The oBserVatoRy

Mom, I'm not there yet!!

2010-11-17T20:35:00.014+05:30

You ever wonder if you're ready for something that is expected of u? If you do I guess you would fall under the category of being completely normal. Off late, I go through this everyday. And then the day to day things that I do (go through) all keep pointing in the same damn thing, I'm not there yet!

Now, just to give you a brief idea, since I'm 24 now, (well almost) my parents have been pushing me....pushing me to get married! Infact, some of their friends have suggested them a few "candidates". This has probably got them all excited, infact, so excited that my parents are now actively pushing me for it. They have their own theory on why I should atleast start "looking" for girls!

The theory goes like this....I'm 24, a Chartered Accountant, a Company Secretary, working for a MNC bank, earning good money, just bought a new 3 BHK flat, a car and still manage to save some salary. So, basically I'm "settled". So, now.....whats there left in my lifE? Eh? Nothing really....I mean, c'mon, I'm 24...can't I see how old that is?! So I guess its like married at 25, kids after that....and......and......and.....

My dad tells me how difficult it is to find a proper bride out there these days! Same goes for a groom, but since I'm not gay, we dont give a shit about that. I think that apart from reservations about my marriage, that the whole concept of arranged marriage is splendid! I mean think about it for a second, ususally guys/girls who opt for arranged marriages do so cause they are not already in a relationship. So, how do they get married if they've reached a certain age?

Well, the oldies came up with an answer! Arranged marriage! So, here we have a guy in his mid twenties, never got a girl in his life, or couldn't hang on to the one he did. So his parents decided to help him out. I guess that's gotta hurt a bit of personal pride eh? It's like your parents telling you,

"Look son, we think you're terrible with the ladies, let us help you out. We know a fella whose girl is just as bad at picking up guys. We think you two will make an awesome couple. Should we go see them? Besides, Khanna uncle has also recommended that girl!". (Khanna uncle is either single or divorced).

But thats not the point I'm trying to make over here. The point is that my mom has been dragging me to D-Mart (its like my training for when my wife will drag me there) these days and then she goes on picking up stuff that she wants. I hate that place, I find it a drag. I don't know what the hell I'm doing there...and I start making faces at mom, so she asks me to just stay put in one place! Like an order or something! So what I do then is make faces at other shoppers, look around at these men all pulling carts and the thing that saddens me the most is the look on their faces....they are all happy to be there! All happy to be pushing carts while their wives load an unbelievable amount of provisions (its like everyone is having everyone over at their places). I'm not ready for stuff like that....I'm bad at the simplest of mundane things. This makes me realise that I'm far from ready to get married. I can't possibly push the cart, not yet.

My best escape route is my age, I try to get away by saying, "Guys, I'm only 23" but my parents shoot it down saying whatever comes to their mind. Sometimes they tell me that by the time I'll get married, I'll be 25 (like thats really old!). On other times, "Look at Rahul, he got married when he was 22". And most often there is this big dialogue (Oh, I really do mean like a proper dialogue) of why marrying early is good planning. My friends aren't helping my cause too. Two of my friends are getting married this year. Then a few of my relatives possibly know a few "good girls", so all of sudden, ever since I've turned 23, they've been telling me about them. I sat on it...so now, they've gone to my parents!

And it goes like, "I know this one girl, she's fair, good looking and she'd be really nice for you! Plus, she's a Doctor!". And I'm like wow! I hope she's a neuro surgeon, I'd like to take you therE!

Well, thankfully, the matrimonials aren't being considered yet! Wish me luck.

My beloved Mumbai...Part 2

2008-11-27T17:14:00.003+05:30

If you're straight reading this "Part 2" then i suggest you read the 1st part. Both these parts are actually the views that i've expressed on a community on orkut. But, nevertheless, these views are my views. They're the views that i feel i have the right to express, a right that the Constitution gives me, unhindered by any other citizen of this great country.

the actual post that i posted on orkut starts from here....

"to my mind the congress lacks the political will to really investigate these terror attacks or any terror attacks for that matter.

all that the congress does is minority appeasement. the congress lacks the political ability and worse yet, the will, to fight terrorism. repealing POTA was the first of its acts to concede to terrorism. then, again, failing to execute mohd afzal, or rather leading the way in his clemency appeal was the next sign of not wanting to let go of its minority appeasement tactics. (the Honourable SC found him guilty and had ordered for his execution.)

but, then, having said that, how many can really find faults with these tactics.
when sanju baba was sentenced to 6yrs of RI, many of his "fans" said it was too harsh...the man had done his time..and all the usual melodramatic crap....but i'm sorry...wasn't this man in possession of AK-47 rifles that were used by the terrorists. How ironic, or rather unforgivably fitting (not for a second do i not sympathise with the victims of, or feel aggrieved by, the acts of last night) , that yesterday night, the terrorists used the same AK-47 rifles to unleash terror?!

When, scores of (young) men and women------fans as they call themselves, of this movie-"star" and some ppl who all of a sudden changed their lives to lead the peaceful, non-violent, all forgiving life, wrote into countless newspapers as to why sanju baba had to be forgiven-----they lost the right, in my mind, to the find faults with the system collapse that took place last night.

By literally propagating his freedom by referring to the "changed man", these ppl have sown the seeds for the posterity to suffer from. As a nation, we have time and again failed to have a general sense of natural justice prevail over us. We pardon the jehadis (afzal), we free our "stars" (sanju baba), we neglect our real problems, instead focus on the non-issues really..and we're the educated ones, not the jst literate ones, mind u!

what good is education, where the will to learn and evolve is lost?we applaud the man who changed Indian Railways in 4yrs..invite him to our IIMs (of all places) to deliver lectures, yet so easily forget the involvement of the same man in a fodder-scam...yet forget how after yrs of being the incumbent of the post of CM, Bihar still remains an under-developed state. dont we then for a second wonder, how could this man really pull it off? shudn't we?

how many of our leaders are really and truly worthy of representing us in the House...let alone, how many of them face charges and etc etc...

ive seen many ppl in this community support the MNS and sighting reasons that are at best childish...with an attitude like this, how far can we really go? how can we really be secure? if all we desire is to fight the bhaiyyas and the non-mumbaikars (so to call them), why will our elected representatives bother doing anymore?

we take pride in being the voters of the largest democracy in the world...but then, well, how many virtues of democracy have we really got imbibed in us? to start with, have we (got) tolerance? and, i guess, it jst ends there, right there!

many ppl oppose capital punishments.....many ppl who say that the afzals have children, well, what bout the ones who died? these terrorists, if caught, shud be most definitely hanged. if they're not, may be months frm now, u cud have a plane hijack with a demand for release of the same terrorists!

u know, its really surprising that for an educated bunch like ourselves, its really that god-damn difficult to learn from the past, ignore divisive politics, look beyond religion, colour, caste and focus on delivering justice to the aggrieved."

PS : Portions of this post have been edited as considered appropriate. But a no point have i altered the essence of the post.

My beloved Mumbai...Part 1

2008-11-27T17:07:00.003+05:30

we all say that mumbai is resilient and will come thru this...im sure the ppl will...

having said that fortunately ive nvr had to be at the wrong end of these acts of terrorism..but i know a few ppl in person, some family frens, who've lost their loved ones...

it happened in the ghatkopar blasts...then the zaveri bazaar blasts..then the train blasts...the best bus' blasts...now these latest...

but to say that mumbai is resilient in the fact that the ppl go to their offices the very next day is to misinterpret the whole situation in the 1st place...theres nothing more insensitive to say about them...this is not resilience...this is helplessness....given the choice (which ive had today) id like to stay home (something that the govt has advised itself...also does make sense) but not everyone has really had the comfort of stayin indoors....

some ppl jst have to go to work as they really have no choice...its what they have to do for a living and with the latest attacks, the whole security system, or the lack of it, is transparently brought out. everyday that i take a train from ccgt to my place at nsp, a 1.5 hrs one-way journey, i do get scared cos u can nvr be sure, if theres a bomb in the train or not. what confidence do we take if our 24X7 patrolled train stations are such soft targets of terrorism?

ive personally seen the metal-detectors...manned posts...but whats the use if these ppl are going to be sloppy or not upto the task?

we've got to look beyond divisive politics...for instance, look beyond the bhaiyya barrier...
politicians divide us, they win our votes on basis like the bhaiyya issue..the SCs, OBCs etc...and we pledge them our votes..
terrorism is no longer confined to the middle east or kashmir or africa...its spreading like a virus...
we have to vote for candidates based on real issues and not issues that stem or originate or culminate in divisive politics.

