destroyed one of moms plants in our garden.

Well, that was the last straw for mom and the same day she splashed her with a bucket of water.

Offended by such treatment she exiled herself from our society and went and settled in the next one.

This was at a time when my sister was here. And she was/is shit scared of dogs always complained about how they look at her with their "Khooni nazar". I remember how me n my sis used to discuss paris' partying habits!

Paris was later spotted several times but she failed to recognize me. It was sad, but at least she was alive.

And then again from where I started, she came. Not paris. It was mostly paris' kid but she was a year or two old when she came over. At that time I didnt know whether she was a male or a female. So by my gross assumption I named her 'Chandu', assuming she was a male. Then when realization struck she was renamed 'Chandni'.

She slowly grew on the family, not mom yet tho. Our garden was her 'crib' and our house for her was a kitchen. Dad alongwith me started feeding her and she in turn did some house protecting of her own, mainly by barking at strangers. (She disliked people wearing caps somehow).

She was trained in her own way coz whenever she went near someone her hand would spring up in a shakehand sign of goodwill.

She's the one who has been here the longest. Soon she became a member of the family when mom once called her "Cho chweet!" with her neat shakehand move. Somehow it impressed people.

Now she was also notoriously popular for goin into people's houses and wandering aroung with a regal air of granudeur but fortunately no chhappal stealings.

The best moment of all was when a neighbour came to complain about the dog to our place while mom was reading her morning paper. The moment she came in through our door she wasnt looking at mom. Coz chandni was sitting on the opposite sofa with a 'can-you-please-pass-the-sports-section' expression on her face. Mom was shocked at her silent arrival and her majestic aura of the art of sitting on the sofa.

Hence she was often shooed away, but me n dad used to smuggle her back and make her retain her position in the family.

On october 2008 she gave birth to two new family members. For the first time given the normal names Cookie(Joan) and Brownie(Gengis Khan).

Although the first month was scary because they didnt show a lotta movements and most of their time was in the garden sleeping and well...sleeping. At a point it turned out to be a question of whether they would make it alive or not for they didnt open their eyes even after the second week.

But fortunately one fine day, Brownie ventured out 'into the wild'/'the rest of our garden' and Cookie followed. Now me n Dad loved them, and even mom couldnt say much with their adorable wet baby eyes staring back.

Soon they started hopping around, crashing into themselves, running in circles,bouncing like happy merry children. It was one big happy family!

Their best moments at action were the both of them trying to sleep over each other playing the part of a contortionist in order to take up minimum space.

Video link here.

This december I had taken a trip down south for a cousins wedding. We were away from home for around 14 days.

The day we came back we couldnt find them. I was scared they had moved out. I looked around our colony but no sign of them.

I called my friend up and asked them where they were. To my relief he said they were in his house. I gave out a whistle, and both of them came running and bouncing towards me. And that feeling of happiness that you get like watching your own children after such a long time. The joy of relief. Loved all three of them.

Today January 15th I was digging a grave for one. Joan was run over by our neighbours car and she died on the spot. I froze on the site unable to take in what happened. The night before I fed her a few biscuits and it was the first time she actually jumped up in the air to catch it in her mouth. She was growing up. She was.

11.30AM today it changed and she took her last breath. Mother and brother standing next to her. I went back home and cried for a while to get it out of my system. After a while I called up a friend who also cared for all 3 of them a lot. He came later and wasnt able to bare the sight of it.

I had to lift Joan and put her in the grave I dug for her. But when I covered it up with mud, chandni came running back and started digging again. We tried stopping her but she didnt budge and left her alone.

A few minutes later she realization Cookie wasnt coming back and so she sat there watching her.

A while later she buried her own child herself and sat next to the grave refusing to eat. Even when we gave her a chappati, all she did was take it and put it next to the grave. Gengis still didnt know much of what was going on but eventually he was seen sulking under a car and refused to come out.

It was a sad day. I cried a lot. And I believe my friend had too.

This is for you Cookie(Joan). We miss you!

Been hearing this song the whole day:

Six random things

2009-01-07T12:54:00.002+05:30

Jagriti tagged me in this game of 6 random things about oneself…being a young sporting lad that I am I shall jump into this bandwagon and let my spontaneity mesmerize the dear reader/s of this blog.

Like life, this thing here also comes with a set of rules that shall be strictly adhered to and not purposefully be broken just to be "cool" (You get my drift, right?):

Here are the rules ~

1. Link to the person who tagged you.

2. Post the rules on your blog.

3. Write six random things about yourself.

4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.

5. Let each person know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.

6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

And the oscar goes too…

Sorry, wrong envelope. :P

Here it goes:

1. I sometimes talk to myself, usually when nobody’s around so that I don’t end up looking like a nutcase. This is kind o like a deep dark secret in a way. So please feel proud of acquiring this general knowledge. I still don’t know the reason though.

2. I don’t like the volume of the TV to be on 31 or 57, I find them to be really irritating numbers.

3. I have this psychic (or something related) thing with dogs. Even the ferocious ones start wagging their tail when I call them. Although this doesn’t happen every time and I am in no mood to push my luck.

4. I was a really spiritual person around 3 years ago, to the point where I used to read a verse of Bhagavad Gita every day which my parents interpreted as me trying to buy time away from my actual ‘study’ related books! The past few months have affected me weirdly and I find myself immensely material with a falling rate of the spiritual halo around me. I blame it on ‘Discovery Travel and Living’ and ‘VH1 Fabulous Life’!!!

5. One of the most influential person for me is a graphic novel character from ‘The Watchmen’. The name is Adrian Veidt!

6. The only thing the present me and the 8 year old me would agree on right now would be that ‘I don’t wanna marry!’

My tag victim hit list shall be:

1. Dagny

2. Made to be broken

3. Merc

4. Chuck

5. Anant

6. Aanshi

0

2008-12-10T01:48:00.004+05:30

Im scared of nothingness now.

Was I craving for it only because I had everything?

Got a really fuzzy head right now.

It's just when you are prepared to lose everything, is when you stop fearing.

But, how do I know Im ready?

No Silent Night, No holy light

2008-12-02T20:12:00.001+05:30

My Exams have started today, yet with all the chaos that has erupted with the recent terror attacks at Mumbai have made my fingers itchy and finally i want to get it out of my system.

Since the night of 26th November when I got the shocking news and minute by minute coverage of the horrors unfold in Mumbai, I was speechless. I was glued to the TV for a long time as I was at utter disbelief of witnessing a terror of such magnitude that was happening 500kms away from from my city. We always had this protective mental shield in our head that such things dont happen to us. Slowly that mental shield was being penetrated. The possibility of facing something similar here(also provided the recent blasts in the city) has never been this high.

Since I dont have much time right now to burst into an emotional monologue, I’ll just vent out my current train of thoughts:

1. Stop calling it “India’s 9/11”…the media has made this into a catchy title so that the people of our country feel that we are on the same platform as out American “brothers” were years ago. It’s just to make its sound more glorifying. Treating 9/11 as if it was the only terror attack that shook the world is what the media wants. There have been more horrible terror attacks around the world with heart stopping death tolls and damage that could not be narrowed down to the 9/11 attacks.

Somehow I find the “India’s 9/11” tag disturbing on how we are so keen on relating ourselves to Americans.

2. The difference between last post-terror attack speech given by our PM and the current one is only that he might have been sitting 2 inches to the left. The footage looks like it was last shot at 1983 and the sound quality made him sound like a grandfather announcing his final wishes on his death bed. This is National TV for crying out loud.

Plus with the usual clichés like “We will take strict and immediate action” and “We shall no longer tolerate such attacks” are no longer comforting for anyone. Everytime the nation is attacked all we do is tolerate it and hope that it doesn’t happen again. That’s what India has been. Yes, we are a peace loving country…yes, we are Gandhi’s children…but those principles don’t qualify at such times. You can show them the other cheek so long as that we don’t have any cheeks to show, and at the end its we who get burnt.

Everytime we end up like a dog licking its own wounds mentally satisfying itself that it has the strength to suffer more.

If we suffer more than this, there wont be a population to suffer later on. Our nation is on the brink on a violence similar to that of what happens in the middle east.

3. The day the 26/11 attack happened I had surfed a few forums for discussion and was shocked to find the vox populi with a “FUCK OFF PAKISTAN!” posts carelessly put out with a wide range of expletives (some I hadn’t heard of) and venom which just made me realize its all growing into a vicious circle. Now I have nothing against freedom of speech, I am not against the whole feel of the post (whatever that is), but this is what they call a ‘knee jerk’ reaction.

Now I am in no way defending Pakistan, since it has such a dubious repertoire of playing around cunningly with nations on the diplomacy game. But when people without any knowledge of the situation and conformation make assumptions and spew venom like this, its a sad sight. We call the terrorists bastards for they have no heart, why follow them when we have a logical brain to use. But to think without anger and hatred at such times is too much to ask for. For I am one of the angry people.

I had a friend in school who was a Pakistani and I remember once in school when she accidentally did something wrong one of my classmates’ first reaction was “Damn! Never trust these Pakistanis.” This was something that appalled me for a long time, and made me realize how the hatred had been hard wired into our heads. The current snubbing game was a rerun in my head.

Although with the current scenario people with strong opinions are all set and ready for the nation to “wage a war” on our neighbors, but there’s no point in reacting completely on impulse at times when we are so hurt.

The air no matter what will be tense now, and we as a nation have to be strategic and careful about our actions. Improve our diplomatic relations and other things which I don’t think I’m qualified enough to discuss.

4. People saying ,"Terrorists dont have any religion, they dont have a nationality!" .

Well guess what suckers, statistics disagree.

Also Javed Akhtars statement saying something like, 'This is not a time to play the blame game. We should help each other and rise...blah blah blah!'. Found it funny. When you get hit so bad the first thing you would not want to know is who did it to you? Weird Logic man!

Frankly, this is not time to get all cuddly and lovey dovey and release doves into the air...its serious now.

5. The media! With ample number of news channels to chose from, not one… I repeat…NOT ONE had refrained from putting a cheesy title and a theme music + a trailer of the events taking place.

Plus each channel was more interested in who got the sound of the gunfire’s, grenades, glass shatters rather than focusing on the details of what exactly was happening. Now I know, not showing the actually “action” would be like hiding the truth for some people…but when news presenters yell out, “Look Look, [insert news channel here] has the first exclusive shot of the bullet fired/glass shatter/terrorists hand…” that’s when you realize that they they’re not there to tell you the truth and give you information. Its business.

I swear to god it was a pain in the ass. The moment some news info comes in the presenters would beat around the bush buying our valuable time waiting for ‘THE’ moment to tell you the ‘real’ news. Now I may be counter argued by the fact that they have to buy our time since they don’t get confirmed updates for all info. Well I would have have agreed, but when I saw BBC was showing more pertinent news happening in our country(with really bad pronunciations though) I was shocked at what our 20 news channels here had been singing about.

The whole filmy style news reporting had become a farce, a parody. And it was unbearable. Unfortunately since I didn’t have any other sources, I didn’t have any options. Thank god for the remote though.

That’s when I understood that at the scenes of terror some local people had gathered to watch the “tamasha” as if it was a ‘Big Boss’ episode, but it might have been that even they found the news channels bullshiting them.

Whatever events happening, its sad but the harsh reality is the coming few months might not be that bright.

That’s it for now. Have to study.

More on this later!

Peace!

A minute of VIsuallyConsciousCOordination(VICCO)

2008-10-26T14:35:00.014+05:30

We had our days when we used to witness all those harmless Vicco commercials, pointing and laughing at it without trying to comprehend on the pertinent information it had secretly given us. Overlooking the critical issues it dealt with, we in our movie theaters or in front our idiot boxes felt it was best to ignore the harsh and bitter truth that was spread out on the table!

With the power of current technology termed "youtube" I stumbled onto a video footage that made me realize, made me aware...and more importantly made me write this post!

The footage going by the loosely abstracted term 'commercial' has the power to shake the foundations of our current society. Till now only the elite of the nation understood this, but now its TIME!
Ok, maybe im going too far with this.

Laydees and gentlemans, here it is -

Now did that seem harmless? Seem like those ordinary "commercial" things intended for brainwash?
Alas! My friend...for thy hath not seen beyond the looking glass.

Sample this-

0:01 - The video starts with a glimpse of the world outside. The world of the future! The visuals which might seem familiar. Like the cover of a book...like the covers of every Arthur C Clarke's books!!

Uncanny??
Your heart skips a beat!

0:07 - A normal civilian kid casually comes out of the bathroom with a white powdered substance in his hand and in a move that he thought would put Shakespeare to shame, jumps onto a poetic line - "Ahem...Mummy yeh powder kitna mulayam hai, bilkul aapke jaisa!". Now you can sit and excavate all the figures of speech the boy(for simplicity lets call him 'Bunty') has brilliantly put in, but then something ain't right!

Now I'm not a psychoanalyst but when a boy is so fond of a 'white powdered substance' that he uses his own mother as a frame of reference to praise its 'mulayam-ness'...it adds up to only one conclusion. The white powdered substance my friends is...probably cocaine/heroin!

But then you shout "HOGWASH!!" in protest with an argument saying - why would the mother be sitting so idly letting her own child consume this malicious drug?
The answer my friends lies in the government. For this is the dystopian future we are looking at ...where the government allows people to get drugged and high, i.e- its legal! Much like the soma drugs in Aldoux Huxleys Brave New World.

Yes people, there's no point in hiding the truth now.

0:10 - Suddenly a sharp and commanding voice blasts out of nowhere and the mother and bunty face the wall adorned with the speaker and a poster highlighting the words 'Big Brother Is watching you!'. For a fraction of a second they are shocked.
Was it Ramu kaka?
It couldnt be.
Otherwise the sentence would have been "Chotte maalik ko aaj kaunsa powder chahiye?".
There was a camera there. Surveillance. The all seeing eye! (Lord Sauron?)

wtf!!!

But then they realize its the government. The voice was to be obeyed. And so in a hypnotic grace the mother stands up with the fluidity and hydraulic movements of a manufactured 'mom' robot (its the bloody future!!). The duo stare blankly at the wall with rapt attention, creeping the audience out at the same time as they obey their masters teachings!!

Longer attention spans due to the drugs

0:33 to 0:43 - The teachings are then projected visually as they are shown how utter garbage separated out to look like neatly arranged useful stuff called 'jadibootiya'(probably an anagram for the name of a narcotic drug) is packaged into yellow boxes and white tubes hovering in mid air with an innocuous label of 'VICCO' on it. So as you can see that is how recycling is gonna be in the future. Pretty much similar to a concept shown in the movie inspired from this "commercial" - Soylent Green.

Procedure : Magic

Also note the double usage of 'V' (i.e- Vicco Vajradanti) here and the red V as its symbol. This later on inspired Alan Moore to write 'V for Vendetta', followed by the movie staying true to the Vicco tradition.

0:47 - The time had come for the real drug. Vicco. And so Bunty with his mothers help gets his first shot and is transformed from the Shakespearean pajama wearing toddler to a drugged Shakespearean pajama wearing toddler. And you are shown how Bunty's hollow lifeless eyes reflect the infinite blankness inside and with a ghastly contented smile which could even make Dracula piss in his pants reflect on the to be disturbing future.

Although if Bunty doesn't have his intake regulated, 20 years later the only place where he would feel at home might be the state asylum.

0:55 - The footage gallops towards the climax with an undefined grace when all of a sudden the viewer is shown the face of the puppeteer, the architect - 'MUNNI'!

The architect

Well, talk about Character Development!!!
All this time she was there with them.
She was a witness. But such subtelty had she improvised till now only to come in as a cameo appearance to fool the regular audience...some who did not even notice her as their persistence of vision was no match for Munni's 'arrival and departure' scene frame rate!

Now we as the popcorn munching audience would have appreciated if Munni came out with a jaw breaking line... some thing like,
"Bunty, your life is the sum of a remainder of an unbalanced equation inherent to the programming of the matrix. You are the eventuality of an anomaly, which despite my sincerest efforts I have been unable to eliminate from what is otherwise a harmony of mathematical precision. While it remains a burden assiduously avoided, it is not unexpected, and thus not beyond a measure of control. Which has led you, inexorably, here."

But no, thats not Munni. She's the REAL architect. Its her own subtlety that makes here who she is.

And so the moment comes when the video bar slider touches the 1:00 minute mark and the viewer trembling with fear has bouts of realization.

The truth is out there!

Its ok, you can breathe now.

Chaos Theory

2008-09-10T12:06:00.003+05:30

This post is not related to the mathematical concept of 'Chaos theory' in any way as far as I know, just sounded like an appropriate name for this post. These are just ideas and philosophies that I think about in my free time and which may be controversial in a way. So I've edited a lot of stuff to keep it cleaner and readable.

*The best way to live life?
*With no rules.

This has become an often cliched statement, and maybe coming from me it sounds pretty hypocritical. Well I am merely remarking on this concept there as for me it is a something philosophical that I usually do end up thinking about.

Now breaking things down first of all. We live in a world where rules are kept to bring a degree of order. And with this our life has a flow in order to how these rules are followed. Now usually even a minor sidestep away from this order will create a disruption which shall affect whatever that sidestep is linked with. That is how delicate and fragile things are.

We have morals. We have codes. But everything is so widely relative. Although there are a fundamental set of values in society like 'killing a person' would be a crime...still there are exceptions like mercy killings or sacrifices in some civilizations etc. And so a person would be considered more civilized if he/she would be disciplined and act according to that given set of moral codes that define a particular society. Anyone straying away from it would be a criminal or a lawbreaker and would basically suffer exclusion from the group and other charges imposed as per the set of rules.

Now usually in any civilization or a culture a big hand in putting down these set of moral codes is done by Religion. Religion would set its norms for its people, setting beliefs, making the foundations of a persons conscience and other ways to establish order according to what way might seem favorable to the conditions and the environment around them. These rules followed would be loosely called traditions. Now as the rules are set by a religion, all the fundamental rules would still be the same but an outer layer coating of a different attribute is given as to differentiate from another religion. This is done as to avoid a shock among its followers if any new drastic tradition is introduced. No religion in its starting phase would bring something totally from the outside and completely unconventional. This is trans mutation. So by this process things on further processing through the years get refined and follow the objective of establishment of an order.

But as time progresses new rules are introduced as to close out any probability of an event that would disturb the order. Slowly to that degree freedom is to be sacrificed for the sake of security. What we call freedom is barely the word it means. We would say we live in a free world, but aren't we wrong! You see, freedom is considered dangerous. We are made to believe that the world we are in is a free world, just because we stopped perceiving the constraints upon us because they have been made natural. Once there are a certain set of rules imposed upon us and we follow them strictly, we stop recognizing it later on because it would be registered in our subconscious. We live in fear of breaking any rule for the fear of social exclusion, very fundamentally put.

If I stand in a public place and yell "WHAT THE FUCK!"...you could certainly graph out the reaction patterns for the surrounding people. Its a state of shock. I've become immoral. I upset the order to that degree. That's the freedom of speech.

Boiling everything down to a basic level, what exists in everything and everywhere is CHAOS.

