Ramblings of a Rebel

Casual Introspection

2011-08-30T20:39:00.006-03:00

Since I may be 5 years too late for such a post but the adage 'it is never too late' may be true sometimes, here are some random facts about me -

1. I love walking. I mean yes, just walking.

2. I loved Friends. It has me laughing even now if I come across some old scene on YouTube.

3. Sometimes I just like being alone. Quiet and to myself.

4. I thoroughly enjoyed the entire Harry Potter set of movies. The wizards and their world were magical.

5. Cricket is something I have never been able to detach myself from. The only thing that has changed is that unlike in my teenage years, watching it doesn't enthuse me much now. I get excited about playing cricket.

6. I like Music. I mean really really like. If there is nothing playing to my ears, there will usually be something playing in my head. My favorites? The Who, The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Indian Ocean and a lot more. And before you frown, I like a lot of Bollywood music too.

7. I am usually surrounded by gadgets in my bed when I am going to sleep. It is difficult for me to survive without them.

8. Thankfully, I don't have addiction to tea, coffee or any such thing yet.

9. I stopped reading newspapers many years back. I just hated the amount of gloom and nonsense they had. Google News has served me well enough since then and on some weekends I just read the supplements.

10. Attending Paul McCartney's concert was among the best things I ever did. I had a very good time.

11. I like going to new places, without planning for them. On some nice and free weekends, I will get on a random bus and go to the farthest place it can take me too. It is fun.

12. I have an appetite you may find difficult to digest.

13. My reading has reduced steadily over past few years. But, I still keep at least some book with me. At times, I need it.

14. I try to keep my surroundings clean. It is ok if my living room is messy, but I need the kitchen to be clean.

The Other Language

2011-04-14T19:37:00.021-03:00

This is meant to be a short post. About five movies that I have thoroughly enjoyed in last few years.

The Motorcycle Diaries was a very fine movie. It showed what I have always craved for. A journey into the unknown woods. The scene where Gael Garcia Bernal swims across the river to the leper colony resonated the strongest. It was an amazingly powerful and well shot scene, the one which left a lasting memory. Soon after I happened to watch Babel, a slow paced movie spread across four different terrains. Again, I found it to be an excellent movie and another scene where a Moroccan villager refuses money from Brad Pitt left a lasting impression on me. Dekalog is something which I am yet to finish. It isn't a complete movie but a series of 10 one hour short-films. All the five episodes I have seen so far started slowly, but gradually had me in its complete grip. They are technically impeccable, subtle yet quite profound in their narration. Almost every episode hit me with something. Entre Nos was quite good as well. The character Paola Mendoza portrayed was heartening to say the least. And last friday, I watched Owl and the Sparrow. It was very very good. Very well paced, endearing and with a real ending.

All these movies are in a language I don't know and yet I enjoyed them more than most of the English or Hindi movies I have seen. There is something different about watching foreign movies of a language you don't know. They have an unpredictability. In an English movie, I know to an extent how the scene will pan out, how will the actor tell his dialog. But with such movies, you don't quite know. The same dialog being told in a language one knows well has a different kind of subconscious effect on the mind when it is narrated in a language one doesn't know. And such movies are fresh, because you don't know about them. The thing which actually had me interested in Owl and the Sparrow in its initial minutes was just the fact that they were showing a place and culture I knew nothing about, and it was interesting to watch.

I am High, I am Drained

2011-04-02T22:15:00.015-03:00

Following Indian cricket team in the 90s was a heart-breaking experience. Nothing used to happen and nothing used to look like happening either. Of course, it is easy to be so blunt about it now looking back, but back then we always lived in the hope or belief that next time around we will win. But, no it never really used to happen. I think cricket first caught my attention around the time India went to Australia in '91 and I was hooked to it since then. I wanted India to win, if not every time it played, at least one in a while. Not just in home, but also abroad. In big matches, when the pressure is on.

But no it didn't used to happen. No matter how badly I wanted it, it didn't used to happen. I was a mess when India crumbled against Sri Lanka in Eden Gardens. Was shocked when they collapsed in Barbados on the verge of the elusive away win. Was totally crestfallen, when Pakistan defeated us in Chennai in spite of a masterful knock by Sachin who really was a demi-God to me. It took me days to recover from it (to be honest only now it doesn't rankle me anymore). I even remember a final in Colombo when a 'new' India couldn't manage it once again. That too was very painful to take. It was miserable. Following our team when we were kids, really was miserable. I wanted us to be the World Champions, be the best in the world. But no, it didn't happen. Not even later in '03 when we reached the final and when cricket still meant a lot to me.

I knew the game's history, I knew that there were various periods for almost every other team when they were the best in the world. Some people wrote that India were the world's best in '71 when they defeated West Indies and England away from home. But were they really the best team in the world, I doubt it. Some may say that we were the best in '83 and '85. But nope, we were still not the best. West Indies were the best team in the world and we were losing in tests anyway. I wanted us to be the best team in the world, the undisputed best.

And one day almost a year and a half back, it happened. Against Sri Lanka, we reached the summit in Test Rankings. I was elated. For that is what I had longed for in all my years as an impassioned follower of the Indian team. It was not something ephemeral or freakish, the rankings intelligently took into account the performance over a prolonged period of time. It was what it depicted.

And today, it happened again. In a more blatant way. India has won the World Cup, we are the world champions. The World Cup!! This is truly what we all have wanted, since we were kids. One of my friends posted today that he was crying even long after the winning shot by Dhoni. And knowing him, I know that he really would have been. I wasn't anywhere near to crying and to be honest, somewhere I envied my friend for still having that unbridled fanaticism for our team. But hey, we have won. Think of a million true smilies and they will still not portray how we feel. Today is a day, we have all waited for. All our lives.

P.S. - I may well lose my interest in watching or following Indian cricket now. For over the last decade or so this team has given me almost everything that I dreamt of. And now, I am drained. I am high and I am relieved. Thank you Team India. You truly have done us proud today.

Ripple in Still Water

2010-07-12T15:19:00.051-03:00

I just didn't knew until quite recently that there used to be a show called Freaks and Geeks. Not that I am an authority in movies, serials and their ilk. But I certainly didn't know about Freaks and Geeks until I read some one's tweet on it. It didn't sound something cool enough to me, but after some minimal wiki-ing, I thought of giving it a try and saw it's first two episodes. It took me around another month or so to watch it's all eighteen episodes. Without any further ado - I have loved Freaks and Geeks. It's been some time now since I finished watching it, but I still watch it every now and then, time and again.