Road to racism and more : Part 3

2008-04-01T08:08:00.005+05:30

To once again pick-up from where I left, well, before that, for those of you joining us mid-way, heres the link to the Part 1 in this series, and heres the link to Part 2. In Part 2 of this series, I spoke of how some people fret at even the identification of race and claim that to be racist. I do not buy that. Identification is not necessarily racism, but it surely could be terminus a quo in a racist act.

Also, as Ive said before that cultures influence ones takes towards many issues, issues that are ab initio social. Racism is no different. There are so many instances of us being racist in our daily lives as well. I mean, we can all camouflage ourselves and say that certain instances warrant the act of unequal treatments, but then, where does one draw the line? Are you a racist based on what you do and how you treat a member of a suppressed race? I would like to think not. Racism would mean nurturing an ill-will towards a community as a whole, well, more often than not.

Now-a-days you see Indians "stealing" American jobs, the BPO where you've had the Sharavaris turn into Sharons, but this was done with a purpose. So now, all Americans hate globalisation. No real surprise there, but then, now if they bad to an Indian, would that also be embedded with a tinge of racism, or is it really just racism from the very start? Would the Americans really have fretted as bad as they are now because their jobs are going to the Asians? Would they have done the same has their jobs been outsourced to their colonial ancestors? Maybe, maybe not. We'll never know.

In this part, I take a look at the men who redefined the world for the coloured people.

The Men of Honour

Another example of racism is the ICC. Yeah, Im talking cricket. With years that Malcom Speed was at the helm of affairs at the ICC no one saw a possible Australian threat, now, that a person of Indian origin is being talked of as the new ICC chief, the media just can be terrified enough! We all know what happens to Asians when they tour down-under. Remember the "no-ball" over by Mutthaiah in late 90s. Remember the "ball-tampering" incident involving the scumbag Darrel Hair, and remember his reinstatement. The Aussie crowd really grind up opposition players, though to be fair they give each player his due, but nothing then excuses the Australian media's complete ignorance of the acts of their crowd, but a complete symphony-like attack at the Indian masses. It is deplorable at mildest. I remember once when Mark Taylor and the Sri Lankan captain, Arjuna Ranatunga had a heated exchange of words, and then the Lankan came on top when he shot back at the Aussies comment about cultures, he said (something like) "Dont you talk to me about cultures. The Australians have been here for only 5 mins, our culture dates back 5000 years!" Way to go, HAIL ARJUNA!

Another instance of unbelievable racism by the ICC, while we're at it. Steve Bucknor was removed, and correctly so, because he just didnt get his act right. The Windies made all the noise about it, as much as they could. But whatever happened to fair treatment? Why was Mark Benson given a reprive for asking Ponting when that is clearly against the rules. How can a "dishonest batsman, become an honest fielder?" Why was Benson not made to sit out like Bucknor was? Im still trying to figure out. Going back to the ball-tampering, why was nothing done to Hair, when he had acted clearly without any proof, but Inzy was punished. Hair also, almost unforgivably, but not quite as we all know now, had asked for money. Im fed up of asking questions and expecting that the men who take decisions will ever answer them, cause right from our schools we're told, the teacher can quiz and question, the student can only "clear doubts".

The coloured people have often had the shoulders of people like Arjuna, Sunny etc. to bear the flags of equality for them. Outside of cricket, there couldnt be men bigger than Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., also, Tupac Shakur. If it were'nt for these men, the black in America would still have been negros, there would have been no NAS with his Nigger albums, he'd been back on some farm land of his farming, instead of earning millions.

Over the centuries of toil and hardships that the coloured race has been subjected to, many men have evolved. Men who've taken racism by its neck and broken it. For themselves, though surely. While on a visit to Hollywood, do not miss out a chance to inquire about one Mr. Sydney Poitier. Im sure you know all about the Denzel Washingtons, Morgan Freemans, Cuba Gooding Juniors. These men, and many more like them who never quite made it to the front page, or any page, have changed the way the world looked at the coloured race. Racism still prevails and will always keep on so, until we have "them" understanding that a black man has more to himself that big one(!), a jew is more than just rich, and when pronouncing IRAQ, its pronounced, E-RAAK, and not Aaye-rack!

So, who from India, other than our beloved Sunny, takes the racism to the perpetrators in the face? Dont even think of one Mr Singh, he does'nt do that well enough. He comes out as someone who has got more testosterone than brain impulses. We will never have another Luther Kings, another Mandela's, but we sure do need someone who will carry the flame that these men have lit up. But in our efforts to carry the burning flame, one must make sure that they dont fire it to the point that it spills out of the torch, for otherwise it'll burn the innocent too. We need to be cautious. In trying to "kick out racism" (as the English FA says) lets not tackle the ones who never played the game! But as for now, its game on. And may I add, we need a better referee than Steve Bennet! Ask Mascherano.

[comments expected, as always]

Road to racism and more : Part 2

2008-03-30T08:57:00.004+05:30

Now, in continuation of my( if you did not read it, you should read it first) Part 1 of this controversial and undoubtedly delicate topic, I assume the post from where I left the previous one. I embedded a link in the blog so that you could see what the Americans really think of the N-word. So I thought over the issue, but you know if you try and tackle the issue in one go you are sure to end messed up, dazzled, tired and surely still confused. I read this article in the newspapers some months back as how the Africans who now seem to be everywhere in Mumbai complained of being subjects of racism. I wonder though, what exactly is it that defines a racist act? I mean, as I said before calling someone a monkey, whether the person actually looks like one or not, is not (to my mind) an act of racism. But then we had the whole deal of the Australian media taking digs at Harbhajan, accusing him of being a racist and what not. That was a bit too much. I mean, no one made a hue over when Hogg called some Indian players as basta**ds.

I cannot seem to understand as to how a country can actually accept the usage of a word as derogatory as basta**d--- a word that questions the relationship between someones parents; ridicules it, tarnishes it and insults the oldest institution by slam-dunking it--- yet fret, cry foul and condemn a person for calling one of their own a monkey! Now, did the Australians find Harbajan at fault because he was not one of their own? I guess only an Aussie can answer that one. But, in all honesty, this incident and then the kinda reactions the two incidents drew does make me feel that, in my quest towards racism, i should not give much importance to the reactions that these incidents drew. I mean after-all, it does seem a little skewed in the favour of one of their own. But I shall take one thing from this episode though. Thats the cultural perception.

The cultural take & identification

That one thing, which has been common in all racism accusations, calling some a black (at times the N-word), calling the guy a monkey, or addressing a customer as a jew by a waiter at the diner. That one thing is identification. This to me is a very crucial element of this whole saga of being a racist, and one small act by a man, one huge act by mankind towards racism. Surely the use of the N-word, the F-word, the C-word, well they are all considered bad, but then, one has got to understand that the way racism is looked at in different parts of the world is different. I mean, its hip to use the F-word these days, I did that on this blog, but then with time the usage of words once considered as very offensive does tend to not be offensive as before anymore. That has been the general trend. The youth today uses the F-word to denote a sign of frustration, something that was used to actually derogate somebody years back. This tells you that the way in which we use our words are surely but a matter and should always be viewed in context to the situation. So, when Harbhajan called Symonds a monkey, what should have first been seen was the baggage attached to word in the culture of the person who spoke it. In this case, Harbhajan. I mean, in India calling someone a monkey is surely not racist. May be down there it is. But the Australian media did its best to make Harbhajan look like a serial racist. That was bad. How they almost forgot about the words used by Hogg, words that are derogatory anywhere on this planet, and thought that they were less derogatory than a "monkey", a word that is not racist all over the world! For someone in the media and the Australian media as a whole it just showed exactly what they were wanting to achieve. You cannot adjudge a person as a racist just because he said something which is racist in your community, your culture. To be racist, the person has got to be aware of the fact that the word he used is racist and also necessary is that the use of such word is frowned upon in his cultural, even though the word might not be racist in his culture. Monkey is not racist in India, not even frowned upon, and for someone to take cover and shelter of that word and accuse a person as racist is surely in much worse taste because it undermines the real issues of racism and dilutes racist acts elsewhere.