And Chaos is the most fundamental thing around, its omnipresent. When we bind this chaos by establishing a rule and we get order. But you know what means, it would still be chaos.
Order is bounded Chaos! Contrary to the popular belief both are not the opposites of each other. The order that we call it is just a derivative of Chaos.
Its funny, but Order is Chaos.

And one more things about Chaos is a closely linked synonym, freedom. Chaos is freedom, a place where anything and everything happens...where there are no morals no conscience...everything is fair...because everything is an action without any repercussion.
That is Chaos!

But now here in the real world what we follow is freedom through order. Freedom through imposing more rules. Hm mm...?
Now lately I've been reading about public surveillance and other forms of security measures. A threat to privacy. Something that motivated me to write the previous post.

Drifting a bit away now... As in today's world there's always a threat to any nation with the growth in terrorism. Security and vigilance do point out to a degree of surveillance proportional to the degree of threat. Imagining that to be a mathematical equation that means one simple thing, what does any organization/government do to have the maximum degree of surveillance.
Answer = Keep the degree of threat to the maximum.
And to obtain this degree involves an easy but disastrous step. Ignore or enforce a security breach, resulting to a disaster, resulting into panic. And people are vulnerable when in panic, as given a choice between security and privacy...anyone influenced enough by the panic attack would choose the former.

The freedom that we live in or live for would take a backseat for survival. Scrutiny is a necessity as to choke any possibility of a disaster. And so a whole new set of rules come into action here at such times of disaster which can affect and change our desired conditions of living. So the biggest ingredient in the recipe for control over the people by setting new constraints is a disaster.

Now Orwell picked the year 1984, and as we see he was horrendously wrong with the timeline. But he may soon be proved not wrong with his predictions.
Big Brother might soon be watching you!

And so, all these morals,codes,rules,laws so established for our sake would be dropped at the hint of trouble. Since nothing is absolute, things are subject to change.

Everything is relative right? There is no absolution.
Except maybe in Chaos. Where any relativity and absolution just doesn't matter!

I've tried to consciously stay out of discussing the topic of "So... what ultimately is the meaning of life?" as to keep things more simple and mainly because I dont know. So eventually, there would be less chaos, right?

Trapped in a NET

2008-09-03T15:06:00.005+05:30

[This is a work of fiction. Any resmeblance to the characters living,dead or in zombie state is merely a coincidence and is to be taken in a light manner by kindly smiling at this web page.]

It was a Saturday, 8 pm . Aditya was there, with the best dress he had in his wardrobe, which meant there wasn't much to choose from. But the white shirt and denim jeans with the black blazer on top did make things look fancy.

The hunt began. He wasn't actually invited to the party, but he knew the security was gonna be lax. And gatecrashing was something he mastered in, usually turning up at weddings and ogling at the food and the women. But this was not the like the previous parties. This one was with a purpose. He had an aim. He actually had come close to the word commitment for the task up at hand, but he chose not to use the 'C' word. And also the other thing that was different was that it was not a wedding or a birthday party. This was the 'rich bitch' party, the party where one woman invites everyone existing in her address book so that 1) She can show off her wealth. 2) She can show off her contacts, all the famous people she knew. 3) To come on page 3 the next day. Aditya was the proud human who claimed to have coined the term 'rich bitch party'. The best part was the reason for the party : nothing. In her defense - It was a Saturday, and parties aren't illegal, are they!

The people here were fascinating. Dressed in their best clothes women and men keep coming wondering why the hell they were invited for no apparent reason. While some women were highly intelligent, as their sense of best dressing was highly linked to the adage - "Less is more!" and thus leaving a very little margin of error for the dress to go wrong. These were the usual victims of Aditya's ogling. And the best thing about these 'rich bitch' parties was that these women liked the fact that there exists a man ogling at them. Aditya did start his usual practice with the girl in black. She seemed familiar, and soon Aditya gave his 'hey-check-me-out' look. But suddenly, Aditya coming back to his senses shoved her off his thoughts.

He realized, this was a 'rich bitch' party...and if any woman here knew that he was wearing a cheap imitation of a 'tag heuer' they would drop him like a hot brick. Also, then again he reminded himself he was on a mission. He would have to fight his desires, and face reality. He had his plan rolling in his head, but distractions kept coming. How would he focus!! But then, as his face turned he saw the woman. She seemed different from the usual conspicuously cleavaged women who adorned the crowd that very same room. She had no artificial make up on, natural. Aditya lost track of what his aim was, and was guided by pure impulse.

Slowly like a predator of the Savannah he made way through the hordes of tall grass, the rest of the people. His prey was in sight. His eyes were locked, yet he didn't want the prey to notice. Inconspicuously, he slid through populated barriers between him and his prey and slowly camouflaged himself with the background. Steadily, he drew nearer and closer...the final pounce! As the confidence of being the predator had reached its climax...suddenly he was back to being Aditya again.

Oh shit! he thought, Now what!!!.
He saw a guy with a tray passing by and picked up a wine glass.

Nonchalantly he walked in with an acute air of confidence and the smile of a vacuum cleaner salesman. He twitched a bit on his way, but with his panache he made it look like a complex salsa step. And now he was close. She was alone, with a drink in her hand. The time had come.

"Hey!" Aditya exhaled a ton of breath along with the word and sustained his smile.
She looked around. She put on a genuine amiable face.
"Hello there. Do I know you ?" her voice a musical note in every word.

"Ummm...no. I mean you can't say... right, its such a small world after all. Frankly speaking I was getting really bored and needed to flex my vocal chords a bit, someone to talk to you know. Apparently most of the women here are only concerned about how much worth stuff they are wearing and who'll get photographed next."

"Ah! I see. I find these parties really boring actually. I'm just here to photograph these people. It's my job! God! Given a choice I would rather go to Afghanistan and get photos of what exactly the world is going through. Sigh! They say i need experience first. I don't understand how taking photographs of these --"

"...Sluts?" Aditya the uncrowned oversmart added.

She smiled.
"Well, not quite what I was looking for, was looking for something more polite. He he. But it'll do. So...what do you do?"

"Well...me. I just passed out with an engineering degree. But I barely value it. This was not the line I wanted to follow. It was just flowing with the trend, you see. I'm more interested in the creative stuff you know. Making films, painting, photography--"

"Wow! which camera do you own?"

"Ummm...i have that thing...the Sony Cyber....Sony Cybercrop?"

"Oh! you mean a Sony Cybershot?"

"Yeah yeah! that one. With carl zeus' lenses...crystal clear stuff."

"Carl Zeiss you mean. Good good. I own this piece." She suddenly conjured up a huge contraption which later made Aditya realize that this is what you get when you stick 3 cybershots back to back.
She continued,"Its a Canon EOS 350d SLR. Got it as a gift. Cool na?"

"Awesome. This thing looks like it can actually stop global warming!"

"Hehe! Well what sort of photography do you like?"

"Nature stuff. Mainly clouds. I see patterns in them. You know, Gods geometry."

"Wow! I wrote an article on a web site lately with that title. Amazing! So then what do you do nowadays?"

"Actually I'm doing nothing at all. Taking a sabbatical n all you know. I keep reading day n night though. Started with pulp stuff but now I'm maturing you see."

"Ahhh! Enlightening. So, whats the latest book you're on?"

"Animal Farm by Orwell."

"Me too. I just finished it. Wow! What a coincidence. Somehow I found it a bit sad though. But its nothing compared to--"

"--1984. well, yeah. But somehow I prefer Huxley's Brave new world. It's more...what do I say...refined!"

"Oh my god! That was exactly what I was gonna say. Are you sure we aren't the same person? He he."

We will be soon, thought Aditya. It was working now. Everything seemed under control.

She was utterly floored and ecstatic with joy. It was evident in her eyes. How could she have met such a guy at such a boring and mundane party, it was like a romantic play. Serendipity! Yet she did not reveal it all from her body language. This meant there was still some last magical spell to be chanted.

"Ok now this." She beamed, "Favorite movie?"

Hook, line and sinker. Exactly what Aditya wanted. The final litmus test. The crescendo had been built up now, time for the climax.

"Shawshank redemption!" Aditya gave a highly exuberant smile and felt like beating his chest to signify the fact that he was the Alpha male of this conversation!

But then, something went wrong. Her face didn't light up as expected. Aditya panicked now.
He asked, "What??"

"Oh nothing! Mine is 'The fountain'."

"No its not. Its Shawshank redemption!"

"He he! I'm sorry. You lost me on this one. We were so close to a high score weren't we?"

"I beg to differ here. Your favorite movie IS the Shawshank redemption!!"

"I actually found it boring. It's too slow."

"That's impossible!" Aditya lost control, "Its clearly stated on your orkut profile!"

"WHAT??? Did you just say my 'profile'??"

The ship had hit the iceberg. All that was left for Aditya to decide was how to sink - 1) A grand finale explosion or 2) An invisible and silent bubble breaking with a pop.

"Ummm....no no....I could have said...ummm... pedophile?"

"Could have?? What? You son of a --" she lifted her camera, or so it looked like a machete from where Aditya was standing.

"--hey let's just all be calm here okay!". It's interesting how the word 'calm' catalyzes something that is completely its semantic opposite.

"Calm!! CALM!! I know you now! You're that loverboy_007 guy on orkut right? You do all this in depth research and the hunt women down, dont ya! My freind told me about you. How dumb do you think I am? The nerve of you to send me scraps and a friend request! You filthy PERVERT!"

All the people around them were watching the delightful show. Some of the women just drew close to the 'scene' having high hopes of being photographed for the papers. The problem here was that the photographer was the assailant and the camera was her primary weapon.

Unfortunately, for Aditya he just had the epiphany on why the camera was named a 'Canon'. And he was in it's blast radius.

The was a loud thud.
Nobody died.
Yet there is no record if anybody present in the scene lived happily ever after.

Moral of the story : We live in a world where our privacy is controlled by a check box and a mouse click.

Fun-Da-Mental

2008-08-25T17:08:00.002+05:30

Just a small thought.

So, how do we understand or Learn a new idea. Basically, we have a set of fundamental ideas installed in our mind since the beginning of our learning process. The most basic I can think right now is numbers and alphabets and visual aids used for understanding, there is a deeper level of logic and reasoning that I shall no think about right now in order to not clutter up my neural connections!

So everything dissolves down to or is built from our basic predefined notions that are introduced to us through our learning. As we are exposed to a new concept or an idea, we would join two or more of our fundamentals in maybe a 'complex'(not necessarily) manner to form a new pattern of understanding. So as we are taught derived units are taken from a set of fundamental units!

So, what happens for example, when one of the fundamental concept is unknown to us. Taking things in an algorithmic sense there would be a decision :
1. Go back and build the fundamental
2. Derive the fundamental from its derived learning(if known)...which is kinda a paradox since we're going the other way around.

Now, option 1 is the most reliable choice, but option 2 is usually a choice in order to save time. Now option 2 is risky, because it is the equivalent of 'assuming' a fundamental concept. But somehow it might be a new view point to look at something. And so after established our derived fundamental we would question its validity. Now this is the part which puts the 'fun' in fundamental...it mostly will lead to the actual fundamental or be somewhat close to it...or be an interesting but awkward theory which would probably sound like something out of a comic book.

But it would be a process that might lead to new concepts or a discovery. Now as we see in history, thats how fundamentals are based. By observing a complex derived thing, breaking it down to fundamentals...and giving a cool name or probably your own name to a theory that you can explain!!

Reverse engineering?? hmmmm??

But still that doesn't make option 1 obsolete in any way, its a classic right? And that's what my friend Jinal would be thinking...since he uses a awkward amalgamation of options 1 and 2 which a lot of people may be at a loss for comprehension!

Now reading this a time after reading it, it looks like a bunch or rand words...much like William Burroughs Cut up technique[link].

This post is dedicated to the "Concept-Man" and todays Birthday Boy and a best friend, Jinal!!

Dementia

2008-08-16T19:15:00.002+05:30

The whole theme and a few posts of my blog play around the reference of insanity/madness. But today was something that scared my soul out of me. I had not slept yesterday night since I was out with my friends, so as I reach home I promptly drop off on the bed. Now its a normal observation that when people are woken up from deep sleep just for some small reason the person tends to get pissed. Losing precious sleep, thats a loss. Yes, it has occurred to me time to time...but not at this magnitude. Today something was different.

I was asleep and mom was there telling me something, though I don't remember it clearly it was something about her having some work to do that my require my help. Now I was mumbling some incoherent stuff as any person in my state of sleep would. Mom kept poking me for a while and was angry that I wasn't even giving a slight response.

She then said," You're face looks like one of those drug addicts." . Somehow this I heard clearly. And it triggered something in me. I wasnt awake when all this happened coz I was really tired. But what I did was I could recall really well. I stood up all of a sudden and started shouting, "Me! I'm a drug addict!" , my voice was so shrill it sounded as if it was coming from somewhere else. My body was out control. Having weird and acute spasms as my hands and legs started writhing in awkward positions. I couldn't stand and I fell on to the bed.

At that time I had the weirdest feeling, as if I fell into a cobweb. I felt it stick all over me. I violently tried to remove it. I could see there was nothing there, still my skin felt something sticking. I was crying helplessly. I couldnt make sense. I couldnt see properly cause half my brain was still asleep. My Mom watched in horror and tried to get hold of my hand. I was still having those spasms.

Then Mom's hand came. Mom, my angel. She held me close and pampered me as If I was a small child. I was still sobbing. Mom gave me that me that one warm embrace which suddenly freed me off all the insanity. I came to my senses.

What was I doing!! What has happened to me!!

I cried," Please help me! I don't know whats happening. Please!" . Mom just held me closer. I didn't need words. I was freed. The darkness was gone. My Mom, how I love my Mom.

She put me back to bed. Put a thin blanket on me and caressed my hair. I slept like a baby.

I woke up a while later all of a sudden, figuring if it was a dream or real. When do we actually know its a dream? I then touched my face and felt dried tears. It was real. I couldn't believe it was me. It seemed like I was possessed. This is one of those things I wish I could forget, but there's no point in that. When things come up against the best would be to face it, so that when similar things come in the future you would be prepared with the previous experience.

This time I wont question my sanity. Because I am scared. Are my doubts the one who gave birth to it. I would not want to know now. For now I am me. And right now, it barely seems like a silly statement...its the most important thing!

My Mom's leaving for Lucknow tomorrow. Just for two days. But I feel like me when I was 8 years old. Mom away from the house meant Mom wasn't gonna be there around may it be for 2 days. I want her to be here. Oh by the way, I'm 19 now. And still feel like a small kid. For I donno if this is the part of being an adult, or if this should be a part of anything at all!

Was I dreaming?

2008-08-13T22:41:00.002+05:30

'But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.

'Oh, you can't help that,' said the cat : 'We're all mad here.
I'm mad. You're mad.'

'How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.

'You must be,' said the cat ,'Or you wouldn't have come here.'

-Lewis Carrol
'Alice's Adventures In Wonderland'

!

2008-08-03T23:10:00.000+05:30

It was friendship day.

It was a really really lonely day!

A secret

2008-08-03T13:12:00.002+05:30

Everyone has secrets.

I would like to state the fact that its a funny world we live in, but the word 'funny' just seems askew. Even to the person who you could maybe share all the stuff that you have inside of you, all of your secrets...there maybe be this one single deep dark thing that you just might not want to say...or maybe you don't say it because you dont know it. This one thing, hidden in the labyrinth of thoughts. Its sometimes not lack of trust or the expected reaction that might scare from revealing this dark secret, its just the revealing. Although trust does play its major role in this, there are times when its not a factor.

And there are those secrets which are made not meant to be a secret. There is no 'method' of differentiating this, maybe its instinct. Like the ones you keep a secret so that you can let it out later and connect. In any relation(well most of them) sharing secrets is the most vital part in connecting and knowing the other person. Because you're getting access to information which very few or no one else has been granted.

There are so many things we have to say when we talk. We sometimes do run dry on conversations. Does a secret help? Well that barely matters.

There's always this thing that you might never want to say, a part you never wanted to open up...a part for yourself maybe. A secret is such that what connects people so instantly, but on the other hand it might play as the most caustic solvent in breaking things. Sharing it is sharing a part of you. But sometimes its not always about sharing, its understanding the difference for that person of what is to be shared and whats not.
Respecting secrecy. A tough thing to do, really really tough.
But willing to go through all that mind power to kill that curiosity to find out that secret(by any means).
Thats friendship i guess. :)

Happy Friendship day!

Thank you Alanis

2008-07-30T00:58:00.003+05:30

The best and the worst thing about this journey : the unexpectedness. And weirdly the 'unexpectedness' always is a product of expecting something...coz you expect "normal" stuff to happen. Ironic is it?

"It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife."
- Ironic, Alanis Morisette

Do I love it?
Despise it?
Let things flow?
Leave it to "Time"?

Sometimes it feels so important to know what you really really want.
And then you set out on a journey to just "know" it thoroughly, takes the fun away.

Speculation and the question : "Is life really that boring?"!
-
Cheers!

The Dark Knight

2008-07-21T20:31:00.008+05:30

Just came back from the new batman movie...that is -

THE DARK KNIGHT (spoken in a hoarse creepy voice to add the effect).

Yes, in all the dark splendor that Hollywood has to offer...but not to be confused with the other dark (k)night -

M.Night Shyamalan

Ok, So I go to the movie plex...get a seat for 110 bucks and expect the normal "Yaaay! Hero saves the day stuff." that all the recent superhero movies are cliche'd with. But remember this is the "dark" knight...so things would tend to get creepy, right? And they do.

I have admired Christian Bale for his acting mainly for his role in 'American Psycho' (creeped the shit outta me), and here he comes with the sequel looking 'batty' as ever. But what ho! There's a showstealer here...Heath Ledger as the joker that is. And oh my holy dog! he's defined the qualities of a villian. Makes Jack Nicholson Joker look like a chimpanzee wearing a pink tutu and frolicking around. Yes, I do agree Jack Nicholson was creepy as the joker...but it was just the face. And frankly he needs no make up to look creepy, The Shining and A few good men was a proof of that. But Ledger whirrs past way ahead of him, scoring somewhere near Hannibal Lecter.

Now there's this thing about batman which other superheroes dont have. He wasn't bitten by a radioactive bug, wasn't from some faraway planet, wasn't involved in a toxic waste accident. He's a normal guy, like you and me. So there's this thought that I could also become batman someday. But first I'll have to become a millionaire. Ummmm...build an underground batcave. Have the US military R&D working under me...etc etc. You get my point...possible stuff you see.

And here the batman doesn't locate a crime and exclaim - "To the Batmobile!".
Tho' that was Robin's dialog...and there are some batman expressions which suggests he does miss his partner.

"We are sooo gay!"

But the prequel did show how he evolved to become a trained vigilante warrior of justice. Realistic explanations for the weapons he used and the "batmobile" too. And in this sequel he whips out a "bat-bike" or whatever its called.

Through all these years we have seen batman evolve-

From Adam West's horrifically hilarious hand made haloween costume

"I beat bad guys by the mere stupidity of this pose!"

To the more superior and far more cooler Christian Bale version -

"Okay! this isnt funny, who stole my pants!"

And thats what makes you think...aesthetic appeal does matter when it comes to kickin' badass villains.