For the uninitiated, Freaks and Geeks is a television show which used to be aired on NBC in late nineties. The show was cancelled after twelve shows but a campaign by the public forced the channel to air the remaining six shows. The show took its viewers through life in a high-school (which I tend to think is the American equivalent of the class 8 to class 12 strata of the Indian schools) for two contrasting sets of people - the freaks (will just about study, will bully) and the geeks (would like to get nerdy, would like not to get bullied). And that's just about as far as I would go with the plot. This post is not about the story, it's about what made me like the show so much.

To begin with, the entire relation between Lindsay and Sam throughout the show has been portrayed so well. Lindsay trying to protect her frail young brother Sam from the bullies, Sam playing the spoilsport to Lindsay's adventurous plans at times, all the late night gossips between them, Lindsay pulling Sam's leg and all that sibling fun. It reminded me strongly of my growing up with my elder sister.

The dialogs are just too good. Ken telling to Kelly, "You killed Millie's dog! What, like with your bare hands?". Then another one, Ken to Lindsay, "Ok, how about you date Nick and then break up our band. Oh wait, I think you already did that." Bill to Coach Fredricks, "Anything is better than that, like picking my nose and eating it". Daniel to Nick, "Whichever way we play is the right way". Ken by the way, I sometimes think was the coolest character on the show. My favorite dialog came in the last episode. Lindsay to Ken, "Ken why are you doing this?". Ken, "Because it goes against everything that we stand for." The last two episodes are may be the best two.

And then there were the other things, the characters are just perfect and they gradually grow upon you. Everyone of them. With time, every character opened up more. Kim looked the sure bad woman to begin with, but soon enough you start liking her as well. Even the bumbling Nick endears himself by the end. The soundtrack is way too good, from The Who opera in that Bill-centered episode to the final episode when Lindsay moves to the rhythm of Box of Rain and the credits roll out with Ripple. I mean if not anything else, this show opened me up to the American Beauty album, I still haven't got tired. It made me fall more in love with The Who. I"ll confess, until watching this show - I had not been a much of a fan of 'Teenage Wasteland' (Ken to Lindsay - "Baba O'Reily, the song is Baba O'Reily"), 'I'm One' or even 'The Song Is Over'. It just reignited my interest in The Who and a few others as well.

Lindsay Weir bowled me over. Breathtaking beauty, excellent character and impeccable acting. Never before I have liked a woman protagonist in any movie, etc. so much. Some of her dialogues straight away come to my mind every time I think of the character. To the visiting Republican, "Mr. Vice-President, my question is why did your staff reject my question. Are you afraid of an open discourse.". To Daniel - "Gosh, how can I be so awful to suggest that you people actually play a complete song correctly.". To Sam - "Sam, you cannot date someone you do not like." I honestly don't know any other character in any movie or television which comes even close to Linda Cardellini as Lindsay Weir.

The show ends with what is easily my favorite scene where Lindsay gets down, smiles and gets on to the bus. The ending credits roll over and Ripple plays on.

There's a chill wind blowing

2009-07-20T14:45:00.003-03:00

This is an eerie night. It hasn't rained since evening, but it feels slightly cold. My flat mate has not switched on the front room ceiling fan as he sits there watching the television in near darkness. It feels cold, it is not supposed to feel cold here. The floor in my room is greasy. The internet was not working and the technician had walked in with his shoes on. But I had mopped up after he left. It is still greasy. I feel the tingling tiredness in my calf, like I used to when I was in school. I hadn't exerted myself much. Something is weird, it feels cold. In a way that it hasn't for a long long time here and I almost miss the winters. I haven't really experienced winter for a long long time now. My mind backtracks, it thinks about certain days when I had shuddered in cold.

Riding a bicycle in my para on a Sunday morning to the nearby grocery for a Modern bread, cool wind had thudded on to my chest. When winter was about to arrive in first semester, I had a new cotton blanket which was cosy but for the fact that it was a tad short and my feet used to get uncovered if I tossed around in the night. A particular break spent in my home after the odd semester in third year. It was enlivened by the magic of Indian batsmen in far Australia, but the days were cold enough to give chill down the spine even in afternoons. The nocturnal bus ride from Muzaffarpur to Barkakana in late December with just a windbreaker on. The night had felt like an eternity. My first week in Montevideo, the winter was not yet over and I had never witnessed cold like that.

There has been no winter since close to four years. Tonight reminds me of such winter days. Dark real winters.

Scars on the Fingers

2008-11-30T17:02:00.042-02:00

When I was in class 12, music made a place of its own in my mind space. Sashi had again given me the audio cassette Savage Garden and funnily enough the same thing which I had disdainfully discarded in class 11, left an indelible mark on me. It was the beginning of my obsession with music.

As with everyone else, after a few years the next thing I wanted to do was to play a guitar. But the good old unsure me, saw no chance of that happening. To begin with, I hadn't known one person in Calcutta (or anywhere for that matter) who used to play a guitar or even knew how to play it. And oh yes, I was too much of a good boy in my adolescent years to even think of asking my parents for money for anything other than buying Raj comics initially and those terrifying M.L.Khanna type of books later. I gave up my strumming pursuits in the consoling knowledge that it is something which an average boy just didn't do and that there was no expiry date to it like completing my engineering degree. Besides, I didn't actually believe that I can come even close to doing something as cool as playing a guitar. A few years later, we went to Munnar one weekend. It was the first trip we had taken after coming to Kochi and we played Rang De Basanti all throughout. Moving at 70 kmph, in the serene Idukki valley at the crack of dawn is a heavenly experience in itself and if there is a just released Rang De Basanti sound track to go with it, it can take your mind to a different world. It was in one such moment of madness, realisation, whatever that one particular note of the Paathshala (Be a rebel) made me decide that I should learn how to play guitar.

I came back to Kochi and enrolled in the weekend guitar classes at Kala Bhavan which was a charitable organisation that taught music for peanuts. For four consecutive Saturdays, I braved kilometres of intense sun to go there and gave up. I didn't learn anything there, found guitaringquite difficult and mysterious and didn't quite like the teacher. I gave up in disappointment. I was wrong, in hindsight I should have given at least some blame to the teacher. His speech was unclear, his body-language was indifferent as he seemed to have no interest in teaching (now that is where the entire problem begins) and he had scolded me for a stupid thing! I forgot about guitaring but the hope never quite left my mind and I was aware of it. I just knew that someday somewhere I will again get a chance.

As fate would have it, I did manage to find a guitar teacher in Montevideo an year and a half-later (how I found him is another story, just know that it wasn't quite easy). His name was Miguel, he was said to be a guitar-prodigy. The day I met him for the first time, I was shocked. He was younger to me and had a wide-grin on his face! He took me and Maneesh to his room upstairs and asked us which song we would like him to play. Now, this was impressive : ) and yes, in stark contrast to my previous experience. I told him to play quite a few tracks, he played them all and played them damn well. What satisfied me the most was that he was happy to teach and happier to play! I decided that I am learning from him, come what may. Well, Maneesh backed-off when he realised that we"ll be on our own and there will be no Latin girls learning along with us, but I started. The very next day I went and bought a Stagg guitar (and a Proell gig-bag) from a shop near the Intendencia and started going to Miguel at his grand house in Beyeruth every few days. All I wanted to do at the end of it all was to play at least something of One Last Breath or Here Comes The Sun. I had two or three months in my hands.

