Shaktian Space

A letter without an address

2012-01-29T01:43:00.006+05:30

Dear Soulmate,
I’m penning this missive with warm discontent against you and the circumstances that surround us. You may not be aware of me but I’ve been looking for you since I came to know of your existence. You simply couldn’t be found though. There is something about you that’s been cruelly invisible. Perhaps it’s your face. If not, then it’s my mind. In any case, I wonder about the lack of ‘us’ in the foreseeable future. Not a day goes by I don’t wish we were known to each other. It seems as if you just aren’t anywhere close. Most probably, I am searching in all the wrong directions. That must be one of the reasons why we are still strangers. Out of desperation, sometimes, I fancy you on social media; but then common sense prevails and I pray hard this isn’t the case! The only positive outcome of this excruciating delay is that with every passing day, we are only getting older and a bit wiser (if you may). So the experience accumulated in the meantime will tend to enrich our soul. Speaking of which, I worry about you. I admit it’s almost bizarre to do so especially when the person in question is incognito. But still, that’s true. Every once in a while I think about your well-being. I do strongly hope you are healthy, optimistic and all the blah associated with Viva la Vida. But as long as I don’t get to see you, I can only speculate. Trust me, I ain't good at it – I always guess wrong. And right now, I’m guessing that you’ve found your soulmate and are happy with him/her.
Yours,
Soulmate-to-be

The Princess Who Got Charmed

2012-01-25T19:25:00.000+05:30

In a faraway land (no, not the planets Mormons believe in), there once dwelled a vain Princess who had nothing to do except look forward to her Prince Charming. She was hypnotized to do so by some creepy writer who thought it was übercool to dictate a lady whose only claim to distinction was her fair smooth skin and long golden locks.

As scripted, she patiently waited by the French window day in and day out. She hoped PC would arrive someday on a white horse (which aptly makes her a bit racist!) and help escape her moribund existence. Of course, she wasn’t sure what kind of life PC might provide her once she hops on to sidesaddle him. But the fact that she didn’t know how to clean or cook kept her confidence high and expectations low. More or less, the future was bound to be better out there on the wrong side of window.

Holding all these reasons in her empty head safe, she persisted. In the meantime, PC took a lengthy detour and got killed in the ensuing freak accident which involved his horse and a mare.

End result: He didn’t show up.

The poor Princess, unaware of this bone-breaking news, kept her faith. While she was at it, she lost some weight too. No one bothered though as she wasn’t suffering from anorexia. Besides, the worst that could happen was some modeling agency landing up at her doorstep and window-shopping her. It didn’t matter who rescued her as long as she was loved by the idea of freedom. Whatever that means.

Meanwhile, weeks grew into months and months got substituted by years and eventually time lost track of itself. Neverthemore, the frail Princess was still lonely with no Twitter timeline to pour her frustration on nor Facebook friends to photoshop her emotions with. It was advisable to learn something new like cooking, gardening or knitting but she simply wasn’t interested. Her thoughts were with PC (who should have been alive had he respected equine privacy) and prayed the feeling was mutual.

One afternoon, a frog gatecrashed this story and startled her. He croaked, “Sweetheart, this is me – the one you’ve been waiting for all these years.” On witnessing a frog that spoke fluent English, the Princess turned pale and was about to faint before she blurted out, “Are you my PC?”

This abbreviated question knotted frog’s long tongue and infuriated him, “Now who the fcuk is PC?” Having a pair of ears that weren’t subject to harsh words, she got scared and instantly replied, “Prince Charming!” The frog smiled like they aren’t supposed to on Animal Planet and was relieved to say, “Yeah! That dude’s me.”

There was a long silence and a longer staring contest between the two before the restless frog interrupted: “Well, this is the part where you kiss me and we live happily ever after.” Taking the cue, she lifted him up on her soft palm and closed her to eyes to oblige. At this very instance, the inevitable happened. She turned into a frogess and there was no way to go back other than live croakily ever after.

Bigotry: 1 India: -1

2012-01-22T17:24:00.004+05:30

Since everyone’s talking about Salman Rushdie, let’s stick with him. The latest score indicates the bigots have won. Hands down. Once again. They generally do in our country but this time around the story’s a bit different. Legend has it that ultra-religious folks got furious at somebody who once wrote a humorous yet defiling book in 1989 that got banned across a majority of the Islamic world. (Why the so-called secular India decided to become the first nation to join the bandobast still haunts all non-political answers.)

Anyway this acclaimed writer was planning to attend an event in Jaipur which interestingly he had already been part of back in 2007 without the ongoing banfare. Now here’s the most intriguing facet: the ones who are enraged are Muslims and the one they are engraed at is also a Muslim. The only difference between them is that the latter has read the book by default.

So what gave rise to such a beautiful conundrum? Election. Yup. It’s around the corner so politicians got interested in a literature festival that they otherwise wouldn’t have. Vested interest and narrow vision has more to do with this hapless scenario than anything else. Whatever has happened, is happening and will happen is a lesson in progress for all. Human history has not only seen how religion makes people go crazy but also how bigotry makes them do worse. Add politics to the bonfire (or banfire, if you will) and try to imagine God praying heavily for our sanity.

The worst aspect about this current situation is we’ll never know who is right and who isn’t. At the end of the day, religion is a subscriber’s product and God, a belief system. One can join the party or not. It firmly depends on the given person’s sense of rumour. And as long as everybody is cool and nobody’s shouting “My imaginary God’s imaginary dick is bigger than your imaginary God’s imaginary dick!”, no one’s going to regret non-silence.

Excuse moi for digressing here but once upon a train, there was a little boy traveling with his granddad. He was pestering the elderly gentleman with ceaseless questions but with an unassuming innocence. One such query was related to the passing paddy the kid saw through the window. The wise old man was asked who created those green paddy fields. Instead of going into painstaking details, the former decided to snitch on God and stated, “God did.”

On hearing this, the zealous kid’s eyes got excited and started verifying everything they could set themselves on. “What about those trees?” to which the elaboration-free response “God did that too!” echoed. This enamoring charade went on for a long while. All of a sudden, God was the perfect answer to everything the boy had to ask. It didn’t even spare the non-living things either. With “And this train, grandpa?” getting “Who else? The almighty God!” on the conversational track.

It was at that very precise moment the idea of God was born in that child’s moulding mind. The very God who must be mighty pleased with those offended nincompoops’ ability to be well-versed in the tenets of Satanic blasphemy without even giving the godfatwa’d book a try.

Him Advising Her

2012-01-17T19:37:00.005+05:30

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Don’t listen to them, ignore what you hear
They’re just a crowd
They’ve got to talk
Don’t be selfish, give them something to gossip about
Your moves invite envy for a reason
Your gaze has a story of her own
What’s the point in staying coy
When there are gaits to be shown?
Beauty chose you while you were fast asleep
It’s beyond you – it’s beyond them, too
Live your life as per you wish
Like living-things are supposed to be
Grinless yet smiling
Strong yet fragile
Hold yourself high for the days are few and nights, dark
The memory will play with your youth no matter what
So better make it worthwhile
There’s no need to bow if your heart doesn’t ask you to
You are wonderful as you are
Far more than just what the word ‘unique’ has to say
Your wicked chortle shall echo in the minds of your loved ones
Waiting for their eyes to be flooded again
Akin to the wind that carries the weather wherever it wants
Stay yourself
If sad, write some painful verses
Thrive
For you are a part of something bigger than anything else
And wilder than the universe’s imagination
Nothing ends with you except your thoughts
As well as your laughs
They know you are used to forgiving
As a question mark at the end of a meaningless sentence
You are nature personified
You'll stay unbeknownst to them yet seen.
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Biography se bioscope tak

2012-01-12T09:40:00.003+05:30

It’s an ongoing trend in Hollywood to make biographical films. A Beautiful Mind, Alexander, The Aviator, The Queen, Frost/ Nixon, The King’s Speech, 127 Hours, Moneyball, J. Edgar and The Iron Lady are some recent examples. Bollywood hasn’t replicated this fad. Yet.

Interestingly, India’s first feature film Raja Harishchandra was a biopic. But the Hindi film industry continues to shy away from this genre for commercial reasons. Audience’s lack of zest for history is also to be blamed. Asoka, Rang De Basanti, Mangal Pandey — The Rising, Jodhaa Akbar, Guru, Bose: The Forgotten Hero and No One Killed Jessica were a handful of brave aberrations.

There is certainly no dearth of characters from our history to inspire film writers.

Here are some personalities who could inspire an interesting watch and the actors who might do justice to their role.

Sardar Patel (Aamir Khan): For a man who drew our map as we know it today, we barely know anything about him. After all, he was not called the Iron Man for nothing.

Dara Shikoh (Ranbir Kapoor): He was the rightful heir to Shah Jahan’s throne and a cheerful hedonist but a political fool. A Sufi liberal whose advocacy of Hindu- Muslim unity proved to be his undoing.

Sanjay Gandhi (Saif Ali Khan): Not only a Nehru scion and an apparent heir to the political dynasty, he was also someone who was a rebel and was drawn towards commotion. His magnetic demeanour mixed with hyperactivity and an eventual premature death makes his life quite cinematic.

The Emergency (Multiple Cast): A proper mainstream film on the 21- month long blemish on the face of Indian democracy is prone to drama… and dramatic characters.

Premchand (Irrfan Khan): The discoverer of the soul in rural India — the unsung Tolstoy of India. He influenced both Hindi as well as Urdu prose. Fortunately, we are aware of his beautiful stories. Unfortunately, we aren’t aware of his story.

Jyotirao-Savitribai Phule (Pavan Malhotra-Shahana Goswami) This Maharashtrian couple with their modern mindset faced huge opposition from the society but made long strides in the field of education and the upliftment of women and untouchables. Jyotirao was labelled the Mahatma long before Gandhiji and Savitribai set up India’s first female school.

Dhyan Chand (Shah Rukh Khan): The very symbol of Indian sportsmanship and the undisputed wizard of our national sport. His successful legacy stays surprisingly humble. He is party to awe- inspiring anecdotes that involve Bradman as well as Hitler.

Swami Vivekanand (R Madhavan): He died young, leaving behind a legacy of spirituality and the idea of a global Indian. The monk who made the West buy the eternal philosophy of Upanishads ought to make a wonderful script.

Bahadur Shah Zafar (Victor Banerjee): The last emperor of India and his melancholic final days in the country before being deported to Burma merits attention — not to mention his mental vagaries and poetic indulgences.

Budhia Singh (Irfan Khan of Chillar Party): The world’s youngest marathon runner who made the media wonder whether he was a victim of torture. They’ve already made a documentary on him. A movie would be going a mile further.

PT Usha (Poorna Jagannathan): Her journey towards becoming the fastest Indian woman wasn’t an easy one. Coming from a humble village, her life story has what it takes to make an enthralling sports flick.

JRD Tata (Naseeruddin Shah): A humane capitalist who provided a better meaning to the word enterprise in free India. Though we are familiar with the brand Tata, we don’t have much clue about his life.

Birbal (Kay Kay Menon): Arguably the wittiest person from the Mughal era. Apart from his brainy exploits in Akbar’s court, very little is known of him. This allows the writers to complement fiction with legends.

(NB: This over-imaginative article appeared on MiD DAY's Hitlist today.)

A Strawberry Tale

2012-01-10T23:09:00.005+05:30

Since he secretly liked her a lot, he always desired a casual conversation. His head rattled with millions of flop ideas. Finally a plan stuck his mind and his ears almost bled. Well, not really, but it’s always fun to inject exaggeration into matters pertaining to heart, love, mind and ear. Anyway, he went ahead with his stratagem and didn’t want to wait no longer. It was 2012 already and there was no point in leaving things to a destiny that followed the Mayan calendar.

So he decided to confront her in the office canteen. Accordingly, he walked straight up to her table where she was having lunch alone. He leaned forward and looked straight into her bespectacled eyes and asked, “Do you like strawberries?” Needless to say she was startled and could barely manage a perplexing “o_O” in reply.

But for him, it was as if every sound dropped mute. Time froze back to Ice Age. Life seemed meaningful after an interval of a lifetime. He just stood there like an idiot which he was and witnessed her beauty create a never-imagined-before frown. But being a true lover, he simply couldn’t quit admiring the art form that her face had turned into. All thanks to his one benign question. This episode must have carried on for about 189 seconds when suddenly she changed her stance and uttered, “Yes, I do.”

Sensing an incredible opportunity, he pulled the chair in front of her and started talking in his native tongue Gibberish. Within moments, the equation rolled down to status quo and things went f—ing downhill from then onwards.

Moral of the story: Strawberries are helpful for budding love-stories during winter but some languages ought to be banned for good.

Some days you are Calvin and some days, Hobbes

2012-01-08T23:16:00.000+05:30

It's high time they made a movie on Calvin and Hobbes. But they won’t. Of all the animals on this planet Calvin chose a stuffed Indian tiger to be his imaginary friend. Or perhaps, it was the other way around. Any which case, it can’t be a mere coincidence though. There must have been multiple layers of metaphysical factors at work to make this event a reality. OK. Even if there weren’t, let’s believe otherwise.

The reason why we should do so is Calvin and Hobbes don’t happen everyday. They are not only unique but also unique. Their friendship is the ultimate paragon of a human being’s verbal interaction with another entity – real, imagined or both. Sadly, there is a limitation too. Both of them are characters from a comic strip illustrated by Bill Watterson. Like all cartoonists, Bill doesn't let Calvin learn anything from his misapprehensions lest wisdom corrupt his delightful eccentricity. And we are so grateful to him for that.

Being cartoons, they’ll never age. In a way, this is precisely what makes both of them adorable. The fact that Calvin might never grow up fills millions (like me) with hope. On the other hand, as much as Calvin’s parents might want him to mature, Hobbes would never let that happen. You see, he’s not an ideal friend. He might be a wise tiger who blabbers not as much as Calvin does but he rarely roars any sense into the li’l boy’s wicked head.

One can go a step further and state that Hobbes is an Indian tiger who happens to have a crazy American friend in Calvin. It’s all about multicultural perception. Talking of culture, Calvin's popularity and longevity owes a lot to his parents not being Indian. Had they been Indians (like mine do), the kind of stuff Calvin pulls off every other strip wouldn’t have been viable. Parents in India are, well, you know, quite un-American when it comes to parenting.

Anyway, let’s take this analogy one more step further: In Soviet Russia, Calvin would have been just another boy and Hobbes, just another toy. (Ahem. There was no need to add a communist tangent here but who gives a damn about Lenin-Stalin duo anyway?!) Speaking twitteratically, every tweep is a Calvin and every timeline, Hobbes. (At least no one can dispute this primarily because all the concerned parties are busy tweeting.)

By the way, the most interesting aspect however is we conveniently overlook the possibility that Calvin could well be suffering from a severe mental disorder. Children are meant to be delusional. It helps them in their development but abusing imagination is something else. Anyway the day everything comes to an end, Calvin and Hobbes might be the ones having the last laugh. With us.

When in India, Occupy Caste

2012-01-04T15:00:00.004+05:30

There are LOTS of social issues with respect to caste. Foremost of all is the general economic disparity — the usual ‘rich is getting richer and poor is getting poorer’ cliché. The huge chasm between the rural India and the urban India is facing us. The overwhelming urge of the former to merge with the latter is not only intriguing but also worrisome. The lack of opportunities is what’s driving this social disorder. There are many more ailments like failing infrastructure, lack of governance, civil disobedience when it comes to adherence of basic laws, poverty, illiteracy, corruption and growing Maoist threat. All these inimical elements blend perfectly with our turbulent society.

These are the social issues. Political terrain is quite different and bumpy.

Political issues pertain mostly to politicians. Democracy empowers us to vote, yes but what happens next is not guaranteed. Of course, that’s the case with almost all democracies across the world but here, things are a bit more skewed (or screwed, for lack of better word). Politicians are perceived as villains by the haves and saviors by the have-nots. But that doesn’t stop us from electing more of the unreliable kind. The reason behind this being the role caste plays a key role in the national arena.