And the movie triumphs on this occasion too, since there are many scene's where you go...."Whoa!! that's freakin awesome!". But apart from the ass kicking its the plot and the situations where the viewer gets engrossed. Its a wild goose chase where you'll have to figure out who's chasing who. Anarchy and chaos at its best!!
And with a 152 minute runtime, you wont come out complaining "Man! that could've been longer!". Yes! It is the best batman movie ever for now, but what makes it more interesting that its one of the best movies you'll get to see too.

I did follow a lotta batman through the cartoon's when I was a kid. So Harvey Dent's character as 'Two-Face' seemed just okay for me. The only disappointment in the movie was Nestor Carbonell as the mayor of gotham with a coal black eyeliner(Now thats funny!). And a pleasant thing to see that the plastic Katie Holmes was booted out and exchanged for a better Maggie Gyllenhaal, tho she barely gets much screentime. Michael Caine is well all Caine-like and patches up with Christian Bale after their showdown in The Prestige acting all wise old manlike...well if you were so smart then why didnt you put the batsuit on eh, alfie?

So there you have it. No homoeroticism(link) in this episode of the bat crusader. All you have is kick ass action, a well enough runtime, the joker, and en expression that makes you ask

" Why so seriousss??"

4/5 for me on this movie.

Thats all.
For now.

A stolen thought

2008-07-15T23:25:00.002+05:30

Things keep happening around in life. I never chose to participate in any event around me till now. Always waited for opportunity to come and knock at my door. Since that never happened I have not ventured out fresh into this world of goin and giving my own best shots. May it be music,drama,technical events...whatever. Participation! A very fresh discovery for me.

Somehow , in a few ways I do regret it that I've been so dormant all through. I never was sure enough if I would have been good enough. And that "What If I lost?" always hovered in my head. Once or twice I might have taken part. Lost...eventually suppressing me more. Now, interestingly that all has faded away to a large extent, though not completely. But I'm satisfied.

Now one real important thing I've learned till now is that we always have this sharpening to perfection attitude in us in which before we undertake a given task we lay our focus totally on the preparations and be real sure about everything to the extent of validating double checks on each and every attribute required. And when finally comes the stage for the execution of that task, turns out everything or nearly everything goes wrong and haywire. I'm not against planning things. Its the attitude that we have do keep a check on ourselves to be sure of what we're doing rather than goin ahead and doing it.

And then there are times when a task is taken up and all you do is gun it, carry it forward making no conscious checks or having pangs of self doubts of authenticated perfection. As Nike said, 'Just do it'. Thats when things work out. Thats when things start flowing and the true work comes out. So its to come out of that state of over consciousness and go ahead with a target. This is something very similar to what Chris Adler(Drummer of Lamb of god, an Idol to me) said on the Killadelphia DVD.

So thats the message.
Once you feel something strong(may be any magnitude), don't just sit and plan it.
Just do it!

(Hope I dont get sued by Nike for this!)

My Fall

2008-06-28T01:49:00.001+05:30

I stood on the edge
I fought in my mind
A degree discontent
Seared in my head.

I forget where I am
I look to the sky
The wind passes me
I feel that I fly.

Floating with no wings
Light as a feather
Drowned into happiness
Blinded surrender.

Away and I move
Progress on digress
The air that soothes
A careful caress.

With wings I cant see
No sound that I hear
A moment I'm free
The next in fear.

My heart it stops
I ended my trip
Reality knocks
As hard as it hits.

This ground that I face now
The journey so far
Falling from grace
My surrender to god!

Of bands and sleeplessness

2008-06-27T02:52:00.003+05:30

Since last year jan I've been inducted into the local rock scene by guitar-ing my way to a stage shows with 'Morbid Genesis'. N then came a one show with 'Untouched corpse', further moved onto 'Niflheim'...a show with 'Overdrive' too. But all this time it was mostly about covering songs, practicing 3 days before the show, and just plain screwin and jumpin around on stage. Never took it seriously coz of this and so it was highly sidetracked, since things were not the way I expected them to be.

Meeting Soumitra after a few months, he comes with a proposal of joining/forming a new progressive metal band. And this time it was serious. Then Shubham(another guitarist) tagged along to form the fundamental core of the current band. Things seemed a bit loose for me at the initial phase coz Soumitra(a.k.a Chutu) seemed really excited like a kid aiming to be on the moon just by looking at it. I wanted a big kick start so that there was some check on the seriousness that we might put in the band. Unfortunately my exams were goin in.

Going thru the nomenclature procedure was and is(since we're still nameless) a pain in the butt. We started off with 'String Theory', moved on to 'Lake Thor' and then came 'Blackville' (my favorite) and then onto 'BloodRush', and the manically depressing 'Mahasagar'.

My exams got over and so we took off with the band. Our main aim was making original compositions. This didn't take much time, Soumitra already had some tracks ready so the composition part was brief. We didn't look forward to piling up the track count, coz all we needed right now were a few songs for a demo tape. The main aim was to record these tracks to 'spread the music' and wait for reviews.

The recordings started. And then I came to know how it really felt like. Recording leave alone a whole track, just a riff for the track took us six straight nocturnal hours. Backbreaking it was, but on the other hand it was really fun. Playing guitar seriously knowing that If I play this well someone outside might hear it and like it. Wow! felt extraordinary. There was this drive inside to keep practicing for my clarity and sound. I worked on a single riff right thru an hour and still I wasn't bored of it. This is how awesome it feels! Making music. Pure Fun.

And its wasn't only the music that I really enjoyed, it was the company too. Me, Chutu and Shubham gelled in along so well considering that I didn't know Chutu that well before and never met Shubham till 3 weeks back. We kept on cracking really awful PJ's, torturing each other mentally, laughing like lunatics, jumping around, playing music...and all this was midnight to morning at my place.

We've not been really successful in the recording process so we had to delay the process in search of better equipment. But all the recording was not in vain coz from the amount of work we three put in it was clear what our commitment level to making music was. Crystal!

My sleep patterns got really skewed though, a bit insomnia has set in(if thats what I can call it!). But all this while I never felt this serious considering music something close to a career option.
The best part is I was going through my old diary written when I was 15. I had written this - " I'll be a guitarist of a band one day. A Rockstar."
Well the term 'Rockstar' is pretty embarrassing, but reading that really made me feel this great overwhelming happy feeling.

I'm here now, where I wanted to be!

The House I called Home

2008-06-18T11:36:00.003+05:30

A lot of things in life varying in significance are taken for granted. The belief that 'its' just there and would always be'. And later to come to know that there are forces at work which would would go against this inside belief might add a painful level of shock.

I just came to know a few days back that my dad's place at Kodungaloor(kerala) is gonna be locked up, and if it follows suit like my mom's old place...probably get demolished in the future. This was something that would never have come to my head when I was there. I usually go there on vacations to visit my relatives. This house was huge, there were like 5 rooms, a pond, a ground, a garden, a fountain, an outhouse, a well, a stable and had that typical big Kerala family house thing to it. For me it was like a sanctuary during my vacations.

I still remember sometimes when I used to go with mom I used to make a fuss that I wanted to go over to dad's place coz I didn't like it at mom's place where there was no one my age. It was just going to Kodungaloor to this house where each room was inhabited by one of my uncle's or aunt's. And to go there and be greeted by so many people of your family all together - wow!

I do agree that I'm not much into the joint family living thing and all but I guess during the vacations when I used to go there it felt really warm to be in presence of so many people. There was this whole cousins 'gang' thing, usually the 'behenlog'(sisters) used to sit in a room and discuss girly( my ignorance to their topics of interest made me choose this label) stuff and me and my bhailog(brothers) would be out playing cricket or badminton r something. The best part was that a few of my uncle's and my dad would also join us while playing, and that was really awesome. I always used to go during the vacations so everyone would be free at that time.

Sometimes in the morning all of the cousins would go to the pond just to play around in the water, had some really fun times there. I was dead scared of deep waters actually mainly coz I was not a swimmer, but it was really fun just splashing around, relaxing in the sun...etc. The whole 'attempts to swim' would make us all really hungry and so off we would run to the bathrooms to clean ourselves up and be the first to reach the dinner table. Its always rice n sambhar alongwith assorted spices n subzi's n stuff in Kerala, you can't expect domino's of course...but eating the typical 'Kerala-south Indian' food felt like heaven. Though I frankly admit there used to be times when I would get bored of the rice too, but it added the whole 'authenticity' of being 'in' Kerala. After dinner we would either be talkin, watchin TV, or takin a siesta.

The evening would start with 'tea-time', and so there would be some awesome ladoos, mysore paks and other sweets with tea n coffee. Munch munch and then straight to the ground for us 'guys'. Our play would end and we would join our sisters expecting some delightful conversation eventually being shooed off or being given 'the look'. So there would be this time frame where we(as in the bhailog) would be put to thought about what all stuff would they be talking about the whole vacation that kept them so busy. Hmmm... never found out. Sigh.

There always was a power cut from 8-9 P.M. there. So everyone of use would sit outside in the semi darkness with just the moonlight. All the bhailog and behenlog would finally get together and play all sorts of kiddie games like 'red letter', 'chor police', 'lock n key' blah blah...and I guess nobody would be conscious of their own age. The joy of being a kid again, Ahhh!

Nightime, it was dinner and zap off to sleep. People used to sleep pretty early there sometimes. But me and brothers would just wake up late talking about all ummmm....may I say 'manly' stuff. Really fun, especially when my brother would make up this whole story about a 'hot encounter' he had with this girl in class. I used to listen with my mouth wide open and believe all the crap. I never made my own story, I was really bad at it...more plainly speaking - I sucked. We would all try to stay up till the morning but we would quickly drop one by one to increment the sleeping casualty toll.

Years went on. People started growing. Some of the bhailog and behenlog were too mature to be with the kids now so they would be spotted more often with the aunts and uncles talking about more serious issues. The groups got smaller.

The marriage bug came in. One after the other people would leave off to somewhere else. Their membership to the whole 'gang' had expired. I always knew this would happen, but I never prepared myself for the change coz as dumb as I might have been I thought the people would still be the same after marriage. And thats not how it was. The gaps set in. They now had their own children to take care of. What would we talk about when we met, I barely knew any part of adult life. Though I do say there was a 'gap', but it was not a bad one as it may seem from the word...the warmth would still be there, we would talk about the 'old-days' as if we were all sexagenarians. But that feeling of being a 'care-free' child slowly slipped away. Responsibilities had now crept in...there were priorities to manage. And I was still somewhere figuring it out.
Families started clearing the big old house to go off and live alone in the small new one. People split up to places.

We grew up. The frequency of playing had considerably decreased. Being in the same room with some of the remnants of the 'gang' just turned out to be a vestigial procedure. Now there was just me,my sister, my other two cousin brothers and their sisters. All the brothers were of the same age...all the sisters - same age.

Last year, one of my sisters got married. She's in Australia now, happy. My other cousin sister would get married this December. My own sister, well...she would soon be haunted by the "Woman! Its time you got married." bug. Me and my brothers, the survivors (for the moment!!!).

Things are not same anymore. Thats life they say. Though through all this topsy turvy of a journey there is one common thing which we all shared that still exists - The house. The house where it all was. A representation of our memories, stored in the walls of this abode. Calling it a mere dwelling was a laugh. It means a lot more to me. And I probably couldn't bare to witness it evacuated and locked up. But that sometimes is that hardest part of life, swallow and move on. Accept the ways. It feels horrible but not many options to ponder on.

I would soon be going there. To bare witness to the splendor that was, that is. Its my home away from home.

And as everyone knows...there's no place like Home!

A long shower

2008-05-24T20:59:00.003+05:30

Freedom.
A favorite tag word often used for people my age. Usually its associated to getting "free" from being under rules, taking ones own decisions etc etc... you get my point, right!

I have this contemplating time period in a day while I stand extremely still under the shower and and think on...everything. The day, my life,' Am I happy?', 'am I sane today?' and stuff like that. And it really helps. That cool feeling goes through my body and feels as if the water purifies every negative thought or gives me the resistance.

Freedom. Some of my friends always count the number of days they'll be free to be on their own feet. No parents to bug around , no one to tell you what to do...although with the whole "revolution" in communication, scrutinizing surveillance is 'easier than stealing candy from a baby'(quote : Mr.Burns, Simpsons). Nobody would obviously think of the burden of responsibility that would be present. Its like this - if the chocolate cake looks extremely delicious you're not gonna stand there and count the calories. And yeah anyways it not "soooo" tough living alone and being free, is it? We always have that sense of over confidence that if I can survive these 20 years of my life I can go ahead and do what I want.

Freedom.
The words has a lotta ambiguous meanings linked with it, depends on the situation. Where's the freedom when you run outta money while you're supposed to be working, is it gonna be 'mommy and daddy' to rescue?

Maybe I'm not even old enough to write this stuff. It's part of being an 'adult'!!
Oh yes, the being an 'adult' brings all sorts of oooh's and aaah's with it, I'm still a kid tho' pretending to be an 80 year old experienced veteran.

And yet there are these times when you just can take it when you're given 'orders', you shout out - I wanna be alone, somewhere else...anywhere else but this!
Sounds familiar?
No? Then stop reading I guess.

Freedom.
So many genre's, so dangerous...yet so tempting.
Solitude is.

But whatever we do, all the dilemma's , all the indecisiveness, the crossroads... follow your gut,
the grass is always gonna be greener on the other side!! (?)

Con Air!

2008-05-14T11:06:00.003+05:30

I remember watching Con Air when it was released, we had this VCR and the cassette was a bad quality camera print i think. I barely understood the movie coz o the quality and turned it off. 8 years laters when I saw it again, it gained access to my favorite movie list. The best thing about the movie are the dialogs, sheer splendid stuff. This is the movie in which I really appreciated John Malkovich for his role as Cyrus the Virus.

Here are some memorable quotes from the movie :

* [Holding a gun up to the head of a stuffed pink bunny]
Cyrus Grissom: Make a move and the bunny gets it.

* Cyrus Grissom: I despise rapists. For me, you're somewhere between a cockroach and that white stuff that accumulates at the corners of your mouth when you're really thirsty. But, in your case, I'll make an exception.

* Garland Greene: What if I told you insane was working fifty hours a week in some office for fifty years at the end of which they tell you to piss off; ending up in some retirement village hoping to die before suffering the indignity of trying to make it to the toilet on time? Wouldn't you consider that to be insane?

* [to the pilot whom he is holding at gunpoint]
Cyrus Grissom: Say a word about this over the radio, and the next wings you see will belong to the flies buzzing over your rotting corpse!

* Vince Larkin: Do you understand me, or do you need me to draw it in crayon, like usual?

* Garland Greene: He's a font of misplaced rage. Name your cliche; Mother held him too much or not enough, last picked at kickball, late night sneaky uncle, whatever. Now he's so angry that moments of levity actually cause him pain; give him headaches. Happiness, for that gentleman, hurts.

* William 'Billy Bedlam' Bedford: Have you lost your mind?
Cyrus Grissom: According to my last psych evaluation, yes.

* Duncan Malloy: What's with "dictionary-boy" over here?
Vince Larkin: I believe "thesaurus-boy" would be more appropriate.

* Baby O: What's wrong with him?
Cameron Poe: My first guess would be... a lot.

* Vince Larkin: Cyrus, where are you taking my plane?
Cyrus Grissom: We're going to Disney Land.
Vince Larkin: You're lying, Cyrus.
Cyrus Grissom: So are you, Vince.
[singing mockingly]
Cyrus Grissom: Ohh... nothing makes me sadder than the agent lost his blader in the... aaaiirrrplane
[throws the headset he's using]

* Cyrus Grissom: Ladies and Gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. I have the only gun on board. Welcome to Con Air.

* Johnny 23: Do you know what I am?
Cameron Poe: Ugly all day?

* Vince Larkin: This one has done it all: kidnapping, robbery, murder, and extortion. His name is Cyrus Grissom, A.K.A. Cyrus the Virus. Thirty-nine years old, twenty-five of them spent in our institutions. But he's bettered himself on the inside. Earned two degrees, including his juris doctorate. He's also killed eleven fellow inmates, incited three riots, and escaped twice. Likes to brag he's killed more men than cancer. Cyrus is a poster child for the criminally insane. He's a true product of the system.
Duncan Malloy: What's that supposed to mean?
[Malloy looks back at Sims]
Duncan Malloy: What is he, one of these sociology majors who thinks we're responsible for breeding these animals?
Vince Larkin: No, but I can point a few fingers if it would make you feel comfortable.

* [after seeing a Corvette being towed in the air by a plane]
Cameron Poe: On any other day, that might seem strange.

* ["Sweet Home Alabama" plays in background]
Garland Greene: Define irony: a bunch of idiots dancing around on a plane to a song made famous by a band that died in a plane crash.

* Cameron Poe: Sorry Larkin, but there's only two men I trust. One of them's me. The other's not you.

* Cyrus Grissom: Thank you Poe, you've proven to be a most useful mammal.
Cameron Poe: Many hands make light work. My father taught me that.
Cyrus Grissom: Know what my father taught me? Nothing.
Cameron Poe: Self-educated man.

* Cyrus Grissom: It's not difficult to surmise Nathan's feelings towards killing these guards; and my own proclivities are well-known and often-lamented facts of penal lore.

* Vince Larkin: "The degree of civilization can be judged by its prisoners." Dostoyevsky said that... after doin' a little time.

* Cyrus Grissom: Considering my audience, I'm going to make this very quick and very simple.
[points to objects in the sand]
Cyrus Grissom: This is the boneyard, this is the hanger, this is our plane.
Con #1: [points] What's that?
Cyrus Grissom: That's a rock!
[knocks it out of the way]
Con #1: Okay.

* Cyrus Grissom: Where's the plane Cindino?
Francisco Cindino: It'll be here, have patience.
Cyrus Grissom: The last guy who told me to have patience, I burned him down, bagged his ashes.

Men will be Men

2008-05-12T10:54:00.004+05:30

Stretch! Yawn!
"McGrath is awesome...this is where all the experience kicks in." I comment after watching an almost maiden over bowled by the Delhi Daredevils fast-medium pace bowler.
Kushal and Sahil nod in agreement.

There it was on the idiot box, the Delhi Daredevils Vs. Rajasthan Royals. IPL at one of its best.

I stretch more. Relaxed and getting back to the match.
This is how I spent my evening yesterday with the "guys", i.e - My old school friends Kushal and Sahil. It was all the old memories coming back, when we used to be glued to the TV watching an ODI and cheering for India(or sometimes the winning side!) and then during the breaks we used to play 'handy' cricket with a sponge ball in the living room. These were the 'get-togethers' we had pre-high school days.

We met after a few 'months' yesterday, yet the best thing(or thats what I see it as) is that we don't go into all the tight hugging and "Man! its been so long!"...I enter with a casual 'Hey!Watsup?' and the next moment we're discussing about the current match. That is the awesome part with these guys in a way, we never had to tell each other any intimate stuff, share secrets or lament on how screwed things were. It's all about the time that we meet. Let the past be the past, which is really relaxing in a lotta ways.

So here we were, lying on the sofa. Jumping on boundaries being hit, cursing the fielders, giving pieces of advice to the bowlers...hey! as long as we aren't in the match there's no pressure on us, right? So whats wrong in some harmless criticism.