As I started this "cultural take", with the whole issue of identification, I mean, with all this hue and cry over the identification of race one really wonders whether all that is required to be a racist is to be an identifier? What if you were walking down the road and spotted a black man and called him black? There, right there at that very time on that very spot did you become a racist? To my mind, HELL NO! When someone identifies some person as a black, or a jew or some other race, no racism is being initiated. Even the Oxford Dictionary defines racism as belief in the superiority of a particular race; prejudice based on this; antagonism towards other races. Then how exactly does identification of race mean racism? It does not, it surely does not. Its arguably without a shred of doubt the first step in the schema of things that could be considered racist, but the act of identification on a standalone basis does not amount to racism and thus labeling someone a racist just because he distinguished between two people based on their origins and physical appearance is premature and ill-thought. Also for those who say that identification a racial difference amounts to racism, a question, a thought worries me. If someone says that calling a black man black amounts to racism, then I wanna know, how? Now, if a black man is called black whats the harm in that? How else would you describe his physical appearance. Besides, whoever believes that identification of race is racism, does that mean, that all but the white race are bad?

I mean, does that mean that you belong to a race that is so bad, that you would not even want to be identified with it? Now, Im not talking about the use of N-word, Im talking about the use of black, or calling someone a jew at the diner. Really, just because the waiter was able to identify your race and wrote it down on your bill (for reasons best known to him) he became racist? Is being a jew so bad, or any other race for that matter, that the very instance of people acknowledging your links with that race make you feel pathetic about yourself and give you a sense of injustice? If you feel so, then are you not actually saying something like,

"hey! look fellas, Im a jew (black, or whatever) and I would not like to be even reminded of where I come from and I don't even care whether you gonna be bad to me after knowing that fact. I am an equal, just like you, God created me, just that he placed me in a race that has been subject of injustice (or something that actually amounts to racism) and Im really fed up of this. All my life Ive tried to work as hard as I can to get to a point where I can be considered as an equal or one among the very limited tenants of the accepted race, and so if you identify my race of origin (doesnt really matter what you do to me after itand also something that I could not have controlled), the very instance of identifying me as a different race person Im gonna label you a racist! Whew! So, dare you call me a jew (black, or whatever). AND OH YES! I take pride in being a jew(black, or whatever)."

(will be continued in Part 3.

Drop your comments. I need to know what you people think.)

Road to racism and more : Part 1

2008-03-29T08:36:00.004+05:30

Now I know that I'm not a social doctor, or a Phd. in social sciences, but I've got a mind. A mind that wanders here and there, every brief while. I've been thinking of racism for quite sometime now, and really wanna know what exactly it is. So, I thought that if I pen my words down, well, not exactly, but pretty much that though, I may be able to get somewhere (rather than get lost).

They say that its in really bad taste to call someone a nigger. But, then again, its not everyday that we get outta our house and let the N-word flow out. (Man its a hell of a job to keep count of, I mean, theres the F-word, the C-word...its an ever-growing family we got down there!) But, what exactly amounts to racism? I mean, if I did call you a black man (Id stay away from using the N-word, till I reach some conclusion) would that amount to racism? Those who followed the tour down under, well, the Andrew Symonds incident. I mean, to be honest, he does look like a monkey, so there it is. I just said that. Am I racist now? Does me calling a man, who in all honesty does look like a monkey, make me racist beyond the consideration of what Ive made of myself up till this day. All the deeds that Ive done, and all the good that was to come to me once I reached THERE, have I relinquished that just because I said that some guy resembles a monkey? The jury is still out on that one, ask Harbhajan Singh!

But again, they say that you cant use the N-word, to tell you honestly check out the lyrics of this song and you tell me what you think. Again there is this one thing that I came across. If you do read it closely, or well enough, you'll find a link which will take you here. Okay, so now we know (err, me thinks it should be read as "think") that not all the americans are down with it, but you gotta definitely see this one. And once you are done with, and clicking all the links I provided you with, just wait for the next part in this series which I have decided to call....Road to racism and more : Part 1

Breaking news : The great Indian disaster show

2008-03-24T20:31:00.006+05:30

Good Morning India! Its about time you woke up. Its been a little late, but as they say, better late than never! Its approx. 6:30 am that i wake up every morning and i cant help but switch on the television so early. I just hope that somewhere across the hundreds of frequencies that ive got access to, they are airing some classic football match, or a movie that wont kill me! (You gotta admit, some movies stink, stink so bad, even worse than akshoo chobby's wide opened up jaw!). I try and avoid the media channels. They claim to be an Indian's passage to India. Exposing scams, educating the "common man", helping India and Indians in building a more aware, open society, and the breaking news part is just fabulous!! I mean, the way the India media just keeps the viewers abreast with the latest developments is fantastic!

Kudos, kudos indeed on such a massive achievement. After all, its not easy to quench the thirst of a nation with a billion people, and to do that for 6years straight as Aaj Tak claims to have done. Really brilliant. But you know somewhere amidst all the accolades, all the prizes and all the never-ending claims to glory and hurrah that these media (news) channels have claimed, some of the most disgusting and "getting-on-my-nerve" moments have also been possible due to the Indian media alone. I mean, after all, who can forget the coverage (kinda ironical term o describe her!) that Rakhi Sawant got when she dumped her "boyfriend" on air. Again, wasn't it this same female who walked out of a show 'cos she lost! Man, and the media, the Indian media, afforded her, more than 15 mins of fame that Andy Warhol thought everyone deserved!!

Is it just me or is really everyone bored, infuriated at times, of the unnecessary "coverage" the media does? I mean, really, do you really wanna know what colour shirt, or pant some "superstar" is wearing? But turn on any channel (no pun intended) and thats what you'll get. We then, or rather earlier, also had to undergo the torture of being told the colour of saree one Mrs. Bachchan was wearing on her honeymoon, where she went for her honeymoon. To tell you honestly, even if my ~~too hot to handle~~ neighbour got married, I still wont give a damn as to where she's going for her honeymoon!! I mean, c'mon, do you really wanna know that? And what exactly do you plan on accomplishing with the use of such secretive (for as long as it was) information? Again, one had to sit through and hope that one day, maybe one day, the media will realise that a "commoner" like me does not and wont give a damn what happens to relations between Aamir Khan and his brother. I've got my problems to worry about, my issues that this (as was the case with the previous) govt. had promised to solve, but did not. I wanna know the status of that, rather than switch on the Tv and have some guy, whose closest relatives have now dismembered him, host a Tv news show about what pissed off Salman! I don't wanna see how scores of young women, in their twenties or thirties (or forties or even fifties at times), have assembled outside of SRKs, or Hrithik's bungalow just to get a glimpse and listen to the lame ass narrator boast how well they've got the situation covered from all angles! Jesus, I'm sure there are more important things for which we need the media, but more definitively, not for such a preposterous, filthy, ill-thought and prematurely conceived and showering of iconic status on our "heroes" and "heroines".

The most unfortunate part of the whole saga is that in all of this the media has ensured diversion of truth, not by lying, but by not telling. The real heroes are left unsung, the real tragedies are never mentioned. The truth is buried under the debris of an attitude, sell what sells! I remember watching on Star News recap of Hindi serials!! Goodness me! I mean, you know what I mean right? It seems that with the burgeoning revenues and fat bottom lines that the Tv media has got accustomed to see, it has somewhere lost the track. Its not derailed though, not as yet. Thanks to the likes of Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt. but surely not 'cos of "The RKB Show". (Dear Lord, invitees on that show were not even recognised by their neighbours!). Now is the time when some clear leadership is established in this field. There needs to be someone who takes the truth by the scruff of its neck and present it to us, in as crude, rough, real for as it is. The media, one would do well to acknowledge, is a medium of seeing things. It must be ensured that this medium is as clear so as to give a distort-less view of the ground zero. We don't want someone to draw conclusions for us, give us the news, let us draw the inference ourselves.

One hopes with each passing day, the media would get even more mature and take up the responsibility. But no, all such hopes are laid to rest when you have a channel that has been the "best" for six consecutive years and it airs what is the only pic in this blog. Need I say more?

(Drop in your comments for this blog. Very thankful indeed.)

Strangers

2008-03-14T21:05:00.006+05:30

I hate it. I must admit. I hate the fact that some jackass/jenny is lying somewhere (pun intended..this is for you, the one who asked me today) in his house and then using the internet or orkut more synonymously to project himself/herself as(s) the king/queen of the world. I just hate it. I'm sure you do too. But then, come to think of it, maybe thats what I & u do as well. I mean, we write about ourselves in the "about me" of orkut and claim ourselves to be the alpha-male, eternal beauty of the universe. But, thats what orkut, or more so the net is all about. Its about a fat-ass claiming to have washboards, its about a never-been-asked-out claiming to be Miss Universe! Worse, its about fakies.