Caste is like the most legal illegal substance in India. The Untouchability Act was passed in 1955. In that very year, the Protection of Civil Rights Act was passed. Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act took place in 1989 and Human Rights Protection Act in 1993. Since they are part of the constitution now, they are bona fide laws. Besides, the Hindu system has been casteist since time immemorial. It’s India’s version of apartheid. People like Buddha and Mahavir were the earliest proponents of ‘Chuck discrimination! Everybody is equal’ dictum. And if one observes closely, Buddha in particular was very successful too. It’s a different story though that his ideals are followed more religiously in South-East Asian countries than in India! Similarly, Gandhi took particular interest in the upliftment of the Harijans.

So reservation helps the case or not?

Reservation was a temporary solution crafted by our founding fathers who thought the under-privileged ones should get an upper hand when the nation kick-starts. Reservation was meant to go on for about 15 years. But it’s been almost 65 years now! When Morarji Desai founded Mandal Commission during his tenure as the PM, it was an honest step towards separating the privileged from the underprivileged ones. But with PM VP Singh’s shrewd decision to implement the reservation policy in 1990, caste, politics and reservation became inextricable bedfellows – ultimately giving new rise to new faces in politics who run the roost today.

Interestingly, the Dalits found a messiah in Mayawati when she became the Chief Minister of the largest non-nation entity on the planet (read: Uttar Pradesh) but as time went passed by, it became apparent that she’s just another narcissistic politician. For the record, the last Dalit leader whom no one has been able to emulate till date is Dr. Ambedkar (who is also considered the Father of Indian constitution). Every other Dalit leader carries his picture for approval from poor Dalits but barely anyone truly stand for what he did. Political solutions are most effective in a vast country like ours but it takes a lot of awareness and time. And patience is an expensive virtue in politics.

On the other hand, independent India saw some Dalit leaders making a mark too in the last two decades. Like RK Narayan becoming India’s first Dalit President and KMC Balayogi, first Dalit Lok Sabha speaker. KG Balakrishnan became the first Dalit Chief Justice of India in 2006.

So we can’t deny that thanks to such schemes, there has been a heck of an improvement for Dalits in the overall social order. In fact, a lot of progress has taken place over the years due to reservation mainly in the field of education and employment. But at the end of the day, reservation is self-defeating and anti-competition. And worst of all, people who are economically privileged and don’t even belong to the eligible caste try to leech benefits. There was a time when people didn’t know that caste was a major issue in independent India but now, thanks to widespread mass media, we get to know what happened where. People aren’t asleep anymore.

As a byproduct of these actions, we now have 27% reservation for OBC (Other Backward Class) and Muslims are eagerly anticipating a 4.5% reservation as a sub-quota with the OBC. Women are looking forward to 33% reservation. Math can’t get murkier than this. Even some new states like Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh were formed under the pretext of empowering the downtrodden communities. But what’s going on today is in stark contrast with what was supposedly intended. Or like Charlie Sheen would quip, upper caste politicians are #winning in these states.

So how does the non-political entity contribute to this cauldron? Well, there are effective personalities like Sudha Murthy (wife of Infosys founder NR Murthy) who is busy building schools in far-off villages. And there are selfless crusaders like Binayak Sen and many more who could have lived a charming life in cities if they wanted. These activists and campaigners try to work at the grass-root level. Most of them are of the opinion that education is what’s missing. And it’s very true. They believe that stringent legislation will empower the lower castes in the long run. Offering a helping hand by upgrading their living condition is the way to go.

Here again, political will portrays an important role. Like Indira Gandhi’s garibi hatao movement was effectively turning land laborers into landowners overnight!

After all, you won’t find pickets like “Occupy Caste” anywhere in India. Urbanites don’t care about it and that’s that. This is how it works (and doesn’t work) in India. Since rural areas are the ones where casteist discriminations takes place, most of the activists working there are nameless and faceless. Except when we read about their inspiring work in newspapers/magazines.

Caste doesn’t change but our perception towards it does… from place to place. If you are born a Hindu, it implies one surety – you are born in to a caste by default whether you like it or not. And in states like Gujarat and Rajasthan, caste transcends religion. Like the Muslims have castes belonging to mercantile communities and such. In South India, people usually don’t care much about caste in the society unless someone is getting married. YOU’VE GOT TO MARRY A PERSON FROM YOUR OWN CASTE – is the norm. Politically, it’s very Brahminically-oriented though. In North India, caste is more prominent and sometimes, brutal. But cities like Patna and Lucknow won’t witness discrimination based on caste the way forlorn villages are bound to.

Caste has also benefited proselytism. Christian Missionaries will generally target the forest-dwellers and the downtroddens. They offer education in exchange of faith. Net-net, it’s a win-win situation. No one’s complaining. Except the radical Hindu groups who think it’s a conspiracy against their religion. Net-net, they are morons.

Development (read: capitalism) has what it takes to overshadow caste. Remnants of feudalism can still be found in villages where Dalits often suffer at the hands of cruel landlords. Everyone must have heard or seen Bandit Queen. It’s a hardcore movie about a real-life dacoit who took revenge on people from upper caste who wronged her when she was younger. Well, the story ended this way – she surrendered, served sentence and joined politics later and then one morning, got shot by a kin of whom she massacred!

The setting is quite different in cities as far as caste identification is concerned. Urban areas function like a neo-liberal. Hardly anyone cares to ask each other which caste one belongs to. Everyone share a common table in the office canteen without any hassle. However, religion, linguistic and regional identity rather plays a bigger role in metropolitans sometimes. Caste is not THAT visible in the vital status. People are way too busy chasing trains that often don’t run on time to bother with anything else.

Mass migration has a lot to do with the prevailing caste (mal)practices in rural areas. Loads of people migrate to Mumbai every single day. It goes without saying that a major bulk of this ‘Diaspora’ belongs to the lower caste. They enter the city with dreamy eyes. Everyone wants a new start and they are no different. Once they are within the city, their caste ceases to exist. Hard work and opportunities are what matters. The word is reinvent. In any case, they are better off in restless Delhi or Kolkata than in the bucolic pockets of India.

Talking of Mumbai, Bollywood is a shining example of how casteism can be thwarted. First of all, Bollywood is like the most secular thing in India. The very fact that the Punjabi Kapoors and Muslim Khans have dominated it over the years illustrates this point. A different and purer adaptation of caste-ing applies here — dynasty. It is pivotal. For example, Big B’s son becomes an actor even though he might not have an iota of actor in him. The same goes for Hema Malini’s daughter. A producer’s son becomes a producer (if he fails as an actor first!) and a director’s son will vie to get behind the camera like his father. So in a way, it’s a casteist from a professional point of view.

To understand why Bollywood doesn’t have a Dalit superstar yet, we’ll have to peek into its history. Bollywood happened in a Marathi-Gujarati Bombay but it thrived because of the Punjabi infusion. Bollywood’s first superstar post-independence was a Muslim who went about with a Hindu name: Dilip Kumar. And today, it’s a Muslim who proudly goes with his Pathan name: Shah Rukh Khan. Between them, there have been an array of superstars who came and went but none of them were Dalits.

Perhaps the future might belong to some Dalit superstar. Hopefully. It will definitely be a positive sign. There were Dalit poets and writers but how much of their work influenced Bollywood needs to be researched. There are Dalits in the production team who work behind the scene but they aren’t forced to display their ID cards.

In an ideal world, caste won’t exist. But we don’t live in an ideal world. So I believe affirmative actions with a pedantic approach is what’s needed. There will always be people who’ll be oppressed, especially farmers. After all, India is an agrarian country with nearly 70% of the economy depending on agriculture. And it’s a sorry state of affairs for farmers who commit suicide as if it’s a newborn trend. Hence reservation ought to be based on economic factors rather than one’s caste.

Just because a person is born of low caste doesn’t mean s/he should be addressed with provisions meant for the underprivileged. In simpler words, it’d be unfair. The same goes for the lower caste kids who are applying for colleges/universities. Why should they be given preferential treatment when a kid from a general category scores better marks but is denied the rightful seat?

Gumption is what’s lacking. And the worst scenario happens when casteist mentality becomes apparent in cities while applying for higher education or government jobs. LUCKILY, THERE ARE NO RESERVATIONS IN PRIVATE SECTOR THOUGH POLITICIANS ARE TRYING TO GATECRASH IN THERE TOO!

Anti-discrimination has to take place at the grass-root level like most the national activists keep on reiterating. What’s the point in allowing reservations in IITs and IIMs when the low-caste kids don’t even get to attend a proper school? Education, general awareness and a strong political go-to-ness is what’s required to tackle these issues. Society can change but a country as a whole needs politicians at the helm. And we aren’t blessed with such politicians. Yet.

Changing years, Unchanging life

2011-12-31T23:52:00.007+05:30

Neglect this part: For the past few days, I’ve been encountering queries like “Any plan for New Year?” and “Will you be spending New Year’s night at home again?”. The ones asking me the former question don’t know me and the ones asking the latter wish they were asking the former. Na, I'm not blaming them. They are genuinely nice people but victims of curiosity. My boringness is beyond me for a reason. Even snails are more interesting. Most of my jokes prefer not to be laughed at. In the course of human evolution, I’m a f—ing downhill. Sometimes I ask myself why am I not a chimp yet. But then chimps aren't supposed to suffer from identity crisis. For reality's sake, humankind is way too sophisticated and directional. But then there are always aberrations and exceptions and vocabulary to lean back on. So I console my bruised ego with asthmatic arguments and breathe deeply. It beats me how it works every single time. If it hadn’t, I’d have killed myself by hanging on a noose made of noodles. The worst part is I’m not even depressed and am a thorough teetotaler. The only thing I’m addicted to is cinema. Earlier I was mistaken about an apparent addiction to social media. Turns out it was just a temporary delusion. I scribble so-called funny one-liners daily masquerading as philosourphy. Luckily, I fail to laugh at them. Unluckily, some poor kind-hearted souls do. At least that’s what their comments imply. I don’t reply. I stopped communicating via tweets long time back. I’m quite grown-up for that nonsense now – making fake conversations with imaginary friends while overlooking calls from the real world ones. By the way, this doesn’t mean that my friends and I are on winning terms. Speaking of age, I’m 25 now and the year we are going to step into will try its best to make it 26. I’m prepared as I’m not ready to die as of now. I haven’t accomplished anything, you see, except few sweet words every now and then. I haven’t done well on the financial side too. The friends I grew up with have. I don't even have a girlfriend. The friends I grew up with do. Presently, they must be busy enjoying some parties somewhere. A few of them want me to be there with them although they understand that I don’t enjoy people’s company. I like individuals. I’m not adept at presenting myself as a people’s guy either. Pretending is an art and I can't pretend to be an artist. I hope all of them have a memorable night. (On a second thought, considering the alcohol they’ll be ingesting, I hope they don’t.) Coming back to me, I’m better off in my own company watching movies the popcorn-hogging people usually don’t bother with, posting meaningless blogs and creating sense out of absolute rubbish. It’s a less than pathetic existence but still fulfilling in its own precarious way. All I’ve got to do is remind myself that I’m supposed to be glum and smug and sad and fallow. And like I mentioned earlier, it works every single time.

Don't neglect this part: Happy New Year for bearing with me through factual fiction and wasting your not-so-precious time on this page! May 2012 make y’all forget what you always wanted to be.

Passionate enough to go home?

2011-12-30T23:57:00.004+05:30

There is a memorable scene at the end of The Hurt Locker where Jeremy Renner’s character walks with a military swagger with his back towards us on the street of Baghdad before credits roll on. That moment captures a person’s commitment to his dreams – almost bordering on acute selfishness – nonetheless, inspiring. To put things in perspective, the case in point is this ain’t a tourist destination. It’s Iraq aka Shithole, for lack of better aka, especially when the person in question is an American army guy. And that’s exactly what Renner is in that movie!

One can note that he’s very passionate about his job and perhaps it’s the only thing on earth he’s very good at. He probably understands that loneliness and solitude are two different factors better than anybody else. Whatever. He literally abandons his family including his little kid to go back to being a freaking expert in dismantling bombs. The bottomline here is he does what he has to, and more importantly, what he wants to. All prices paid, it doesn’t matter whether he dies as a miserable old man regretting the arrogance of his youth or not.

Likewise, Mickey Rourke's The Wrestler strolls on a familiar terrain. It's all about love in the end. Just like it was in the beginning. In this movie, he is abandoned by folks who were supposed to be loved by him, failing which, they are not loving him. As the climax bares itself, he chooses his fans who were always there for him over his daughter and new-found girlfriend. The catch here is he's prepared to put even his life up on line to entertain the crowd. Maybe he died. Maybe he didn't. We'll never know. The bloody credits were on a roll as usual.

On a similar note, a classic moment from The Secret in Their Eyes takes place when Sandoval explains to Espósito how everything changes for a person but not his passion. It could be for anything. A football club. Books. Cinema. Alcohol. Art. Music. You name it and you have it. That’s the beauty of emotions conspiring against the host in collusion with the host. The search carries on but the quench stays unfulfilled; for if it does, there’d be nothing left to neither grieve nor pursue.

People are sad not because they are not happy but also because they've found comfort in being sorrowful. You could be one of them. I am for sure. Humans just want to go home. It could be a temporary one too. Passion simply helps us get there. This so-called home could be anything. It doesn't always have to have walls. It could be an abstract art, if you will. The sound of music might go a step further and shelter your abysmal soul. A painting's fine shades shall somehow encapsulate you in a well-protected cocoon. The list is endless, not to forget the inebriating depression. Or I like I say, the real call of nature.

Everywhere we go or wish to go, we leave a piece of us in there and once we are back, we can't help but hope to return at least one more time. This urge explains the time we spent in our mother's womb. Moreover, nine months is not a short period of time. And then one day, all of a sudden, we're forced to abandon that safe abode to enter a harsh world. Naturally, a piece of us got left behind. After all, that's where passion took birth. The place we keep looking for, fully aware that it's long gone. But passion not only works in mysterious ways but also makes us do the same.

The Last Christmas

2011-12-26T15:49:00.005+05:30

Merry Boxing Day to y’all. Or better still, Merry leftover Christmas to the poor. I love this time of the year, you see? In fact, I’m fond of every festival that offers delicious yet free food. Nevertheless, as one can guess, I’m going to be harsh from this point onwards. I waited nearly a week for Diwali bash(ing) but since I realize that my blog has got only a handful of unfortunate followers (thanks to my reluctance to unabashedly promote the way everyone is supposed to), there is no point in waiting to hurt people’s sentiments.

I abhor most practices associated with religion. It has more to do with my DNA than my parents’ as they are very God-fearing. But that doesn’t mean I don’t admire the festivity and the colorful decorations and whatnot. But then there is always something hidden behind religion that ain’t an expert with the concept of camouflage. Christmas too has its fallacious side.

"Maybe I’ll have to resurrect once again just to remind you idiots that it's not my birthday!" - Jesus Christ

We celebrate it as Jesus Christ’s birthday despite being fully aware that he wasn’t born on December 25^th. He was a superb fella who had issues with his Father and all but that doesn’t mean we should distort his very date of birth. To add to his eternal woes, we haven’t tried hard enough to rectify this error. Accordingly, we should have been a little more sensitive and traced the exact night he was born.

The travelogues of the Three Wise Men who were on Maggi diet during their arduous travel could have helped. After all, we celebrate Buddha and Muhammad’s birthday every single year using lunar year calendar. So why befuddle ourselves with Georgian calendar and carry on this historical travesty?

One other aspect regarding Christ’s race bothers me. He was a brown-eyed, dark-haired Jew. There is no ambiguity in this reality. But thanks to Charlemagne and the eventual patenting of Christianity by ‘whites’, Christ miraculously turned into a blonde supermodel with blue eyes, golden-hair and an awe-inspiring set of abs. Would he be any less of a prophet (or God or whatever it is we look up to him for) were he a brunette?

Even the nativity scenes replicated by us during yuletide exhibit critical geographical and climatic flaws. We depict snowfalls in them when we know that Bethlehem had as much chance of a snowfall as Mumbai does. And it doesn’t stop there. We have this infatuation with the so-called Xmas tree when it has hardly anything to do with Jesus and his neighborhood. Those trees became a part of Christmas folklore way late into the 15^th century or so in Eastern Europe.