I learnt the basic chord positions and tried practising them at home everyday. It wasn't easy. When I pressed the strings strongly with my fingers, they would hurt. It would pain a lot to hold it for even a minute at stretch. Now before this, I hadn't imagined that something as trivial as pressing some strings can inflict pain. Anyway, it was physical pain, I took it and kept practising. The next class, Miguel showed me how to change chords and make a melody. When I came back and tried practising it, I was defeated. I would try endlessly, but I would just not be able to change chords seamlessly, not even supposedly the easiest of chord transitions. I tried for a many days, but made no perceptible progress and just didn't understand how will I ever play anything at all. But I kept practising and one fine day, all of a sudden, it happened. I was able to change the chords and go from A to G to E to D. Next hiccup was playing my chords when a person sitting next to me was singing the song or playing a different arrangement. It just wouldn't happen, as my mind would repeatedly lose track of my chords. But in time, that too happened. Every new lesson repeated this cycle till I was left with no more time in Uruguay and by the end of it, I had learnt a fair portion of a lot many songs along with some basics of guitaring.

I returned with scars on my left fingers, they had stopped hurting anymore and I just didn't mind my calloused skin. I had been able to start with what I had wanted for a very very long time. I still can't play a F chord properly, cannot tune a guitar without a tuner and know almost nothing about the theory. The maximum I would rate myself as an amateur guitarist is 1.5/10. But I am living this dream of mine and the scars make me happy : )

It's the Nation, stupid

2008-10-31T16:22:00.008-02:00

Well, the news is that (in case you didn't know), Maharashtra is burning with rage. I have never stayed in Maharashtra, have barely had a countable Marathi acquaintances(or friends rather) and can lay no claim to have an intimate understanding of the psyche of a typical Marathi man in the way I understand my dear Bengali folks. But it is clear that there are enough educated Maharashtrians around who are appreciating what MNS is doing. They have no qualms about people from Hindi belt (an euphemism for Bihar) getting assaulted in their state and have no regrets in saying that the police did the right thing by killing a young man who had a pistol in hand and was threatening to pull the trigger. They are shocked that the national media (or non-Marathi media) has been unanimous in its criticism of MNS.

Mumbai today is said to have up to 40% of its population as the bhaiyas and it is only increasing. Most of them do blue collar work. Now they don't go and get themselves jobs by holding the employers at gunpoint. They get it because they probably work harder and are willing to work for lesser pay. And this hurts the local people who just can't digest the fact they are not getting jobs on a platter in their homeland. And this has led to gradual hatred which has now reached boiling point. It cannot however be denied that there are several migrants who go on to become Mafias and do nothing to improve the city they chose to live in. But none of this can justify the hundreds of innocent young students being assaulted (yes literally assaulted with stones, sticks, kicks and punches) for daring to come and work in Maharashtra. I can understand hooligans and politicians indulging into all this, but I just cannot understand educated people like me (and in all probability, you as well) voicing their support for this. What is their grievance, what possibly can it be?

1. The migrants are snatching their jobs - Well if they are working hard for it, they deserve it. Anyone who is an Indian is a son of the soil and is free to seek his livelihood anywhere he chooses to.

2. The migrants refuse to speak their language - I don't think there is any migrant who will refuse to speak Marathi even if knows it. And if he doesn't know it, then he is probably speaking with the local people in Hindi. This is not because he considers Marathi to be lesser language, it is just because you both seem to be on more even terms on another language which is not Marathi. It may still happen that he doesn't want to learn Marathi, OK so leave him to his fate. He will suffer, not you. You cannot mandate a person to learn your language, just because he is staying in your place.

3. The migrants litter their place - Yes, I am afraid they do. But have a better municipality to deal with this, don't go around beating them with sticks just because of it.

4. Population proliferation - Well, again you didn't earn a right to live in a place just because you grew up there and others didn't lack a right to live in a place just because they did not grow up there.

I don't understand what is happening, but I just know that it is all too sick. There is a serious rabble-rouser there who has perpetrated the most sinister of crimes and has people who have made a champion out of him. Beating 19-20 year olds who have studied and seeked to get a job fair and square is just not on. It is not their fault that they were born in a state that doesn't offer opportunities. They are seeking to sweat and earn (not claim) a livelihood elsewhere in their country.

(Nothing new about all this. If 75 years from now, Patna becomes what Mumbai is today and Marathis come seeking a job there, the Biharis would do the same thing, even if there is no MNS and the deeds it did in the old journals)

Viva La Vida

2008-09-04T14:32:00.010-03:00

I used to rule the world
Seas would rise when I gave the word
Now in the morning I sweep alone
Sweep the streets I used to own

I used to roll the dice
Feel the fear in my enemy's eyes
Listen as the crowd would sing:
"Now the old king is dead! Long live the king!"

One minute I held the key
Next the walls were closed on me
And I discovered that my castles stand
Upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand.

Jojo was a man who thought he was a loner
But he knew it wouldn't last
Jojo left his home in Tucson, Arizona
For some California grass

Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged.

Why is that every time a club signs a player and the manager and player pose together for a snap, it seems that the player has actually condescended by joining the concerned team, as if he was not half as interested as the club and as if he is doing them a favour. Well, it is not the case always but all photographs look like that. Below it seems as if Rafael Benitez believes he has pulled off the deal of the season by signing Albert Reira.

Turbulent Recess

2008-07-20T13:44:00.005-03:00

The last few months have rushed past me. It seems as if it was only yesterday that I returned, moved about in Bombay, boarded the Rajdhani express to Nizamudeen, bought a Mac, came back to home, met Baba (that is how we call our Grandfather in Bihar) in Barkakana and finally returned to work. Work life has not been great to be honest. I have not done much, yet it appears as if the months have passed in a jiffy. Yes, there has been a lot of filthy politicking at work, but you learn to accept and live with it with time. There is another week knocking for the footsteps and it reminds me of many more things which need to be completed. They have lied there, waiting to be done since days. Snap, I will try.