Its about the ones we could never be, so why not be someone in this world (the net) who we can never be in real world, the real world where flesh sweats, our voice is coarse and face ugly? All this comes from being a part of orkut for the last 2 yrs (almost) now. This sheer frustration of reading profiles where girls have got "no friend requests" and boys have got "i'm cool" templates! Ah, enough is enough. I think its time these sons of bitches and bitches themselves (yes, I said that!) woke up, smelt the coffee and had a nice look in the mirror and saw what everyone else around them sees, nothing!

I hate the way people act so cool on the net. Maybe you think, I'm trying to be one right now, well i don't give a FUCK about what you think. I look like a nice boy. A nice boy I am, but get on my wrong side and Ill brush you tougher than Symonds brushed that streaker! I'm really pissed. I don't know about what. Maybe its about the fact that my friend is delaying my next blog feed....maybe its about having a lot to do, but yet not having the mood to. Maybe its about just being stuck up the whole week, the same routines, an ennui. But, Ill tell you what, stop being a net-dude. Stop the bullshit, or you'll be in it one day! I was not born to be nice to you, neither were you. But as you grow up you realise that you've gotta give everyone their fair chance, even the latest stranger. We grow up and we build friends, orkut is just a place where strangers meet, your closest friends were once strangers, be nice to the newer ones.

Step out of the net-addiction. Step into the real world. Spend time with the ones who care for you, rather than try be super-cool in front of strangers, who are most definitely trying to do the same. Who are we kidding? We're all so different in our real lives. Are we?

Tattoo mE!!

2008-03-10T19:18:00.005+05:30

Ever sine the first time i saw a heavy metal video, Robbie Williams, and other crazy people, ive always wanted a ~~taboo~~ tattoo. But I never have had that kind of ~~money~~ chance. But boy o' boy, does Pauly Unstoppable make me feel like a ~~lousy excuse grunting ass~~ lesser man.

Im currently working on a blog, till then hopefully this will suffice ur appetite that has become so dependent on my blogworks!!

I want a tattoo!!

Is Saturday really a weekend?

2008-02-04T08:55:00.000+05:30

Well, I'm reduced to weekend blogging which means that I cant blog any other time. I'm rarely home. Even on weekends, I'd say Sunday is just about the day. Saturday is like, well, I don't even understand why Saturday is a "weekend". I mean, at least not universally. So many of us have to work even on Saturdays. Is it not bad enough to put in say more than like 8 hours every weekday that you lose even Saturdays?!! Saturday, I'd say is more like a foreplay to the eventual sex, a Sunday.

I really cant understand the basic reason why Saturday is universally a recognised "weekend"! I mean, after the Pluto demotion (i feel sorry for Pluto by the way, 77 years was it?!) I thought that anything that did not satisfy the universal conditions could not be held universally correct. Now how about applying that to Saturdays for a change ha?! What is even more pathetic is when someone has weekend"s" and all you have is "a" weekend. It kinda sucks, lets face it. You work all week long and all you get in return is a Sunday. I mean, how rewarding is that after busting your butt all week long only so that you don't get thrown outta your present job? Those people, like me, who've got only Sundays, know what I'm talking 'bout. All you ever get is a Sunday, and then, well, I must say, you do feel like a King. A king in the sense that you get to choose who spends "that" day with you. All of a sudden you come in demand, I mean, as pathetic as you maybe, people are having less of your crap stuff and since each one of us is here for some reason or the other, people actually miss THE BULLSHIT YOU CAUSE WHEN YOU ARE AROUND!!! And then everyone starts asking you what are you planning on doing on the weekends, and for a moment you forget all the bonds with the person and you wish you could just yell, "I don't have weekends you ASS, all I have is "a" weekend.But you don't. I'm really frustrated, who else is? So, i must leave this unfinished and wonder if Saturday really is a weekend?!

(Some one over my shoulder) "Hey man!?"

Me : Who is it?

(That some one) "Its me, Bollywood!! Got time?"

Me : Sorry man but I'm almost done, 'bout to leave.

Bollywood : Hey, WTF, i thought you were gonna call me when you'd be online the next time. Especially after the first time. What happened?

Me : Well, I was going to, but maybe next time ha? What say? Its been a frustrating weekend you know.

Bollywood : Yeah, yeah, i know. Alright, but dont miss me next time. Hey, you there man?

(The blogger has left the blog. Catch him next time. Well what to say, he's one unreasonable chap!!)

When fate intervenes....

2008-02-04T08:25:00.000+05:30

This one is purely for my Manchester United "brotherhood". As we come close to half-a-century passing by since the Munich Tragedy..i found this on the net and think that everyone would do well to take a read. I know, some of you guys are gonna say its biased, but when you take a look at what we lost, it doesnt quite look the same. I pray those men who could have changed the face of European Football, and world as well, rest in peace.

And as for Real Madrid's dominance in Europe, but for the tragedy, just like we did to Liverpool, WE WOULD HAVE "KNOCK(ED) THEM OFF THEIR FUCKIN' PERCH"!!
(Said one Sir Alex of Liverpool once!!)

Take a look at this article in the Telegraph.

And for an evening they stiched.....

2007-09-25T20:15:00.000+05:30

All I could hear today, this morning, well maybe had i been out long enough, all day long, was "did you see?!!!!!" There was a sense of disbelief in those words, dint matter who spoke them. "Yes!!" And a sense of rejoice, dint matter who replied either. All those who asked questions asked this, all those who replied, replied this. I cant remember the last time so many people must have called in sick, called in sick just so that they could watch one solitary match. But, come to really think 'bout it, it was more than just a match, it just somehow seemed to be the answer to the embarrassment suffered in March earlier this year.

How can you forget a day like this?! How can you afford to miss a match like this?! Well, some just could'nt make the "grade". Could'nt call in sick, had to work. Trying to concentrate on the job on hand and at the same time trying to keep those ever zealous eyes and ears away from the tv and radio sets. It was sure difficult, sheer difficult. Sure it was 4 years back we last reached the World Cup Finals, but the last time we lifted it was 24!! Thats a longtime. All i could manage for the mega event was a finale of say, 25 minutes! Yeah, thats it. But all the while you return from your office to your tv sets back home there was no one who was not taking about it.

Suddenly, the trains were emptier than before. I guess people had "eloped" from their workplaces just to be a part of this mega event. More than the fact that it was such a mega event, it was the hope that a bunch of 20 somethings would, from being not even contenders, go onto lift one of the trophies of their lifetime! They did eventually.

I had never watched India lift a trophy that said "World Cup". Not many others had either. So i wanted to go home and see it "LIVE", as live as can be! So, i finish my work and head back home with the match already begun. The score seems to be even. Not much to choose between the sides in the first innings itself. And as you trot back home, evading the Tv shops on the way back home, you just cant help but take a glance or two. Get the scores updated and continue on your way back home. Wanting to reach as quickly as possible. So i took the train. It was raining. Raining quite heavily. But its rained like this before. It gotten ugly as well. If uve ever stayed in Mumbai you'll know that with the downpours and people dangling on the footboards of the trains, its a great combination for a fight, BINGO!! No one wants to get wet. Some people inevitably do and then people fight. Everyone knows that they are all helpless, helpless cause of a careless Govt. but they still fight each other....arrgh!! There i go again, thats a topic for another day.

It rained badly as well yesterday. But no one was fighting. Perhaps, it was the match that got them so engrossed of the events far out in South Africa, so much so that they dint care if they were getting drenched helplessly again in the city rains. Inside the train, there were groups of say 8-10 men, 2-3 groups maybe,all of them in a huddle (resembled the Indian huddle for a while) listening to the scores. It was not being aired on the radio, i think, so there were these guys with their GPRS mobiles constantly refreshing their web-pages and screaming the scores. "OUT!!OUT!!" cried one man. The crowd got excited. Then, the other huddles confirmed and now everyone was happy. The Pakistanis were batting. "They are going a good rate, we have to take all 10(wickets)" said one. Normally, it would have the same man who would have been fighting with me by now,the train(although comparatively empty) was still crowded nonetheless and I was literally on that guys feet. But he said those words, smiled and then looked at me with those eyes, eyes which made me wonder if he wanted me to reply back.

"Yeah, we dont much of a total to defend!" He seemed happy with my involvement. Then--(I ride in "First Class" compartment) with only a steel grill separating the 1st class and the 2nd class compartment, anything said in either compartments was sure to be heard in the other-- someone from the 2nd class compartment yelled, "OUT!!" Suddenly, the GPRS dudes( lets call 'em that) frantically started "refreshing" (I'd like to thank Mr. Gates for the word). They confirmed and again, joy spread through out the compartment. Everyone was celebrating, and then again someone yelled, "OUT!!OUT!!OUT!!" 2wickets in a quick succession, two wickets, more than twice the joy!!