Recently, Pope got all worked up and reminded Christendom the importance of inculcating deeper religious values instead of celebratory ones. He was slyly attacking Santa Claus I guess. After all, kids (and adults alike) seem so thrilled to greet that obese character from Finland who is hell bent on promoting Coca-Cola even today after decades of slipping through charred chimneys. I adore his reindeers though. Since my childhood days, all I’ve ever requested him to do is gracefully hand me over his mode of transport. Naturally, I haven’t heard from him yet. Either he doesn’t exist or he loves his reindeers way too much.

Coming back to where I started, I can’t make a difference nor do I wish to when religion is involved. But we’ve got to understand that almost all faith-based ideologies are replete with myths, lies, tales and unsubstantial claims. Unless and until we don’t realize this, there will always be a wall of discontent and intolerance between folks belonging to different religion and sects.

In any case, what’s the harm in creating fancy stories and fake snowfall? As long as humankind is kind enough to be happy and not baying for each other’s blood, we should be celebrating whatever comes up on the calendar even if the date is grossly mistaken.

One more thing. I don’t mean to be a doomsdayist but if the Mayans were right, this could well had been our last Christmas ever!

Once upon a year in Hollywood

2011-12-23T12:22:00.006+05:30

2011 saw a mixed bag of releases. We take a look at how a few of them fared at the box office....

SEQUEL DUDS AND WINS: Like every year, 2011 too saw numerous sequels flooding the theaters. Almost all of them had one thing in common – the hype. However, very few managed to deliver the box office numbers as well as impress critics. The ones who accomplished this feat were X-Men: First Class, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, Fast and Furious: Fast Five and Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows: Part 2. Those who found themselves left out in the cold were Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Hangover II, Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn and Transformers: Dark of the Moon.

THRILLAAAAA: The thrillers had a field year! A clear majority who hit the theatre came out with flying colors. The list included The Adjustment Bureau, Source Code, Contagion, The Whistleblower and The Ides of March.

SPECIAL EFFECTS: There was a slew of forgettables like Happy Feet Two, The Smurfs 2 and Cars 2. But the ones that left a mark were The Adventures of Tintin, Kung Fu Panda 2, Rango, The Puss in Boots, Winnie the Pooh and The Muppets.

MEANINGFUL CINEMA’S CAMEO: Unlike last year when art took a backseat, this year witnessed a moderate resurgence. The Tree of Life took the cake along with the violent yet stoic Drive. The racial drama The Help was noteworthy. And it’s a shame Melancholia never released!

UNDERRATED vs OVERRATED: Immortals, The Rum Diary, Warrior and Machine Gun Preacher got less than what they deserved – both commercially as well as critically. On the other hand, Super 8, Thor and Crazy, Stupid, Love. somehow received much more than expected.

PS: For the record, this piece appeared on MiD-Day and is my second byline ever!

Annus Mortabilis of 2011

2011-12-19T14:48:00.013+05:30

Folks die. There’s nothing fancy or novel about it. Living organisms have been dying since era immemorial. The luckier ones die only once. Even the dinosaurs perished so as to make sure Steven Spielberg become the most powerful Jew in cinema. But 2011 seemed a bit too crowded with dead famous people. And in this piece, I’m going to drop a few names who have already dropped dead. Some of them were not only close to my heart (mainly because they are no more now) but also occupied a lot of space in my head (mainly because it’s empty).

The year kicked off with Kobayashi’s death. Yeah, the one from The Usual Suspects. For the record, no other British bloke could have gotten away with a Japanese name and an Indian accent in a movie. Well, Pete Postlethwaite did. One of my all-time favorite actors.

A few days later, a personality I used to mock on Twitter for his staunch anti-India tweets got killed by his own security guard. Salmaan Taseer turned out to be a true martyr in a nation obsessed with religion. After all, not many voices are heard in support of Pakistani minorities. Bullets silenced him but the message was out. A month later, Shahbaz Bhatti, the only Christian cabinet member, was gunned down for his outspoken stand against blasphemy laws.

Meanwhile, a 26 year-old Tunisian street vendor named Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire. This event eventually exploded in the form of Arab Spring. Years of resentment against elite [read: corrupt] ruling governments expressed itself on the very street this young man immolated.

In India, Bharat Ratna Bhimsen Joshi passed away leaving behind a legacy of music and humility. He was 88 so one can’t employ the word ‘unfair’ as was the case in the aforementioned deaths. But I have a deep grudge against our media who were hell-bent on using a mugshot of his during a performance where he appears to be suffering from asthma or something. Kindly don’t tell me they couldn’t find a better snap. And the worst part is almost ALL newspapers carried the same photograph! Hmmph.

Another famous Indian who taught me the pleasure of reading decided to call it a life. I owe to Uncle Pai inasmuch as I do to every teacher I came across in my otherwise miserable life.

In the month of March when Mumbai was preparing to swelter, Knut drowned and killed himself in Germany. He was to polar bears what Paul was to octopus. With his departure, humankind learned an essential lesson – polar bears belong to polar regions, not zoos.

Actress Elizabeth Taylor, who managed to bag an Oscar while walking the aisle eight times, left us an impossible beauty and unfortunate marriages to ponder. Following suit, another exceptional personality from Hollywood, director Sidney Lumet bid farewell.

Coming back to Pakistan, Syed Saleem Shahzad went missing only to be found dead in a canal with apparent signs of ISI-marked torture on him. Maybe journalism pays way too high a price for courage. Similarly, MiD-Day’s crime editor Jyotirmoy Dey was bumped off in road daylight by Mumbai underworld.

As monsoon started approaching India, news about Ilyas Kashmiri’s probable death amid US drone attacks in Waziristan caught world attention. He wasn’t just another two-bit Islamist militant. In fact, he was in line to replace Osama bin Laden – who got mauled by U.S. commandoes *vacationing* just a few kilometers away from Pakistani military HQs – as the head of Al-Qaeda. Conclusion: Jihad works in mysterious ways.

Talking of death, Jack “Dr. Death” Kevorkian expired, leaving Kim Kardashian the most famous Armenian-American I’m aware of. He made euthanasia cool and even served prison for his beliefs. Those who don’t know him should watch the movie You Don’t Know Jack starring Al Pacino.

MF. Husain, a born Maharashtrian, went away twice. Once when he left India. Secondly, when he left Qatar. We lost a great painter thanks to our intolerance and lack of gumption. He lost an ancient country thanks to his reluctance to appease Hindus by painting Prophet.

In the month of July, Amy Winehouse became the latest member of the infamous 27 Club. I felt bad for her. She had a unique voice and makeup. All things sung and OD-ed, she deserved to live more. Maybe we don’t want the entertainers to leave us. They are the ones who fill our psyche with hope and color. Likewise, Shammi Kapoor’s exit widened this popular sentimentality. Watching him play that shehnai in Rockstar with those deep eyes a la Ustad Bismillah Khan was soothing, to say the least.

No matter how disparaging it may sound, no death list is complete without a mention of a Parsi. Painter Jehangir Sabavala filled the spot this year. Jagmohan Mundhra who made Nandita Das in Bawandar and Aishwarya Rai in Provoked look vulnerable packed up.

Death winked at Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi so the latter had no choice but to close his eye. Wangari Maathai who won a Nobel for her contributions towards environmental conservatism returned to soil. In related news, I admired her a lot. I still do.

With Steve Jobs joining the Dead Club much to digital world’s utter grief, things speeded up. A few days later, Dennis Ritchie who spearheaded C Programming (and compelled me to give up engineering) gave up the ghost! But compared to Jobs, he made a bigger contribution to technology by not patenting C.

Though being a teetotaler sucks but Jagjit Singh’s poignant songs never do. He shall be remembered as long as sorrow is in this world. In simpler word, forever. The same is true about Bhupen Hazarika.

On the other hand, people won’t miss Gaddafi much. Even the ones who named that Lahore stadium after him. The only rue I hold is against the way he was treated during his final moments. They could have at least had the wisdom to not record it on a video. Sadistic morons.

A young man aged 24, Marco Simoncelli, got killed doing something he loved – motobiking on the race course. Perhaps he was too young and fast to live. In the same vein, an entire ice hockey team vanished in the form of Lokomotiv Yaroslavl. Too cold. Too bad. Too many.

As the year neared its curtain, some former sportsperson quit. Joe Frazier was one of them. I haven’t seen him box but I’ve watched him break down in a documentary while talking about his once archrival Muhammad Ali. The kind of respect he showed immediately struck a chord. Yes, cancer is more than just a bitch.

Being a former cricket fan, I must admit I always enjoyed reading Peter Roebuck’s articles. An English county cricketer who later became an Australian newspaper columnist chose South Africa to commit suicide. If this is not intriguing enough, then the fact that his Facebook account was involved in this suicide is.

In the non-sports arena, India’s most wanted Maoist (a softer term for terrorist) Kishenji was killed by CRPF in West Bengal. No one complained as such except the Mao-loving Communist gang.

December arrived and carrying on. Bollywood is still reeling under the loss of its legend Dev Anand. For his credit, he was part of some of the finest cinema and much to his discredit, worst, too. I’ll remember him for unabashedly promoting smoking in the Har Fikr Ko Dhue Mein song. Cartoonist Mario Miranda, known for his honest caricatures of Goa (or the Goa that once was) sketched himself away a few days later.

Last week, one of my role models, Christopher Hitchens, gave into cancer. He didn’t believe in God but to most of his fans, he was THE God. One the very day, Gadzhimurat Kamalov became the 18th Russian journalist to be assassinated since 2000. This morning, the buzz about two totally contrasting personalities, Czech Republic’s first President Václav Havel and North Korea’s Kim Jong-il, departing, broke out.

As we speak and read, there are millions protesting against the authorities. A considerable nameless lot got killed in Tunisia, Syria, Yemen and other distressed regions on the planet. No wonder Time selected 'The Protester' as the person of the year.

We’ve got 12 more days to go for New Year's Eve. In the meantime, let’s see how many names squeeze in onto this list.

A melancholic cede to surrealism

2011-12-16T12:48:00.003+05:30

Lars von Trier is the director of this movie. The reason why it’s specified at the very beginning is because of the kind of films he creates. Or perhaps, only he creates. Melancholia is one such piece of art. Having said that, it’s not for the everyday crowd. Those who are familiar with his work know this. Or perhaps, only they do.

Melancholia begins with graphic visuals that occupies considerable amount of time and mind. If one pays close attention, the entire storyline is depicted in these 3D sci-fi mélange. Almost every single act is a symbol layered in mystery that unravels itself as the screen moves forward. The real world cinema begins much later.

The drama basically revolves around Justine (Kirsten Dunst) who is getting married. The trouble is she’s hardly excited about it and is visibly losing her will to live. Later it turns out that she is not only depressed but also quite assertive of her delusions about the realities surrounding us. Anyway the marriage may not even last a night. Thankfully, her sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg) plays stoic and cares for her. Likewise, her brother-in-law John (Kiefer Sutherland), though highly irritated with her incomprehensible behavior, chooses to stay hospitable.

Against this already disturbing background, the world is coming to an end.

A planet named Melancholia is about to crash with Earth. But unlike in most other movies, nobody does nothing about it – no one is saving no one! Everyone involved is just awaiting end in his or her unique ways. The purposelessness of life is effectively emphasized from the beginning till the credits roll.

All the lead actors did a remarkable job, especially Dunst who essayed a similar role in All Good Things. You almost get that uncomfortable taste on the tip of your tongue when she cries: "It tastes like ashes!" Charlotte Gainsbourg proved once again why she is von Trier's favourite.

Cinematography and the background score is the key here. As for some directors like Terrence Mallick, Jim Jarmusch and Lars von Trier, of course, an image carries more weightage than a dialogue. As expected, they are often accused of indulging too much, leaving the audience exasperated. But then we are not supposed to crib as they are the torchbearers, post-Bergman. No wonder one will always find restless long shots with shaking cameras and crisp optical illusions in movies like The Tree of Life and Melancholia. A lot.

This flick is worth every single minute of its 136 runtime but your patience shall be severely tested. Must watch for the cinephiles!

Help yourself with this one!

2011-12-14T19:08:00.005+05:30

Calling The Help a ‘fair’ movie would be racist. At least in the 1960s of USA. More so in Mississippi where the movie is peculiarly set. But the notable part is it’s not only entertaining and educative but also inspiring and poignant at the same time. Adapted from a book titled the same, it deals with an era where the demarcation between the blacks and the whites in America was redoubtable. Mason-Dixon line was the norm. Despite all these not-so-modern day aberrations, one aspect was striking: almost all white kids in the town were nurtured by black maids.

Directed by Tate Taylor, who also happens to have written the screenplay, displayed intense sparks of genius in terms of storytelling. In this racial drama, Skeeter (Emma Stone) wishes to be a journalist-cum-writer. Running along this pursuit, she goes out of town only to return back and find her childhood maid Constantine (a powerful cameo by Cicely Tyson) sacked by her parents. This sets the tone for the movie. With the civil right movement gaining strength in the background, she decides to write a book so as to deliver the maids’ “side of stories”.

This is where Aibileen (Viola Davis) and Minny (Octavia Spencer) enter the picture. Both are maids with emotional hardship to match as well as courageous enough to do what other maids aren’t prepared for – share their experiences with Skeeter. The former works for a somewhat indecisive Elizabeth (Ahna O'Reilly) whereas the latter, for a rather rude Hilly (Bryce Dallas Howard). The book starts writing itself here onwards with Aibileen’s soothing voice in narration. But only two stories won’t do. Skeeter needs more maids to volunteer but who will rise against the white neighborhood’s imminent fear? Well, as the movie proceeds, many do. Willingly.

The Help touches the sentiment’s chord with a measured restrain. And that’s what works for it. It doesn’t try to vilify one group against another. No doubt it exposes the nexus of disdain among blacks for their apparent subjugation in the form of separate toilet and such. But then it also includes cheerful white characters Celia (Jessica Chastain) and Hilly’s liberal mother (played to perfection by Sissy Spacek). Furthermore, the movie strikes a right balance between comedy and tragedy.

Emma Stone has been the biggest surprise here. Her act does to this movie what Sandra Bullock’s did to ‘The Blind Side’. On the hindsight, 2011 hasn’t been very American for Hollywood due to the lack of race-related screenplays. The Help considerably fills that gap. It’s worth a watch.

Falling in snow with Bombay

2011-12-08T13:32:00.010+05:30

No one seems to get enough of this city. Everybody who’s here remains confined under its unrecoverable spell. They may not completely like it but they won’t quit either. Not all of them may turn out as winners but they don’t mind keeping up with the joneses. Meanwhile, there is a strong sense of aberration that never goes unnoticed though... the ever-expanding crowd and the asphyxiating smells are prime examples.

And at the end of the day, Mumbai is sinking. Metamorphically, at least. The huge rubble of filth that we are helping accumulate on its surface, on land, into sea and in air, would hopefully do the deed. Someday.

Until then, we’ll survive. Anyhow. For this, we’re prepared to come along as dehumanized primates in bursting trains or honking lunatics while surrounded by an inordinate traffic. Also, we’ll litter, hock a loogie, cut queues and stage civil disobedience at individual level wherever and however possible. Despite all of this, we still manage to avoid the much-deserved self-loathing – creating a not-so-smug city full of smugger inhabitants – one day at a time.

Over the past many years, our excuse has been the cliché: chaltha hai toh chalne doh! After all, expecting anything different from us would have been a bit preposterous too given the undermining circumstances a majority of the city-dwellers survive in. There is an utter disregard for law and order, yes. But there is failing governance, rumpled administration and crumbling infrastructure to balance the blame beam. It’s a unique case of two clenched fists shaking hands to make ends meet.

So here’s what I think will put an end to this miserable crap. Snowfall. Yup. Mumbai requires snowfall more than anything else. This city burns throughout summer but then which Indian city doesn’t! The only difference is the excruciating humidity. Expectedly, rain happens every monsoon that leaves us asking for less. Soon afterwards, winter takes place. Now, winter is supposed to be cold but Mumbai has a rather warm winter so basically what we get is a raw deal from Weather God. We are supposed to shiver and enjoy the whims of supercool wind (as long as no one’s homeless) but that’s not part of the ongoing reality.

A regular snowfall might change the whole scenario.