Baba passed away in May. He was not keeping well and his urinal infection had sucked out almost every ounce of energy left in him. Dadi had passed away in August last year. Ever since then Baba's heath had started deteriorating. His last few days were too painful. He used to refuse to take food, fully aware that he needs to eat, yet he could barely make himself eat anything. He lived a good life, fulfilled all his responsibilities, took care of all of us untill his last few years. I just wish that his last few days were more peaceful for him, but they were not. There are so many stories we had of him. He had fled away from our zamindari system in the village and gone to Calcutta for studying/working. He subsequently joined CCL and stayed at Barkakana. Who knows, if not for that audacious trip down to Calcutta, today I would have been a peasant taking care of our land in Tariyani Chhapra. He used to recount to us how they had fought against the British rule before independence and how they had not cared a fig for themselves, but just dreamt of an independent nation. Or how devastating was the earthquake which struck Bihar back then and he had experienced first-hand. His last days were not good, he deserved a better time.Baba was perhaps the perfect match for Dadi. Dadi was a kid at heart and had an infectious enthusiasm for life. She had survived numerous serious ailments all throughout her life and every time had been back to her energetic self in no time. She was too good at those supposedly feminine things like knitting and cooking. Her last days were also intensly painful, but they were swift and lasted for a lesser duration. May they live in peace now up there in heaven.

The last few months also saw a long awaited reprisal of my four favourite South Asian singers/writers. As if they had formed some secret coalition among themselves, Jal, Chetan Bhagat, Jhumpa Lahiri and Rabbi Shergill decided to come out with their next work within months of each other after years of lull. How have they been? Well, Jal's new album is crap. I don't know if anyone else has ever come up with a worse second album after a debut album so fine and promising. The rest have been good. To be specific, here is the order - Unaccustomed Earth, Avengi Ja Nahin, The Three Mistakes Of My Life and then much below the rest, Boondh - A Drop Of Jal. If you can, listen to this song in Rabbi's new album - Maen Bolia. Vintage Rabbi : ). Rabbi in my opinion, is the best song writer in India currently and his songs are nearly as good as anyone else. I was tempted to call him the best composer as well, but that's a dicier verdict since there is an Indian Ocean to contend with. The only trouble with Rabbi is that you can never truly appreciate his songs unless you are having his translated lyrics in your hands. And yes, I have been listening to a lot of Coldplay of late.

If everything goes fine, some of my friends should be visiting in a few weeks from now and that is what keeps me going currently.

Shit Happens

2008-06-25T15:33:00.008-03:00

"Anderson and Doig informed me that NZC was into 'Best Practice', one of those nifty corporate terms that on close examination was little more than a statement of the bleeding obvious. It was comforting to know that they weren't into Mediocre Practice or Completely Shithouse Practice."

"Doig's reply referred to what was deemed to be a poor showing on my part in the teleconference interview and stated that NZC's area of great concern was over my ability to apply my cricketing and people skills 'in the team environment over a period of time in order to enhance performance'. I was advised to 'work on strategies' to overcome the impression I gave of being 'indecisive and unspecific'. They would be 'reassured' to hear that I was attending courses to address this 'perceived weakness' and urged me to attend sports and science conferences to develop a 'philosophical approach to practice methods' and 'full familiarity with technology and its ability to support performance enhancement.' I was asked to consider getting involved with the national under-19 and A teams."

- An excerpt from John Wright's book 'Indian Summers'

John Wright has said this more eloquently than I could ever have.The extent of jargon used in corporate world still continues to surprise and frustrate me. All this talk of quality, etc. is bloated. We all know what is said is implied and never needs to be said so feverishly, perhaps the more you say the more it harms the cause. But still it goes on and on. Most of the energy is expended on something which will bear no fruit. It is utterly sick. Because we know it will never end. Every two weeks or so, I get to hear about a new initiative which has been launched and which again turns out to be repetition of what has already been said or done before. Just that it has a new name this time.

Similarly, sycophancy knows no limits. People begin mails saying "I thank so and so for his/her guidance...." when it is crystal clear that there was no guidance involved and the thing went through only because there was no guidance (read interference).

Darn, hail Dilbert!

I was bereft of Internet for two weeks as the adapter was out for repair and what should have taken a mere three to six days somehow took fourteen days. I think I would have gone insane had I not got it back by now.

All Things Must Pass....But Not Beatles

2008-06-04T16:02:00.009-03:00

Many things in life happen by chance and not by design.You just hit upon something and it stays with you.I once bought a Reebok shoe(and that was my first branded shoe) with my friend Shriram just because we happened to be together and sighted a buy 1 get 1 free kind of offer.None of us had gone out with any idea of buying shoes,nor were we impulsive buyers in those days(never mind the fact that we didn't have any money either).But we still somehow bought those shoes.Similarly,late last year I went to a barbecue party arranged by my office colleagues.I am not much of a party goer and generally try and limit them,but till date I am glad I went to this one.A lady had brought her boyfriend to the party and the boyfriend had brought his guitar.We all sat and sang as he played his guitar.And what is it that he was playing the most,Beatles my dear friends.I had seldom listened to Beatles' songs before that,but this chance encounter pulled me to Beatles.I returned very late to home,was dog-tired after the pollo(chicken in Spanish,pronounced as posho) and songs and drifted to sleep in no time.The next day as expected was a Saturday and besides several other things,it also gave me ample time to sit and just try and listen to some Beatles.Fortunately,I had put the entire Beatles collection in my iPod before leaving India.I listened,I chanced upon A Hard Day's Night and thought "Not Bad",listened to Hey Jude and didn't press the next key in spite of it being a 7 minute song,and then came to Here Comes The Sun and was hooked by then.I am still hooked.Here Comes The Sun did it for me : ),I have heard that song a thousand times since then and still feel like listening a thousand times more.I gradually started discovering more and more Beatles songs(the discovery still continues) and became a Beatles addict.Then onwards,there was atleast one constant in my life for next few months,listening to Beatles every morning in the office cab which took about 40 minutes to reach its destination.The cab used to make its way from posh Pocitos to the Carrasco outskirts,sometimes in sun and sometimes in rain,but Beatles always sounded good.

Why do I still like Beatles so much?I honestly do not know.You can understand people being fans of Pink Floyd,Metallica,Creed,Guns n' Roses,Rolling Stones or even Oasis.But Beatles!Aren't their songs childish and romantic,all of them?Yes,but I still like them.I think it is because their songs are so clean or may be so pleasant.They make you happy.Perhaps,simplicity is their forte,that is what made them click.They spoke of simple emotions and gave them sweet music.What is "Here Comes The Sun" but just the pleasure a person gets when he sees sun coming out after months and months of dreaded winter."Hey Jude" is just a plain old song asking a boy to go and speak out to his lady love."Norwegian Wood" speaks of the hurt inflicted by a girl who feigned interest,"You Know My Name" is just a two or three line song which speaks of the happiness you feel when you get to know that someone just knows your name,"In My Life" is a song of memories,nostalgia(don't we all have our own?).No wonder Beatles are so popular.They are huge in fact,Beatlemania is actually a mania.They are not so popular or well appreciated in India,perhaps because by the time English music really made it to India through the cable channels,their style was outdated,they didn't make heavy noise from their old looking acoustic instruments,didn't have any piercings or tattoos and never torchered their vocal chords.But Beatles are huge in Uruguay,a Spanish speaking nation.People there might not have have heard about Sir David Gilmour,but even today every knows about Paul,John,Ringo and George.I have seen old footages in YouTube of Beatles concerts,seen what happened wherever they went.Even today,Sir Paul Mccartney makes a news whenever he speaks,not for nothing.Beatles live,no doubt.They will live forever.