Suddenly, and astonishingly for the first time in my 6 year train travel i saw the people from the two compartments(aforementioned) almost seemingly transcend "grills" and interact as if there were none! All of a sudden, everyone was talking to someone! Some wise cracks started giving their interim match "expert opinions". No one really cared from that time on about anything else but to concentrate on one thing and one thing only, THE MATCH. Wickets kept tumbling and people kept on cheering. Some fours were hit, the "dudes" confirmed this after every "refreshment"(Mr. Gates again, with some amendments of my own). Almost reaching my station, the mood in the train was jubilant. Everyone was cocksure that the 24 year old wait would finally end. I started speaking to strangers,and even though those talks lasted a few coinciding,overlapping minutes inside a train, that was something I'd normally not do. Others, many others, would'nt either. But they did.

And I got down, walking as quickly as i could, headed out of the station and then took a rickshaw to my place. I spoke to the auto-driver as well!! I was really different. The streets seemed to be filled with hope and joy, both at the same time. In the rick, the driver asked me to update him, I unhesitatingly did. Came home, watched the match, saw the team win it, saw all the match presentations and then get back to my usual self. And as I lie in my bed, all I could think was the craziness in the train. I mean, I had a 60-65 year old next to me and a 30-35 year old man on the other side, and both equally "into" the match. So was I, a 20 year old lad.(I pronounce it "laad", the English way, sorta, I love the accent!!)

The next day people, there were many in the trains again, but not many spoke to each other. Everyone was busy with their own selves, I had my earphones plugged, some deep into their slumber, some buried in the newspapers, others just looking away from each other. And I realised, that these 20 somethings from our country out there in S Africa managed to do something unbelievable. Its the love for the game really, but then, they had to win it to evoke the love again. And they did. And so also did they, for an evening, stitch these self-absorbed individuals(myself including) into a NATION. Now, everything is back to "normalcy".

Whats up, Bollywood?

2007-08-19T13:52:00.000+05:30

I'm so definitely not the kinda person who has any right whatsoever to talk 'bout Bollywood. I find it hard enough to tell one from song from the other (one hindi song from some english song that is). I rarely see Hindi movies but a lot of that has a lot to do with whatever the hell is up with Bollywood. I mean, its not that long ago when i used to watch Hindi movies and rubbish the English ones, but now, its the other way around, totally, permanently.

Let me start with how Bollywood was once a surreal place. All originals (well, most of 'em), brilliant directors, unreal music and of-course the lyrics were a rose petal touch to th ears. Over the years, the rose has dried out and the thorns keep rubbing your body, pricking one spot at a time. I mean, who can forget Nargis from her Mother India role? How about Sholay? That movie is still a crowd-puller. I, many others as well, would still watch it, atleast for sometime, if not the entire length.

Now, thats enough said and done. Fast forward about 3 odd decades from the Jay aur Viru ki jodi and you are devastated to see the plight of Bollywood. You've got Rakhi Sawant claiming to be an actress (I'm not a Christain, but still, Father please forgive her, for she know not what she (modified) claims) and you see Om Puri showing off his belly button in a saree in the same movie, you definitely know you've landed in hell.

Most of these Hindi movies are a total rip-off of Hollywood flicks. Let me start by giving some examples, say for instance, there was this one movie Awaraa Pagal Deewana starring Akshay Kumar, Suniel ~~Shitty~~ Shetty and others "superstars". Now, there in this film from the very outset the director wants his audience to know that he's not put a lot of money(or thought for that matter) into his action sequences. His first fight scene (forgive me if its not that first one) is like watching Matrix part 1, dubbed in Hindi, with bad looking people all over the place. Then, going forward, the movie slowly unveils how, Akshay Kumar is the bad don, the whole of India is looking for, taking refuge in America and how, he ends up meeting a dentist, whose assistant is totally nuts 'bout dons, and they don't come much better than Akki himself. Now, this reminds me of the Bruce Willis, Matthew Perry starer Hollywood flick, The Whole Nine Yards. Same story, there even a rose tattoo planted on Akki's neck, which has a close resemblance to that of Willis'. Now, whats up with this?

Then, coming suddenly to the latest movie starring Sushmita Sen, and Shiny Ahuja Zindagi Rocks. Not really!! The movie was crap, bout a rock star, and thats all you wanna know 'bout it. Trust me! There was a song in it, which is a total rip-off of Shakira's video. Now, how pathetic is this? Then we have the latest craze doing rounds, the Shahrukh Khan starer Chak De India. Now, its got great reviews, but somewhere in between those reviews the critics just let go of the part where they should tell the readers that this movie is "based" on the Kurt Russel one, Miracle. Now, theres a scene in both the movies where the coach makes his players run their butts off till they all claim to being playing for their countries. No marks for guessing which movie was out first. No. Not even a consolation prize.

Ok, let me stop the embarrassment, but this is really pathetic.

(My inner voice : One more, one more) (Me : Alright, just one more)
Now, this one's the best. Whats the height of copying someone else's movie, (let alone if thats David Fincher) and make your own Fight Club. How cool is that?

(Interrupted) "Hey thats not right!!"

(Me) "Who the hell are you?!!"

(Interrupter) "I'm Bollywood.The Entire Bollywood fraternity. The same one who found the Sanju Baba sentence preposterous, but find nothing wrong in someone blatantly lifting someone else's work, that work that we've wanted to excel in all our life."

(Me) "So, WTF, you doing here anyways?"

(The Entire B'wood) "That movie had nothing common, except the name my friend. Besides, don't you think you've thrown enough mud on Bollywood today? I mean, c'mon, take a break, get at us some other day."

(Me) "But that sucks. I mean, dude..(i by default call everyone a dude, ive noticed it makes people feel nice)..c'mon...ive not even begun talking 'bout the "inspired" songs. Ive not even mentioned Anu Malik. Or, how i almost heard Shaggy in the Partner track (you're my love). Hey, reminds, what kinda bloody theft of ideas is Partner?!!!!"

(The Entire Bollywood) "Hey man, uve gotta chill. You should know that we've reached a certain point in our lives where most of us have started to admire works of art and see how far we can assimilate that into our Bollywood. You know, this way, even those who dont watch Hollywood can have access to the best in Cinema, be it from the West or East. Bollywood caters to everyone, anyhow!!"

(Me) "Okie man, will surely think of the latest admission and claims you lay. Gotta go now, will be back. You gonna be there too?"

(The Entire Bollywood) "Yeah sure, just call me, ill be there"

Boys dont "AWWWW..."

2007-08-18T08:11:00.000+05:30

I believe it has been a common presumption, unless you were born with the wrong set of genitals, that boys dont awww. There are so many of these issues, situations perhaps is more apt, where you would find the girls and boys reacting in a very different manner, so different that it yells out the difference in perception. Again, another thing that ive been hearing for a long longtime is that, men dont cry. I cant seem to figure this out, but still, its been the notion, misguided, ill-thought or otherwise.

This whole thought came to my mind after a fellow-orkutter asked me very recently, what my display pic was all about? Well, i really couldnt explain to him exactly what the case for it was, all i said was, " its jst a very simple innocent pic...love it cos its very "awww".." And then i figure out that boys arent meant to awwww...but i just did. A little feminine side of me, or is it me just being plain thoughtless bout something that im saying on the internet? I drop the latter as an option to my hidden multi-optional answer to this question (im very particular bout what i say), then there are many left, although the "feminine side" is the only other one ive mentioned.

Now reverting to the main issue over here, girls will find a baby cute, boys (mostly referred to as emotional shit-heads by the opposite sex) just dont know how to react. If a baby says something, when it actually cant, girls go nuts--ive seen this--boys might end up saying "ahh!what a dork!" This stuff happens and is for real. Its out there, inside each one of us, each one of us boys. Again, here some guys girls find "show kuute". Boys find them nerds. Thats the basic difference that stems from different set of genitals. Finally an emotional connection is established with whats in your pants today(and forever , at your sole discretion of-course!)

How bout the colours for a change? There are male colours and then, there are female colours. Female colours are mostly and always revolving around PINK. Boys should choose colours that are more of a darkish sorts. Say, BLACK. I hate that colour. I mean, surely its got its importance in the derivation of some other colours, but does that really matter? I mean, why should the girls have all the fun? Girls can have pink, green, turquoise (i used to call it a bull-shit colour while i was still recovering from the Tyler Durden hangover) and then all that the boys are left with is Navy blue, maroon, black, dark green etc etc(what are indeed bull-shit colours!!). I cant seem to understand, why widen the scope of sexual discrimination? Lets keep that to the boardrooms, shall we?