[By the way I had lost complete faith and interest in Cricket when I was around 16-17, and stopped following it completely. But that's when I hooked on to F1, Soccer and Tennis matches. With the current IPL trend taking over, I have been a victim of this new format of the so called 'Gentleman's Game'. Amen to that!]

Its when I got an sms which said "Men! Men! Men!" from Dagny, on updating her with my then-current state that I realized this is how 'Men!' are always pictured to be. Being with a group and watching a sport(we also kept on switching to the English Premiere League once in a while!) and cheering, shouting n what not. Being Lazy was another perspective, but I refrain from acknowledging that point of view. Yet somehow I felt all 'Manly' about myself in weird ways, which I don't usually.

This was rarely the way I spend my time with my other friends. I never felt all that masculine and testosterone driven in any way. Thats why yesterday it felt all different but new. I still couldn't calculate my thoughts in my head and come to any conclusion on that.

Anyways we had 'hum-pum' paneer(muchos splendido!) and lotsa garlic bread which was great and a bit of green apple vodka(thank you Russia!) for that manly touch. And had a great time reuniting and feeling a bit nostalgic.

Wish I had taken a pic with all three of us yesterday, we dont even have one such photo. But sometimes leaving it to the memory can be more fun. :)

Cheers!

In Dependence

2008-05-03T14:51:00.004+05:30

I've been trying hard since a few weeks to be with myself alone, as to know 'what' I am. It sounds all too heavy and spiritual and stuff, but its really quite simple. All I want to do is identify myself as another person so that I can be with myself and not be afraid of being alone, coz even if end up being alone sometimes I would still have someone - Me!

I admit it - I am really really dependent on the people around me...when it comes to work and even emotionally. When I breakdown emotionally I confide everything to any of my friend even though he/she is not my best(est) friend...and I do not weigh at that time that how the information that I'm disclosing would have any consequences or not. When I'm emotional I just cling onto someone. Lately I found out that, that is a really big weakness that I have.

Yes yes, friends are there for us all the time. 'A friend in need is a friend in need' and all that stuff, but I land up getting too dependent on others. I only visualize myself as a helpless fog, with no solidarity. And such moments I fail to acknowledge my strength in order to borrow it from others, it really makes me weak. And I never realize this at the right time. I keep on looking for support all around. Someone to confide in or just let out those bitter things to take weight off my chest. Maybe I might be getting too extreme on the 'be with myself' part, but in no way do I mean that I won't socialize and be alone on an island.

Yes, I do crave for solitude sometimes but not every time. I have such wonderful people around me whom I could probably not live without. No man is an island, right?

Since a few weeks I've been learning to be less dependent. Now I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing, though I feel better in some ways. I guess I feel more strong and capable to take stuff on my own and have my own feelings and intuition to work on something rather than being dependent on what others might think of it. It's that sense of freedom 'to be' and not 'to be for'.

When I get all emotionally heavy, frustrated or disturbed I go into this blankness...sort of like a meditation mode. I switch my mobile phone off usually, coz my phone is the thing which keeps me connected to the people around me and as long as its on I still am connected and ummm...can I say...bound(?) in a way. Even if I try to free my mind I would still think of the messages and the missed calls that I'll be missing. So I go off line and try to figure out things and be with myself and take the whole emotional responsibility. Although the bad part in this is that I only come back online when I'm totally sure about myself...so sometimes that takes more than the estimated time to be online.

Now, in now way when I'm doing this means that I'm running away from my responsibilities. That is far from what I intend. All I need is just a little time to know myself. Sometimes this sounds like total hogwash, bullshit or whatever you may call it...this is how things are going on for me now. Maybe I would be clearer about this whole thing later on, we'll see!

I still thought of a lot more things to write about this...maybe next time!

Peace!

Live

2008-04-27T19:55:00.002+05:30

Out of all the things that you do, never stop treasuring the greatest gift that you have been given. The gift of life.

When you're sad or you feel low, that never means that you're not living your life. It's when you try to stop feeling things around you, when you make yourself numb and so try not to feel anything because you're afraid...thats when you stop living.

To not feel, to deny it...that is the greatest crime.

Whenever that feeling of sadness overcomes you, close your eyes and feel it pass through you. Dont deny it's presence, it still is there. Touch, hear, see, FEEL...that's what makes you different. Perception.

Even if you're sad you're still feeling sadness. Nobody said life was only about being happy. Make sure you live it, unwrap this gift. Once again I stress - Feel it!

Anything you do, there is a reason for it. Its for you to experience that reason. To go through it and be a part of things. To belong in this world. To be the one who belongs.

Love yourself and Love this Gift!

SuperHuman Samurai : Syber Squad

2008-04-27T16:23:00.006+05:30

Long before I was blessed with the gift of cable T.V. local channels 'DD1' and 'DD Metro' were the only visual treats I was accustomed to. I remember being a kid, being back home from school happily bouncing around, throwing my water bottle and bag on the couch and celebrating the merry occasion of the end of a day at school.

4:30 PM - Flick. The T.V. is switched on and I jump in pure glee as its another episode of 'SuperHuman Samurai'!! Wheeeeeeee!!

I was a religious follower of this show. Sam Collins,Servo,Tanker, Syd, Amp,Lucky, Malcolm, KiloKahn (Looked a lot like shredder)...Man!
All Sam Collins had to do was strum his electric and utter "Let's Samuraize, Guys!" !! Way too coool!
I found some of the episodes on youtube...nostalgia. God it was fun back then!!!

I always used to screw up the intro song lyrics by putting my own interpretation, finally now I figured it out. Phew!
Here it goes -
" Super Human Samurai [Guitar riff]
Super Human Samurai [Guitar riff, muffled by sounds of bolts of electricity]
They're gonna F it up [Ahhhh! 'f' it up, eh??]
Kick Some gigabutt [How nerdy!]
They're gonna rip it up [I think I had a crush on Robin Mary Florence(Syd)!! She was really cute.]
A hero always makes the cut! [Oh! he does more than that. :)]
Super Human Samurai [Guitar riff + Kilokahn in one of his happy moods]"

Note the 'S' in Syber. Now that's RAD man!!!
Good ol' days. *cough cough*

"To Servo and to protect!"

Lol

2008-04-25T23:34:00.003+05:30

Been youtube surfin a lot these days, sad part is that the main surfing goes on after 2 in the morning coz thats when its free.
Ok so was just goin thru some random videos and pop - Bambi meets godzilla

Saw this video when I was a kid, it cam on 'splat' which was a show about animation on the discovery channel. Freakin funny the first time you see it!

We the equals

2008-04-25T22:54:00.003+05:30

Few days back me and few of my classmates were sitting in our college garden and talkin about the whole engineering college admission system, how our college sucks, and how this new academic year students are gettin a hell lotta more options than us to stay in ahmedabad.

Two other seniors joined in and went on about their views about the whole thing and at a point started preaching a bit. They're seniors right!

We were cursing how the whole OBC quota and other SC/ST things were ruining our chances of getting into better places. Due to this the major part of our college has such 'special' category students, which makes the overall quality of the students hit rock bottom. All of us sitting there started bashing about the whole division and the extra privilege that the OBC students get.
Really vented out there. Profanities flying around like bats in a cave.

And then as we were talking this other student walks and sits near us.

We stay silent for a while. And then ask him about his admission days.
"Got in through the ST quota.",he sulks...though not sure what his reason was. Later we found out that he got only half of the marks that the rest of us sitting there had scored.
At a point I felt like a fool sitting there. Then I thought,"Well these guys might be finding it really tough to even pay the college fees, so its not as if its all sunshine n daisies for them I guess."

Suddenly someone's mobile starts ringing...its the latest hit hindi pop song (donno which one tho!). Its the ST guys phone. "Yeah! OK. Be there in half an hour.", he sticks the phone into his ear. Gives a contented smile to the rest of us and exhibits his new shining N92.

Bah! Life's not fair!

[Note : I keep no discrimination among my classmates to check and see which caste or category they are from, its just to show the irony of the whole situation with the quota system that I named this guy 'ST guy' for this post.]

Kids + Kick boxing equals dumb parents

2008-04-22T20:47:00.004+05:30

Tired day today ended up doing nothing after working till 3 AM in the morning today. No sleep.
Planning to switch to hibernation mode in a while.

Well, was reading the news today (barely do that nowadays and hence am oblivious to the current affairs n events) and came across this shocking article about 4-year old kids being bullied into kickboxing matches [link].
The first reaction I had was how sick can people get. I agree there are worse things goin on in todays world, but reading this just made me really angry at how brainless jerks these parents must be.

So where does "parenthood" step in here? Well, I haven't researched much on the families that support such ruthless bullying of children but its obvious there's no pleasant side to it.

As the articles goes, Darren Flanagan, father/coach/moron(being judgmental here) defends the art of kick boxing toddlers as he believes the hits his children are taking now will stand them in good stead for the future.
He further says,

"If someone grabs Miah(Flanagan's 5-year old daughter) when she's 15, what do you think is going to happen?"

You see he's got a point there. Why wait for kids to reach their maturity level?? Why not just teach them that the only way you can deal with the big bad mean world out there is violence!!

I mean god! C'mon. At the age of four!!!
I seriously feel like adopting those kids right now, even at 19 I could be a way better father.

The other shocking part was this -

"The children's MuayThai boxing bouts happen within an adult-sized boxing ring, with parents shouting tips such as "come on Princess, go forward, kick 'em, kick 'em."

Ok, so now you split that sentence into two and pretend as if you're just hearing someone say that.
1) 'come on princess, go forward ' - Sounds like a loving parent teaching their daughter how to ride a bicycle.

2) 'kick 'em, kick 'em' - How the hell can any parent link that with part 1!!!

The worst part in all this is that there's no age limit, so there might be some idiotic moron out there ready to coach his 2year old son or 3-year old daughter some form of martial arts!!

I'm still furious about the whole thing. Still can't swallow it down. Its good that there's a documentary being made about it spreading awareness about such a terrible bloodsport.

Over n out!

Conversations with the Anti-God - 1

2008-04-19T04:09:00.005+05:30

Me : Somebody got to know about the sin I committed last week. I thought it was our secret!!!

Satan : What could I do. Was pretty bored then I guess.

Me : What the...?

Satan : Was talkin' to this angel dude. Ran short of topics and things to talk about. Caught hold of this thing. I hope you really mind.

Me : God!!! You really suck.

Satan : Oh! I thought you were talkin to me.

Me : Fuck you!

Satan : When?

Me : Aaaarrrgh! Bugger off.

Satan : You seem pissed.

Me : You think!!!

Satan : Anyhoo, we here are makin sure you stay depressed all the time. Things workin well aren't they?

Me : I'm happy dammit.

Satan : Aaah! Can you hear the music of the lie detectors screaming?

Me : Shut the fuck up!!

Satan : You're pretty lame and useless ya know. Can help you out you know?

Me : How desperate do you think I am!

Satan : Twice your ego. And thats ummm...pretty Big!

Nrkey Menon has signed off

Conversations with God - I

2008-03-31T00:53:00.003+05:30

God : So what would you answer if I asked you who you are?

Me : I'm just a form actually. I'm what or who you want me to be.

God : Are you saying you don't have constance?

Me : Yes. I'm merely a mold and and I can be cast into various shapes. You want a goody good guy to talk to, I'll be you're angel. You want a rebel to talk to, I'll be the swearing punk. I have no core If there is such a thing. Maybe I'm not human inside, but my saying this would only be perceived by you as an act of being "cool" or being "different". I do act on those principles, but they aren't the only factors governing my behavior. Inside there's a reason to everything, on the outside I'm clay!

God : Then what do people think of you?

Me : If I knew that then I wouldn't be here talking to you.

God : Your logic fails me. Yet I shall not press on that fact. Answer me this, do you hate any person?

Me : As an individual I hate no one. I might dislike them and show that I do hate them, but acceptance and forgiveness are my virtues. And these virtues are what people don't like about me...cause then it becomes inhuman not to hate. We were believed to be born to occupy our own emotional spectrum to every value be it anger,love,hatred,peace...and beyond. But maybe hatred is too harsh a word, or too impossible an extremity.

God : It seems you find it tough to fit in.

Me : On the contrary, thats my last worry.

God : So you can be independent and survive all alone.

Me : Given the opportunity I would attempt that, but thats where my human characteristics kick in. Indecisiveness and uncertainty, I'm full of it.

God : Thats the only human traits you claim to own? So you still claim not to be a human?

Me : Do you really wanna know the answer?

God : Humour me.

Me :

God : I didn't quite get that.

Me : They don't call you 'God' for nothing, do they?

God : They??

Me: Your subjects. Your children!

Me : So... what would you answer if I asked you who you are?

God : I'm would say I'm me.

Me : But that's me!!

God : That's all I have to say.

Harvest

2008-03-27T20:44:00.002+05:30

For a moment I sat there. Trying to open my eyes. I could, but I didn't. Something scared me. What would I see once I open them. Things as they were, unbroken...not shattered to pieces!
And then I muster up my will n courage (Is it mine now??). The light enters my eyes. My pupils dilate adjusting to the brilliant light. And then I see. Things there, the same place.

It was a wound, and darkness was a friend. Nothing around existed actually. Coz I didn't want things to. They might have been there, just existing...a mere entity in it's place. I didn't want to touch anything, coz I was scared now things would be different. Would I touch the cold n smooth surface of metal and feel the same...would I know the softness of anything.

I reason. That's all I usually do. Stare at the sky and reason. Analyse. He!

And then I move my head. Everything was moving inside my head. The numbness was slowly fading away, but it was still there.
Vertigo!
Was I still living? Did I do something that I shouldn't have? Did I preserve my mask of sanity, or has it slipped away?

All I could see was a circle fading to black.

I try to stand up and feel the back of my head. Blood.
It was a nasty fall.
I never knew it happened. But still it was a deja-vu!

People were around me. Looking and observing me like a moonrock. Why would I trust them? Why would I trust anyone?
It's my life.
It's mine.
My precious! *gollum tone*

I stood up. I walked...
and then I lived happily ever after.

Fading oblivion

2008-03-07T01:38:00.003+05:30

I can be really addiction prone sometimes, though I have control in me some form or the other. There is this thin red line between desire n submission...and there's no point of view which makes it clear.

My hands spread out, fingers open
this wall of air passes through me
I stay and remain as I was
Though I'm vulnerable, I feel weak.

This silent drug enters my veins
and sleeps inside my blood, no pain
my body is open built with trust
my eyes are closed and may open again.

If flows inside my body
this happiness, the joy, the vain
A world of light rushes in
perceived the glory, protect the pain.

A violent smile beneath this face
of the shadow which was kept to wait
Am falling into this hallucination
free from reality, free from hate.

All I saw was a flower blooming
Its immortal glow, nothing else
no death,no pain, no seed of hate
just the drug sinking in.

I kept on falling, but it had to end
and so I face the solid ground
the drug - my cure has drained away
Immortal is not what it sounds.

And now I writhe in pain, all hollow
in the shadow of the light that came
this drug my cure, my life it swallowed
And left me helpless on the ground again.

I open my hand, but it seems lifeless
I open my eyes, I'm blind again
by all the light that was thrown on me
I'm back in this darkness all again.

Vindication of my title

2008-02-13T02:11:00.000+05:30

I felt I was superhuman once. Punched by the mere existence of things that did not make sense I was partly compelled by the innacuracy and inability of my comprehension with the reality that existed and the one that I believed in. It was the ignorance that pulled me down to inept form of reasoning that I drove my own mind to illogical conclusions. My thoughts dwindled around an unformed axis of randomness unable to find a source. Every thought and the roots which gave birth had no originality but was merely a reflection of others judgements. An thus the unprecendented and unexpected decisions which took place in my head were a crystallization of experience rather than a product of self creativity. To crack in to deeper analysis of my own flow, from the insipid and mundane to the spiritually enlightening and thought provoking...everything boiled down to the same level. There was no spectrum of analysis, there is not. Only mediocrity. And yet I choose as we all do to classify extremes for our every action, every thought. Nothing could be born out of nothing. Things work on the principle of the law of thermodynamics.

A sense of constance. Of stagnancy yet violence in itself. An undefined paradox that is ceased to believe but yet exists, like god. I am equipped with every knowledge there is in this world...in fact everyone is. This is no philosophy, no mythology. Coz eventually nothing exists, but everything does. We encouter anoher paradox.

I'm not superhuman. I barely know what it means. For that i'll have to search for the greater definition of humans, of humanity. Yet a stubborn belief is born in me that says that I could find all the answers sitting here or maybe there, by just opening the minds eye. Answers by staring into the light, staring at the sun. By looking at nature, a bleeding vein, by answering your own questions. I know that sense of completion is not gonna set in. There is no suicide, no giving up. A thrist is to be quenched, its destiny has been written. Nobody knows what it is.

Yet I once again stare at a light. Waiting for something to happen. For the universe to implode in a speck of dust, but how long do I wait. And I see before the light the glass that contains the lumina, and it reflects nothing. It just shows off what it has. Be it darkness, be it light. It will live no matter what, It'll give light contained in it. It wont respond unless its life and its functions are thwarted upon. But it persists to its completion. Even a tube of light has an objective.
Then why cant I!

Trying to be on more sane terms - I do believe in god. I do believe he does not play with dice.
There is a master plan. Nobody knows. I dont intend to unravel even if given the powers.
But control is never an independant virtue, its a smeared web.

I believe someone read this and someone did understand.
I crave for distinction to a point of make believe.

I felt I was superhuman once!

[its 2 in the morning and I think I've been hit on the head.]

Another prick in the wall

2008-01-29T20:52:00.000+05:30

Ok so here I am...back in the sack. College's started again. Same old faces....tch tch, sadly!
Sigh!
Got a lotta 'ur gettin fat' from a bunch o ppl, so have planned to hit the gym(a really hypothetical PLAN B for now I must add!). I am putting on weight though, the worst part is that all the fat gets accumulated somewhere around the mid torso area giving justice to the shyly visible paunch in the making. My sis always used to scare me that I'm gonna be fat and bald when I'm 35, the only silver lining in her statements where the absence of usage of the word 'ugly'!
Haha! take that. At least i'll be good looking then.....or would I!!!

*ominous music*

Ok so here I was sitting in the lecture(as in synonym for lullaby), sitting on the first bench (what the hell was i doing there!) and trying to absorb every ounce of nonsensical jargon thrown at me(metonymy for the class). [I'll stop using the parenthesis right about now....(i guess not!).]
And was feeling bored, same ol' same ol'. Some new faculty members this time. Each of them professing in their preposterous usage of the English dialect. Butchering everything that has been ever been invented and know to man about the English grammar. Clearly the little red book called wren and martin was not meant for them.
Sometimes it gets torturous just to try n figure out the mistakes.... i tell you the part to figure out what they mean by their speech is much more an arduous task than learning about 'data structures, algorithms' and all bloody what-nots.

Getting too bored I seemed too interested in the dysfunctional verbiage(note the sarcasm please) that one of my very 'dear' teacher was emanating. I scratched a single line for each time she used 'understand or not'...and later found 37 lines sprawled on my page. That's what the definition of 'fun' is reduced to in that hour of mental agony.