3 of my 5 or 6 favourite Beatles songs happened to be Harrison songs.Obviously,my favourite Beatle is George Harrison.Besides,Here Come The Sun is a Harrison song after all. : )

The weather has improved these days.It rains in the mornings,it rains in the night and at times it rains for a while in the day as well.It feels good to sit in my home in the night in the mildly chilled weather and surf,study,sip,whatever..For 6 months,the temperature will be just right though the rains will start getting onto my nerves in a few weeks from now.But till then,I can enjoy.Mid-May to mid-June is the best time to stay(not tour) in Kerala.Goodnight now,am off to something else and am leaving you with this.Let it buffer and listen in peace.

A Project for Mr. Kumar

2008-05-23T11:48:00.014-03:00

On 9th May 2003,I thought I am finished.I couldn't believe that all my toil had come to nothing.I had been studying in an engineering college since last 2 years,but had never quite felt like I had left school.The reason was simple,till then I had subconsciously never allowed myself to think that I actually belong to my college.I had been burning the midnight oil for 4 years to get into the much famed corridors of IIT.If desperation to get into IITs had been a paper,I would have strolled into them.Any IIT,any stream would have done,I had given it my all,nearly.But that day,I flunked again,for the 3rd time in a row.It was all over,nothing I would now do in my life would change the fact that I didn't study in an IIT(B.Tech that is).So what do I do now,where do I go?My college was a non-entity compared to IIT.

Till 1 more year,I didn't understand what is it that could liberate me from the mediocrity of my college.Then 1 fine day,we got the news that an Indian IT heavy weight is coming to the campus and is expected to pick up some of the students.This news was God sent for me.I thought this could be the Nirvana I had been seeking.I had a chance to get into something big,something which people have heard about.I prepared hard in the intervening period,had a good day when they came to the campus and got selected.Needless to say,I was really looking forward to starting my career there,to work in great projects.

We joined the real office by December 2005.By then,I had become sort of familiar with a new term,it was called 'bench' and it meant getting paid but being jobless.And the news was that every Indian IT company worth its name kept freshers in bench for unknown periods.If these bench men were lucky,they would get a computer for some time every day and if they were really lucky,they would get a cubicle all of their own with unblocked Internet access.Needless to say,if kick starting your career is what you were looking for,bench was the last place you would have liked to be in.Some 70 of us joined the office together and to our great delight were allocated our accounts on the very first day.Though this was better than being on bench in the sense that we knew which client we would ultimately work for,it was still the same as we didn't knew when.This went for a week or two and then some person walked into the conference room we were called to and told us that we have been divided into competencies and would be trained accordingly.They didn't have any project to give(in the hindsight,they were doing the next best thing,i.e. taking time off their work and training us) and it was obvious.These trainings went for another two or three weeks.Then the coordinator of my competency came and told us that we had been identified for projects,finally.Great,so finally we had one.Well,as it turned out,we still weren't into projects as what had been given to us was the task of making in house applications and not the client work which was supposed to be the real thing.However,this was fun and we started having hands-on experience of doing things.We loved it,learnt things and finished what was asked of us.This entire thing took another one and a half months.

We were ready or so we thought,but we still didn't have projects.To put it bluntly,we were still in bench.Two and a half months since we joined and still in bench.Crazy heavens and I had thought this company was my ticket to the big world.Being in bench sounds tempting at first if you have access to bandwidth to fritter.But it is dangerous even if you believe life is a lark and working is the most useless thing to do in this world.It is like a bedbug which slowly eats you out.It shakes your self-esteem,coaxes you into a norm of inactivity and ultimately kills you with boredom.You will look at your watch and then look at it again after 5 minutes in spite of knowing well enough that you had looked at it recently.You just wouldn't know how to kill time.And if you get to know that your friend who joined at about the same time in some other place as you had got into a project,it would be like rubbing salt into your wounds.Every hour you think about the days lost,when you could have worked and learnt something.Mr. Biswas had wanted a simple house for himself,that's all he had wished for.I too just wanted a project,from somewhere,rather anywhere and the situation had looked quite bleak for too long.Every day felt like a month and still there was no project(or rather good project) in sight.I took a week's leave and went home for Holi.I wasn't going home in the right mood but hoped to return in the right mood because I had been to home.Two days before I was about to leave my home,I got a message from my colleague,I had been selected for a good project based on my performance in the in house application we made.Oh,finally!I had never felt happier on receiving an SMS.

Well,that's it and that was 2 years back.A lot has happened since then,I have worked in multiple projects,been to multiple places and understood the system better.But those bench days still scare me when I think of them.

Random Scribblings

2007-11-23T21:00:00.003-03:00

Statutory warning - Whatever follows will chart an unpredictable course of its own. It wouldn´t be inane but some of you may find it weird. If you wish or expect the following lines to lead to something meaningful, I hereby dissuade you from reading any further. Open some other blog perhaps, there are plenty of good ones around. Now, if you still haven´t given up, thanks for the faith you showed on me. Read on.

All constructs are going to be mutually exclusive and should be read independent of each other. You can read them in any order you wish to.

1. There is nothing like a Friday evening or night. I don´t know why they hype Saturday nights so much. Fridays are that much better than saturdays. You have two full days still waiting for indulging yourself. You know that that you can do the stuff you want to not only tommorow, but also day after tommorow. You know that you can lie in the bed and read a novel till dawn not only today but also day after today. Fridays are better than what they promise to bring closer to you with every passing moment, i. e. the weekends. :) The only issue with Fridays is that even if you can easily cook at your home and have good food, you still can´t stop yourself from eating outside. It does burn a hole in the pockets when you sum it up at the end of the month.