First of all, it will keep more people off the street and in their school, home and office.
Secondly, as the roads would be layered with snow, the chances of littering and defecating on them shall drop axiomatically.
Thirdly, and most importantly, unchecked immigration may take a belated pause, if not complete shutdown.
Fourthly, India as a nation will wake up and realize that Mumbai alone can’t carry the economical burden of the entire country.
Fifthly, global warming will turn out to be just another myth inspired by Iraqi WMD.
Sixthly, politics might suffer as an eventual byproduct.
Seventhly, Kashmiri snow could end up facing inferiority complex.
Eightly, miracles will be back in business.
Ninthly, Mumbai may not sink, as I SO want it to.
Tenthly, I might score better (read: sensible) topics to write on.

I’m sure there are more than ten reasons/outcomes why we should be having snowfall in Mumbai but I don’t know what.

Write whatever is left

2011-11-19T17:16:00.004+05:30

Last week, I found myself in a conference room with an elegant lady sitting across the table asking me “Why do you want to write?” That question caught me off guard and I did what I do best – gape with a patented awkward look. Then I mumbled trying really hard to make sense in my fluent Nonsense. Obviously, she didn’t buy them. Neither did I.

But now that I have ample time to improvise on my answer, I’ll sit back and type what I believe are the reasons why I want to write. For a start, I’m neither mundane nor skillful. And this reality is attested by my absolute disregard towards learning something as basic as replacing empty cooking gas cylinder with a filled one. It goes without saying that I’m darn lazy. But when it comes to writing, I guess I’m a different person. I can write. No matter how rubbish my thoughts are, I can truly write.

A: "I want to be a writer."

B: "You mean you want to die of hunger?"

A: "Nope. I want to be a writer."

People usually wait to break in. Like actors have their break with a certain movie. Or an IT professional with a remarkable project. But a majority of us often forget that we had our first break with education. We were lucky enough to grow up as literates. And the ugly fact that there are still billions who don’t receive the kind of exposure to knowledge the way we did is preposterous. No matter how big a Pink Floyd fan one is, s/he can’t disagree that that cult song couldn’t have been penned had the band members been illiterates.

Having said that, not everyone can write. Everyone has a story, yes. But not everyone can write, no. There is a widespread misconception among literates that they are always write. In simpler words, some of the brilliantest writers who lived never had the fortune to write. There are zillions of thoughts enveloped in an idea but very few are able to draw them down to alphabets and let it flow on a page or screen. Besides, it’s rather tough to find an excellent writer as they are mostly lost in thoughts. On the other hand, some of the greatest writers will remain so as long as we don't get to read their books.

I want to be a writer too but while I’m at it, I wish to get paid. Though I don’t harbor Indian middle class’ (read: parents’) ambition of getting married and settled, I don’t desire to be broke either. You know the awkward moment when you and the ATM screen engage in a staring contest and you always end up blinking first. Yeah, that.

My love for writing is conceptualized in a simple philosourphy – don't bother whether you're wrong or right, simply write whatever is left. In a not-so-ideal world, a writer is the pauper who writes on his own, of his own, but nothing to own. Well, that may be the harsh reality but a writer is not someone who writes but someone who gets paid for doing so.

For instance, have a look at Twitter. Some of the brightest thoughts disguised as jokes are relegated from public memory in the name of tweets. These lines get circulated far and wide but eventually they don’t carry the name of the person who wrote them in the first place. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with it as plagiarism and attribution don’t sleep with each other on Internet. In any case, pro bono tweeting is rubbish for charity. And to help this illation, there are remnants of a failed writer in every tweep.

Fair enough.

Coming back to the HR’s question, I thought I’ll be able to express why I want to write in this blog piece but I digressed and got carried away as usual. Perchance I need to abandon one-linerism and go back to poetry. Back to a boundaryless world where the poet and his poems are meant for each other. He writes them. They read him. Or maybe I just need to STFU and then write a book on how.

Lost and found... in childhood

2011-11-15T20:07:00.004+05:30

No matter how tough we think we are, we aren’t as tough as our childhood memories. There is something about them that grows on us. And then we reach that point in our life where it's impossible to go back. And then we die. And then they return to the womb of nature.

Childhood memories are untouchable. I mean, in a good way, not in the Indian casteist context. Of course, you may not remember every single detail of what happened thousands of days ago but still. Your childhood memories will never forget you. If you think about it, memories are what we are left with at the end of the day. Or for that matter, at the end of our existence. And what can possibly beat the era when we had no idea what we are getting ourselves into. Everything little incident was a surprise and continued to be so.

My childhood lacked imagination as I never had a friend like Hobbes. It wasn’t epic. The primary reason being that I can recollect quite vividly most parts of it so the veneer of mystique remains missing in my case. Though there were folks from those days who threw permanent color on my psyche when we passed each other. Such people somehow fail to perish. They just linger on in the nous triggering your nostalgia button every now and then.

One such personality was my grandma. I miss her as she was the only one I knew who loved me expecting absolutely nothing in return. She was a wise angel who weaved and narrated ceaseless yet brilliant stories. She used to tell us, “At any give time, you can be a lot better human being.” At that age, we had vague understanding of what she was trying to convey but those words, along with myriads other words, remain etched in my Tulu mind.

My cousin was another such person who made a huge impact. He was a free spirit – someone who won’t lay manacled to societal (dis)order, especially bunt community’s endogamic mores. He dropped out of medical college. I still wonder why he did that. After all, he was the one who told me, “A doctor saves life. It’s a rare gift.” I too wanted to become a doctor when I grow up but that phase didn’t last long. All things said and not done, he passed away at the age of 29. Unfulfilled potential, withstanding.

We basically miss the childhood we never had. Exaggeration is a pain reliever against our present state of affairs. The shy child in us is what makes us act all grown up. Sometimes, there is not only a child but an entire kindergarten in each one of us. Funny how our species is programmed to grow! By all accounts, one stops growing the moment one avoids being childish and begins to perceive others as childish.

I reminisce all the stupid things I committed when I was very young and how little I’ve changed since then. I guess it’s my karma to be an aching two-legged creature who failed to become a superhero despite being bitten by spider on numerous occasions. Perhaps selecting a proper childhood hero makes a hell lot of difference. Hence I blame Mowgli for whatever I am today.

I blame God too for not existing nor pretending to listen to my childhood prayers. I’m convinced that if at all there is a God, he'd be a lot like Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory. Only a bit more childish and with severe OCD.

Diwali: I am Jack's utter lack of darkness but aplenty in noise.

2011-11-02T14:52:00.005+05:30

The smoke has settled. The noise is dead too. By this, I mean nobody is bursting firecrackers nor feeling jubilant about not getting burned in the process. All in all, Diwali is no more. At least for now. Just two nights ago, I wished folks in my neighborhood took a break and while they were at it, donated their ammunition of firecrackers to Army or something.

Yeah, I must be sounding like a party pooper here with an anti-festival stand but that’s only half of the truth. What I am versus are these morons who sadly belong to the very same species I come from. Now that’s not to surmise that I’m wise et al but considering the present situation, I won’t give into invisible peer pressure and create unnecessary din.

Early Stone Age men who discovered fire must have been Hindus. Perhaps that could have explained our infatuation with firecrackers. Or maybe not. Anyway, show me one person who enjoys the noise these firecrackers produce. Just one person. You can’t, can you? Well, those who fired crackers are the only ones who derive sadistic pleasure from them while the bystanders’ eardrums wish the commotion end as quickly as possible. This is the other half of the truth I was referring to earlier. The government has already levied a noise curfew but not everyone adheres to it and to top that, the power-that-be hardly reacts to such disobedience.

You see, it’s quite interesting to note that Diwali is a festival of lights, not chemicals. I’m pretty sure no one exploded loud irritating bangers when Lord Rama returned to Ayodhya crooning ♫ ♪I’m coming Ommmmmmmm♫ ♪ a la Ozzy Osbourne! But what we witness today is a chaotic aberration of how things should have been but are somehow distorted by overt commercialization of an event. Correct me if I’m wrong but Diwali should be more of diyas, sweets, lanterns, rangolis, social gatherings and noiseless-firecrackers-bursting-in-the-sky, if you will. But that obviously ain’t the case.

Though it’s not specifically a Hindu festival, so to speak, considering the fact that Jains, Buddhists and Sikhs celebrate it too according to their assorted legends, the diyas are nonetheless missing in numbers in urban India. Diwali has become an Indian festival celebrated with made-in-China lanterns. Blame it on globalization. Of course, everyone have their own way of celebrating as well as celeberating and one can’t superimpose their beliefs on others. End of argument.

I love Diwali too as millions out there do. Especially when I’m not wondering how Sri Lankans feel about this hyped festival of ours. My mind may not comply with religious byproducts but my tongue holds nothing against delicious festive food. I have a soft corner in my mouth for sweets. My decaying sweet teeth can vouch for that! But you get sick of sweets after a while. This is how it works – you crave Diwali sweets; you devour 'em; you get bored; you run out of 'me; and then you miss 'em. Tada. Diwali has ended. You know the drill.

I also like to see my house spick and span though (unlike my amma) I resent the painstaking procedure called cleaning. Just to put things into better perspective, the reason why I hate firecrackers so much is I can’t possibly make more noise than they do. And for the record, in an internet-less parallel universe, each one of us must be busy participating in criminal activities like bursting firecrackers be it Diwali or not.

the Bucket List stops here

2011-10-23T18:10:00.005+05:30

Everyone has a Bucket List. No, not the DVD of that senior citizen movie (nor the torrent considering how deep we’ve dived into the Somalia-less ocean of internet piracy). I mean the real deal. We may not jot down on a paper or notepad lest someone accuses us of being pedantic but it’s always hovering in the backyard of our empty mind. These are those stuff that you wish to accomplish before you go back to hell and brag in front of His Evilness Devil himself. The list could include anything from watching Elvis perform live (he ain't dead) to visiting El Dorado (yeah, it exists) to tapping a Playboy model (die, Hefner, die). Ahem. I got carried away there. Regardless, Bucket List is a must-have, especially when you are sure that you are not immortal.

A Bucket List is very similar to the one we prepare at the very beginning of the year. Like every January, we invent this huge list of to-dos which we resolve never to do. On the contrary, they do us. Likewise, there ought to be a list that addresses the disappointments and the apparent adaptations-cum-modifications required to fill the vacuum of a lifetime. In fact, the only difference between Bucket List and New Year Resolutions is there isn't a movie titled on the latter YET!

Just to give a peek into how a Bucket List should NOT look like. Here's mine. It is a bit haphazard, to say the least; but honest, to say the most. Just lying.

Bucket List #01:-Tame the Fail Whale and then take it for a long ride.

Bucket List #02:- Reach the top of Mt. Everest and burp loudly.

Bucket List #03:- Conserve Tulu-speaking tigers (whatever that means).

Bucket List #04:- Find a heart that's made of glass. And break it.

Bucket List #05:- Unlearn to sing in my crowf-ed voice.

Bucket List #06:- Rewrite (in)human history.

Bucket List #07:- Check into Hotel California and then leave.

Bucket List #08:- Fluently talk like Marlon Brando in Godfather sans the toilet paper.

Bucket List #09:- Pen a script on Orwell’s life and persuade Sean Penn to take the leading role as well produce the movie.

Bucket List #10:- Get laid.

Bucket List #11:- Bag a Nobel Prize for letting others win Booker, Pulitzer and whatnot.

Bucket List #12:- Quit passive smoking.

Bucket List #13:- Write a song in favour of arranged marriages just for the heck of it.

Bucket List #14:- Fcuk off for real.

Bucket List #15:- Die on the last Sunday of my life.

Bucket List #16:- Learn break dancing to Vande Mataram in the background.

Bucket List #17:- Discover new colors.

Bucket List #18:- Strike out all the previous seven inanities mentioned and focus hard on #10.

Bucket List #19:- Make an offer that got refused the first time around.

Bucket List #20:- Learn to write the way Obama does with a twisted wrist.

Bucket List #21:- Quit social media sooner or later…whichever happens later.

Come to think of it, every little thing we do must be a part of someone else' Bucket List. By that logic, we are all living each other's dreams.

A majorly known minority and NOT counting!

2011-10-19T21:16:00.006+05:30

Which is the first word that springs to your mind when you think of Parsis? Other than endangered, I mean? Homi Bhabha? Rich? Dhikra? Elite? JRD? Philanthropy? Berry Pulao? All right. These are few associated with them but there is this one term they truly deserve but hardly get referred by. Minorities. They are one of the very few communities in India who can actually call themselves THAT and get away with whatever they want in the name of political reservation. But unfortunately, that ain’t the lame case. No one assorts pity when it comes to Parsis for a very simple reason – they don’t need it. Ironically, the word 'parsimonious' has nothing to do with Parsis.

They may be accused of being English during the Raj but then so were the princely Maharajas and Nabobs of that time. What matters is Parsis have been actively contributing to the bigger canvas named society thanks to their collective acumen in the world of business. In other words, they kept the promise their Dastur made to the Gujarati king centuries ago. Even today Tata is the most beloved brand hence duly respected too. Reliance may be roaring loud but it lacks overall public goodwill. The balance Parsis maintain between personal prosperity and public welfare is worth emulating. Thanks to the number of hospitals, schools, museums, and other such people-oriented undertakings, they have successfully carved a niche for themselves in metropolitan India.

About two weeks ago, I and my equally crazy friends biked all the way to Udvada in Gujarat to visit India’s (or should we say, world’s) oldest functioning Parsi fire temple. The only trouble was getting in as Parsis are quite particular about prohibiting non-Parsis from entering their religious premise. Give or take, that day, four guys from New-Bombay were utterly disappointed. Not with Zoroastrian in general but with their own lack of preemptive research! But anyway, it was an enriching experience as we visited a nearby museum, coincidentally inaugurated by NaMo, that detailed Parsis and their way of life and a lot more. My personal favorite was reading Sam Manekshaw’s contributions though I’m a pacifist and all that jazz.

Coming back to their dwindling number, one can’t overlook the stringent laws Parsi religious heads adhere to in the sensitive matters of inter-religious marriages and the resulting proselytism. This penchant towards staying ‘pure’ has badly affected their census number. Had there been some relaxation and due acceptance of non-Parsis into the fold once they marry a Parsi, things could have been numerically colorful. And Parsippany indeed would have been a place full of epiphanic Parsis.

Parsis basically follow 3 principles in life: good thoughts, good words and good deeds. No wonder they are on the endangered list today. Secondly, the word of the year for Parsis is and shall always be reproduction. Seriously. One can fully understand the vanity in preserving something that is not at all interested in avoiding extinction but still. After all, who cares whether Freddie Mercury was a Parsi who just happened to be gay enough to title his band “Queen”! Speaking of which, I’m aware of four Boman Iranis. Perhaps along with Parsis, their names are scuppered too. Blame it on globalization but we are so busy running that we have stopped bothering where a person comes from as long as we know where he’s headed to. And there’s hardly anything wrong with it, ad hoc.

Concluding where I started from, if you think of Parsis and the word ‘endangered’ doesn't click in your mind, then you are definitely a Parsi.

P.S. When I have absolutely nothing else to do, I worry about Parsis' declining population.

Through a jobless pair of eyes

2011-10-16T18:52:00.008+05:30

I’ve entered my fourth week of unemployment. This whole newness is so surreal in a very non-Luis Buñuel kind of way. Being free and moneyless and all. The thing is when you have a job, all you want to do is slack. For the employed, job is a dirty word. But as soon as you get to the other side of the fence, things starts falling into perspective. Or rather, things fall into uglier perspective. For the record, most of my weekdays are spent on a mundane hype called weekends. No kidding. I literally wait for Saturday. I haven’t figured out why yet, though.

Once you’re jobless, you notice stuff you used to take for granted or forgot to notice in the first place. For example, all unhappy employees are alike. They’ll find excuse to hate their job more than they are supposed to. It’s an evolutionary build-up against complacency. You’ve got to abhor the very enemy that supports you financially. That’s how it works. Of course, I’m not speaking on behalf of all employed folks. I am just pitching up for 98.71% of the crowd. The bottom-line is some people will never be happy. Let's just call them employees.