Somehow after a year and a semester of this same torture treatment I've grown quite numb to it and now feel immensely immune to the random rantings from our educationists!!

...So here I am now feeling tired n hungry(a perennial state of mind proving my normalcy) and eying the pillows which just seem fluffier right now.

I end on a pleasant note on what Floyd(see: god) once said :
"We don't need no ejju-kay-shun..................

Taare Zameen Par

2008-01-10T15:07:00.000+05:30

Rarely do I write reviews for movies. To add a pinch of weirdness to that - rarely do I write reviews for 'bollywood' movies. But yesterday I went n watched 'Taare Zameen par'(TZP) out of curiosity to know what all the fuss was about. And behold! I was enlightened by the movie.

I am not such a big fan of bollywood, which all has recently become too glamorous and downright bland. Most of the directors follow a formula and viola! there they are getting what they want...their usual (target) audience. So going through all the monotonous rut of "bold" item numbers, flaming cars elevating (even though they were shot just by a bullet) and cliched humour is quite a pain in the *beep* and I would rather save my monetary holdings for a better purpose. And so here comes TZP saving bollywood from its decayed decline gracefully.

The movie gets into the head of 8-9year old dyslexic Ishaan Awasthi(brilliantly played by Darsheel Safary), who finds beauty of the world around him through his imagination and is captivated by the sights of what life has to offer. The innocence and restlessness of a child is well reflected and portrayed by the characters antics. The expressions... may it be fear,anger,sadness or pure exultation are carried out by the young actor quite flawlessly and naturally with not even a hint of overacting.

Amir Khan with his a la patch adams entry into the school has given the movie its share of completeness. With his unconventional tutelage, Ram Shankar Nikumbh (Amir Khans character) coaches the children to do what they want in life, i.e 'live life' it rather that just 'succeed in life'.

The movie explores how children nowadays are being pressured on and on to stay ahead in the rat-race. There's a beautiful dialog in the movie where Amir Khan criticizes how parents want to grow toppers and scorers in their houses. Brilliant.

I have really appreciated Amir Khan for his diversity in acting roles in his movies, and this movie is a proof how he has evolved as an actor. Hats off to Mr.Khan for making this movie.

This movie is really a work of art.

Ummm...well....thats it.

Entropy

2008-01-09T15:54:00.000+05:30

For the past few hours/days all I've been doin is 'puzzles'. Yeah! thats right...puzzles. I'm putting my mind through every sudoku, crossword, kakuro, loop the loop, crypting and jumbled up anagrams in every newspaper I could find.

It now has taken a turn to an obsession. I've not stopped solving these things since morning. I dont take a bath, I barely think of food(unless it smells great...hey I got my soft spots too!) and stop thinking for a while of the stuff happening around me.
By the popular method of induction i might say 'THIS IS NOT ME'. I had an attention span of like ....1,2....5 seconds i think. This is new.

Though I do shy away a bit when I bare witness to the 'Medium' or the 'Hard'(rarely occurs) tag beneath each sudoku challenge, the next moment I jump onto it as if hunting down a gazelle! I admit that crosswords are not my cup o tea...but there's hope. Even solving 1/4th of the darned array of strategically arranged characters makes me go 'woohooing' around the house like a marionette. And yes I'm humble and modest so I wont give myself the total credit, rather share it with my dad and my girlfriend. Though I still manage to scribble my illegible handwriting(rather close to hieroglyphics!) all around the newspaper.

There's this one thing I was thinking about when I was solving all this stuff. I usually get stuck, as human I am at every 5 min period at a particular part of any puzzle that I'm working on. Slowly the latency deteriorates and frustration sets it. If this period of getting 'stuck' still goes on the mind gets close to a saturation point when all the collective barrage of logical explanations and solutions have a sudden breakdown. And then the logic stops and you solve the given problem through illogical means. However improper and erroneous it seems the mind would satisfy itself (temporarily) and an illogical base is set. On further proceeding the numbers or the characters loose its value and the whole element of the puzzle becomes a farce of its actual components.

Its like writing your favorite words in the crossword boxes without paying heed to the clues. Eventually it makes no sense, but somehow sometimes you're satisfied by ending the puzzle.

Here I would like to draw an analogy of how the "society" or the "modern people" accept what they believe is right through logical or illogical explanations. The objective eventually is skewed as it is not the 'authenticity' of the outcome its just the 'presence' of the outcome. We take things given to us, information fed to us through any form. We're satisfied by the information we get, coz we get it from "reliable" sources. There is no authenticity. There is no absolution of truth...no evidence. Everything is straight from the horse's mouth.

Reminds of the System of a Down video in where a newsreader spits out :
"...I wish I could tell you more pertinent news, but we're in a rating system here. And the key factor is "Sensationalism". They've got you running in circles, nine to five and five to nine (you're mine). I tell you what they want you to know and you consider it the truth. Nobody is opening their eyes! Our global economy is depleting the world of our lives and natural resources and ARE YOU HAPPY? ..."

I leave it here.
I've strayed pretty far away from where I started.
Hehe! thats the beauty of blogging, isnt it?

Its 2008!

2008-01-06T15:15:00.000+05:30

Ahhh! Its 2008 already. Happy new year!

Somehow, I feel as if the years are gettin' shorter. (*cough cough* or maybe i'm growin older!)

2007 has been a great year for me, although really bad things have also happened in these last 12 months the good things just nullify them off.

Its been two years since my blog started, starting with the 'People R strange' post. And now have come a long way in terms of maturity and understanding.(Ummm! well thats what I think at least.) I'm in a relationship now, though I have seldom mentioned it on my blog(actually never I think!) I prefer not to make everything public. So here I am.

Here's the 2007 chronology:

Jan 1: Not much a happy new year it seemed. I was fed up of college. So as a new year resolution I decided I would make efforts to get into a better institution by giving the engg. tests all over again.

Jan 23: I caught up with Purav through orkut, who called me in to join 'Morbid genesis' as a guitarist coz Sankalp(their original guitarist) had an accident and got his hand fractured. So I go in with my guitar,amp and processor over to some place these ppl call me, which turned out to be mruganks spare house. And I get recruited. So met all of them - mrugank, purav, Maulik, Joel on this day. I was erally excited.

Jan 26:My first show. I was somewhat superproud of myself and it really felt awsome going on stage for the first time playing to the songs that I had been listening to for so long.
The show was at CEPT called 'Metamorphosis'. I was dead nervous when we were about to play...and I kept saying "Dont screw this up!" again n again inside my head. It turned out pretty well. I wasnt facing the crowd much coz I was headbanging and riffing most of the time. And somehow there was some conspiracy which resulted in our performance being cut short and robbed us off of playin our trump song - 'Hallowed be thy name(Maiden cover)'.
Though I was really happy when it was over. 'My first show'!!
Just when I was about to display my impatience for the next show in which I might perform, Mrugank pops up and informs me,"Oh we've got a show tomorrow, and you're playing!".

Jan 27-28: This was really unexpected. I never thought the moment I start performing I would end up playing back to back. But here I was...at IIM chaos. Anubhav got tense on the last song and so I got the opportunity to vocalize my love for the metallica song. Singing and playing on stage...whoo! for a second timer it felt like scaling half of Mt.Everest. Had a blast at IIM at night/dawn too. Sadly our turn came at 4AM...so we had an audience of some seriously sleep deprived people, some staring with bloodshot eyes ("When will this end!") others successfully making makeshift beds out of the leaning chairs (hats off to them actually!). Oh yeah and was the day when I witnessed the wonder know to us fellow humans as 'Prestorika'! Amazing!

Feb 3: The third show. A notch higher. This was the campus rock Idols, and my smile got creepier. I had promised my sis the next Idols I would be up there on stage performing. Alas! My sister wasnt there. Although the show was pretty awful at some parts with the problems in bass tuning and anubhav screwing up a bit...It was really fun to be at sucha level of stage perfomance. I really did a lotta monkeying around, almost went berserk and prancing around like a pony on steroids. One word - Fun!

March 9: The DAIICT show. The best one of all. Again here I was super proud to me on vocals and guitar. But sadly I got a shocker when I heard my own voice on the video. We lost badly coz we were expecting to win, but at a level in barely mattered with all the fun we had. More on this post.

March 16: A day I would never forget. Ishan calls me up to ask me if I was interested to go for a college techfest held that day or not, I got too sleepy and said that I'll rather stay home n study. My parents werent that convinced that I would study at home so they suggest me that it would be better I went for the techfest. Finally I agree and tag along with Ishan. And so I met Dagny. It was pretty friendly and formal that day actually, but was a beginning.

June 6 - Quite smoking cold turkey. Sounds easy...I tell you its not. But I had to before it consumed me.

Jun 7 - The worst day of my life till now. Never have I cried and I felt so close to death. The joy of living was redefined in a way.

June (16 - whole bloody month!) : Had my first year final exams...the not so grand finale. Alas! It was disappointing but the period was amazing coz I was mostly on the phone or on messaging with Dagny.

July 2: The exams end. Believe me...this might seem insignificant but it was humongous relief for me. And what followed later...

July 29 : My fifth show. This time with a band called 'Untouched Corpse'. And yeah! I did feel like a corpse while performing that day. The best part though was that I was not at all tense on stage and I felt really free and wasn't scared even with people staring at the erroneous blunders that we committed ourselves to - The band! But then I forgot every bad thing that happened. Result : time stopped. Archive here.

August 4: A day I personally found really really important and heavenly.

Aug 27 and Sep 3 : Discovering the godliness by foodliness!

September (Last week!) : Jinal making his major decision of taking a year long drop. I first thought he was joking when he came forward with the idea...but then swoosh! Ching-bam! Here he is back in the city. I didn't make any preparations for a warm welcome coz I was too ahem 'bizzy' with my stuff. But at last we did meet, we still do. And talking abt it like a matter of national security does make me feel weird.

October 9 - Dagny's birthday. And there was awesome cake too! I apologize for my ravenous appetite! Khee khee!

October 13 & 14- My trip to Surat NIT with Amit and Ishan. It was really fun. Did a lotta timepass. Particpated for the contraption thingy competetion. Ate the menu. Fun travelling with friends!

November 6- My sister is back, only for a really short time tho.

November 8 - I am old(er)! Age : |1-20|. I would say this was my first birthday though.

November 9 to 15 - The shimla trip. The whole family(all four of us!) together after a long long time. Twas splendid. Quality time I say, and adventurous too!

December 26-My sis leaves for the US of A. Right now in Urbana champagne, Illinois. Miss her. But happy that she's getting to see a whole new world.

December 31 - Bloody exams on the 1st on jan....can ya believe that!
ha! Crappy new year!

Ummm....well that's some of it. I wrap it up here and leave a bit to my amazing power of memory storage.
I loved this year.
Cheers!

Living

2008-01-03T02:15:00.000+05:30

Listening to 'Metallica - To live is to die'...

at 4:56mins past the song, a tear falls down.

Asylum of the Dead

2007-12-09T02:43:00.000+05:30

Was just browsing through some o the crappy notepad files I write down. Lotsa them lie around which don't make it to the blogpage. This was one of them.
Read it...and I was thinking...'Bloody hell what was I thinking when I wrote this!'.

At a point its funny/disturbing. But I guess this was at the phase when I was totally sozzled in death metal. Fun times. :)
And please if you're gonna temme stop listening to death metal when you're done reading this. Dont!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Feed on decay
the skull that bleeds to death
the core of dismay
Realigned in hell.

The flesh of thy blood
the powerless hungry saint
Corrupt from the wounds
by traitors of the sane!

The untimely urge
of yielding the bloody sword
the dark face surrounds
the unholy Satan god.

The mind just seems to
surrender to deformity
the unformed caprice
of the vile heretic priest.

The thoughts so obtuse
that feeling numb it seems
the giving thats taken
for the millions forsaken.

The heart of this soul
the life that weeps instead
of healing the broken
the broken, the dead!

Welcome to the asylum.

Addendum

2007-12-04T01:34:00.000+05:30

Goin thru all the nostalgia writin the last post made me forget a major major thing. I missed out an important point in those listed ones about our quality time stuff n all.

Anyway it was soo cool that it needs a post of its own i guess.

While comin back home late at night we would be on our bikes (*cough*...not mine...coz i dont own one!) and there is one seriously lonely road from the farmhouse to the highway. Used to be pretty empty and barren at any time of the day. So we would switch off the lights [although maulik didnt require that, since his bike didnt have a headlight!] and ride through the cold and dark roads. The only thing that surrounded us was the moonlight, and the cold wind on our faces. The good thing was that the bikes weren't all that noisy so it had that 'floating effect' to it. All in all it was loads o fun.

And I remember this time when Sid was with us on his way back, we had our lights dimmed and he was all soaring through the road with his hi beam luminance. The rest 3 of us were shouting 'Saale! Light band kar.', 'batti bujjha' and stuff like that. Still he failed to realize what we were so anxiously endeavoring to accomplish. He scooted off pretty quickly.

Sigh!
Waiting for the reunion :D!

Como estas amigo

2007-11-24T13:01:00.000+05:30

I was just sittin on my terrace a few days back with my mp3 player and was shufflin' thru the playlist. Suddenly a maiden song pops outta nowhere and then for the next hour I didnt move an inch from my place. It was the metallica, megadeth and maiden playlist...and whenever I listen to maiden all I could think of is the ol' 'Morbid Genesis' days. Listening to trooper n Hallowed be thy name....my god! how memories and nostalgia rush back in.
Its the power of songs you know...every song has an allocation space for the memories at that time. Like listening to hybrid theory reminds me of my eight grade days n stuff like that.
All I could think of at this time was the jam and practice sessions we had at mruganks farm place. And gosh those were such fun times. I donno abt the rest of the people but that period of fun that I had was quite significant for me.

We would all prepare ourselves a week before the actual show when we have to perform, and still we would screw around with our instruments most of the time. At first when I joined the band I used to find it odd as I thought that all these bands worked four hours a day and would not sleep n all. And here we were jammin 2-3 times a week and still we would make it on stage. And considering the amount of practice we did, we did perform quite well. Yeah baby! :D

Of all the morbid sessions it was Mrugank's farm house that I guess I(and maybe 'we the band') enjoyed the most.
Some of the quality moments that we had were as follows ...

Maulik, me and mrugank would set out for the jam place all ready with our heavy equipments all decked with processors and stuff like that. The place was about 13kms away, and just when we're about to cross the 10km mark mrugank would suddenly be reminded of the most important thing we needed - the key to the farm house. And this happened 3-4 times as far as i remember. So the double kheti's added a lotta digits on the odometer. Still the stupidity was fun somehow.
Maulik singing the Cradle of filth cover of Hallowed be thy name. And people screwing around laughing incessantly. Maulik does have a bright future being Danni filth though.
Sid explaining me and mrugank how the A lydian would sound better than an E phrygian or something of that sort for our original composition, while the whole time me n mrugank would have that 'We-are-a-couple-o-baboons-in-a-nuclear-physics-class' expression. I felt like a total illiterate , I donno what mrugank was goin through. But still things did work out well with the lydian mode I think. Hehe!
The mic!!! Oh yes...the makeshift mic stands we had to make. Hanging the mic on the window, passin it over the ceiling fan (that was quite a task!)...and the famous balti mic. That is...keepin the mic between two buckets (tough to explain man!) and balancing it in such a way that we have a perfect blend of echo and reverb n delay. Take that digitech!!
Forcin mrugank to take his 'gaddi' along!! Yes, we were successful at some attempts.
Screwing around with the line-up...sid on drums...maulik on guitars...me on bass...mrugank...umm well he stuck to his guitar as far as i think. Though he did sing a bit one time...damn! i didnt record that!!

Altogether It was so much fun. I used to get scolded back home for coming late sometimes but It was kinda like' a price to pay for' thing.

And It was at the time when we had to clear the farm house that I gotto know how attached I was to the place. Me and mrugank had gone to the farm for the last time to dismantle the drum set...the last piece of equiment left there. And I seriously had that empty feeling to look at the place without people and the energy. It felt so wierd and lifeless at that time. And it was like a big farewell thing. I suddenly got that pang of nostalgia and the sadness of departure type thingies.

And then I was standin there outside...me n mrugank lookin at the house.
"So this is the last time I think we'll be seein this place, right?" I said in a more controlled tone trying to sound all macho and 'Men dont cry' type.
"Yup. The last time. We'll try to jam again some day, though It wont be so soon." Replied mrugank.
We gave a last goodbye to the farm house and departed.

Suddenly lamb of god started off, the maiden playlist was over. Hmmmph...sigh. Back to reality and present times for now. Miss those days!

[
This post is dedicated to all the 'morbid genesis' members I've been with -
Purav, Mrugank, Maulik, Sid, Sankalp, Percy, Anubhav, Harsh, Joel...all of you guys!
Rock on!!
]

Numb

2007-11-22T04:09:00.000+05:30

Its 3 A.M.
I'm lying in my balcony curled up, letting the winter chill pass through my body.
It gets colder with every passing minute, and the body failing to show any signs of resistance.
Simply because it doesn't want to.
I curse the violently bright moonlight as it laughs upon me.
The numbness sets in...of the cold and everything else. Somehow at such a time if feels better to be numb rather than being receptive to human emotions.
The mind gets drained of all its thoughts except a few that haunt around and refuse to fade.
It's colder now than it was when I came here...and I sleep on the cold floor.
I pull my legs upto my chest feeling an invisible womb of pure feelings around me.
The bat screeches.
I open both my eyes in acrid horror and hear my brain far from solace.

I was never good at accepting things the way they were, always trying to change things around me.
Its a part of life this - change. It just keeps on happenin and the next moment you know, you're somewhere else.
I was never good at adapting, but since the last few years that part of me has been exercised really well. I am a learner though.
I'm a new born child. Denying the rules by which the world plays with. I blindly see the beauty of things and smile and cherish upon the thought that comforts me - 'Beauty is forever'.
But maybe I go far too deep into happiness. Frankly, I don't know.
And 'I don't know' has been the answer to a majority of my own questions.
I am not the type of person who says 'All I want to be is happy'. Coz that is now how things work. With immense happiness always there is pain.
I am numb. And I guess I'm pretty good at seeing things differently now.
But still the adapting part has been a huge question mark for me.
Funny how things work though.
They always change. No matter what resistance you put in. Things change.
It can be the sad part of life or the happiest.
I was never good with change.
But sometimes when I sit and contemplate I realise,
that maybe the only thing constant in this world is change.

Reflections on emit

2007-10-30T19:26:00.000+05:30

This is not me , this is just a....

Open your eyes. Is it so hard??
Can you see whats real?? Can you feel it??
People are so bound to themselves sometimes, isnt it so. Never get time to see whats important. Time to 'be there'. Time to have a laugh. Time to share a smile.
Time is intricate, complex and the best alibi when you run out of reasons. Time sucks actually!
I've got lots n lotsa time. I mean I could empty my pockets and you could see hours and minutes falling to something that newton once proposed. Crazy bloke Newton!! Think he knows it all!! Schmuck!!

So where was I .....oh yes....Time. People say time is money.
I say 'Haha!! Fuck you!'
I mean time is money. For cryin out loud...all that you want associated to time is money?? Doesnt that show how we homo sapien (+sapiens??) think. I like to blame humanity actually, it's like one o' my things on the 'things to do' list that I have.(I stopped blaming the chimps coz they stared practicing projectile fecal matter throwing on me...talk about evolution!!). So we come back to 'TIME'....we have time. We've actually got all the time we want. We just keep looking for breaks....but alas!! we have no time.