2. I've spent about 3 years now trying to make myself like reading Business magazines or like checking the Business pages in the newspaper. It has led to zilch. I¨ll complete a cricinfo article before I empty my cup of coffee, I¨ll devour a Chetan Bhagat creation even if I am feeling damn sleepy, I¨ll finish absorbing serious philosohical writings before I realise it, but I¨ll struggle to make myself go beyound a paragraph or two of a usual Business World article. Every line seems the same as the one before it. Every argument put, every conclusion reached seems fake and futile. It amazes me how much of jargon they use, half of which is redundant and repetitive. I´ve tried reading a few books by or about the coporate honchos. All but 1, made me feel like tearing myself apart. The one which didn´t was a gem, a gem coming out of nowhere. It was a book which went by the name of ´The Google Story´. If I were a buinessman in an ideal world, I think I would have considered two books as my truest teachers, ¨The Google Story¨ and ¨Atlas Shrugged¨. Anyway, stepping out from the digression, I think I am just not made for it, for reading the mundane company policies and trying to make sense out of it. But, I¨ll still pick up a business magazine, still flip the pages and still try to understand it. Freaking 3 years, but I still feel like having another go at it. Whoever said old habits die hard, they don´t die at all.

3. The power of Arial. I feel captivated by this font. There is no other font which is so straight and easily expressive as this font. My office mail clients have the default font as Default Sans Serif, duh I don´t know why. There are people who prefer to use Verdana and Times New Roman, both of which are ok, but not quite like Arial. And there are some people who use ridiculous fonts, I don´t even remember the names of those fonts, but I find those fonts way too obtuse or blunt(Cool it folks, no offence meant. You carry on with your fonts ;) ). By the way, 2 cents and a drink to anyone who tells me how to change my default font type in Lotus Notes.

4. Cliches, there are pobably a hundred of them. You can find them left, right and center. But once in a while a statement classified as a cliche doesn´t remain cliched anymore. One such cliche is ¨Music knows no boundaries¨. Well true, it did make me forget mine a few months back. In a stage more fit for clowns to practise their difficult art, being dressed in attires which would make you think if they were actually being made clowns, being heralded by way over the top hindi words like ¨vishwa-yudh, yudh-viraam, etc. ¨, two virtuosos certainly made me forget my boundaries. Two people who went by the name of Amanat Ali and Mussarat Abbas literally rocked the floor and touched the hearts every friday and saturday for a few months this year. Together with other gems like Aneek, Raja and Mauli they made watching Zee Sa Re Ga Ma Pa an addiction. When Mussarat sang ´Sanu Ek Pal Chain Na Awe´, I found myself glued to the idiot box. When Amanat tried ¨Maar Sutiya¨even I found my toes tapping on the floor. The Pakistani singers in general are superb. Down with all the India-Pakistan rivalry, this was sheer bliss.

5. Cultures vary across terrains. What is acceptable at one place may not be at another. Let me cite one such instance. Last sunday I visited the historic Estadio Centenario to watch the World Cup qualifier between Uruguay and Chile. The atmoshpere was electric and the Uruguayan spectators were quite often shouting a word called ´puta´ whenever refree was giving anything against their team. I thought it may mean somthing like cheating or may be that tabooed four letter word. In the later stage of the match when Uruguay had just struck back from 1-2 down and were going for the kill, the entire stadium was singing a song in unison. I was able to make out only 2 words-Chilean and puta. The match got over as a draw, we all enjotyed ourselves and there was normal banter on show in betweeen the players and spectators of the two sides. Everything was normal. Next day, I found out that song, it meant ¨All Chileans are prosititutes¨!!Imagine, the whole stadium, adolescents and grown-ups all singing such a song together. And it was perfectly normal, no hard feelings harbored by anyone at the end of it. This place is amazing and the people here are fantastic, trust me. You probably wouldn´t get such cordial people anywhere else. :)

6. I am having this irresistable urge to watch the movie ´Casablanca´. I had it in my desktop a few years back but had deleted it as my hard disk was running short of GBs. Don´t know why I deleted that movie, I didn´t quite realise how good it was. I should have deleted some other movie like ´2 Fast 2 Furious´.

For the love of the game

2007-08-02T07:48:00.001-03:00

Prologue - I live in a country said to be obsessed with the game of cricket.Every single person knows the nuances of the game and has a strong argument to make.People stand in queues for a long time to get a ticket for the match next day.They can recollect some Sachin innings better than some exam they may have written the same day.Keeping political matters aside,nothing else affects the general mood of an entire nation (and mind you,a big one that) like the national team's performance.Even if Sania Mirza goes on to win the US Open month next month,the amount of national fervour or 'feel-good' undercurrent it will generate is nothing compared to the upbeat mood which will result if India manages to win the Twenty20 World Cup next month.Oh,they just love the game here!Or,do they?

My childhood like most others' was spent in playing cricket.I grew up playing the game on streets,on grounds and finally on proper pitches.We started with plastic balls,then moved to rubber tyre balls,soon preferred the cambis balls and finally graduated to deuce balls (of course,there was another type of ball,I don't remember what we used to call it,which was a cheap cousin of deuce balls but was far less forgiving than it.I really wonder now that how we had the nerve of taking guard to that ball on a pitched uneven road with no pads on).All kinds of vacations were keenly awaited not because they broke us free of the rigours of school but because they gave us infinite time to play cricket.We could play a tense match with lots at stake with any neighbouring locality's team early in the morning,return home to have our breakfast,have a bath and then go for a match among ourselves on our own road before it was time for lunch and then again hit the big grounds for another match in the evening.Of course,the more ambitious (or insaner) people like me sneaked in a practice session in intense sun just after lunch as well.Oh,there was nothing like cricket.We tried our hands in many other sports,but honestly nothing stirred us like cricket.Football was soon deemed as too 'uneventful',hockey was never in contention,tennis was great till one of those more wealthy boys of our locality decided to mix less with us (as we were then left with no tennis rackets),badminton pricked our nascent machismo as we thought it was a game fit for skirt wearing girls and hide-and-seek was inherently juvenile(though even that can get very thrilling at times,believe me).Table Tennis could have been an enticing option but by the time we were 4 feet,the club in our locality was scrapped because of some land dispute.The only game which came close to challenging our loyalty to cricket was carom.When baptised with a proper match-board,we had become so hooked to it that we didn't pick up a bat for many days.Thankfully,we soon outgrew it and deemed it mundane or uni-dimensional.We were back to what we liked most,playing cricket,seeing the stumps of a top batsman uprooted by a deadly yorker or hitting a six stepping out to a lethal pacer.Even in school,our favourite time-pass apart from gossiping and bullying was playing....well not cricket really,but book-cricket.All of us at school were crazy about cricket.We would speak at lengths debating about just any obscure player or long forgotten match.Oh and yes,there were also those high profile matches with the other sections of my school every winter season.I still remember all those wickets I took then.My motive here is not to glorify my accomplishments on the cemetry or maidan(my cricket grounds) but something else,hence I"ll rather put a pause on that.

Class 11 turned out to be the graveyard of my cricketing antics.The travails of Physics,Chemistry,etc. dropped upon me out of nowhere.All of a sudden I was taken aback by the load of books around me,almost every single day my evenings were now spent in travelling to the tutor's place instead of running into bowl.I waited for the storm to settle down,but that was a futile wait.The black hole of twelfth degree sucked me and it was never the same for me.I got too disillusioned into my career and rather reluctantly swapped the ball for the book.I am not trying to suggest that I never played cricket again,but that it was far and few in between.I perfectly understood that my days of bowling abandon are gone.