I was once Jack's raging employee who was not able to keep up with social media. In my erstwhile office, I used to struggle with the organizational setup to tweet on a regular basis which was nevertheless difficult. That’s one of the reasons why I turned bot on Twitter. But now that I am majorly indoors, I wonder why core issues like unemployment are seldom discussed on the timeline. The reason is pretty simple – most of the tweeps are unemployed and home truths are hard to swallow (or sell). Furthermore, no one can match unemployed folks in driving the point home. There are positive sides too. Unemployed folks try not to take God's name in vain on a Friday morning.

I miss my colleagues as well as my boss sometimes. Just for old times’ sake. Nothing personal. Whenever people ask me why I left my job, I try to be at my diplomatic best and suggest that there comes a time in every person’s life when he contemplates becoming a farmer with unlimited access to internet. And then, in my defense, I remind them that my forefathers were bona fide farmers so maybe I should go back to ploughing. But the truth is there comes a time in an employee's life when he decides to take a lifelong break from serving a particular field. And that’s exactly what I did. On a broader scale, I was done with transcription.

I don’t want to be an employee anymore. I want to be one of those guys from Indian TV soap operas who never have a job yet live a rich life full of dialogues. Just kidding. By the way, although I’m a Christopher McCandless fan, I’ve got nothing against money. I’ll never burn them. I’ve been working since I turned 20 so I guess I value money and the hard work that goes behind earning it. And Nickelback's Rockstar is nothing less than an inspiration. Not.

Having said that, employees are nothing more than salaried machines. We like to call ourselves employees as it sounds cool but it doesn't change the fact that we are bonded laborers who gave up too soon. For the record, the company I used to work for was way too kind to tolerate my mediocrity. I remember the chair I used to sit on. It was like the loyalest employee out here. It won’t let me get up unless my job allowed me to. OK. Granted, that was an exaggeration. I can afford one, as always. Like jobless guys are expected to.

Life, try not to die today

2011-10-10T22:01:00.002+05:30

Everybody believes the race is up against time when in practicality, it is Death we are chasing. The poor florist has to sell his flowers before time smuggles them to Death. No matter what, we are all programmed to end up on the losing side of Life. You see, the problem with Death is it knows exactly what it's up to. Life, on the contrary, doesn’t. In the battle between Life and Death, one of them gives up to let the other survive. Furthermore, Life speaks Death fluently and vice versa. They are made for each other. Ironically, Life and afterlife are conjugated by Death.

A few days ago, I woke up to the news that Steve Jobs has passed away to a place in dire need of technological innovation. I always admired him for the way his Life shaped up and inspired millions not only to touch buttons on their small screens but also give digital revolution a chance. And like the rest of them, I too was shattered. The last time I felt such grief was when Pope John Paul II deceased. It’s kind of a strange feeling to be sad for someone whom you haven’t met but are damn sure about their goodness.

A few hours later, I was confronted with the knowledge that my close friend’s mom has fallen victim to a fatal heart attack amid Vijaya Dashami in a local temple that very morning. This was too much. It was like Death retweeting itself (for those who are familiar with Twitter). She was such a beautiful person. This was not only cruel but also unjustified. But then, who will challenge the final verdict? No one, I suppose. Maybe Death is the most pragmatic thing that ever happens to us. If not, kindly point me down the path that won’t lead to Death.

And then today, dad informed me that Jagjit Singh, one of the finest few Ghazal singers I admire, has left earthly bounds. Of course, there’s nothing phenomenal about people taking birth and then dying eventually. But still, you want others to survive; live one more day; get a better hang of Life. And if things don’t materialize according to your wishes, then you pray or hope the person dies an easy Death. The reason for this concession lies in the fact that there is no such thing as a perfect Death. How can there be a perfect Death when there ain't no perfect Life? By the way, Humpty Dumpty deserved a better Death.

Dying is totally over-rated. So is birth. Both happen every single day. Well, can't say the same about Life though. After all, the most constant side effect of Life is Death. People die in earthquakes and whatnot and term it accidents, either man-made or natural. While doing so, we conveniently overlook the truth that Death is a natural disaster, too. These are the times when all our opinions about Life and Death sum up to what they are indeed worth – nothing. Apparently we face too many of near-Death experiences but very few of near-Life ones to comment. That’s the reason we haven’t come to terms with this reality YET! Give or take, nothing else kills us faster than Death.

Birth gets trampled by childhood that gets trampled by youth that gets trampled by dotage that gets trampled by Death.

Lately, some Tibetans immolated themselves as a protest against Chinese aggression in Tibet. They merely burned themselves to Life, not Death. I fully endorse these sort of protests in which you hurt yourself instead of innocent bystanders. Needless to say, The Burning Monk is my hero. History is rife with such hyped glorious stories, permanent deaths and a little bit of temporary lives embedded in between.

Poets, not philosophers, came close to deciphering the mysteries of how everything begins and ends. They made a habit of romanticizing the experience of leaving this planet forever. I've got nothing against them or the alcohol they were on but I’m sure there must be better ways to die a poetic Death. Metaphors containing myriad meanings had been employed by them which help us get close to the cold truth. I agree with most of these verses and disagree with very few. For instance, economy, not Death, is the great leveler. And sometimes, we do feel older than Death.

Tip: Smile. Death can wait for your poker face.

There comes a moment in everyone’s Life when they finally learn to STFU. Nah, I ain’t talking about Death here. It’s called common sense. The court think it can decide (preferably, on behalf of the citizens and based on human laws) what is right and what is wrong when it comes to sentencing someone to hang till kingdom come. In any case, Death penalty itself is a crime. You can’t go wrong with this. If A kills B and C kills A via legal frameworks, then there is very little difference between A and C. Having said that, I’m not at all in favour of Kasab *enjoying* the costliest criminal status in India. There is no way can he reconcile with the grave mistakes he committed under the guise of ignorance and brainwashed ideology. Perhaps Death is more disappointed in him than Life itself.

"If you were on a death row, what would you like your last meal to be?"

"Delivered on time."

Death is beautiful because, unlike most other things in Life, it happens just once. It will certainly smell sweet if one is drowned in a pool full of chocolate or ice-cream. I keep discussing Death as it makes me feel good about the Life I never had. As I’m growing older, I’m realizing how lonely I really am. I don’t fantasize killing myself or anything. I am too selfish for such foolery. But every time someone I look up to or love decides to call it a life, I wonder why. Thankfully, I’ve stopped molesting poetry. Or else I’d have written some miserable verses on the perpetual shallowness of Life and the escapism facilitated by Death instead of this lengthy falderal. Anyway, just because I never had a Life doesn't mean I can't comment on it. By that yardstick, none of us should ever mention Death.

RIP My Transcription Career (Mon, 24 Sept, '07 – Fri, 23 Sept '11)

2011-09-26T13:09:00.006+05:30

Today marks the first Monday of my unemployment. For the past four years, this particular day has been the scariest of all. But not today. I left my job as a transcriber gone Friday and I guess I’m done with business transcription for good! I always knew I’ll be quitting someday but I just didn’t know whether I had the guts to type out a polite resignation letter. We tend to find a comfort zone and then get stuck in it, not knowing what lies beyond that perfunctory farewell mail.

Two years ago, I wrote this piece commemorating my completion of two years in the industry! But as of now, I can claim to be a former transcriber instead of a transcriber. What a relief! No matter how accomplished a transcriber you are, it's always a pain to explain what transcription is all about. And trust me, not many people are aware of it. I’m sure even you don’t know much about it. (So, you don't know what transcription is all about, huh? I wish I had that privilege!) Unfortunately, the greatest thing about transcription does not exist. The corporate clowns speak. The listless transcribers discern. The editors curse transcribers for shoddy work. The transcription industry yawns.

A:- "Which one is easier when you're dead sleepy – transcribing or editing?"

B:- "Sleeping."

I joined transcription after I dropped out of engineering college. It was like an escape or a detour or something to ease my cluttered mind. I just needed a job and got one and stayed with it for the consecutive four summers. Much to my colleagues’ amusement, I often joke that I drained 4 years of my not-so-precious life for the *betterment* of this industry. You see, transcription requires a very basic skill – listening. And not many of us carry a good pair of unbiased ears. A lot of joinees discontinue, unable to take the stress. Yes. There is a very stress-friendly environment out there with the blaring microphone latched on your pate; eyes rolling; fingers tap dancing; a leg placed on pedal to adjust the flow. In spite of all these hyperbole, the job is rewarding to those who know for sure why they got themselves into this nocturnal number-chasing rigmarole! ‘

The next level of progression for a transcriber is to become an editor. Editor’s job looks easy but is way too tedious and arduous, too. For me, if you’re are transcriber and aspiring to be a better transcriber, you’re screwed. Your aim should be to be ANYTHING other than to be a transcriber. An editor, perhaps. Or a Quality Analyst or a manager or the CEO of the damn company.

Of course, this shows the kind of transcriber I am. I mean I was. Every time I watch an English movie without subtitles, I realize how terrible a transcriber I turned out to be. Being a lousy transcriber, I hated my profession from the bottom of my fingers. My typing was not an issue. 90 WPM is my bitch! Even the foreign accents were not an impediment provided the audios were of good quality. My issue was I just couldn’t find out the reason why I wasn’t in some other job that involved writing – to be a writer – the ones who are able to accurately transcribe what the voices in their head dictates.

The unfavouritest quote in transcription: "Please standby. We are about to begin."

As a kid, my only ambition was to become Mowgli. I don’t know when exactly Mowgli got replaced by Transcriber. How life transforms from chasing dreams to chasing deadlines! As a solace, Transcriber is the superhero who types so quick that sparks fly from his fingertips, not to mention his bleeding ears. Professionally speaking, the fact that Lord Ganesha ‘transcribed’ Mahabharata was a huge consolation for me.

The favouritest quote in transcription: "And we have no further questions. You may now disconnect."

People ask me why I quit and that too in the middle of the fiscal year. I could have stayed back 4 more months and collected my annual bonus and then quit. On top of that, I recently got a raise. My colleagues are basically perplexed. Nothing new but I had many benefits in this job which I’m not entitled to anymore. They always had a hunch that I am a moron but this abrupt act of leaving confirmed their doubts.

To be honest, I myself have no particular reason or answers. Perhaps I just wanted to be blissfully unemployed. Anyway, for a two-bit transcriber, I was way too busy. Secondly, my health was suffering too. My former sleep pattern jumped out of the window and committed suicide. I can say I was healthy once upon a time and then I joined this ball-busting industry. My ears have grown deaf, too. In fact, partial deafness is the first sign of becoming a brilliant transcriber. But in my case, the brilliance got replaced by a higher volume of deafness.

I know I’m sounding pathetic and unprofessional. But let me remind you, a jobless guy can’t afford to be professional. Besides, they'd call you unprofessional in case you died transcribing in the office. Even if you are the world’s finest transcriber, you'll never hear an ant sing or a heart break. And then one fine day, your will be speaking in a strange accent and your job would have rubbed off on you.

Stuff you don’t ask a transcriber during quarter peak season: "How are you?"

There were things I liked about my job. For instance, we work in absolute silence. Transcribers appreciate silence. In reality, no one appreciates silence more than a transcriber who is covering an accented conference call. Although I couldn’t become a good transcriber despite spending four years on it, there are guys out there who can pick up stuff normal human ears can’t possibly replicate.

So, what next? I’ve got no idea. I don’t even have a back-up job. Most probably, I’ll stay home for a while and try to get my procrastinating ass into some writing-related work, if possible. In the meantime, also teach some SSC kids grammar for a month or so. Sleep at night for a change. Jog. Live.

the journey from Pakis(ass)tan back to Pakistan....

2011-09-21T18:20:00.009+05:30

On 19^th September, 2011, Pakistan woke up to a bomb blast in Karachi and somehow managed to end the day with the same in Peshawar. And to top it all, Pakistanis are pretty much used to the trend now. For a nation carved out for the welfare of the minorities, it doesn’t care about smaller communities nor bears the necessity of protecting them at any cost.

To paraphrase, Pakistan is an international headache. Worse off, an incurable migraine. Add to this, the natural calamities it faces nearly other year. Last year, one-fifth of Pakistan was under water. As we speak, Sindh is badly affected by flood and the kind of apathy – shown by the government as well as the people in other parts of the nation – is shameful to say the least. All in all, you’ve got a country that’s mired in acute hopelessness and financial debts. Over the years, it has accumulated so much bad press that the image is not going to cleanse itself overnight. The throes of disasters ranging from serious internal rumblings and suspicious bearing in the global fora are everyday fodder for news.

Sounds clichéd? Well, the word is facts.

Now, let’s change the track a bit and see what could be on the other side of the canvas. After all, challenges beckon opportunities to rise! I know we can’t compare instances of revival that happened in the case of Japan, S. Korea, Singapore, and China. But did Japan in its heydays anticipated that in the years to come, China will recover its lost economic ground and gain foothold in world affairs?

Well, Pakistan finds itself in a unique paradigm. So that’d be totally out of question considering the extreme parameters and present day circumstances. But then, we can’t discard the possibility either. Anything can happen. And anything does happen. There is still a floating probability that Pakistan will rise in the future. All it has to do is some soul searching provided some soul is left in there. It has to ask tough questions and then settle with the truth.

No other nation on the planet in modern era had tried to tamper with genuine history the way Pakistan has. Here is a nation founded on the basis of fear. Fear of being ill-treated and subjugated by the majorities. And to sustain this theory, it had to create a false grandeur of paranoia and self-righteousness. Of course, this practice helped for a while to keep the newborn nation united but eventually the seams came apart. And the Frankenstein we are witnessing today in the form of domestic terrorism is a byproduct of that experiment.

People often say Pakistan’s biggest problem is its obsession with religion. Yes, it’s true but that’s not entirely the case. Religion is merely a blindside designed for the benefit of military, mullahs and self-proclaimed ultra-nationalists. The real problem is commerce. Or should I say, the lack of it. Citizens shy away from paying taxes. Law and order is synonymous with nepotism and cronyism. The loans granted by the Western countries are rising on a daily basis. Net-net, everything appears shoddy thanks to the sway military holds within the boundary with no opposition whatsoever. Democracy is a charade. Ironically, Pakistan wholeheartedly exercises democratic freedom of expression only when it comes to allowing anti-India slogan rallies.

Furthermore, the National Assembly is highly inspired by the Indian Parliament and functions more like a circus and less like the way it should be. Under such situations, economy is bound to choke. And it is choking. Badly. As far as economics goes, Pakistan has become the 51st state of United States but pays the price with innocent lives.

Foremost of all, Pakistan needs to be at ease with itself. It should embrace its history. There is no point running away from its origin. Changing syllabus doesn’t change a nation’s chronicle nor its destiny. Secondly, it should breathe free and develop a vision for itself. That doesn’t necessarily have to coincide with what Jinnah had in mind for it’s quite obvious that Jinnah was a confused personality. Like Gandhi, he too was a flawed character, but unlike Gandhi, he wasn’t the introspective kind. No wonder Pakistan finds itself without a horizon today.

Islam at its sectarian best resulted in nothing but bloodshed after bloodshed after bloodshed. Even during the holy month of Ramadan. The idea of secularism should be given a chance. If not, the most reasonable solution would be to allow Pakistan to be a moderate Muslim country. That'd include electoral reforms like abolition of separate electorates system, reorganization of provinces based on mix of ethno-linguistic claims and administrative convenience, etc.

Reforms must take place be it in agriculture or foreign policies. Speaking of its neighbors, it has to build a more transparent relationship with everyone in the vicinity. China may be an all-weather friend but when the heat’s up, only Pakistan sweats. Plus, it’s high time Rawalpindi overcame its India-centric complex. Pakistan's fiercest enemy is Pakistan, not India. In fact, Pakistan is one of those few blessed countries (along with India) that can do without an enemy!

Kashmir is and will always be an apple of discord but a Pakistani snubbing Balochistan but urging for Palestinian freedom is a lot like an Indian ignoring Kashmir but advocating Tibetan independence. Go figure. That’s how things are in Indian subcontinent.

Trade should be the language between the two countries; forget conjoined past and sentimental attachments. Better grow up before time runs out. Besides, the nuclear warheads ain’t going to feed the masses (especially, those from the non-military end). Besides, the climate of hatred and indifference should be checked.