It is complex my fellow primates... we see the loss of time in everything.
So when does the 'quality' time come??
What is this 'quality' time??

*sinister mysterious music played on a cello and two violins*

After trying to calculate the answer in my brain for a brief period of 1.2334587 seconds (thats how long the registers in my brain function.) ...I have come to the conclusion that the best way to answer the question in order to avoid controversies, arguments, and people fumbling for the 'report as abuse' button on my orkut account shall be answered in the following manner -

'Sorry for the inconvenience!'

So ladies and worms, girls and germs...I hath successfully been umm.....successful in wasting thy time...and there's more too.

So where was I ....ahhh! yes....Time. Yes actually I just like blaming 'time' for everything too...its next to humanity and god on the 'blame list' that I have. If time was available at a retail store at every crossroad, then we can say 'time is money!'. But for now I discard that phrase, quote or whatever from my memory registers.

But if you wake up on the right (as in antonym of wrong) side of the bed, you shall see how beautiful time is when it is organised. When you can see what time goes where. When you have control.
But now one thing...does that mean you have to 'control' time??

*sinister music on an A minor scale*

Actually you never need to control, you just know stuff. Its that gut feeling you have to trust on like the ones you got when you were a kid with that 'i dont wanna go to school today' type gut feelings. See!!

So you don't need to hold time in you hands...it just flows!!!

Yes there is chaos, there is randomness....well ummm...lemme remove the 'randomness' for the time being, i'll stick to chaos!
But there is order in chaos too...thats chaos theory my fellow humans!
Therefore - Time is chaotic!

Time freaks me out too... the similar way I'm freakin you out while you're readin this piece of crap.

So people of the netherworlds and beyond, I say time is something we should not study about. Lets just limit it to SI units and physics numericals! No metaphysics here!

I repeat -
'Sorry for the inconvenience!'

By the way...*cough cough*...whats the time??

Vent

2007-10-05T22:50:00.000+05:30

I am really bad at accepting things sometimes. And the worst at which I am is accepting my own faults. People point out my faults in me sometimes, It does help most of the times. But some obvious things are pointed out too, and then I'm given advice. I know about all this, I am just an inactive bonehead. I just get so worked up and angry sometimes that I just feel like breakin stuff and then I end up shouting alone to myself!!

I hate it sometimes, the fact that I dont accept things which are only or the good of me. I just am not the one to swallow the bitter pills that are laid in front of me. I had so much left to swallow...I cant fuckin handle all this in my head!!

I have never hated people ever in my life, coz I always thought that the more nice I do the more nicer people will get. Baah!! This fucked up world barely works this way...buttheads still remain the same way irrelevant of whatever 'nice' we do. I dont hate people, just hate their presence sometimes!!

I'm just too angry and full of the energy to break stuff right now.
Cant keep it bottled up inside - Fuck you world!!

Suffer the people

2007-10-04T00:45:00.000+05:30

A collection of random thoughts I had today in the bus today...

I was thinking after watching so many people talk about stuff. Usually it is always seen that people want to show others around them that they have suffered through stuff that others don't know about. Like even If someone was awake till 4 in the morning to do an some work, then it usually is spoken in the 'oh-my-god-i-have-suffered-so-much' tone.
Is is that people expect sympathy?? Or just as a sign of merit that they have been through it all??

I talk of people as if i'm not one of them. But hey I'm human...i do that too. The thing is that tone is misused quite a lot, for us people its quite often that such a behavior would pop out.
People do like to whine sometimes, and the more response they get the greater the satisfaction is.
It just intrigues me some times about what usually is the source of it. Is it just to attract attention? to gain sympathy(again!)??

I'm full of questions. But I do have this will to understand that part of human psychology sometimes.

'Ohhh! i'm writing this stuff at 1 in the morning and I still have 2 more hours to work!!!'

Somebody gimme some sympathy!!!

Auguries of Innocence

2007-09-23T02:38:00.000+05:30

The actual post was temporary and a bit disturbing...I dont feel that way right now. So here's the edit.
I know I cant delete my emotions and previous feelings, but I just felt this way.

Now coming to the poem by William Blake, the starting four lines are so beautiful...I was spellbound by the words. The whole poem is truly amazing especially the way it ends.

The poem starts with this -

"To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour."

Something about these four lines that really mesmerizes me.Just simply Wow!!

And it ends in the following way -

"Every Night & every Morn
Some to Misery are Born.
Every Morn & every Night
Some are Born to sweet Delight.
Some are Born to sweet Delight,
Some are born to Endless Night.
We are led to Believe a Lie
When we see not Thro' the Eye
Which was Born in a Night to Perish in a Night
When the Soul Slept in Beams of Light.
God Appears & God is Light
To those poor Souls who dwell in the Night,
But does a Human Form Display
To those who Dwell in Realms of day."

I might have just spoilt the main parts of the poem to you...but its just too amazing that I can keep it inside.
Brilliant!!

I did not cheat!!!

2007-09-22T20:34:00.000+05:30

Ok...so I took a tickle test on what my room means to me n people n what not.
Here's what it says. Check it out -

...............................................................................

AJ, your room says you're Motivated

You've got goals, baby, and your ambition is more than apparent in your surroundings. While you might not color-code your entire closet or require hospital corners when you make the bed, your organized and well-thought-out room says that you like to be in charge of situations, and you have a clear plan for getting exactly what you want.

So when you find yourself cleaning, studying, or just relaxing in your room, it's pretty likely that you're also planning the next step toward a new challenge. Just don't work too hard. Remember: There's no place like your room for a nice, long nap!

...................................................................................

Pretty neat, huh?
Time to celebrate with the dust mites!!

This is now

2007-09-21T12:30:00.000+05:30

Some say better late than never.
Why not now??

Leave you with these lyrics...

HATEBREED - This is now

Another memory and I'm asking myself
How can I let the past be the past.
Once and for all take a hold of the future
And not let it control what I aspire to have.
I see where my decisions have brought me
What's done is done and it's time to start again
Can't let it tear me in two waste me away
I gotta believe
Cause this is now
How can I change tomorrow if I can't change today.
This is now
If I control myself I control my destiny.
What I've seen and what I've been through has made me who I am
There was a time in my life where I had no desire to carry on
I couldn't see a place for me or a will to survive
I never thought to rely on myself or the beliefs that I have denied
But this is now
How can I can change tomorrow if I can't change today
This is now
If I control myself I control my destiny
If I control myself I control my tomorrow
I got to change today
Cause this is now
How can I change tomorrow if I can't change today.
I must control myself if I 'm to control my destiny.
Cause this is now.
Cause this is now
How can I change tomorrow if I can't change today.
This is now
If I control myself I control my destiny

So far, So good, So what...

2007-09-20T07:52:00.000+05:30

I was always into music since I was a kid. Back then it started with 'hindi' songs and using my mom's old turntable to listen to the sounds of the beatles and santana and abba (though I found it hard at that time why people liked santana so much!). The turntable was awsum at times, it had that old charm thing associated with it...that vintage feeling of old is gold thing. And this thing was quite old, coz it looked like a survivor of world war 1. This was all during '95 - '99.

The main influence for my love in music has been my sister, coz whatever she used to hear...I had to hear it. Coz once she records a song, she kept on playing it again n again for days till the 'juice' ran out. I was so bored by the 'my heart will go on' song at that time that I used to make fits in front of my sis that if she didn't stop that song then i'll have to leave home and run away so that all the blame would be on her. (hehe! at that time I always used to blackmail my family members that i'll leave home and never come back. And my 'leaving home' never got past the front gate!). Slowly suddenly I started liking those Celine Dion songs coz that was what my sister used to loop. And then there was a song 'To the moon and back' by savage garden...brings all those ol' times back.

At that time there were no mp3's and cassetes used to cost 120 bucks (which was quite high considering our pocket money was 50 bucks a month!). So what my sis used to do was keep a tape recorder ready near the TV and record stuff directly whenever one of her favorite songs appeared. Channel V was her main source at that time. The quality was awful and was only clear to the point that the lyrics would be barely audible. But it was kinda like a desperate time , and desperate times require desperate measures.

My second most significant influence was my cousin brother Prashant. He introduced me to a whole new world of rock at that time, we'll come to that later though.

So here starts my timeline.

2000 - The 'backstreet boys' time was here. Most of the people I know had this part in their lives for a time, when backstreet boys was considered to be the epitome of 'cool'. Pop had dominated over a lotta things at that times. Also others were N'sync, 911, boyzone, spice girls....and all that kinda similar stuff. I was never a fan of britney or christina at any point though, coz they had that 'i'm a dumb bimbo' image stuck to them which was really irritating. I must admit tho that I used to listen to one particular album of spice girls and the song 'wannabe' was something that I used to loop over and over again. But I got bored of it eventually.
I remember the time the sony stereo system had entered the premises of my humble abode, I used to keep the 'everybody' song on total loud volume to showcase my 'cool' choice of music to my neighbors. And then people at school started listening to it and discussin about it. I remember there was a particular line '...am I the only one?...yeah...am I sexual...' and then all the people would go all 'Aay haay!' as if they had just witnessed a murder taking place. The school mount abu picnic was fun coz this was the only 'engliss' song that people knew. It was also quite hilarious though watching people try to act cool coz they thought they knew what the lyrics for the song were.

2001 - The horizon was expanding and backstreet boys were sounding the same as they started. Started listening to corrs, sheryl crow, garbage, RHCP and all that stuff which sounded a bit more mature than the usual poppy stuff.
At that time Eminem had taken over a large part of my musical time because of his controversial and funny lyrics filled with profanity. The label 'Parental Advisory lyrics' was quite new to me at that time. And hearing silent beep over the tons of 'F-words' was something I found really funny at that time. I started memorising the lyrics and made attempts to rap at the same velocity at which Eminem was goin at. Though I never sounded right it was fun to try.

As I was fond of eminem at that time, so I tried my hand at some other hip hop stuff. But I never liked all the other stuff coz all o' them sounded the same and boring. It was just like 'plain talking' with some rythmic beats in the background.

At that time mp3's had entered and it was quite easy to get CD's of your favourite songs now. Downloading was not a ver good option though coz the dial ups were really slow (it took 20 mins to download a single mp3!).

2002 - The hip hop effect had gone, and I gave up trying to decipher what all the lyrics meant which usually consisted of money,fame,booty and blah blah stuff like that. At that very time I had heard a song called 'Points of authority' on channel V . I didnt like it much the first time I heard it but then it kept on goin on in my brain. It seemed catchy. And so I downloaded the song and found myself listening to it everyday, almost evertime. That was when I got interested into rock music as such. I got more and more curious about linkin park and had bought an mp3 CD and got obsessed to it.

The thing I liked so much about LP at that time was the way in which they let out all emotions of sadness, anger, frustration etc. without the use of profanities. The song 'One step Closer' had meant a lot to me at that time and I was obsessed with it. The song has a part in which frontman Chester Bennington shouts 'Shut up! Shut Up! Shut up when i'm talkin to you!!'...god! it was so amazing at that time to have that feeling of freedom through music. I got the hybrid theory and the 'Reanimation' album and soon I started collecting cassettes. I also had bought a 'Limp Bizkit' album at the very same time...it didnt make much sense to me though. And there was a song called 'Hot Dog' which apparently had 56 'f-words' in the song and justified with the 'notorious bad boy' image fred furst had. But there were other slow and jumpy songs too through which I found limp bizkit empowering in a way.
But my obsession with LP just kept on increasin. I started readin stuff about them, about how the band was formed, about their past, almost every interview....I was one big fan. I even had joined all the chatrooms and found similar people on the net ( I had to sneak in to a cyber cafe sometimes to surf the net coz I was not allowed more than 10 mins at home!). LP had taken over a huge part of my life at that time.
It got all expressive coz I had so much frustration inside me...being he 'invisble kid' (hehe!). And I knew that none of the people around me would understand the music that I listened to, and that made it more precious in a way.
It was a channel for me now.

2003 - Meteora had been released this year and LP had quite a fresh sound now, they seemed more mature though. There was no equivalent of 'One step closer' but 'faint' was quite close to it.
I started memorising the lyrics and started rapping. Mike Shinoda was the one who I idolised at that time. And I was pretty good at it. I started writing my own lyrics (which were quite pathetic!!) and started practicing. The rap/rock genre was what I was pretty much stuck to... this also included limp bizkit and papa roach.
Papa Roach had a new flavour to it...and the agression it had was quite awsum.

System of a down had come into the scene now. I bought their first album. And personally, I hated it quite a lot. It had profanities in every song, the lyrics were meaningless and the tempo of the songs was confusing. Then I heard the second album. 'Toxicity' was born in me. And then came 'chop suey'. The lyrics were wierd, some really funny (listen to : pogo and jet pilot). And now I had gone back to the first album and it sounded better now. Musically SOAD was realy fun to listen to, mostly becoz of their quirky n whacky lyrics. But some songs had a meaning...especially the song 'Spiders' which sounded quite poetic.

At these times I was getting highly philosophical in life and started getting the 'i'm feeling low' thing quite often. It was tough...and all the music that I listened to helped only in some ways. Although 'One step closer' was the most liberating song at that time, it felt as is there was a need to find something new.

As I had gone for a trip to crossword I was searching for something heavier and more heavy metal types. I was browsing through the cassettes when one album cover really had an impact on me. It looked quite creepy at that time. It was Korn - issues.
I bought the album on the spot, went home at sat listening to it on my walkman. It was deep and had a lotta hard emotions to it. At a point it was disturbing, but the creepy sounds from the guitar were simply awesome. It had a sudden impact on me. And I found a new channel now...though I still had LP on my playlist. But this music was darker, deeper and explored a new horizon.

Soon sunny (my neighbour) had also joined me with a similar taste of music. He loved LP and korn too. And the feeling of sharing musical tastes with someone was really something I was looking for. To discuss about the songs, the lyrics, the riffs...everything. Splendid.

Somewhere near that time my cousin Prashant was workin in surat. So he used to come over to our place whenever he had his weekends free. He was the only who greatly influenced into listening to classic metal stuff. I remember that we had gone for a walk once and he explained me the whole scene how metallica was, what megadeth was and how maiden inspired him musically. All of it did not have a sudden impact on me though, coz I used to tell him that megadeth didnt make much sense compared to LP and papa roach. He was laughing at me and said that i'll regret my statment later on. Funny thing is , I did.

As we went home my bro' found a megadeth cassette lying in our collection (it was Siddharth's contribution actually!). I had never heard it with interest...but my brother goes to the stereo, Starts the player, rewinds the tape and plays the song which is still there playin inside my head. It was 'Hangar 18'...and I tell you this the feeling that you get when you listen to that song the first time...incomparable!! Next was 'Holy wars...the punishment due' which was equally awesome. And then there was metallica which my brother had brought along with his collection. He had 'St.Anger' and i think the black album too. He made me listen to both these albums, and it was really a great feeling to listen to all this stuff all at one time. Though metallica didnt have much impact on me as megadeth at that time.
Was totally into megadeth.

2004 - Megadeth was still ruling me brain, but St.Anger was also goin on on parellel lines. Though St.anger didnt have that much of an effect on me except the songs 'Some kind of monster' and 'The unnamed feeling'.I knew about metallica since a long time. When I was in the 7th I had heard the 'Load' album (which my sis had borrowed from parasaran i think!) but it sounded quite deadpan at that time except the song 'Better Than you' (liked that one) and then there was 'I dissapear' which was the song i liked coz of the uber-cool video.

All the fast guitar riffs and solos had been goin on in my head for a long time now...but I needed something different for a while. Nirvana was the answer to that. I remember the first time I heard 'Smells like teen spirit'...the first time I had headbanged I guess. And it had this liberating power in it...Kurt Cobain was god! The lyrics seldom made sense and were barely audible sometimes, but when Cobain uttered words in his raw and rough voice it barely mattered. 'you know you're right' had the same effect and a lot more songs from the 'Best of nirvana' album. I started listening to a lotta other stuff like foo fighters, pearl jam, creed, Deep purple,Guns n roses, evanescence, Oasis etc. And everything started makin sense now. Music was not only about aggression anymore, it had layers.

9th october,2004. My sis had got passes for a gig at CEPT. This was my first rock show, A day I would never forget. Jinal N Rish were there wimme ( And I couldnt have imagined anybody else more perfect to accompany me that day). I had a total blast that day. It was unforgettable. And it was on the front lawn of the CEPT campus, which is quite an awsum place. And there was Big ban theory performing at that time. Splendid! Had headbanged so much that had a sore neck the next morning, but it barely mattered to the amount of fun that I was havin. I seriosuly wanted to learn the guitar now. I wanted to be with music, and create it too. This was a big day!

And now slowly the downloading music started being a common thing. I got a lotta music videos and Mp3's from Siddharth...a lott...and I really thank him for that.

Maiden had now entered my playlist all of a sudden, but I was too choosy about their songs. I listened to it mainly coz Siddharth used to tell me that it is really superb. Only 'The trooper' and 'The wicker man' were the maiden songs that I personally like, rest were so so n ok.

2005 - My main inspiration for learning guitar had been Siddharth. watchin him playin spanish solos on the guitar was really really inspiring! I joined a guitar class and was really impatient at first to start cracking the songs. But I was stuck on learning basics for a long long time. And it really irritated me coz my instructor used to gimme 'hindi' songs while I was sitting there tryin to play metallica. There was not much co-operation and I left the classes in barely 2 months from when I started and had planned the learn the guitar all by myself.

I started listenin to Hendrix and Led Zep quite a lot at that time. While korn and megadeth were still there existing. Had heard 'nothing else matters' at that time and was totally moved and touched by the song. It was the first whole song that I had learnt to crack on the guitar apart from 'Come as you are'. But things on the metallica scene were goin on the same way, when one day I came across one of their classics.
And 'master of puppets' was born for me. Metallica had been my master now...and I was the puppet. :D . The first time I heard master of puppets the song...and when the slow bridge was being played I remember just closing my eyes and feeling the music. I felt it.

I was totally into thrash metal now. Next I heard 'And justice for all...' which also stayed in my head for a long time... and the song 'One' had been an anthem for me. It was a like a prayer. Hetfield was god now! And I had total affinity towards all the metallica albums before 'Load' and 'Reload'.

I remember goin to the terrace at 11 in the night and air guitarin to the whole of 'And justice for all...' album. All of this had been with me for a long time back then.

Korn's 'Untouchables' had come in my hands now and it was quite an emotional album. Along with the Mix of 'Life is peachy' and the first album, all those nights on the terrace with my discman and the music...some seriously emotional and tough times had got through.

2006 - I had never stopped learning the guitar since the day I picked it up...and the guitarin was still on. I got my first electric guitar in May and later on in july my sis had bought me an RP50 guitar processor fro spain. It all added up and I was addicted. I would practice and keep on playin and I was never bored....ever. I didnt have a tutor, which was somewhat of a disadvantage but I was proud of the fact that I learnt all of what I know on my own.