However,thankfully my love for cricket never abated,if anything it only increased.I still watched matches on the television every now and then and if India happened to win a good match,I read and then re-read the match report on the Telegraph the next day and if I felt too happy about it I used to cut it and archive it in my file(I still have all the pieces of the epic India-Australia series in '01.Every single thing,who said what and who replaced whom).Even today my interest in the game continues.If I happen to pass a place where some people are playing a game(now this is actually rare in Kochi),I often pause for a few minutes and watch them play.However,this doesn't have its roots in nostalgia alone.I often watch them in awe,in appreciation.I like the way their bat shapes up to the ball or how their timing seems flawless.I try and recollect my days and find that I wasn't ever able to hit that shot so naturally.To be honest,its really the game I love and not just its custodians.Watching a good serious match in progress in a park soothes me as much as an Indian victory.This is also precisely the reason I always wanted to watch a Ranji trophy match.I didn't need to see Jadeja bat,watching Utpal Chatterjee bowl would also do for me.However,most of my friends didn't seem to think along the same lines.Whenever,I asked them if going to watch a Ranji match at Eden would be a good idea,I was immeditely scoffed upon.They reacted as if it was infra-dig or sufficiently ridiculous to even think about actually doing so.They would rather sit in their homes and get bored,but they not go to watch a Ranji match.I could never quite figure out why.I am not sure,but for some of them it was a prestige issue.They were scared that someone may find out that they had been to Eden Gardens last day to watch a freaking Bengal versus Assam match!!As if watching matches in Eden which didn't figure India was an indication of how cash-deprived you were due to which you were unable to afford the tickets of international matches,thereby satiating your 'I've also been to Eden' aspirations by going to watch a match played by Bongs.Ridiculous,ain't it.But believe me,that is the sort of mentality which is at work in the cerebral nerves of some people.And for some,a Ranji match was just not cricket,it was like "C'mon this is not cricket.How can you call this cricket.Cricket is when Sachin hits a straight-drive with the minimum of footwork or when Shoaib dislodges the stump cameras with the batsman's arc not even half-complete.Cricket happens when India plays Pakistan.How can you even think about watching some Chatterjee,Bhaduri,Bhandari?Why pay to get yourself torchered?"Needless to say,I had no company.I didn't go to watch a Ranji match ever,well almost.

Fast Forward to December 2006.I had been to my home on a 3 weeks vacation.I had a long agenda with me which included eating various dishes at various places(any north Indian staying in extreme Malabar or vice-versa would immediately understand),but it also had one more thing.I was determined to watch atleast some Ranji match now.It was time to set the record staright and fulfill my long standing desire.The Ranji season was on and surely Bengal would be playing some home match in 3 weeks.Finally the day came,I reached Eden Gardens on a fine sunny yet chilly afternoon and bought the ticket(5 rupees).I treaded ahead with small uncertain steps.The negative talks of all these years had cast its spell.I was wondering if I will find myself on the 3rd last page of the newspaper next day with a caption,"a spectator watching the 3rd day's play of the Ranji trophy elite league match netween Bengal and Gujarat". However,the moment I came out of the pit with the stadium staring at me I was in for a pleasant surprise.There were atleast 100 people scattered all over the block B (right next to the club house).and keenly following the match.There were people of all kind.Some were faithful Bengalis who had come to cheer their state's team,some were aged people who wee soaking up the sun (on talking,I found that one of them was Gujarati and a passionate club level player himself in 50s).Some were distinctively young fit lads(they turned out to be the fringe players who were yet to get a break and were here to keenly observed the gurus at work as well as keep an eye on how their more fortunate companions were doing) and then there were some like me,who were there for the sheer joy of cricket.I thoroughly enjoyed myself that day.I watched some good and some promising players (watch out for a left arm pacer called Eklak Ahmed of Bengal,he looked really sharp.And if you get to hear about him later on,do remember that who told you first).It was a keenly contested match with good batting and testing bowling on display.
It is a myth that people love cricket here.They don't.Had they loved cricket,there would have been more crowd in the stadiums for a Ranji match even if doesn't feature any of the national players.People love to see Dhoni smacking a six and Yuvraj defying laws of gravity to take a stunning one-handed catch.But,that is not because they love cricket.It is because they want to fulfill their own hidden egoistic desires through their national team.Nothing much wrong with that,but just that it is not a love for cricket but a regard for self and a regard for the nation.(It is getting a bit philosophical here,I"ll stop.But this surely isn't a love for the game).

By the way,I now stay very near to the Jawaharlal Nehru stadium in Kochi.But,Kerela does not play its Ranji matches here.An international venue,India's second largest cricket stadium but the state team doesn't play here.As a result,on weekends I now think of going for a movie when watching a match would have been a better option.;)

It Never Stopped Teeming

2007-06-13T02:51:00.006-03:00

Calcutta and Kochi are diagonally apart from each other in the coastal India. Till a year and a half back I had always stayed in and around Calcutta and had got quite used to its weather. There wouldn't be any extreme, there would be moderate heat in the summers, reasonable cold in winters and nominal rain in the monsoons. However, my body had still got tuned to surviving in temperatures of 3-4 degrees Celsius as well as 40-41 degrees Celsius, courtesy the 4 years spent in my college hostel which had more extreme conditions than the ones faced in Calcutta.

When, I came to Kochi, climate was probably the last thing in my mind. Months passed as it did remain the last thing in my mind. Yes, the heat was sweltering, ceiling fan would be of little use but that wasn't something which I hadn't faced often. Come June, all my reservations got rearranged. The monsoon had arrived. My colleagues had been telling me that monsoon in Kerala is crazy, like nowhere else. Every time it used to rain heavily in May, they used to say, oh this is nothing, its yet to start. They were true! Kochi became a powerful shower soon enough. It was never a drizzle, but always heavy rain. It used to pour down like anything. Its like you go out for a minute and that's sufficient, it will drench you completely.