How bout our accessories? I mean, girls can decorate (and redecorate) themselves as if they're a work of art and they'd still be heterosexuals. If the boys did that, they'd be metrosexuals!! How did we (and i speak, apparently, for most of us who actually have a thing in our pants) all of a sudden, just by emulating the women and by being a little more cleaned up, than that has been our tradition lose our basic characteristic? Maybe we should thank Mark Simpson for this.

Well, this is actually a much wider topic, than i previously thought, i shall continue this at an appropriate time. Till then, lets sustain traditions and lead ourselves to believe that boys dont awwww...!! Awww (and this ones for the girls)......

I dont have a thing to blog!!

2007-08-06T20:32:00.001+05:30

Well, its been a longtime since i last blogged. And yet, after all these days of absenteeism i have not found anything yet!! Kinda sucks, but when you try and compare this with my daily chronicles i'm sure, the loss of thought aint all that bad. But, how 'bout you? Where have you been? I've been busy, actually, well, when life gets occupied with so many things, i guess we feel we are busy, i feel the same; for now.

I have been thinking, and thinking hard and good that too, but i just cant seem to agree. I mean, my thoughts in the morning and then in the evening seem to disagree on every bit. Every small tiny bit, that needs an electronic microscope to be seen, each one of those thoughts seem to be in complete isolation with its immediate neighbour. Nothing i think seems to be steady for more than , well, hardly at all. I've wanted to blog, and blog so badly as well, but just havent been able to think of anything. Anything at all. I mean, i aint a writer, but surely i can write non-sense, ask my friends to read the pathetic piece of immaterial english abuse and revert to being my usual self. But, thats not been happening these days. I think of myself as wanting to write a masterpiece...like a you know, a MASTERPIECE. But that seems to be more of a hope, a distant cousin of the most ridiculous of hopes that too!

Well, the day begins at 4 and ends at 12. So train-goers watch me sleep all the while. They see me sleep in the morning and then, they see me sleep in the evening. I'm getting used to the first-class green cushioned (yeah right!!) seats. They are not comfortable, but they do the job. Those 50 mins provide a much needed relief. But, coming back to the crisis here, i dont have a thing to blog. I should have a few now, now that the EPL has begun and maybe i'll have a word or two to say 'bout Mr. Jose and his antics, Mr. Arsene "I can do without Henry" Wenger, surely, Rafael "Liverpool cant win the EPL" Benitez. And then, how can i forget, Sir Alex Ferguson. Ah! I dont know why, but i just cant seem to not be impressed with that man.

Anyways, i must cut it short here. Maybe next time out i'll be more elaborate and definitely with something to read 'bout. Well, i must apologise for some nonsense that you might have had to bear with in this post, well you havent lost much, i mean, click here if you think you have. Do write in with your valuable comments, there are processed and looked after.

Discoveries at 32000 feet above sea level

2007-07-18T20:00:00.001+05:30

And for some reason i believe all this - the near atheism, boring prayers, unbelief in heaven and hell alike,not-so-strong-god-following that i'm attributed with (most of it at family reunions) has got something to do with a man i don't know. I met him some eleven years back. I was nine then. On board an Indian Airlines flight from Mumbai (Bombay it was back then) to Mangalore, me and my cousin were more than delighted when this man, gentleman, offered to swap his window seat for our adjoining seats. It was view to watch. We loved it. It must have been like the third time we were flying, but at nine, we loved every bit of that, every single time!

Getting back to the man, i guess we should name him for convenience sakes. Lets call him,Annoying Bob. Annoying Bob was this middle-ages man, spectacled,moustached,short and maybe a little overweight. Thats as far as i can recall Annoying Bob. He was one of the interfering types, i recall him, pooping in every short while, asking us if we needed anything! Man, at times i wished he just disappeared. Being nice is good, being extra nice, is perennially "enough". I wish now, for some strange reason, that i had yelled that at him. Atleast, he would not have asked what he did! But he was indeed a nice man. Guess he saw us as two less than tens, 32000 feet above the sea level all by themselves and must have thought he ought to take care. At 32000 feet its really annoying if your "single-serving friends" get stuck up in your face. I mean its bad enough that you must stay glued to a seat for hours together ( i believe if aint gonna take hours, then theres no point flying) and then, just when you cant move, you come to learn you cant escape as well !!

Back to the screenplay. We were seated in the first row, only the cockpit to stare at after getting bored of continuously watching the clouds come and go, one after the other, higher than the previous ones. Milky white they were, oh what a sight! And for a second i started searching for the Gods, i was told that high above the skies they lived. Where the apsaras danced and there was all happiness. This was to be heaven. I thought. I was told, and so i believed. It must have crossed my mind(its hard to recall what i must have thought 11 years ago, but i try to; vaguely). And then, the air-hostess came serving. I picked up as many chocolates as i could in my right palm. Then, the other. I was out of my thoughts, and could see the airtight doors in between our seats and the cockpits. Munching on them, Annoying Bob seemingly in his sleep, got up and looked at the two of us literally feasting on the chocolates. He was silent,for the best part of first 25-30 mins of the flight, he was not. Then, once again, the silence was broken and Annoying Bob spoke.He spoke like a wise sage teaching his most loved disciple. He said something that etched forever in my mind, cant be sure to how large an impact immediately, but an impact it did and a striking one that too!

Annoying Bob : Whats your name?

Me : Rutesh

Annoying Bob : How old are you?

Me : Nine.

Annoying Bob : Have you heard 'bout God?Heaven?Angels?

Me(with a "who hasn't" look on my face) : Yes!

answering to the point has been one of my most annoying characteristics, which i sometimes(even more annoyingly)tend to over-compensate!!

Annoying Bob : Well, has anyone ever told you that heaven is above the blue sky we see from beneath? That the Gods live there. That the Gods have beautiful apsaras dancing for them and that heaven is beautiful.

Me : Yes, ive heard of it.

Annoying Bob : We are so high above the seas and i cant see any of those things. We've been this high for quite sometime now and yet i don't recollect seeing any today. Ive traveled so often, yet have'nt seen any even once. Well, where are they? I dont think they exist. Heaven does not exist. And if heaven doesnt, then how can hell?!!

At nine, you are usually left dumbfounded by questions like these. I had no idea what to say, and so i went back munching on my chocolates, but not before atleast once looking outside the windows and searching for Them. Every once i a while i would peep out the window yearning to sight them and show Annoying Bob and point to him and yell at him, in his ears and tell him, "Look, there you go! There they are, you...you..." (for innocence, my vocabulary was much restricted then). I could'nt find any. I felt like i had lost, Annoying Bob had won! Thats what i remember vaguely from my conversation 'bout 11 years back. I recall it - well not like yesterday, but most certainly - like the day before.

This took away from me things in a flash. I had not understood it then, but i do now. Now, looking back and trying to correlate one event to another, i see the seeds that Annoying Bob had sown. With that went everything. Soon Christmases were boring, other religious festivals were a mere get together, and myself coming from a not-so-religious dad meant that that was the last thing i wanted to know. At nine i was successfully told how all that, the heaven and hell, God and Evil, were all lies. Lies manifested to make us believe and (now i feel) eventually surrender to a power higher and much stronger than us where none existed. Santa Claus i came to know was a lie. Carols were just another songs sang in a Christian school. Every Dec 25 when the peon would wear a Santa outfit and come and throw the chocolates, i knew it was'nt him. It was'nt Santa. i dint know who it was, but i knew who it was not. I believed that i had been to the place where everyone said Gods lived. I searched and i found none. Now, i dont believe that i managed to understand and totally grasp what it meant when he said, "no heaven-hell", the way i do now, but what i knew was i was being lied. It hurt. There were no Gods. Soon, the cries were all by themselves. The traditional prayers alongwith the childish pains went away. I figured, if God was'nt there to hear it, then why pray? Religious ceremonies were a compelled ritual. Now i attend them to meet cousins and others. Soon the temples became uninteresting and i stopped being afraid of being doomed as i grew up. Who's there to forsake me after all?

I'm not an out and out atheist, i dont think so, but i just have no clue as to why i just dont care 'bout it all anymore. I'm really indifferent to this, heaven and hell, God and the Satan. It feels numb, but well, as it would, who cares?

How many have you?!