I know expecting the above said would invite lot of criticism, muted or otherwise, or may even invoke laughter in some quarters as Pakistan is indeed a very curious case. Agreed, the State of Pakistan is in denial with its milieu but will that be the case forever (or to be honest, aren’t there still many sane voices, maybe overawed by extremist souls?). Someday, there’ll be a strong possibility of ordinary citizens asking very uncomfortable questions to the State instead of mullahs and televangelists and demand legitimate answers and not postulate conspiracies as pills for remedy. That day isn’t far away.

Like the world is now coming to terms to rise of the East i.e. Asia [exclude Myanmar, Pakistan (you were expecting this, right?), etc], others may need to comprehend Pakistan when it may rise (if it will). Assuming that it will, it’s better to hope for the best and work towards that goal. Anyway, Pakistan is a 64-year-young country. There is still time.

When China dialed 911

2011-09-12T10:07:00.013+05:30

Technically, it’s still 9/11 today in New York. And that’s what matters. For the unaffected lot, it could be ‘World Conspiracy Theory Day’– a day that shocked humankind at the very onset of the 21^st century. It was also a morning that redefined the word Terrorism and its extramarital affair with another word called Islam. Humanity, poor as it already is, paid a huge price. After all, hundreds of people perished within seconds leading to minutes leading to hours leading to days leading to months leading to years leading to a decade.

All in all, it was a terrible thing to have happened. And more importantly, it was a terribler thing to do. As a consequence, millions suffered and died (and are still doing) in Afghanistan, Iraq and other parts of the world where Western imperialism holds a sway. You see the problem with United States (unlike India) is it values her citizen’s life highly. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with it. Every nation should do the same. But not at the expense of others’ lives.

No other nation on the map today has disrupted and meddled in other countries’ affairs the way USA had. It’s an open secret. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to state that America’s foreign policies work mysteriously. For America. Perhaps with great power comes great responsibility to take care of your own. And no one but your own!

Now, my intention ain’t to decide who is right or wrong and whether the whole 9/11 tragedy was justified. First of all, it CAN’T be justified and secondly, who am I to decide? Thirdly, people shouldn’t be killed when they are at work in their offices. And we are talking of a casualty figure amounting to 3,000 lives within half a day.

Anyway, thousands of conspiracy theories have been circulating on internet since the day those two humongous buildings gave birth to Ground Zero. Some people are still not convinced of the terrorist attacks’ genuineness. They feel it was a deliberate attempt by US to enter Middle-East politics via Tora Bora and to ultimately gain a foothold in the neighboring regions. Muslims across the world pointed their fingers towards Zionist agents in Washington D.C.

Patriotism is a funny thing. American authorities lied through their teeth about WMD’s presence in Iraq and gave Saddam Hussain a free dental checkup while they were at it! Sophistry is a part and parcel of globalisation and the bloodshed it entails.

Amid such opaque circumstances and Pentagon classified documents that maybe shall see daylight 30 years hence, I thought why not add a new dimension to these theories and contribute to their long-lasting legacy in human entertainment?

Here’s my inference on what really must have happened: CHINA WAS BEHIND THE 9/11 ATTACKS!

The reason why I say so is, if you wonder who profited the most from the two pyrrhic wars Bush, Rumsfeld & Co. dragged United States into and the resulting financial crisis, the answer is plain and simple. China. The last decade proved to be a tilt in China’s favor in terms of economy and an unceremonious decline for her immediate rivals, Japan and USA . Also, better keep in mind that China is capable of such stunts. Moreover, since it’s China we’re discussing here, the question of morality doesn’t even arise. This is the very country that daringly sells arms to African outcast Sudan and Asian pariah Myanmar. And we better not talk about its clandestine contribution to Pakistan’s nuclear prowess. China does what it has to do to do others.

Coming back to the Sept ’11 attacks, the question that rings a bell in everyone’s mind is – how did those idiotically bearded terrorists manage to pull off such a brilliant Hollywood teaser with so much precision? The answer is simple. They didn’t. Some Kung Fu expert Chinese who grew up watched Con Air did. And they all died in the process leaving no trace of their identities. Who knows? Even Osama might have learned his withdrawal and tough-terrain-survival-tricks in Shaolin before ISI took pity and offered him an appartment at Abbottabad.

8 years down the line, United States slipped into recession while Beijing exhibited the most magnificent Olympics of all time. Collective embarrassment of banking sector followed by double-dip followed by quantitative easing followed by record unemployment followed America's bleeding trail like never before. On the brighter side, China continues to plays with the idea of pegging renminbi and boasts of an ever-increasing stake in U.S. foreign reserve. You get the picture.

Enough of lashing China for faring better than India at the moment in its race to superpowerdom! I guess I should stop here. This nonsense is getting stupider than I planned it to be. Whatever. This is exactly how a conspiracy theory ought to sound like.

Peace y’all.

One small step for Jobs; One giant slip for Apple

2011-09-04T04:38:00.006+05:30

There are very few people breathing out there whom I genuinely admire. Steve Jobs is definitely one of them. Not because he has more moolah than the U.S. Treasury itself. Or because he founded and guided the most valuable company on the planet. I look up to him because of the failures and daunting obstacles he faced and yet managed to ratchet through them. Needless to disclaim, he is not a perfect human being. No one is. But whenever I think of Apple, I see a thinner-than-before monkish guy in turtlenecks and jeans with a childlike enthusiasm to showcase the best of technology. And boy he does it so well!

Few years back, I read he used to walk 7 miles every Sunday night to ISKCON temple during his humble days to have a free-of-cost proper meal. I found the Indian tangent there intriguing but that’s not the point. The detail to gawk on here is his truly modest background. His father was a Syrian Muslim so basically he’s a Syrian-American though his mother was a white American. Since they were unmarried at the time of his birth, both kind of disowned him and put him up for adoption. His biological parents then had a daughter who is a famous novelist now. The surname Jobs comes from his foster parents.

For any adopted child, the sense of rejection is always lingering in the back of their mind. I wonder how it must be for a person to grow up and then later learn who their actual parents are. And such corny stuff! As far as I know, he hasn’t reconciled with his biological parents/family yet. Maybe that’s how it will be for the rest of his life.

Now, talking of Apple, funny things happened here, too. He hired a new CEO named Sculley who used to work for Pepsi-Cola in ’83 and as luck (bad luck, actually) would have it, Jobs had to leave the very company he built in ‘85. All thanks to the mutiny led by Sculley. Here, again, the idea of rejection by your own people returns to haunt him. But he’s not the kind to slip into a maudlin-filled cocoon. He sees this as an opportunity to check out new avenues.

Animation seemed like a pretty new and daring venture. And that’s when Pixar took flight. He spent the next 11 years, amongst other things, on nourishing Pixar into becoming what it is today – the most profitable animal studio in the business – which he eventually sold to Walt Disney in ’06 making him its largest individual shareholder. Even Walt Disney would have been proud of him!

Meanwhile, Apple realized it can’t do without Jobs’ chutzpah so they invited him back and he rejoined the board in ’96. It’s been a helluva ride for all Apple-worshippers since then! His phenomenal vision with a mantra of keeping tech as simple as possible clicked with the masses.

Beauty lies in the ‘i’ of Apple.

Cute little gadgets like iPod, iPhone with countless apps and heavier products in the form of iMac, iBook and ilk captured market’s imagination. And still do. Only multiple times more. iPad2 was the latest offering from their storehouse. All in all, innovation has been a key word in the way Apple thinks and works. And Steve Jobs plays first hand role in every execution. In fact, an anecdote about him advising his employees from the hospital bed while he was admitted for liver transplant is legendary.

He was declared the CEO of the noughties for all the good reason. But he has detractors too who criticize him for his clandestine design practice and ego! At least Apple is not facing plagiarism lawsuits like some top-shot tech companies are. I’m not defending it or anything. Just saying that their way of functioning works for both ends – assembly producers as well as end consumers.

Coming back to Steve Jobs, he resigned from his CEO position the very week I offered my resignation from transcription. Like they (don’t) say, great minds resign alike! He’ll be serving as Chairman though but his duties will be severely clipped due to the prostrate cancer he’s suffering from. The very news of his resignation sent the share market into a tizzy. But then it’s Apple and they hardly do anything wrong. He must have it all planned out. At least he always seems to.

Anna: An Inconvenient Hero

2011-09-03T23:38:00.017+05:30

Now that Anna-mania has substantially subsided in this country, I’m wondering what exactly makes a person hero in India. It’s an open secret that for a nation of more than 1.2 billion people, we face a severe drought of real-life icons. And Sachin alone won’t suffice.

In the midst of such anomalies, a 74 year old Gandhian named Anna Hazare declares a non-violent war against corruption. His cronies, Team Anna, even came up with a strong draft (Jan Lokpal Bill) which according to them, and unsurprisingly most of the urban populace, would check corrupt politicians and bureaucrats in the future. They expressed their desire to convert the draft into a law. As expected, the government didn’t comply under the disguise of protecting our sexagenarian constitution. As accepted, Anna embarked on a fast in protest.

All the major cities experienced an overwhelming stimulus resulting in gatherings to express support and solidarity. No surprises there when the middle class including youth rose in large numbers onto the street to make their frustration visible. It was pretty clear that Anna was not only popular but someone who meant business. He completed 12 days without food and the ruling government had to blink first.

What next? Celebration took place and people were exuberant believing they have dealt a heavy blow to a government that is unanimously perceived as corrupt. We can conclude that Anna went hungry but won the first round. Of course while doing so, he kept repeating that Team Anna were representing Aam Aadmi (Common Man) and referred themselves as Civil Society. They went on record and said they were fighting the Freedom Struggle 2.0.

How can people trust a government that ran scam after scam throughout the calendar? Genuine question.

But won’t the very democracy that enables hoi polloi to take a stand against what they feel is unjust be compromised if the draft goes against the very tenets of constitution? Another genuine question.

Democracy is the cornerstone on which our ever-expanding nation is based upon and is the primal reason why neither the geography nor the demography has changed since independence. Secondly, the constitution has been a dynamic force behind it. As far as the Jan Lokpal Bill is concerned, to be very frank, I’m not qualified or well-read enough to comment on the nuances. Nor are the people who think they are Anna. That’s precisely where the problem lies. A majority of those who turned up at Ramlila Ground to express their oneness with the cause most probably don't even exercise their right to vote. Furthermore, the media appeared biased and was literally commending Anna’s food-defying efforts.

Being human, we are bound to get excited but while we are at it, we often forget the price our next generation might well end up paying. A majority of you, your friends and their friends might be supporting the Jan Lokpal without even having an iota of knowledge what it states per se. It's similar to living in a city of blinds. Even if the light shows up, no one will have a clue!

Anyway, corruption didn't just took birth one fine morning and we were bewildered by its might. It's far more complex than that. And Anna Hazare is a honest but a very naive person to deal with that. He commenced with strong speeches against corruption but when the script didn't went the way he thought, the word bhrashtachar (corruption) was effectively replaced by the word sarkar (government). No big deal considering how stained the ruling party is in flesh and blood. But still.

In reality, the fight should have been a gradual progress against a systematic decay. The current need of the day is to check bribe and goonism rampant in the administration. And I guess one single bill is just a small step towards eliminating the virus. But yes, a very necessary step. Thankfully, the entire “uprising” was more or less peaceful unlike the ones that took place post-Jasmine Revolution throughout the Arab world.

Anna Hazare is not Gandhi. What happened in Ramlila Ground is a far cry from what happened during The Emergency of 1975. But the best part of the whole event lies in its irony. Anna's detractors would benefit the most if Anna proves right in the long run. After all, he participated in one of the most interesting episodes that tested the strength of Indian democracy. Net-net, the ruling government received a jolt it so desperately required and the country got a hero in return.

Can’t go to sleep? Go somewhere else!

2011-08-18T13:01:00.005+05:30

I didn't shut up. I was asleep. To be honest, I wasn’t as I’m too sad to be happy to be asleep. But I couldn’t come up with a better excuse for the delay in scrawling a thing or two for my Space.

Besides, I don't remember the last time sleep walked up to me. It was always me who shamelessly chased her. Yup. That’s how it is. Leading a nocturnal life for the past four years has taken a heavy toll on my eyes and the areas surrounding them, including brain. I’d love to be Rip van Winkle for a day and stay asleep for the next 20 years. Or if possible, at least 40. After all, falling asleep is not as risky as falling in love. The process begins with you and ends with you, no strings attached.

Going forward, sleep will be one of those tricks only babies can perform. For insomniacs like me, expressions like "sleeping like a baby" is such a cruel joke. However, I try to find some solace in the fact that sleeping like a log *sounds* a lot better than sleeping like a baby. Ask any newly-parented parent.

Speaking of parents, I love my family but I love them even more while they are asleep and almost non-existent. On a bad day, you can't tolerate them breathing around you and then they go to sleep. And snore. Similarly, my ma, like all other mothers, is beautiful; especially when she's asleep and not nagging me to shut down the PC. You know, you're supposed to close your eyes and pray when your ears starts whispering something and the quickest way left to overcome a night is by going to bed. Embarrassing as it is, when I’m asleep, my boner points to God. On waking up, it points to Devil. Life!

"I feel numb on waking up from sleep." "Try to wake up from something else." “o_O”

If you wake up to go to work and sleep to wake up to go to work, there is not much in your existence to live. On top of that, if you are not able to cover your forty winks adequately, life’s worse. At work, you may be just a blink away from falling flat on your nose. But before you know it, your job teaches you how to doze off with your eyes open. Sometimes yawning is the only thing that keeps you from typing with your nose. While going through such ordeals, all you desire is the floor you’re standing on, nothing else. To make matters pitiful, sleeping on the job cannot be as bad as waking up and finding yourself in office. And you just want to go home to watch a movie and drift off to sleep with headphones on, providing background music to your vacant dreams.

On weekends, being asleep is like a routine before Monday blues take over the scene. Waise, due to irregular sleep patterns, Monday doesn't wake up before we do like it once used to. Thanks to sleeplessness, we don't wake up scared in the middle of the night anymore, either. So in a way, there's plus points too.

There are two kinds of people in this world - those who try to sleep and those who try to live their dreams. The ones with sleeping disorder don’t fit in. They are the eternal misfits tortured by a f-ed up biological clock. For them, insomnia is rest for the soul. Moreover, by any logic, a deaf man sleeps soundest. Come to think of it, disability is an advantage in this case. When you have a sleepy face, no one frankly bothers whether you are paying attention to what they're saying or not.

I don't have a dream left/ Just a volatile wish/ A night to sleep my life off/ Or live my death in peace!

Sometimes all you need to do to make the world a better place is sleep. After all, you don't sleep. You just successfully pretend to dream. And at the end of the day, you go back to sleep with yourself. Happy are those who are asleep when they wish to be asleep and richest are the ones who sleep sound at night. Bleh. Sooner or later, everyone falls asleep. Despite massive advances in science, we neither know where sleep comes from nor where it goes back to.

May you sleep so deep that you forget your old self and wake up as the person you always wanted to be.

Enough of sleepy jabber. I should be asleep now but I am not. I shouldn't be napping in office later but I will be. Anyway I hereby exercise my right to be asleep again.

The monk who never sold his old bike

2011-08-05T13:34:00.005+05:30

Einstein and I share a liking for bicycle, violin and sailing. Okay. I haven't touched a violin nor sailed yet but I’ve got to start somewhere, right? You see, I like to think of myself as a very simple guy. Not because I am one but because I like to believe I am. Even my bicycle agrees with me. After all, we are friends. What are friends for other than pretending to think alike? As for the simple-guy-fantasy, someday I may not show up coz I'd be in Himalayas to fulfill my pursuit of becoming the monk who sold his bicycle. Yeah, something of that sort!

I’ve got to admit I love my bicycle dearly. But thanks to the kind of road we Indians are blessed with, it’s a tumultuous affair. In a more philosophical words, every once in a while we end up loving those who keep disappointing us. That's precisely the kind of relationship I share with my ‘cycle. He doesn’t appreciate my choice of riding under heavy rainfall with my windcheaters on. Maybe he gets cold. Whatever. Bicycles aren't supposed to be emotional. And it’s not his fault but he’s getting old like me and showing signs of infirmity.

It’s all right as long as the wheels are spinning.