It had too much of a bearing on me. Gradually I started hating Kochi for it's rains, for the inconvenience it brings. I could not move out whenever I felt like. It rained too heavily. The droplets were so hard that they hurt you when they hit you. Umbrella would be of little use and even the raincoat would not keep you dry. You could not see a distant place clearly. The rain blurred your sight much like morning fog does in winter. The clothes got dirty or muddy easily, but when washed took an eternity to dry. The puddles formed everywhere and streets got flooded. Sun didn't shine and rain didn't stop for days at a stretch. I pined to see the sun shining, to feel the sensation of sun rays hitting my skin. Power cuts increased. Couldn't read in night. The problem was that I increasingly felt that I didn't have control upon far too many things which had a direct implication on me. I was at the mercy of elements. Roadside groundnut vendors vanished as they could not park their cart in the rains. Even the autos mysteriously vanished.The same stand which used to have dozens of autos standing in other months were now empty. Probably more people took autos during rains,hence it was difficult to find even an auto now.Shoes took a beating. Public buses were not very pleasant to get into. They would be filthy, soggy and dark. Instead of seeing the natural light through the windows, you saw the meek luminescence of the bus bulb with the khaki curtains down. This ordeal lasted till the early days of December. 7 long months. There would be brief periods when there wouldn't be any rains, but yes they would be brief. I was a happy man when the clouds receded and the familiar sun came back in December.

It's June now and as in last year the monsoon is back. It's raining and raining hard at times. The autos are difficult to get and the groundnut vendors are yet again not there. Clothes and shoes still get dirty. But the rain doesn't torment me this time. I wake up every morning to see that it's raining, but it doesn't matter. It's a small walk now from my home to the bus stand. Its raining when I go to sleep in the night, but it's good to lay down and read. Its nice listening to world space when it's raining outside. Funnily, when rest of the country is suffering in the heat, its cosy here. I go to my balcony and see the leaves of the trees outside. They are glistening green with a droplet or two on them. There is life all around you. I step out of my home on weekends, it still splatters hard, but I brave it and reach Brindavan. Its empty, I get served quick and also get Idlis and cutlets even if it is late. There are less people coming in the rain. An exciting idea dawns upon me. Soon enough I"ll go to jetty on a weekend and board a ferry. How pleasing will it be to see the rain hitting the backwaters. I"ll look all around me, see the chinese fishing nets, the huge ships, the distant Marine Drive on one side, the few islands on other and there would be water teeming down. May be I"ll get down at Fort Kochi and go to a place called Kashi Art Cafe. They say that they serve good chicken. Suddenly all this seems a good thing to do when walking in the rain than in the sun.

Ackley Avatars

2007-04-09T10:56:00.004-03:00

He kept standing there. He was exactly the kind of guy that wouldn't get out of your light when you asked him to. He'd do it, finally, but it took him a lot longer if you asked him to. 'What the hellya reading?' he said.

'Goddam book'.

He shoved my book back with his hand so that he could see the name of it. 'Any good?' he said.

'This sentence I am reading is terrific'. I can be quite sarcastic when I am in the mood. He didn't get it, though. He started walking around the room again, picking up all my personal stuff, and Stradlater's. Finally, I put my book down on the floor. You couldn't read anything with a guy like Ackley around. It was impossible.

I came across this piece in a book called 'The Catcher in The Rye' yesterday in the night. It is the narrative of a rebellious young boy living in a residential high school. This scene reminded me such vividly of my college days. It was identical then. There were some people(refered to as 'he' henceforth) who were living example of Ackley. He used to march into the room in much the same way and if he finds you studying something earnestly he will get pissed or worried, not sure what. He will come right next to your desk and keep standing there, looking attentively and trying to figure out what are you studying. Arey, what the heck man, I am not solving some tremendous problem or inventing some brilliant formula. I am not doing anything which people haven't done before here or are never expected to do. But, such thoughts are far removed from him. He is really hooked, he is thinking "Oh God, what is this?I better find out. "My brother, if you want to know, ask, please ask I will bare it all and then please move. I am obviously getting disturbed. "But, as its written above I put my book down on the floor. You couldn't read anything with a guy like like him around. It was impossible. ;)

P. S. -The author (Joseph Salinger) has made this boy(Holden) lament so much so bluntly in this book, that it finds a place in the '100 most controversial books of the 20th century' list. By the way, this book is also there in the '100 top books of the 20th century list'. To top it all, it is included in the curriculum of many schools throughout US. I am not saying its a bad book and all, but there is such blatantly vitriolic material in it that it beats me to no end that how this book came to be read aloud in the classrooms.

Le Kar Hari Ka Naam

2007-03-31T08:42:00.001-03:00

It had to start someday somehow.For far too long I had resisted myself from the temptation of maintaining a blog of my own.Who will write,who will read....and all that.So while I kept visiting some of my friends' blogs and kept chancing upon some strangers' blogs,I couldn't help feeling that I can do with a blog of my own.However,every single time I used to think so,the same cobwebs used to return..."stop it Anand.No 1's gonna be interested in your stupid shitty boring life.What have you got to share anyway?Don't chance upon another time wasting pursuit and do something better and saner instead."And then my mind used to answer"Yeah,right..may be that's right..I better stick to myself and carry on with my work.".

Still,it always takes some impetus to get anything started.I got it yesterday I believe.There is this quaint colleague of mine,Vinod.Well,I am not going to start rambling about Vinod here,but I"ll tell you what happened yesterday.As the smaller needle of the clock was ticking past the digit 7 in the night,Vinod was getting restless.Yet again I was making him wait for a decent time when he wanted to leave ."Hey Vinod,just wait for 5 mins,we"ll leave together.." and all that.It was a friday yesterday and even I was starting to feel guilty about making him wait on this best day of the week.I quickly wrapped off my remaining work and sent those couple of customary mail to my trans-globe teammate and I was done.I happily swivelled and exclaimed "Hey Vinod,let's move".But to my utter astonishment, Vinod said he"ll take some time now.Now,this beated me.He never stays back to do some extra work and God damn it-this was a friday.What on earth had happened,cause he said that quite happily and seemed too preoccupied with something.Anyway,I thought it must be something to do with a particular acquaintance of his who always manages to make him wait in the office(that's another story,neglect it.The bottom line is - I thought may be this is not too uncharacteristic of him).Then,after some 15-20 mins I saw a crowd of 3 to 4 people huddled some distance across my cubicle(the printer was nearby).Vinod was one of them.When,I reached there he showed me his book.Yes,a book.He used to write short stories.All loser kind stories if you ask me,but stories nevertheless.I never seriously thought he has it in him to write a book on short stories.But,he did.He did what he wanted.It doesn't matter that this "book" is barely a neatly taken print-out of his stories from the office printer.I liked the simplicity of his ambition.He wants to be a writer and there are no two ways he thinks about it.I have also always wanted to write,well not to be a writer but to write.So why not you ass ;) By the way,just before starting this blog I again visited a stranger's blog(the link was there in a signature in a forum i visit).It was another fine clean blog and it subconsciously spurred me to actually lead thought to action.So here it goes,....Amen :)

Post Script -
1.Hey Vinod,if you happen to read this,forget any adjective which I may have used :)
2.I have taken my liberties with the language.There is no such word as trans-globe,swivelled and beated(not in google -> define:.. atleast).But,I hope you all understood what I meant.