Now I was deep into understanding music. I was maturing musically on one side while things were still the same in many ways. I started listening to bach, beethoven, mozart, Vivaldi (a bit) and It really felt meaningful now. I remember back when dad used to hear all this stuff I would always tell him that none of these instruments made sense. But now it was different. I was really moved by all the classics and also found a bit of the same taste in what mom used to listen to - Carnatic music. I was more receptive now to the different genre's of music and things were crystallizing. Though I still dont have the same interest in all of it now, but I still listen to it. And that feeling of knowing music really comes to me.
And now it was Floyd. I was never ever really fond of pink floyd myself...but my sis used to listen to the song 'wish you were here' so many times that I came to really understand that song later on. Though I have not been through the whole floyd collection I still find some of the songs really magical. Having the same effect as floyd was 'the doors'. It had that same magical effect that floyd had created. And all this was far different from what my usual taste of music was... and that exploring of genres was an awsum experience.

By september, college first year had started. The frustration was building up. I was angry at myself, but at the same time I was quite sad too. I was in hell. I just wanted release. I went back to my thrash metal stage now. I was quite bugged by college at that time, and I turned to more heavier and darker forms of music. Death metal had slowly made its way in some ways. But I would only listen to it at times of extreme anger or frustration, it was like a reserve thing.

I was into Children of bodom now. They ruled my playlist. They still are.

Present Year(2007) -
So Bodom it was ....continuing its way. Also have all the old stuff with me like metallica and megadeth n korn...cant forget them.

Was playing in a band at this time and was exposed to maiden quite a lot. I was crazy for maiden for a while. But some of it wore off with time.
This year I have jumped into more heavier forms of music I guess. 'Heavy metal' still rules over 'death metal' for me.
'Sepultura' had also had a great big entry in my playlist this year. The sound is awsome, guitars are ok. Superb drums (not playing wise but by the sound!)
Am totally into 'Trivium' and 'Lamb of god' Now....supposed to be of the 'metal-core' genre.

Though all these new things keep on coming I still will never forget my roots. I feel alive and free with the music. I agree that I am dependant on it in many ways, no denying that actually. Its just my refuge I guess to give me that liberating feeling. I donno how people perceive my love for music, but I confess it that I just cant live without it!!

Peace...ROCK ON!!!

[Phew!! this might be the longest post I've ever written!!]

music.mp3

2007-09-17T22:31:00.000+05:30

The morning today was horrible. Nothing wrong happened as such, things just felt that way. And I had a grumpy face almost all day long.I t just didnt feel right. Monday mornings do have that effect on me.

Now the thing is that I felt quite lonely today. There was no messaging today and I didnt even talk to anyone. I just didnt feel like talkin to people around me. This feeling was there throughout the day. But I had my mp3 player along with me. And so I felt the power of music surge in me...and it was awsum. From morning to evening I had the earphones in me ear... nd I couldnt let go of it. Had listened to a lotta 'Lamb of god' today, sounds awsum nd empowering at times. And I didnt have that knot in my stomach anymore...except wen I removed my earphones (and still I would be air guitaring and drumming to the riffs playin on and on in my head!). I was not all that social today...but with music with me all the time, I just dont give a damn!!

Seriously...if I didnt have my player today with me it would have been hell. Cant imagine how I would have been.
And when I got home I got to go out to buy some stuff...had taken me 'gallant steed' and had music in my ears. Oh and the feeling is awsum ya know. With the wind in your face while you're listening to your favorite track!!
Ahh, bliss!
I was literally smiling and freakin out people today coz I was happy to hear the news about 'noise' selling so many copies and just the fact that I felt like a free bird!

The wind and the music. Cowabunga dudes!!!

ROCK ON!!!

At day's end

2007-09-16T23:02:00.000+05:30

I did what I planned to do today. Was out the whole day and kept my mind off of things.
But now am wierdly so tired that I cant think properly...the so called 'brain' that I possess aint functioning. Everything that is happenin right now is purely on what emotion I'm goin through.
I just just kept on sayin things that werent processed in my brain and just went through without any filters...totally raw. And I was swearin' too. I felt bad about that.

Takes me back to friday when I was angry at my senior for he was sayin stuff abt a day when I was pissed off. I suddenly got up from my seat and started shouting and pointing at him and I did swear. It did feel very bad coz he didnt reply and I thought that I would be bashed up for it. But he was silent. That only made me feel worse actually. I did feel a bit strong tho' coz I did stand for what i believed for...just that I was downright blunt to say stuff on his face. And some things never change even with a 'sorry'. Apologies dont help everytime. They dont mend stuff. It was a mixed emotion. Am a confused 'kid' myself.

So, here I am...feeling wierd about things. Just learnt that never figure out things and keep thinking that this is the way things go....coz just when you thought you got it figured out, things strike back. There's this feeling inside your brain - 'Nothing is what it seems!'. Makes sense sometimes.

Random thoughts.
No nightmares tonight I hope.
Happy to be alive,
happy to be living for a reason!

Adios!

D-tox

2007-09-16T08:38:00.000+05:30

Lotta stuff has been goin through my brain since last night. Things just bugging around and seems like they're playing tricks in my head.
I have to detoxify myself from all these thoughts. I need to keep myself busy in a way, so that I dont get time to be alone and think. Coz i know that if I start thinking things aint gonna be pretty.

I donno why I'm so bugged!! Just a very strong n bad sense that something not good is gonna happen. Am still scared. I shall stop now.
Get started with work i guess, my detox!

Untitled

2007-09-16T03:05:00.000+05:30

I donno watts wrong with me...i was sleeping when this nightmare just flashed.
It is seriously stuck on to my brain. I donno if i'll be able to sleep now.

I was sitting on my terrace it was evening. And I was sitting near my usual place,when just that time somebody came up on the terrace, walked in front of me towards the edge and gave a sideways glance and smiled at me. Then he jumped and was no more on the edge.

He was me.

I seriously cant sleep. I just sensed in the night that something bad was about to happen, but I thought that I was paranoid about it. And now i just feel to disturbed and shaken. I'm just too scared now. I still have that feeling that something bad is about to happen. I guess i'll be extra precautious about stuff due to this horrible dream.

I donno what all this means, somehow i'm not curious. I just am scared, really scared and insecure!!
Shit!! I'm gettin paranoid that something is gonna happen...

I'll just calm down now since i've blogged it. Does help in a way. Somewhat.

To end on a humorous note -
Good Night!

Invisible Kid

2007-09-12T12:01:00.000+05:30

Now i'll tell you the story of a boy who didn't like going to school.
A boy who was invisible to the rest of the people, half of them might not even have known his name.

Ok...i'll cut the crap.
Few days ago I was reminded of the ol' school days...this was during the time when all I knew abt jinal was that he was an 'efficient nasta stealer and a bit of a flirty type'...while rishabh...all I knew was that 'he could draw well'. Period. So this was when I didnt really know people from their inside how they were and what they were. They just existed for me...they had no value as such other than just having people around. I liked a lotta people and had so much fun playin with all o them, but emotionally I was one sick freak. Being hypersensitive about every minute thing, was scared to lie coz then 'bahot bada paap ho jayega' thing, had barely flesh inside me(see: skeleton-like) to open the textbooks and close them back.

I donno why I am spilling all this out...its just that I want it outta my system.

I am not in any way blaming all the people around for how mean they have been. Though there was this time when somebody bluntly shouted at me sayin ,"You can barely do anything right and you just try to sniff yourself and hang around girls expecting they would talk to you. Truth is that they dont even know that you're around. Filthy asshole!!". I was appalled when I got to hear this directly being said on my face, but the fact was that it was true. I hated myself for a lotta stuff... I never had achieved anything, I had no talent and mom n dad had to encourage to the point of forcing me do something creative, I was never good with the marks system. But the thing was I was never bad or a failure either.
I was just stuck somewhere in the middle. And the label 'average' had been laid on my head. At first it didnt seem bad but slowly it degrading and I started hating being called normal. Gradually I always took the word 'average n normal' to be associated with 'Who the fk cares about you, you can barely make it to the top!!' thing. I never had any reason to work on...it was all like if i get good grades then I get a better computer or something else that I wanted. But I never did care about all that stuff, maybe I was spoilt coz I got things that I wanted. I just got so pissed off at stuff that I just wanted to run away from everything.

I was slowly getting consumed by bitter thoughts. I would curse myself, sometimes hit myself, punch the wall till my fingers were bruised n started bleeding...and at a point it got all too worse when I started playin around with knives and sharp objects. I even thought at a time that I was an antichrist coz I had scratched the words 'pain is god' on my hand. It got all too dark and bad. The escapist and the defeatist attitude slowly crept in and at some of those hopless days I would be standing on the edge of the terrace making 'life-altering' decisions. I was never ever pressured at home...and that was something I saw past at how lucky I was to have such great parents. I was too consumed to having myself thrown away from the daily rut if living blind.

Around at that time I had started listening to rock music and slowly moved on too heavy metal and all its sub genres. It did change a lot in my life. I had a way to channel my anger, pain,misery, sadness...any extreme emotion. But the darkness didn't fade away as such...it was still there at the same level tho I was making myself believe that it was not there and I was fine. Ignorance is not always bliss though.

I did find it tough to fit into school coz I didnt interact with many people. My universe just mainly consisted on 4 of my friends. I was weak and was quite an easy target for bein picked and pushed around. I had a girly and weak voice, which made it easy for people to point and laugh at me sometimes. I never fought back coz I thought that noone is bad inside they just make mistakes...n I easily started forgiving people coz I knew I wont fight back. But it did spawn violent thoughts in me sometimes and I had even pictured myself bringing a shotgun to school so that people would listen to me and knew who I was. I think during the same year the colombia/arizona school shoot outs had happened and then I was just shocked at how sad it was and how pathetic I was to have even thought about having such awful things in mind. I was the saint's devil...hehe. Thats wat I called myself...proceeded further to being the heretic monk.

Outside,as a person I was seen as the achha baccha who would always help people and do good no matter what. Well that was true in a way...coz I was all that, just that deep inside I was mixed up in identifying who I really was. But I still hated myself coz things had not changed in any way...I was still termed as 'the average guy'.

I wanted to make my prescence felt but I didnt know how. Just then later on I started growing my hair and a beard and started dressin differently and tried to change the exterior part of me. I never wanted to grab attention exactly coz I was scared and shy of talking and reacting to people, being in mental isolation for so long.
Call me stupid,foolish, an ass, wierdo, freak...anything but it just worked at that time. I was out of the 'average guy thing' coz people now did notice me. I wasnt the skinny gawky kid with braces anymore. I did feel like someone else. It was wierd coz I started to talkin to people and had the best time of my life when I got to meet jinal n rishabh. I remember when our school had started and I didnt know jinal that well, he asked me ,"You know actually you dont look like that old Ajay now. But tell me why have you grown your hair and all this beard n all? I dont get the point actually." And I just smiled back and said ,"Yaar...you just wont understand!". Hehe, and now look at the irony.

I like the change as such coz I wasnt called the 'normal - average' guy anymore. Though I was even called a 'freak' by some people, but surprisingly it didn't feel bad at all. The invisible kid had gone by that time...and I thought I had an identity now.

Things were not all happy and gay(as in merry) but there was hope.The darkness was still there....its still is.

Otherwise I would have to change the blog title ...right??

One...

2007-08-28T02:55:00.000+05:30

Sometimes in life all you need is a reason.

Reason.

Seems small a word, but size never determined anything! Just one reason would be enough to change things. To set things in motion. To set sail to farther seas. Just one!

I never thought I would have one. But I just was never good at estimating and predicting stuff anyways.

Things shall change and still be the same...a paradox?

I guess the topic of 'change' has been a major part of my blog. Never do i put thoughts into action is what I thought. But if that was the case then I would have been the same person I was back then. And I'm not.
Change?

Who knows when things happen and how. It does get unpredictable sometimes...but at the end of it all when the road is so clear, it is all about focus and being what you truly are.

[Phew!! Too many thoughts...so little time]

Nightmare

2007-08-19T22:13:00.000+05:30

I had these dreams 3 nights in a row. They never made sense. Except on the third night when I had it. But still, it didn't make sense. And so it was a nightmare.
This is a disturbing post for me as I haven't edited anything here just put in what had come to head. These were disturbing ideas which I had in my head since a long time. But since now it had never spawned to such levels that I would have dream about it.
Here it is...
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...I was sweating when I woke up. And there was a man sitting on a chair next to my bed. Looking at me as if he had been waiting for me to wake up. I had never seen this man before in my life and neither did he seem familiar. But I was frightened for he watched me closely with scrutiny. And then he gave me a satisfied smile...but that scared me more.

"Wh...Who are you?" I inquired. My voice sounding different as I had just woken up. I was just about to run.

"Calm down boy. I am not going hurt you. Just stay here. I have something important to tell you." he sounded like a wise man, and had that voice of someone who knew everything.

"But who are you and what do you want?" My curiosity had taken over me.

"I am just someone. For the time being just call me 'god'. See son I don't want to waste any of yours and my time...so i'll put things directly to you, straight and explicitly. All these years that you have been living have been a part of a test. A test conducted by a leading team of professionals just to solve the mysteries of the thinking that you and your kind possess. See people around you are not what you think they are. Think of them as just actors, but highly trained ones. They had been trained to display any form of emotion be it anger,sadness,happiness,love...and all such forms of emotions. You know what I am talking about right!"

"No. I don't." I was shivering violently. I was dying...

"Think of this. You're in a play and people around you are the actors. But mind you son, you're playing the lead role!"

"How does that matter?"

"The attention is on you. Don't you see. You are given the importance. Everything around you is because of you."

"Not it's not." Still in disbelief.

"Yes it is like that boy. Everything depends on you. The way people were depended on how you would be to them. And we only had to study your reactions."

"But you're sayin that people are just pretending!! It cant be...I have felt it. If this is not reality then what is!!"

"Listen to me son. You have been a part of this project since the start. There is no absolute reality. What would you define reality as? Just electronic impulses to your brain that stimulate some of your nerves so that your sense of smell, touch, hearing and seeing is existent. "

"But everything cant be fake. It feels so real!!"

"I'm not saying it is fake. It is just perception. Reality for me might be a dreamworld for you. Thats what I mean to say...there is no absolute reality."

"But I'm living in a world where people are just pretending. How can that be!!!"

"I'm not saying it has been easy all this way. Taking care of every minute detail and driven to perfection to get the feel of reality. But we have succeeded so far, the system is working. You are still under study."

"But you cant control people. They have identities. People don't lie. This is not a dream......
or maybe 'this' is a dream. I know a lot of people from deep inside they cant be fake!! Get the hell out of my head!!"

"Calm down. All those people who you called your parents, your friends, your brothers, your sisters...all of them have a name. But they have been given roles to play here. The names that you know them by are not always their real names. They're just characters given orders to see how you react to them. Its just a test!"

"Hehe...i get this now. So you're saying that all these years what I was living was just a 'play'. Was just a test...

I gotta hand it to you sir. You have been quite meticulous and down to the details to create this fake universe.

All the people...parents, friends, enemies,the ones i love, the ones i hate,everyone...just fall into one category...'actors'. Hahaha...nothing could make more perfect sense could it.
Reality was never defined. It was just created out of boredom by someone who was to lazy to define it. So I would never know whether I'm in reality or in a dream.

All these years...
the anger, the hate, the fights, the frustrations, the will to die, the happy moments, the feeling of immense joy,the faith,the trust, the unity, the emotions, all the feelings, the feeling of love...
all just pretend.

Pretend.
Fake!!
Just a curtain before my eyes to shield from something I cant handle.
Makes sense. People have sacrificed themselves for understanding the meaning of life. And here I am...the sacrificial lamb, living a life where I mean nothing but just a 'thing' to everyone.
Everything, Everyone. Just visions. Mean nothing.
So the purpose of my existence is just to satisfy the curiosity of people.

Haha!! How ironical things can get. All these years I have felt as to not feel anything, any emotions...as they just bring more complexities in life. I thought that they were just to much to handle...so much that their existence seemed pointless. I just wanted to be free from any extreme emotions and free from the feeling of attachment. Live like a robot.
And now here I am. A paradox. When now I understand that there was nothing to run away from...just makes me pine to go back to experience all those feelings again. The beauty of everything in this world can only be fully understood on its loss. Because otherwise things are always taken for granted.

But now nothing matters. Because there is nothing to matter.
Its empty."

For all these years and all these times I always thought I felt inhuman. But this was the first time I was not human.

"Kid. You just have to face things. Come with me."

I had no will to do anything now. But there was nothing else I had to do. There was so purpose. I followed him and went to the terrace and at the edge, where he was pointing his finger down.

People. All standing there. Looking at me.
People...or may I say...actors.
All of them smiling at me. But not even one smile was able to fill the emptiness.
The smile's were real. But I didn't want to test my beliefs on reality.
There was no perception.
The people were standing there. Everyone I knew. Everyone I loved...everyone I hated.
Everyone.
People.

"So...what now??" I had no will for anything. Emptiness.

"You have two options son. First one, you stay here find out things. New things for you now. Restart your life from your current position with the people not being what you knew them as...but it will be reality for you. And you shall start a new journey and search for the purpose of your existence. The tests shall be forfeited. There shall be none of them.

Option two, you jump from here and you get back to where you were. The place which you called your 'dream'. The fake world which seemed so real for you. It's all upto you."

I had never been given an option ever in my life that would change the course of my entire existence. But looking back every decision had the same importance. Everything was important. Or was it...

...I was sweating when I woke up. And there was no one sitting on the chair next my bed.
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Void

2007-08-08T20:46:00.000+05:30

I'm empty...
thats all I am feeling now.
For the past few hours I just felt like somebody sucked the living inside of me...now I donno if its the weather, the mood of the day or whatever.

I just feel as if I dont trust anyone, as if people just keep lying to me about stuff they just want me to believe. I have no idea where this has come from. But its freakin messin my mind up a lot!!

I just realized how distorted I can get... n i just want to warn people about it. I try to be sane, but I have got so many identities stuck inside me... I just never know who I really am.

I have no idea what everything means. Things are making sense but in a very non-sensical way.

Suddenly for a moment the world flashed. N here I am standing at what darkness lies ahead. I am lost. I feel hopeless. I feel discomfort.

I feel ignorant of whats happening, that's the biggest problem!!
I have no idea what I'm doin with myself.
I've not properly talked to anyone since the last few hours i guess.
I just feel as if i'm a joker, playing a jester in someone's court just dancing around meaninglessly while I have no idea about myself.

I am just a robot, who just forgot what it was programmed to do.

I just feel like goin on my terrace and shouting at the top of my voice till every neuron of energy inside me says that I dont have energy to think anymore!!!

I know one thing for sure -

This is just a temporary phase.

A phase.

Life Under A Scanner

2007-07-31T23:30:00.000+05:30

Freedom. Is it good? Is it independence I seek?

I just don't wanna feel strings pulling me, and so I would feel less like a puupet goin on commands without any individuality.
I might be exaggerating things, I know. But I just want to express it in an extreme way so that the point gets clear on.

"We are not free. We were never free. When was the last time you did something because you and only you wanted to do it. Unaffected by the thoughts of the people around you. Slavery is still prevalant. We have just stopped recognizing it. It's a part of you now. Look at yourself. Ask Yourself. What do you really seek, and are you getting there? What is stopping you?"