Lately, while riding home, my bicycle turns nostalgic reminiscing the good ole days when there used to be a decent road instead of ruthless potholes. Anyway, I try to keep him well-groomed and oiled. Getting killed because of faulty brakes may sound heroic in Tour de France, not here. Moreover, no matter what, I often end up with a flat tyre. If you are a cycle-rider too, you must have noticed by now that a flat tyre is bicycle's way of demonstrating who is faster amongst you two. If you are not, think about it. I know this all thanks to the quality time I share with my bicycle. In fact, many a times, talking to my punctured bicycle while walking it home turns out to be the highlight of the day.

Me: “How far out can you take me from this society?”

Bicycle: “I know you're a teetotaler so stop talking like a boozer!”

By the way, do you remember the childhood thrill of riding a bicycle for the very first time on your own? You do? Well, that experience won't repeat itself again. Ever. This may sound cornier than I intend it to be but trust me when I say this – those moments may get lost in the labyrinth of our memory but nothing can possibly beat it. Deal with it.

Besides, bicycle is THE vehicle of the future. That’s a given. When this planet will be out of oil and all the misdeeds associated with its procurement, all of us will be going Dutch. And by Dutch, I don’t mean splitting the cost equally or something. I’m referring to the Netherlands’ love for cycling. Even today on a busy highway, the one riding a ‘cycle is the odd man (sneaking) out of the maddening rush.

Since I started with a narcissistic paragraph, let me end with one. I want everyone to know that I'm the only guy in my office that commutes by bicycle. Ergo, I'm saving the environment for your kids. In legal terms, each one of you owes me big time! Also, I’m the only known superhero who prefers to be a messiah who can’t walk on water but can balance himself on two wheels!!

Know news is good news!

2011-07-18T16:37:00.001+05:30

Disclaimer : No journalist or media-person was harmed during the making of this blog post.

You wake up everyday. I’m sure you woke up today, too. Once you are done with that, you get started with your routine. And one of the commonest human rituals is to read newspaper or to switch on the TV for news. (Unless you are one of those lucky people who are illiterate but content with their mundane ignorance!) Now, if your day begins with news, what does it say about you as a person? You are curious? Yup, always been. Want to stay abreast of current affairs? Great!

But what exactly do you do with all that you read and learn and watch presented under the garb of news? Nothing, in most cases. Following news is just another evolutionary practice inculcated into our daily life for knowledge’s sake. There is not much one can do about a majority of stuff out there on the paper or screen. So why are we so fond of news, be it good or bad? Because we are an entertainment-loving species and news is gossip presented in a very refined manner. As elementary as that.

On a personal scale, I relish half-baked truths. I have them for breakfast daily. The French in me calls it biscuit. They call it news. To add to the misery, I read something or the other every morning which tells me I should quit reading them. But I never do. In fact, the recent events revolving around Rupert Murdoch made me realize that even some of the oldest media giant might go down for news. Meanwhile, I’ve got no doubt that the world would miraculously change for the better the day we stopped reading newspapers. But then, even if I switched to TV, I’d still be hopeless. After all, in India, the thin line separating TV news from TV soaps is almost invisible now. And this has been the case long before Arnab decided to put the media in comedian.

You see, there might be absolutely nothing out there to report but our media will beautifully turn it into news for gab-hungry masses. Anyone can create news out of thin air. If nothing else works, the media can report on the thinness of the air. [No, wait, the weather bureau is already doing that, aren’t they?] Moreover, watching news destroys a few of those newsworthy moments that could have been ours. Being the minions that we are, we’ll never know what is true and what is being reported as true. Unfortunately, rumours won't give up on news at any cost and vice versa. Fortunately, the spread of fire will never catch up with the spread of its news.

One lesson newspaper teaches us every single day – better not believe every crap you read. Times changes, perceptions changes and of course, news changes. Remember when they got Osama (at last) and how he got killed by breaking news? No one was allowed to see his face nor his dead body but we somehow managed to gulp the shoddy information of his demise. At that moment, the less you looked out for news, the more you’re convinced of the sheer wastage of time and energy.

And the hard part is when they collect too many viewpoints at once and make you look confused than a newborn dinosaur. Goes without saying, the plural of news is nuisance. As a part of social experiment, we should read last week's newspapers and ascertain its relevance in present day, if at all. Or not check news, at all.

You’ll never come across a channel which will go “We’ve got breaking news for you! Damn. We just broke it!” That’s the whole point. There’s hardly anything sacred about truth or news or journalism at large. I don’t mean to sound cynical but everything is commerce now-a-minutes. And the day each one of us is happy is the day news dies.

Putting the quit in mosquitoes

2011-07-11T05:33:00.004+05:30

You know what sucks other than my blog? Mosquitoes. Humans may find it offensive but "You suck!" must be a compliment among mosquitoes. Yes, that’s common sense unless you are a mosquito who‘s reading this piece and feeling offended. Moreover, for a mosquito, human body is just another free bar.

For the record, I share a very bizarre relationship with mosquitoes. I admire them as well as hate them. It’d be fair to say that we are engaged in a die-unto-death battle. One of us has to give up to let the other survive. In my otherwise insipid life, I am guilty of massacring millions of these pests but it was always them who started the fight, not me. But I have to admit that every time I slay a mosquito, the loser in me receives a massive ego boost. The feeling that follows such act is beyond words (and sentences and paragraphs and blogs and universe and everything else!). Thankfully, it's easier to assassinate a well-fed mosquito than a famished one. Perhaps that is Mother Nature's way of making sure no one dies hungry.

It goes without saying that they effortlessly defeat the Gandhian in me because I’m usually a staunch pacifist, even to the point of wimpiness. But being a human, you’ve got to do what a mosquito wants you to do i.e. murder it. Despite all of this, we share a mutual respect for each other. But love is not in the air. Mosquitoes are. The trouble with mosquitoes is that they think they are smart. And the bigger trouble lies in the fact that they are INDEED smart.

For once, they are born with this innate ability to overlook human ugliness. We should be gracious to them for this kind consideration. No wonder they are pious beings. They are a god-fearing as they constantly hum their prayers. Killing them is like a double-edged sword. You are displeasing both Devil as well as God. To make matters worse, they are born musicians. Anyone can kill a mosquito but no one can take away its music. Besides, you only share your blood with them, not your wretched DNA.

I guess early human beings clapped to kill mosquitoes and then clapped more to celebrate their kill. That’s how clapping and mosquitoes got introduced to each other. On a personal level, I firmly adhere to the principle of not mulling those who don't belong to my house. And anyway, even the mosquitoes in my office are professional. They'll bite you only if you're idling around.

Like I mentioned before, mosquitoes possess some attributes unbeknownst to the rest of living beings. For instance, dignity. A bed bug will be prepared to get into your pants but a mosquito won’t ever stoop so low for food. They do face hard times like the rest of us but they’ll keep their proboscis stiff and stay out of fear. Well, for anecdote’s sake, I do remember a swarm of panicked mosquitoes once invading my room. I figured out then that nothing else scares the shit out of them the way rain does. Rain is like a wet ghost to them.

As I’m typing, I can’t help notice this time of the night when some fat mosquitoes get high on blood and crash into walls like drunkards do on street. It is also the period when you’re bound to be touched by their unparalleled love for your skin. You can’t deny that they love you even at their cost of their bloody life.

Appropriately, to set the mood right, I haven't killed a single mosquito tonight. Yeah, age and non-violence is catching up with me. Peace is temporary. Also, it’s a relief there ain’t any clapping limits on killing a mosquito. Or else, I wouldn’t have been the mighty mosquito warrior that I claim to be.

In closing, killing mosquito is a lot like playing Counter-Strike with your own blood and obviously I enjoy it but I won't be satisfied until I participate in the execution of that one last mosquito left on Earth.

A letter to my 16-year-old self

2011-07-07T04:41:00.007+05:30

Dear Me@16,
This mail shall reach you in the worst of your lostness and stupidity. But it’s alright coz you won’t be THIS young EVER again. And one day, nine years down the line, you’ll wake up and see yourself writing a blog piece on how things could have been different. At that moment, you’ll be running short of words while being busy looking for better excuses.

I understand you’re not sure what you want to do with your life. No one is. You are not the first human to be blessed with such indecisiveness. All around you are confused but they just pretend as if they know your roadmap. All you have to do is make a choice and stick to it. As of now, you must be wondering whether to opt for Electronics or Arts. Trust me, go for Arts. You are way too dull for engineering math and way too good to have a *secured* future. It’s better to be an unsuccessful writer than a terrible engineer. No kidding.

Pay attention to what I’m saying as I reckon you don’t listen to anyone. After all, I know you better than anyone else. Most importantly, live. Being scared is not a neutral trait. Stop being shy, you dumbfcuk! Go talk to that girl you liked in school. Trust me, it’s worth a try. Spend more time with grandma. She’ll be gone very soon. Take good care of your health. Swim. Run. Cycle. Play football. Do everything that you love but won’t get you killed before you turn 35. Stay in touch with those few dear school friends whom you’re not going to meet on a daily basis anymore. Send a common Thank You Letter to all school teachers and mention what they mean to you. You are not as bad a poet as you think. Of course, you could be worse than that but don’t you dare give up. Keep scribbling. Learn to play guitar. But don’t sing. Some voices are better left unsung.

Enough of lame advices! Moreover, there’s no point in talking sense into you anyway.

No matter how much I try, nothing will change. You’ll commit the same mistakes I did. You’ll learn the same lessons I learned. You’ll ultimately become Me@25. It’ll be a fun ride, though at points you’ll feel otherwise. And then one fine morning, you’ll write what you’re reading right now and feel good about having an active memory. Like they say, it’s all written…. in destiny or on internet.

Yours very own,
Me@25

N.B. The idea for the above piece came from this post where I left below my more-than-necessary-but-honest comment.

Canada & Kannada!

2011-06-26T11:57:00.004+05:30

Thinking has to be a human brain's favourite pastime. It loves to wander even if you don’t care to join it. Likewise, a human mouth’s favourite pastime is talking (read: gossiping). But when a person is busy thinking, a lot of factors conspire with each other and form a pattern of thoughts. It’s like a canvas filled with unexpressed words. Unfortunately, very few are able to transcribe what the voices in their head dictates. Fortunately, I’m not one of them. But to my credit, I was the first human ever to figure out that African Lion is an anagram of Californian. At least I like to believe so! And to add to my inglorious accomplishments, I achieved this *feat* when I was in eighth grade.

I fully understand whatever I just said doesn’t make sense (and nor will the stuff I’ll be blathering hereafter!). What I’m trying to say is we often stumble on ideas that are unique in a way we never imagined before. It could be anything from how to hold a pencil while writing to tying shoelace in a less time-consuming fashion. Or keeping one eye closed at work to ensure sleep as well as demotion at the same time. In my case, it’s all words. I love words and literally live in them. I keep playing with portmanteaus and homophones and desperately try to coin new words.

Coming back to the title of this post, I recently realized that Canada and Karnataka have a lot of resemblance. Canada, with its significant land area and equally insignificant population (at least, density-wise) is spread out on the continent of North America whereas bang on the other side of the Earth lies the southern Indian state of K’taka located where Kannada is the predominant language.

Ottawa, the capital of Canada is located in the southwestern corner of the country. Similarly, Bangalore, the capital of K’taka state, is also located in the southwestern fringe of the state. Like Canada, the economy and logistics of K’taka is also located primarily in its southern region. Both have better infrastructure in their southern region compared to their northern counterparts. Canada finds its chief external port at Vancouver which is also Canada’s 3rd largest city. Karnataka’s 3rd largest city, Mangalore houses its chief port. Both these cities are located in their southwestern end [Vancouver on Pacific Ocean bordering USA and Mangalore on Arabian Sea bordering Kerala state].

As you can guess by now, I’ve obviously lost the plot here. The title was supposed to be Canada & K’taka instead of Canada & Kannada. Nonetheless, the differences eclipse the similarities in more ways than one. Canada is a sovereign nation whereas K’taka is a state in the Republic of India. Area-wise, Canada is the second largest country in the world with a meagre population of 33 million whereas K’taka has more than 52 million people. Also, Canada has two official languages namely English and French (primarily spoken in Quebec and New Brunswick provinces) whereas Kannada is the sole official language of Karnataka although it constitutes of varied linguistic/cultural domains namely the Tulu-speaking Udupi and Dakshina Kannada districts, Kodava-speaking Kodagu/Coorg district as well as the prosperous native Konkani community spread across the K’taka coast and not to forget the indigenous Marathi community spread inland and many more. But they all are bound by their shared adherence to Kannada.

P.S. I acknowledge the fact that this sincere analysis on such an obscure (and utterly useless) topic wasn’t the need of time. But then I can’t help those trying to find a cure for cancer, either. Besides you don’t need to be meticulous all the time (which I’m not any which way). I just thought of it and decided to indulge in usual trumpery and free geography class to y'all!

In defense of Coke Studio@MTV...

2011-06-19T19:11:00.003+05:30

At the beginning of this year, I wrote a piece on Coke Studio (CS). Well, as you can guess, not many were aware what CS was all about until lately. But since then, it has infiltrated musical aficionados’ psyche like anything. On a personal level, I don’t even remember when CS replaced Suprabhatam at my place without making a sound (no pun intended). It’d be fair to say that Coke Studio is the best thing to have ever come out of Pakistan. After Nusrat Saab.

For the freshers, Coke Studio is a musical extravagance which has its origin in Brazil but the entire concept developed in Pakistan under Rohail Hyatt. The idea was to infuse music from diverse regions of Pakistan and provide them a common platform to showcase their talent. Top-notch is an adjective that comes to mind whenever I think of all the episodes I’ve watched. Yes, listening isn’t enough. If it’s CS, you better watch because there is so much to experience visually. The synchronization of lyrics and music isn’t something we, the hoi polloi, are often privy to. On a side note, the ignoramus among us (yes, Indians) can’t help but be amazed by the variety Pakistan has to offer in musical scenario; be it Sufi, western, devotional, tribal, folk or Qawwali.

So far, so good.

And then, Coke Studio decides to come to India courtesy MTV. As expected, we were thrilled – and still are – about the endless possibilities that lie ahead of it. The very first episode gave us a hint of how things will look like throughout the season. Seven performances took place in that segment which featured songs in 8 languages including Assamese, Bengali, Hindi, Marathi, Punjabi, Telugu, Tamil and Urdu. In simpler words, folk and regional music will get their long-awaited due but not without Bollywood’s crooning escorts.

To be very frank, the inaugural episode garnered mixed review. To be very, very frank, the reviews weren’t too positive. Many viewers expressed their utter disappointment with poor sound engineering and production as well as presentation (dull video panning). There were moments in the show when noise completely dominated fusion. House band were haphazard. Also looking at the chorus girls, what were they up to? What’s the point in having them seated there with no active contribution to a particular performance?

We can’t blame people for not liking CS (though they are more than 200,000 likes on CS’s Facebook homepage). It’s a personal choice but still dissing it without substantial sagacity is quite stupid. The very comparison with Pakistan’s CS makes the argument one-sided. After all, Pak’s CS has been around for three seasons now and is into its fourth year running whereas we are nascent and just one episode old. And we shouldn’t forget that Pak CS wasn’t a runaway hit either. It took time to gain momentum and with patience and precision, it did and how!

Personally, I feel negativity is good as it shall ensure improvisation. Also, we need to give Leslie Lewis credit for putting up a show in such a short notice, though on the down side, the unpreparedness was rather visible in patches in the first episode itself. But Coke Studio is all about evolution. It is like a musical journey through varied phases. And I am pretty confident they’ll pull this off.

Also, India being diverse and rich with umpteen languages, it is but obviously natural that all Indians won’t be able to comprehend every single song. For instance, a Punjabi is not expected to understand Tamil or Kannada per se and similarly a Manipuri or Naga from North-East may not have the knowledge of Marathi or Gujarati. And to be honest, those facing Coke Studio's language barrier must ask themselves whether they can discern their favorite English songs without online lyrics. Ergo, Coke Studio should provide translations from the regional languages to both English and Hindi on their home site.

Anyway for now, we need to sit back, give our consumeristic hypocrisy a break and relax to enjoy the show’s first season!