2007-07-03T07:25:00.000+05:30

Thinking of Titan are you? So was i. Staring down at my wrist all i could think of was how once my mat finished "Fast Track" watch was now an old, "i-should-scrap this" watch. I could have been flaunting an Armani instead, but thats another story. Then i think of the latest from Titan, the Aviator series, and how awesome that collection would be! Now, with the ones that i've got. Tick. Tick. And so goes my Armani. Oh!Its beautiful. That jade-like dial, diamond studded number-stones, its a joy to watch, pun not intended, but used! I used to sport a Titan before,now, i long for a Vacheron Constantin. Every time i look at my Armani i get lost within its beauty. Its enchanting, and then, all of a sudden, i recover. Stop adoring it and see whats really happening. All of a sudden i see the metaphors. Do you? Have you? I am losing a second at a time. Its very different in the sense that i'm snapping from one reality to another.

Have you ever thought about it? Looked at every second of your life tick away? With every tick of the watch that adorns your wrist, you ARE getting older. You are about 2 minutes older than you were when you started reading this. Now, you are 3! Apply this thought to everything you do, you want to do, you have and you wonder the worth of what you do. Made me wonder why i did that. Do you ask yourself (have you started) that whether what you did was worth every second it took off of your life? Decaying further more. All the time we are getting older, nearing the end, closing-in on death. Are we all, but, running out of time?

We love doing a few things say hangout with friends, watch whatever, do whatever, we just do so many things. But seldom do we realise that everything we do is using up that time of our life, one we have limited, not sure how much though. Would you then feel the urge to do things that are worth it? Would you, then, stop lazying around the house, get up earlier on sundays as well, spend more time with your special ones?

Most of us flow with time. we live one day at a time. A week at the best when we've got big plans shaping up at a weekend, beyond that, not much. We take life as it comes, get out of our teens and think we've become big. Look to make something of ourselves so as to occupy ourselves with for the rest of our lives. Try to get as many luxuries as we can. Dream big really. Its like finding something that can keep us busy and get us what we want till we are. We accept death as the destination of this journey called life. We've accepted it so much so that now everyone knows that they're going to lose the ones they love. If we're all born with a clean slate, then how can each one of us, in our lifetime, understand and accept death. The thing really is, we've only accepted it and to my mind this acceptance on our part and so on the part of the posterity has a lot to do with the failure of those before us to unlock the mystery that surrounds death. We've given up hope that we can live forever, so we then want to live as long as we can, dont we?

I do not understand the concept of death. It works in strange ways, akin to life, really. It might happen expectedly or without a notice. It could be by you for quite sometime and finally embrace you, or it could take you by a storm. You might be down with illness for 6-7 months, try hard, battle it out and finally die, or you could go for an evening stroll and next thing (you dont know) an astronaut falls from the blue above and lands on you! Obviously, you die. Death, they say comes to everyone and in many (many) strange ways. We have accepted it. I guess it does sound practical. I mean, if none of us died, where would we all live? At 6 Bn+ we're already into deforestation, at even more so, where would we be? Besides, to live on forever, is that not boring? And then, what would happen of those who are now immortals only because they're dead? We'd never have them. How would we understand the beauty that life is, if we never knew that we could lose it any moment?

Venturing into myths, Achilles wanted to die as well. He just must have got tired of killing everyone. He understood, perhaps, the tranquility that death brought and the constant fight for survival life had become. He, like Alexander, chose death over life. They died young, both. Alexander idolised Achilles. What is it 'bout dying young that these men understood? Was it the time? Was it the life they lived? What was it? Did they see what we have not? Is it just a matter of time then? People ailing with ailments chose death over life as well. Maybe life is not all that beautiful to everyone as we can think. Maybe life does become a pain for many. Are we just lucky then? Is life all but a matter of luck? A point of view? We all try to fill our life with moments that last a lifetime. Sure, we all want to. We all want to life a "full life", dont we? But what does it imply? Does it mean living longer? What does life mean?

Hard to know, too complex to figure out ourselves, too vague to be preached. Whatever it is, we are closing in on death. A tick at time. Who knows how many (ticks) i have left. How many have you?

Me, myself and the Internet--- Part 2

2007-07-01T13:58:00.000+05:30

Now, since u know a little bit 'bout my internet conquests...a little more bout me!
As of now, a simple 20 yr old who you cannot make out from the rest of the crowd. An illusionist, in the sense that people would think that i'm a loner, a "keeps-to-himself" person, only if they knew better, only if i cared more!

This is about "me" ; "myself" and "the internet" will come up later on. Well, where do i start from? I wonder, i mean, ive always wondered what is it, what has been the urge to let people know who we really are. I still cant figure that out as ironic as it may seem. But im an irony unto myself. Guess everyone feels pretty much the same way. We all think we are special, we are; maybe.

I used to be the nice boy, inextricably lost in his books and daily routine that was nothing short of a hectic life. Get up at 5, reach college by 7, and then travel 85-90 odd kms everyday to attend classes. Life was becoming an adventure i never bargained for! And in the midst of all of this, was springing up a boy, a man who would be carving out a mould for himself to fulfill his "must-haves".

All of a sudden, u realise that for a change, you control your life. Its nice to feel that way. The thing with control is that, it is as much an illusion as it is a delusion. Anything beyond that is purely beyond my intellectual abilities to comprehend! Coming back to "me", it felt nice. Life was heading and i seemed to enjoy it! Every step of the way--though i have to say, lifes never been as great as it is now, but somehow, experience teaches you a lot of things--everything that i like. It does'nt get much better.

It is like getting everything that u've ever wanted. Hang out with friends' just seemed to keep getting better. On the academic front i was still very much the same "has'nt proved till yet" boy! Its very frustrating to be that, guess most of you would know!! When these things happen to you and you think that you control life (finally!!), you really dont! All that means is that life is happening too fast, much too fast for you to realise what is happening, and in this moment you live it, and miss out on moments, some of which are the best you might possibly ever have, and then come back to your senses once its all over! Once you've lost it all. Its perhaps similar to a hang-over, i cant be sure though, never had one, luckily or otherwise.

Thats as much about me as im ready to divulge right now, thats as much about me as is necessary for you to correlate my posts to one another. However, must you know more, all i shall say is that, now, looking back and looking down i see myself much better than i ever was. I love the idea of not being in control, letting-it-rip (if you will), "let(ting) the chips fall where they may"....its simply nice. Its so much more nice to know what you want and surrender to it, rather than not know what you want and be illusory that you control everything around you, isnt it?

Me, myself and the Internet--- Part 1

2007-07-01T13:27:00.000+05:30

You know, for a long time i think now, for nearly 2 yrs that ive had internet (without any disruptions) at my place i never realised how far into "it" i really was. It was only after that the net got unexpectedly disconnected (and for 3 weeks that too) when i realised the condition, so to speak.

It made me feel restless, initially. I don't really know why or how the restlessness subsided. Guess it was because i always knew that it would get connected one day, uncertain as to when though. It was a matter of when and not if. Finally it has been "resurrected". I feel alive again, i feel connected, i feel like now, somehow, all of a sudden, im there, out there with the rest of you. Until a few hours back, i was not.

Internet had become a part of ennui. Everyday, i'd wake up, drink tea and log in! Every night, i'd come home tired, but it was never a problem to log in, and stay that way till i lost sense of what i was doing, till i would sit there stare at the monitor and wonder where the f**k the others had gone. Then, i would log out, only to log in less than quarter a day later. I became addicted to it, and i never knew that. All the while for the last two years ive been getting addicted to it, more today than yesterday, more tomorrow than today.

It is when you stop realising what you do, and you stop, all of a sudden one day, take a look around and realise that you dont understand what has become of you! All this while when my internet was like a passport to the rest of the world, while getting to meet new people, i guess i failed to see that those around me, i was drifting away from them. Parents would see, when i entered the house (at 'bout 9 in the night) and then when i left ('bout 10 am). That was as much. My bedroom was my "room". This had become my world, to think that the internet had nothing to do with it, is absolutely incorrect. It was the net that transformed my bedroom into my world. I was proud of it.

Now, without the internet, life became boring. As much as i wanted to get it sorted out (the net) i could not as i had little time left in the day..all other measures were tried, tested and failed. So i get back to cursing, praying that it got sorted out somehow. It now became clearer to me, that all this while, all the net sessions, all the late night staying up, all the surfing, all the.....u get the idea right?...it was all just because i could. I realised that as time went on, the need to have it subsided. But, it was a bit unnerving to lose "my world",lose contact, slip into forced hibernation.

As much as my survival, existence or pleasures did not depend on it, it was irritating not to be able to get "in" whenever i wanted. But soon as i could connect, i would. As i have now.

Things we do!