I am not going with the cliche's that 'My life sucks' and 'I need more independence' but I just want to make a point that I shall have to be let go slowly so that I learn how to stand on my own two feet. It sounds rude when I put it this way coz every help n protection that I get is for the good of myself.

I am not saying I want things the hard way, maybe I m seeking to live under no-ones command and do what I really want to do.

But maybe I am not mature enough. Mature enough to resist some temptation. I hate to say this but I am at a point where I can be easily submerged into the vices of the world. I just believe that I can hold on all by myself. But then I can only judge about it once I get into that situation.

I remember a few days ago I was tempted to smoke by some people. I refused explicitly. I was so confident about myself and plus I never wanted to break the promise I had made. Yet my parents are not that confident enough. And I can understand why.

I have broken their trust once already and it has never been easy to patch back up. Every thing that I did since then had to go under their scanner of suspicion. I wont blame them actually. I would have been worse If I was in their shoes. But sometimes I just feel like a fool always accused of doing the wrong things everytime. I try and prove that I wont be a fool twice.

But that fails. Its never gonna be easy. And it is natural. I just donno how I can make them trust again for what my intentions are for any action that I undertake.

And being falsely accused is the worst feeling I would never be able to swallow. I gasp for air at such times. But I am to blame too, though not fully, but I got myself into this mess.

Anyways...

Everything happens for a reason.

Pause

2007-07-31T02:13:00.000+05:30

You know there are these times in life when you just want to freeze time...squeeze everythin out of a second so that you could just feel it to go on longer. Just to cherish that moment.

A feeling when you get when you dont know whatever that is happening around you...
And strangely you dont even care.

A freeze frame... and thats how its goes. No matter all that you thought you had suffered it all just does not matter coz you just dont tend to remember whatever that happened even a few minutes ago.

Just live for that moment.
Pause.
(Damn! there's no rewind :P.)

She was there...
what more could I say.

Awesome!!! :D

Exile

2007-07-29T00:53:00.000+05:30

I dont know things.
I am no-one....
I am nothing...
I am nowhere.

Voices inside my head. They scream for a place just to be heard.I want to exile myself, for all the mistakes I have made. I'm not saying I want to be the perfect thing...but maybe I might
just dream of being that way.
There is no pressure on me as such...I pressurize myself. I just try n push. But there seems no response.

Exile.
Is this the only answer I have. Why do I always want to run away.
I hate attachments sometimes...they just pull you down.
I guess 'hate' is the harshest term i could use for now. I am just grumpy.
I donno wanna cry for all all that attachment. Just dont want to feel stupid. Am just afraid of responsibilities... I just dont want that. I just dont wanna go wrong somewhere.Just am plainly scared of makin mistakes however valuable a 'mistake' is in learnin stuff.

Just am scared with the question 'What if...?' that loops on and on in my mind.
A distortion of my own thoughts is what I am.
I cant seem to find space now.
I dont wanna suffocate my own self.
'There is no pressure.'
Or do I just keep sayin that to make me feel better.

Exile.
I wanna run away and open up my mind.
Expand my thoughts which are currently limited between four walls of a thought process
that are affected by outside elements. By people. Everywhere, Everything.

I wanna be alone.
I hate sayin this coz I know that I might not even be able to survive one moment without some people.
I just satisfy my inner self to say that there is a remote possibility that things would get all happy n merry n gay ...then there would be the 'happily ever after...' ending.

Sounds cute. But life doesnt function like a 'fairy tale' does it.
That is the reason why we have fairy tales isnt it. So that we can escape into another world of fantasy and live virtually as if there is no absolute reality.
Think.
Nothing is absolute is it...
Nothing is forever.

It hurts me to say this... hehe...nothing is forever. How I want everything to last.But things just fade away into oblivion ...and at that I might be standing there wondering.
Thinking about what ould have been the prefect 'Goodbye' which would have made me feel a lot better.
But there is a reason why things are not there forever, just to make us treasure every moment thinkin that this might be the last.
It just makes everything more precious doesnt it.
Nobody wants to take thins for granted.

Think.
I cant control my thoughts can I.
I am not an austere saint am I??
Hehe...am far from that. I just wanna live.
I am not saying I wanna live happily ever after...coz I think that just completely sucks.
Happiness isnt eveything...sadness is inevitable.
And If I dont know the importance of sadness then that would make just more and more unable to feel hapiness.
Every light casts a dark shadow doesnt it.
Its all together, co-existing.
The universe wasnt sewn from a single thread to create a fabric of space and time that would
go on till infinty.
It is co-existence.
There is always an option.
There is always a reason.
There always is an individuality.

Exile.
Hmmmmmmmmm....
do I really wanna go??
I would call it temporary death.
I'm an escapist aint I.
Deja vu.
But then being practical can have more importance...thinking things not as they are just goin on and take everything for granted.
I just know I am just making up reasons to run away from responsibilities. Silly pretexts.
When all I have to do is to just stand there, prepare and face it.
FACE whatever come's my way.
That's it.
Sounds easy doesnt it.
Well...it is actually. There is nothing to it.
The trick is just not to get thoughts muddled up and leave the path of action.
Leave coz you have a reason to complain about the system and why the conditions dont suit you.
Thats the thing I guess...I always complain about things not being the way they are.
Life is about adapting and change sometimes.
I just dont wanna go n know the mystery to life and spoil the fun here.

Why dont I just go out and discover things myself...

I guess thats what life is about...isnt it??
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Phew!! That was how thoughts flow in my head.Am tired now...anybody care for a snack n beverage??

Excerpt from the Diary...

2007-07-21T01:59:00.000+05:30

Was just browsing through my ol' diary which was aptly titled 'Diary of a Madman' in its front pages. It feels awesome to read some of this old stuff which I thought I had forgotten, and there are some pages that embarrass me so much that I just feel like tearin off those pages...but memories shall be memories. You can't erase them.
This is one of the days that I just came to browse upon in my diary.

Warning: I even used to write utter crap 2 years ago. If you have read my blog then you are already immune to the crappiness.
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25th May 2005

Hey boss, here we go, 3 2 1...

->Its funny how u make promises of commitment. The sad part comes when you've not acheived half of what you should have done. Promises may be easy to make, but it takes the crap out of you to maintain it. The reality of life is quite bitter to what your dreams you build yourselfare.You always dream of heaven, the the stairway to heaven is much harder than the escalator to hell.

And what for all the lazy people like me could do more, than sit and float towards the place where the devils waiting with his trident. Everyday I make a promise to myself, 99% of them are fake and inneffective, the rest is govt. tax (whatever!!). I make a promise that the moment I get up the next day, i'll be good as new, a changed person. Who would start taking in knowledge untill his brain explodes. Theresult - I wake up next day dreary eyed...finding something to spend time with, other thatn watt is actually my objective.

Coming back from the

Philosophical Blabberrer...

I dont have tutions for Chem and physics (which apparently makes people's eye pop-out!!). The reaction I usually get is "ARE YOU OUTTA YOUR MIND??" I wish my anwer was not "YES". Unofrtunately it is. My determination or commitment is not gainin an inch to what must have gained 3 feet by now. [ I'm stuck in a boat, because the anchor is laid but i'm too lazy to pull back tha anchor, so I cant ride with the breeze. And at that time the other boats have gone far far ahead of me. Though I dont want this to happen, this is watt I am. I sit, I rot!]

But everybody has great expectations from me. They think I work.

I Ajay, Hereby pronounce myself

THE LAZIEST MAN ON THE PLANET

Guess I dont get a medal for that. And meanwhile jinal crawls into IIT. I, Ajay, Master of Dust-mites and flies, (crap)...sit and rot.

Hail to the master...Let's Shit on him.

[Whatever that means!!!]

Sleepy now.

Signing off.

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N that was what I was.

FIN

On and on...

2007-07-18T22:33:00.000+05:30

There was nuthin soo interestin goin on in the day.
Just was thinkin of song to make it sound interestin...
i need a riff to sing this! :D
Here it goes...

-----------

Thoughts rush
sky parts
sun rises
rays like darts.

Eyes open
mind shut
deep in the hollow
rumble of the bus.

Destination
Unwanted.
Rather land up
somewhere else.

The sun's a top
mind still stopped.
Slavery remains
of the mind n all.

Automatic moves
of the brain n hands.
Jotting down stuff
later to cram???

Flow with the system
or be a rebel...
I guess i'm too sleepy
that's my only level.

Time flies
though awfully slow.
They call them 'lectures'
and I say - 'what ho!'

Waitin for the hand
to reach the 6.
To run away...
to feel the bliss.

Sitting in the
humming bus again i talk.
Talk with the damsel
so the knight never stops.(beep beep! call on hold!)

Rusted and worn out
I reach my abode.
I gorge on my food
and now starts my road...

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The time table fable....

2007-07-18T01:18:00.000+05:30

Just had my first day at college as a second year student.
The day started off badly when I saw the time table n
found out that saturdays were full days n that we had two
labs.

"Two Labs!!!"I exclaimed. They gotta be kiddin me.

I was thoroughly sad with the thought of wasting my
saturday by sitting in college lookin outside the window
while the rest of the world was goin out n havin fun and
sayin..."There somewhere he might be sinkin in between
huge volumes of books."

Hmmmph...sigh! I sat there sulkin in the Lab. But then I
thought it wasnt right. I had to do something I cant just
sit there n sulk and expect it to go away. I had to be
prepared. I wasnt, but now i have to. I think I got a bit
motivated and inspired by some of Dagny's ideals and her
positivity...she constantly hepled my mood a lott
throughout the day.

I was all merry n energetic again. Though at some times
then I passed the corridor again n saw the time table
staring back at me I sulked again. But I guess now i'll
have to learn to take things as a challenge rather than
make attempts to weasel out.

Most of my hours in college are spent in sulkin abt the
people around me n 'how the hell did I land up here?'. But
now I guess I'll have to extract whatever advantages I've
got with me bein here.

ADAPTING. Here's that word again. (Taken from the previous 'college' post!)

Well....life goes on. I'll live.

Had a tiring day, but its ok. I just feel like i've worked.

Overall Mood : Happy!

(Am gettin better at playin Megadeth-Holy wars... someday i might be able to play it on stage!! That would be cool!)

A Reason

2007-07-17T23:53:00.000+05:30

Something I wrote a few days back. Felt as If things were changing and going into a more pleasant phase! Seems they are...or are they, duh duh duhhhhh!!
-----------------------

I lay asleep
Ignorant of the world around me
too unique to blend
never camouflaged in the society.

Of all the times I have been through
doesnt life ever have a lesson
so teach me what it beholds
or shall I just softly glide away.

I'm impatient
I'm weak
Nothings clear
it's all too bleak.

There is darkness that surrounds me
I might collapse
But I still learn to hold on
hold on till my last.

All that has faded away
the darkness has passed
I'm entering a new world
but dont want to go in fast.

All I wanted was a reason
a reason to live my life
and I wont say I got what I wanted
but what I needed to stay alive...

Restart

2007-07-17T23:33:00.000+05:30

Click...
thugh thugh. Chink. Whirrrrrrr....

And it has started again. The schizo is walkin n talkin again.

Through all these days startin from a rocky journey to some of the best experience have missed all of it out here.

Shall reignite the flames....so that the pheniox will rise from it! :D

No idea what that meant actually!!

Inspired by Dagny i shall try to start writin regular now.

So... corpse and robbers 2 is on the way, till then bear the other posts please!
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FIN
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Corpse And Robbers

2007-05-30T03:18:00.000+05:30

CHAPTER 1.

Its was evening. Me and Ecks checked into a hotel...a bloody cheap one( As our monetary holdings were just a notch above 'broke'!!). We sat in the lounge area that night as the mice were busy playin soccer in our room. I tried to switch the T.V on, but the only thing that happened was that the switch popped out in spring action.
"Hehe! Careful mate. You just might have launched some torpedo with that." Ecks pointed out smiling at me.

But somewhere near the south china sea, people were far from happy...as they just got signals of an incoming torpedo.

I was browsing through the video tapes the hotel had. Most of them being cheap low budget movie tapes and a few episodes of 'Planets funniest animals'. But one tape that caught my attention had no label on it. Curiosity bubbled in me like a bowl of conc. sulphuric acid.

I put the tape in the VCR only to find that the T.V. wasnt working. My curiosity to find out what the tape was all about had taken over. I did what every T.V. repairer in my place would have done. I started banging the T.V. with my fists alternately from the right and left till some cathode ray emissions started. Suddenly light came on to the screen, and I was successful.

I was going to express my joy to Ecks, but he had gone...mostly to his room...he was sleepy anyways.

I turned the VCR on...and next of what the visual hit me on the cornea of my eye had shocked me. My curiosity went all down the drain watching a series of 'disturbing and shocking' images. I couldnt switch the VCR off...there was some force refraining me to not stop what I saw.90 mins later, I was staring in front of a black screen.
"Whatever it was , it was horrific. Why did I even watch it??" I thought as my mind was preforming triple summersaults in my head.
I suddenly found myself guilty for watching it. I shouldnt have. It was the feeling that pandora had when she opened the box...only of less magnitude(hehe! dumb pandora!).

I took a deep breath, when my phone suddenly began ringing.

Who can it be?? This was my new number!! Nobody except Ecks know about it...and the caller was not Ecks.

I slowly pressed the 'call' button and listened.
"Seven Days!!" came a suppressed voice from the other side.
My heart jumped. I was almost squeeling.
"Who's this?? And what seven days??" I inquired.

Suddenly voice turned normal, normal being that of an old man trying to sound young.
"Oh sorry! I was just telling my secretary that its been seven days since my pants have not returned from the dry cleaners!! Damn those bastards."

"But who the hell are you??"

"Oh! Me. Well I am Mr.D.A. U may call me Mr.D.A. I just came to know you just saw my movie. So....how was it??"

"It was horrible.Unbearable. I dont even know why I watched it."

"Whoa! thats the mildest criticism I have had from my viewers. You being the second....ahem....i being the first. Even the actors dont wanna watch it. Hehe."

"Actors?? what actors?? all I saw were lifeless props hanging around...their emotional expressions make Arnold Schwarzenneger in terminator look like hamlet!!! Why the human torture I ask?? Why the brutality??"

"Ummm...just watch it with a mental squint and you shall see clearly."

"But how the hell did you know I saw ur movie...n how did you get this number?"

"Believe me son, if you were in my shoes you would label that question as a 'dumb' one. Lets just say deperate times call for desperate measures..."

"Ohhhhk whatever. But this is still spooky!!"

"I have to meet you in private, we have to clear all these matters. Reach candela square, the one near the hanuman mandir sharp at 11.27 AM and ask a long hair guy at the bus stand for a match and we shall meet."

(Note to myself: There is always a hanuman mandir as a standard reference to any location in the country.)

"Whoa! what's all this secret agent stuff for?"

"We dont want to attract attention do we?"

"Depends on whether -"

The phone gets cut. The beeping sound of the engaged tone seems odd in a way. Who was the caller? And why the hell does he want to meet me. Its a conspiracy.

Next morning I spill it all out to Ecks. While Ecks keeps his usual cool and laughs it all up.
"You sure you had a good night's sleep yesterday?? At least I didnt." Ecks laughed.

"Yeah I did sleep! And whats this about you not havin sleep...your snore vibrations just caused a major earthquake in San Diego. Might have been somewhere around 130 decibels."

"Yeah! yeah. whatever. Well get out of your rotten dream...we have stuff to do."

"Wait its 11. I have to meet that guy, its all too mysterious Ecks. I guess you wont comprehend. Buh bye now, alrighty then!"

Somwhere in San diego people had been engulfed in fear with the trauma of another earthquake. Ecks had no idea about the 'butterfly effect'.

Saying this I stormed out of the room, leaving Ecks with a did-my-wife-just-divorce-me look.

Hopefully Candela Square was quite near to our hotel.As soon as I reached the place I started lookin for a so called 'long hair' guy. The problem was there were two 'long haired' men. I searched for where Mr.D.A might be... and my eye caught a BMW sedan inconspicously parked in a dark corner.

11.25 AM.The problem of the 'long haired' men still loomed. I went to the guy nearer to me and asked him in a whispering tone.
"I need a match please."

The guy gave me a reproachful look, thought for a while and replied,
"Eh?"

Strike one. I was wrong. Went to the other one.Did the same. Emptying his pockets he found a pack and started waving it in the air.

The signal had been given. But it triggered the ignition of an even more unthinkable car.

A 'Padmini Premier' smoked its way upto the bus stand, and let out a blaring horn. I stood there shocked as the bucket of bolts seemed like it was about to explode any second. I let out a muffled cry as it approached me. And the person driving the vehicle was seen...but the guy had concealed his face inside a scarf and a pair of goggles.
And the driver yelled, "Quick, get in."

I stood there. Thought for about 10 minutes calculating the various possibilities of what was about to happen, most of the calculations being how embarrassed i was to become sitting inside the 'junkyard wonder'.

Finally I took a deep breath and sat inside.
The driver gave a piercing gaze through his goggles and finally put his hand forward,
"Hello, I am Mr.D.A.!!"

Facsimilie of a Fake Smile

2007-05-28T15:14:00.001+05:30

You know that feeling...when inside you're wrenchin in agony n torment and then you meet someone at that time...and you give that 'friendly' smile.

The smile...that you conjure up by streching each and every muscle of your face. The body and mind resist its automation...yet you sweat it to give that smile, so that the person in front of you returns the same as a sign of cordiallity. And the moments gone...you're back again to reality.

SLAM! Face first. The sinking feeling.

Maybe I should have replaced all the 'you's' with 'I's'. What the hell anyways!!!

Its this fake smile that I hate. One that you get when you're goin to a hotel n the waiter gives you one...while deep inside he's still thinkin if his wife will give him a second chance again or not??!!.

But this is something that I have been trained to do since all these years...though it does not work all the times. I consider it an art in a way. Its the degree of smile that u give, n there should be a ranking for them -
something like -
(in ascending order)

1.The painful you're getting worse smile
2.Something seems to be troubling you smile
3.Hi things are normal smile
4.Jolly Good day smile
5.You're creepin people out smile

I usually rank a 3 or a 5, though I admit rank 2 comes in the way a lott.

Sigh! masking happiness is a tiring job.
I repeat its an art!!!

[Been a long time since a post...feels good to be back again!!]

Visions...

2006-11-20T19:41:00.001+05:30

As I trample on this unchartered earth
I have much left to see.
And if seeing is beleiving
then in nothing I still believe.

A window to the world opens before me
Yet I choose to wander away.
Groping in the darkness unconquered
searching for the light of the day.

For me its living that I seek
not work that rules that day
Finding happiness not too bleak
A world refrain from pain.

Searching for the possibilities unimagined
For a freedom unknown, unseen;
I glide and melt on my thoughts
of a world too beautiful to dream.

A cold mist passes over me,
the sins of betrayal and hatred.
As things that bound me from thee,
the world seems far from sacred.

But hope prospers in my heart
deep inside though vague
Still i pray O lord save me,
save me from this plague.

I open my eyes it seems so clear,
The truth untouched unveiled.
The purity that never rusts -
of the part that I played.