2007-02-25T20:59:00.000+05:30

Its odd...very odd...i have wanted to blog very badly...but i just could not come up with a post!! I mean usually i'm full of ideas....know-how on how i'd like things to be...but when it comes to blogging i've found myself into a spot of hesitation!! It just feels as if i've got nothing to talk..err...write about!...i do....so what is it? Well, its bout the things we do! How 'bout that?

Let me start by what i mean. I mean, daily we encounter so many things; some repetitive in nature, some new, some strange, some un-wanted, some....well you get the idea, right? So why a blog outta this? I think there's a hidden behaviour pattern in the way we do things that we do. A strange behavioural pattern that is a product of us, of which indirectly we are a product ourselves! I mean, if one says that our actions are a display of ourselves, then are we not a product of our actions!? And if we are, as would seem obvious, then whats a function of what? Are we a function of our behaviour?Or our behaviour a function of us?

Its hard to tell really, isnt it? So what would you do if you found out that there was an event aired on TV--one you could not possibly miss--and at the same time you had to go out, say with your friends(who, by the way, were least interested in that!!)? Just what would you do? Would you call them and tell them the actualities of the situation?Or would you fake a reason?Or would you simply just GO? What would you do? It does not matter what you would, cause whatever you choose to do, you have a acted in a certain way.

So, if you choose to tell them then things as they are, then that means you are honest and would refrain from lying, as you've done over here. No easy way-outs for you, you face things! If you fake a reason that would imply that you know just how important the show is to you, also taking into consideration that your actions might be dis-approved of, so you take the easy way out.However, if you decide to go, then that would mean that acknowledging fully how important it is for you to behave the way your friends (people) expect you to, you decide to give up on your likes and go, even if its a first, still you've taken this decision.

So, now is this a behavioural pattern or just a one-off thing? Well chances are this not a one-off thing! You might have done it before without realising it, or you may do it again, even after swearing to not do it again!! The things we do when we have multiple options, are the things we should watch out for. It is in these decisions we take, however small or "one-off", that we christen ourselves. When we take these decisions, like these, for the first time, we become a function of our beahivour, when we have to take decisions like these again, our behaviour becomes a function of us! We try to re-collect, or if we do re-collect, then we do things exactly in the same manner as we have before when faced with similar conditions, so our behaviour then is a result of how we acted "at that time".

Here then our behaviour depends on our actions then, and so our behaviour is not much different than the previous one, and this is how we establish a behavioural pattern. Our behaviours in most cases from here on start becoming a function of us, that is, we do things the way we expect ourselves to do rather than try to do things differently everytime, ofcourse the behaviour will only be similar or "predictable" only in cases of similar events and not otherwise. When faced with a new thing all together, a new behaviour is potrayed and this time we are function of our behaviour i.e. we behave not by instincts or impulse but by thinking & then acting accordingly. Again when this situation is faced later on, or a similar one chances are we would act more or less in the same way as we had "at that time".

To really try and figure out whether we are a function of our behaviour or our behaviour a function of us, we could say, that first time doings are always without histories and experience and in void of that we become a function of our behaviour, i.e. a product of how we've acted and not acted because of who we are, cause we have not faced this thing before at all. When we have, however, faced the circumstances before and we act exactly like the previous time, then it means that we now have behaved like this because of who we are, and this is how we would behave and here then our behaviour becomes a function of us.

There is, however, one assumption in the whole process of identifying the functions and the constants! It has to be assumed that we are ever-defining, evolving,and learning from our past. Wait or is that what mankind has been all-about? Now, its a different thing if you ask those who've been to war, but otherwise, pretty much!!

Let me know what you think, i hope i've not confused you too much!

What are you afraid of???!!

2007-02-15T22:42:00.000+05:30

FEAR it seems is a word not many like to associate themselves with. It is quite genuine a feeling id like to believe. While it many seem that as we grow up our childhood fears are laid to rest, more fears, newer ones are embedded into us! Ask a child what he is afraid of and he'll say ghosts, darkness, loneliness, etc. All that fairy tale stuff!! It is not always and not necessary that we shed most, let alone all, of our childhood fears as we grow up. We simply cant. Some fears have emotional reasoning behind them, the others continue to exist for lack of opportunity to dispel them, and thus they continue to be a part of life we've always heard but never felt.

The difference between the fears of a child and a grown up adult is that, while the child has no previous experience of trying to squash his fears away, the adult does! This can act in the favour and also against depending upon the success of the adult in trying to get rid of his fears. While the child has only his "ghosts" to deal with the adult has bigger issues. He knows what it is like to fail, he knows the cost of failing whatever he's engaged into currently, the child does not. Then there is constant pressure to succeed at giving a better opportunity to his/her children than what he had. The fear here is of FAILING. Thats perhaps one of the beauty of being a child, they've just no tasted failure, an adult might have over and over again!!

Our greatest fears lie in loosing that thing that we aspire the most. Thats why loosing loved ones is so hard, thats why failing is so hard, its not the fact that we failed, its the fact that we've lost an opportunity to take something we've wanted, something we've always desired the most has slipped out of our hands, something, someone. These things happen to everyone, everyone experiences these fears atleast once a lifetime, its a given.

Then is overcoming these fears our greatest hurdle or is it these fears themselves? For me, our greatest hurdle is neither of them. Our greatest hurdle lies in our ability to rise, not beyond everyone else, but as much as we can. But, how do we know how much we can rise? Simple, keep trying, forever!!Ironically, our greatest hurdle lies in our ability to have faith in ourselves, that we can tackle every obstacle!!Once we are done with a little dose on self-belief then we can try and face the problems, then once we believe that we are self-sufficient then we can bolden up to our greatest fears. Our fears are a manifestation of our beliefs about our abilities. So for me the best way to overcome them is to assess ourselves thoroughly and then gear up!!

Theres no running away from our fears, no hiding either. The only way to escape them is to have them and experience our powers.Lions don't become the king of the jungle unless they've fought another male for a territorial advantage. Someones gotta lose in that fight but the winner knows his ability forever! Thats the beauty of facing our fears, they show us what we are truly made up of. Fears need not end or be finite, and why will they, neither are our abilities nor is our spirit. Even though our greatest fears might lie,besides others, in not being able to unlock our true potential or failing to see that light within us that exemplifies our spirit, our greatest challenge lies in rising up and not in preventing a fall.

This is what i think. Its not all that i think, but pretty much. Please let me know what u think by adding your precious comments!! Thank you!

The plight of being us!!

2007-02-13T16:31:00.000+05:30

There is a problem with the State machinery and that should not be an iota of surprise to anyone. The state im talking of is my own state wherein i reside...Maharashtra...the state is in huge debt...then there is the pathetic condition the railway--the most extensively used means of transport in Mumbai--the state electricity board is in total disruption(mirroring the state)...desperate for power but haplessly inefficient!!...
In the sub-urbs of Mumbai the load-shedding is perhaps most evident..ive heard there are also regions where the load shedding is around 15-16 hrs a day...here it stands at a "moderate"7 1/2 hrs a day!!...
There is a total shortfall of around 5700 Mw of power in the State..n Andhra Pradesh is trying to cash in on it by selling its excess to us at around Rs 8.3/unit. We would have bought that but the state just does not have enough funds to do that as well. And all this...i know...but still, its difficult to understand how the state officials could not have estimated such an increased demand in advance...sure it is tough!..but then so what?..those guys are appointed at those posts only because they are expected to be fully able to calculate and plan for the best interests of the people in the state!...
Another quite startling thing is that while the MSEB has been constantly increasing the hrs under load-shedding, there have been very frequent protests....i mean, yes, i did hear bout the blocking of the Mumbai-Agra highway by the businessmen...angry protesters in other parts of Maharashtra but a very few from the district where i live in!!...its like...i can now think of that one line that Mr Mohan Bhargav said in Swades..the people here have just got so used to living in darkness that it seems but normal to them..the load-shedding, that is. I know perhaps its wrong to blame the people...but then how do let the Govt know of this unacceptable behaviour?...how?..angry protesters beat up those MSEB officials forgetting that they live in the same vicinity where these angry men come from!!
It is about time something legislative happened...the Supreme Court with its recent judgements has boosted the public confidence to a large extent...it wont be incorrect to assume that the public rests more hope.
This problem that has gripped the state will perhaps not go away until the end of the decade..we can only hope for a faster solution....and oh yes...about the farmer suicides...in-efficiency of the state to zero-in on the July 11 blasts i think ill write next time....

This is the part where i expect you to leave a comment...a counter argument...anything you would like to...thank you for the patience exhibited...he he..but we need to now start making a sound!!