Idiot's Block, not Writer's

2011-06-10T06:24:00.009+05:30

I haven’t written a paragraph in almost a month now. No, it can’t be Writer’s Block since I'm not a writer. It’s not much of my concern either. At least not as much as Idiot's Block is. And the worst part is, I'm not even growing wise. It's more confusing than the reason why we signed up for life. Besides, I’m just a one-liner thinker who scribbles and tries way too hard to be funny. In raunchier terms, I’m a writer’s version of one-night stand. Sitting down to write an essay or an article is a torture to be very honest. The kind of time and dedication it takes is sadistic but (sadly) rewarding at the very same time. On the contrary, when you produce an one-liner, there is nothing to lose. You have this idea and all you have to do is put it within a sentence or two and lo you are done! [In related news, I just completed a paragraph.]

Even right now, as I’m typing whatever you are reading, I’ve got no concrete plot to come up with. Like they lie, I’m just going with the flow. Sometimes it’s hard to accept that you are no Pamuk especially when you are writing Grade A bullshit. But somewhere, deep down inside, you have this untouched poetry. Each one of us does. No kidding. This is the part which often stays unexplored. There is a bit of poetry in every human being. Only the lucky few get to share it with others. But then, most of us are neurotically indolent so that kills the suspense. In other words, laziness always replays a huge part in our failures. One needs to get organized and then go ahead with the plan. Like writers do. With research related stuff which I’m totally averse to. (See, the last two lines rhyme!)

That’s it.

I’ve nothing else to babble about. Yes, I can crack some cheap jokes on Baba Ramdev’s antics and PM Singh’s eternal silence or take a dig at the way humankind has totally lost itself in the ring-a-round materialistic whirlpool. But the truth is I had to update my blog page and obviously, I don’t follow rich principles when it comes to photoshopping of thoughts in words. And that’s the reason my fingers are still dancing on the keyboard. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have even reached this third paragraph.

Every once in a while, I try to gauge how a human being can create such fat books full of ideas. No wonder one-lining seems a lot more appealing and of course, easier. Furthermore, there is never a lack of incidents to comment on be it a colleague’s goof-up or your own or snobbish celebrities or politicians or some sports rivals. However, the moment I get down to write a 500-words rough draft, my brain instantly files for divorce. Although there are million of secrets to be told and billions of stories to be sold, I’ll be totally out of topic. That’s how *thinks* are as of now. Perhaps I’m one of those writers who suffer from Writer’s Block even before becoming one.

Lost in the labyrinth of tweets!

2011-05-27T03:49:00.004+05:30

As of now, Twitter is a religion. At least for the tweeps. For the uninitiated, tweeps are the ones who gave up on ‘real’ life and signed up for Twitter instead. It’s almost similar to the selling-your-soul-to-the-devil-at-a-discounted-price thing. Of course, we shouldn’t generalize the entire crowd on the basis of the majority. Yes, there are some exceptions who sign up and then forget their passwords, and in the process, save themselves from getting 140-ed.

For us, Twitter is more than just an addiction. It’s part of a lifestyle. Moreover, it won’t be an exaggeration to state there are 3 types of people on Twitter: those who never want to leave; those who are always here; and the rest.

You wake up and find yourself on the timeline. You are just dying to make an impression. You can crack a joke, post an url link or twitpic. And the best part is even that won’t make you an attention whore. One fish never accuses another fish of being wet. Everyone is in. Yes, some get luckier than others but it doesn’t matter. Everybody’s part of the stage and there is enough space for more. This urge to be heard via tweets is beyond typos. Sometimes, it’s beyond grammar, too. Unfortunately.

Like Tyler Durden once nearly said, “This is twittermania and it's ending one tweet at a time.”

Different people are on Twitter for different reasons. Majority are of the social kind. They don’t mind transforming the timeline back to the heydays of Yahoo! chatroom. Minuscule few are dedicated to mentionless tweeting. But one factor binds all the tweeps – their unconstrained disdain for Orkut and in some cases, Facebook. Anyway, it’s a bit hypocritical on our part to find our common alma mater at fault when it’s clearly not. Whatever goes.

Twitter's Unwritten Rule #1 - If you've got absolutely nothing to tweet, tweet.

So what do we tweet about? Well, we mostly tweet shit. No, seriously. We do. You know, stuff that don’t have an iota of significance, not even to the one who’s tweeting. In less harsher words, Twitter is an adult toy. We experience parallel universe, so to speak. After all, there is nothing wrong with it. Here, you become your handle. You don’t even need a topic to tweet. Just look around you. You see things. You tweet things. Simple. No hard and fast rules. No wonder we seem to get more news on Twitter than there is news in this world. Accordingly, we become a dreamer or an activist or a revolutionary. For a day or two or three or four. In a way, we successfully kill time. Sometimes we even kill celebrities. Remember the time when Twitter killed Nelson Mandela, Shashi Kapoor and Abida Parveen when they were pretty much alive? Good.

Twitter's Unwritten Rule #2 - Don't keep your crap to yourself. Your timeline is dying to *no*.

Twitter loves sad people and vice versa. Complaining about everything under the sky is a daily phenomenon. Nevertheless, you just find an excuse to tweet. For the record, you are a confirmed twitter-addict when you lose something in your house and search for it on your timeline. The point is you can be sad, cribby and lonely on Twitter. Facebook is not a place to cry your heart out. And even if you do, people will *like* that. Twitter allows you to be depressed. That’s one of the reasons why some of the most painfully honest gems (read: tweets) about sorry life could be seen post-midnight. It’s also when Twitter feels like a city annexed by hopeless romantics.

Twitter's Unwritten Rule #3 - Feel busier than you really are.

Twitter is dominated by social engineers who are busy wasting their precious talent on timeline. They’ve got all the solutions to all the problems to all the solutions in the world. Plus, there are some really creative people who are busy entertaining others. And there are the ones who feel bad for the world while staying comfy in their air-conditioned rooms. In short, Twitter is longer than 140 characters. Lots of characters, in fact. Some are trolls, some fanatics, some politicos, some so-called orkutiyas. But then, different people are on Twitter for different reasons.

N.B. I wrote this piece for Ashik Gosaliya's website so thought of sharing here, too.

Oui Federer!

2011-05-22T18:52:00.007+05:30

French Open is on its way. As usual, Rafael Nadal is the favorite to win and equal Björn Borg’s record of six titles at Roland Garros. But Novak Djokovic is not far behind. The Serb hasn’t lost a single match this season and goes into the tournament with a 37-0 win/loss score. More significantly, he has defeated Nadal four times (twice on clay) this year which is a feat in itself considering Nadal’s unprecedented dominance since he overtook the No.1 ranking from Roger Federer last year. And that brings us to the guy in question.

Yes. Federer.

The trouble with being Federer is that no one expects you to fail. But he is failing terribly. Come to think of it, Federer has created a monster of sort for himself. And that shows, especially when he suffers against unhailed opponents. He is currently No.3 after losing his No.2 ranking to Djokovic in March. To top it all, he has won just one title this year at Qatar which is nothing less than a bad half-season for a player of his stature.

Critics love to write Federer off. They’ve been doing this for a long while now. Age is definitely not on his side. At 29, he is among the oldest in the top-10 league. Of course, his remarkable 16 Grand Slams and 17 Masters Titles can’t be overlooked at any cynical cost. You don’t teach Federer how to play tennis nor can you beat him at it. Only Federer can defeat Federer. Or rather, only Federror can defeat Federer. Lately, Federer has been lacking focus and committing errors thanks to desolate second serve and misplaced forehands. Even psychologically, he appears faded and a dark shadow of his former self.

For the record, if Djoko makes it to the semis, Nadal’s No.1 is still at peril even if he wins the GS. Nadal’s recent slip-ups prove that no matter how great a specialist you are, you are bound to slip on the clay sooner or later. This is a lesson in denial for Federer. He can pick up a thing or two from Djoko’s attitude towards game which is based on one principle: Be positive till the very end. Ironically, Federer’s Achilles heels lies in his head. He gives up long before the match ends.

For instance, in the semifinal match in Miami, Nadal totally overwhelmed him. Federer was hardly playing. It was like a worthless stroll across the court. Something Federerphiles are not used to but sadly are getting used to. Fortunately, Federer showed some grit when he met Nadal again in the Madrid semifinal by dominating the first set but Nadal fought back and won the match. Interestingly, if everything goes according to the rankings’ script, Federer will be facing Nadal in the semifinal for a spot in the French Open final. Let’s wait and watch.

Have to admit no one is bigger than the sport. Not even Federer. He aims to collect at least 20 Grand Slams before he hangs up his racquet for good. Going by his contemporaries’ current form, it seems like a distant reality. Every great champion has a crest followed by a trough. We are witnessing Federer’s trough much against our wish. Federer lost to Tomáš Berdych in the quarterfinal match at Wimby and it’s been a downhill since with a sliver of inconsistent revival every now and then.

Whatever be the case, my money is on him. Between Nadal and Djokovic, Federer will always be the in absentia winner. Snatching the French Open under the victorious nose of Nadal-Djoko duo shall be a perfect rejoinder to all the questions about his downfall. Hopefully. May the phoenix rise and rewrite the tennis mythology!

Adios to the Quarter of a Century!

2011-05-09T13:54:00.009+05:30

Disclaimer: Unlike a majority of my posts, this one comes directly from the bottom of my dark narcissistic heart. Okay. Not exactly but for the most part, yes.

Chernobyl disaster happened in the final week of April 1986. Nearly two weeks later, I took birth and fixed the whole nuclear glitch. Rest is history.

Legend has it that I was born on May 9^th, on the very same day Tenzing Norgay died. I can excuse you if you don’t know me but you ought to acknowledge him as he was the first human being ever to scale the mighty Mt. Everest. For the record, he died that morning and I appeared around sunset. He used to climb uphill and my life has been a downhill since then.

If your math is as bad as mine, I’ve completed 25 years on this planet. Although I’m planning on living forever but even if I die at 100 (give or take), it’s like completing a quarter of my life. That’s a huge number. By today’s standards, nonetheless. I don’t exactly celebrate birthdays. Now, before the words “You stupid self-obsessed self-piteous cretin…!” springs to your head, let me make myself clear. It has nothing to do with my usual cynicism. I don’t hate birthday, so to speak. But I can’t deny the fact too many birthdays will eventually lead to my death.

As a matter of fact, birthdays are wonderful. But that’s only as long as you are a kid. Once you grow up and know the functional benefits of being an adult, birthdays are just a date people don’t even care to remember coz Zuckerberg will always be there to help. I mean, that’s what Facebook is for–to remind you of your friends’ birthdays, right?

For the birthday boy or girl, it’s a trip down memory lane and trying to match those childhood days when birthday meant something words can’t even describe. As for me, I never cut a cake or blew candles. It was never part of my upbringing. Maybe it has to do with the fact that my younger brother’s twin died a tragic death just days after my third birthday. So my parents avoided blowing trumpets out of birthdays and it has stayed that way since then.

I hate being so corny! Forget it.

Okay, so as I look back at what have I underachieved over all these years, I run short of errr… excuses. I haven’t got myself a career yet. I’m just a two-bit transcriber who writes three-bit pseudofunny quotes and posts them on Twitter and repeats ‘em on Facebook. Ironically, I am way too content playing with words and one-liners. I haven’t traveled to Ladakh or Tawang or Kashmir or anywhere north of Maharashtra. I haven’t helped Tibetans gain independence, either. I never got into a relationship (but secretly, I’m all smart about it!). I’m yet to receive an offer that I couldn’t refuse. I haven't touched snow yet (Seriously, Mumbai needs snow more than I do. Snowfall can solve more than half of its problem). Net-net, life has been devastatingly dull. Had it not been for my acute ignorance, I could have, well, killed myself on my 16^th birthday when I was writing bad poems which eventually graduated to worse and now it’s, as one can guess, worst. Thankfully, I have given up on poems. In other words, poems have given up on me.

On the rosier side, I am happy too about some fabrics of my repugnant personality. Like I don’t wear watches. I ride my ‘cycle as far as I can and don’t plan to own any other vehicle. By the way, I’m tired of flat tires so maybe I’ll commute on a horse someday soon. I don’t have beverages be it coffee, tea or aerated drinks. And most significant of all, I’m deeply in love with cinema and I’m terribly proud of it. I’m brutally honest as long as I’m not forced to lie. I conserve energy too by not working too hard. Blah. Blah. Blah. Blah. Blah. Blah. Blah. That’s all. Of course, these are not Nobel-worthy traits but somehow I cherish them.

You don’t grow intelligent with age. It’s an illusion. No one has anything coming. People just say so to feel wise about their amnesiac past. We are almost dead if we don’t know what to do with our time because in the long term, time is the biggest asset of our short lifespan. All you’ve got to do is live without being a pain in the ass of others. If you manage to share your time with the ones you care for, good for you. If not, it’s alright.

In your declining years, you go back to your own disappointments and accomplishments and the interrupting moments of happiness. That’s how it is. As for now, I may molest words like anything… and most probably will continue to do so provided the marbles rattle in my cranium. Any which way, who gives a damn? I’m growing old and I’m loving it! Cheers.

Commoners Wed Society

2011-05-04T12:49:00.007+05:30

Last week, third rock from the sun witnessed one heck of a royal wedding. Nearly two-sixth of humankind was glued to the live event which substantiates our hopeless belief in medieval fairytale. In related news, many were wondering whether it was Beckham's wedding for he sure as hell looked a whole lot nattier than balding William. Similarly Kate’s sister stole the limelight right under her Diana-esque charm. No big deal. It’s all part of regal folklores now.

Anyway, if you paid attention to the extravagance, the ultimate question hits you sooner or later (most probably, sooner): Who’s going to pay for all of this? Well, as usual, the monarch does everything except the payment. When Lakshmi Mittal spent $78 million for his daughter’s wedding, he actually could afford it. On the contrary, here, the bill's is shared by the taxpayers. Yes, common people like you and me and the aliens up in heaven. Some of the lessons of history are debited to future.

Personally, I don't attend weddings. I mean, what's the point when I can't stop it from happening? No, seriously. And if I at all, I do, out of familial pressure or emotional blackmailing, I feel rather sorry for the couples who have to plaster that fake smile throughout the procession. I even fail to understand the significance of this hackneyed marital ritual. If two people love each other, why waste precious time on something as insignificant as announcing it to the society that’s attending just for free food? And then there is the act of divine fraud when the couples exchange “I do” and then do it again and again. Of course, that’s a different story altogether.

By the way, isn’t it amazing that almost every human being, be it from any part of the world, acknowledges the institution of marriage? Perhaps it’s part of social devolution. Yes, people will retort that had my parents not married, I wouldn’t have been typing this drivel here. Nor would you be reading it. True that, in both cases. We are Indians, after all. Maybe that’s precisely what I’m trying to imply here. It’s time to free ourselves from unnecessary bondages of societal validation. It’s not about right or wrong. It’s about why it is so and why couldn’t it be not so. No, I ain’t advocating live-in although I don’t find anything amiss with it, either.

Going back to the royal marriage, media as well as the social media couldn’t help orgasming. They got royally high on a wedding they allegedly didn’t give a damn about. That’s the extent of our blatant hypocrisy when it comes to current affairs. On a lighter note, I’m glad Osama could witness this wedding before embarking on the long-awaited journey to meet 72 virgins. The only thing the $34 million wedding lacked was Indian flavor. You know Dhol, Band Bhaaja, Bharaat, irritating fat aunties and stuff. Okay, forget it. Chicken Tikka Masala is more than enough for Brits.

PS: We’ve got bigger problems than weddings – followed by divorces – so I guess this blog piece was a pure waste of time as always. May y’all have a royaler wedding! Amen.

I am free

2011-04-30T11:09:00.009+05:30

I am free…. in a way you can never be
and nothing can possess me;
I'm free.
I am free…. like sun is, and moon rather wished it was
along with the waves of eternity;
I'm free.
I am free…. from whatever you say or preach
of all the things you want me to see;
I'm free.
I am free…. of the very bonds you tie yourselves in
but draw a stupid smile or an ambiguous grin;
I'm free.
I am free…. for I can breathe as long as I want
as even death defies me;
I'm free.
I am free…. to commit mistakes as long as I live
to unlearn the lessons of cyclical mystery;
I'm free.
I am free…. by the power vested in my lines
a bit of stagnant lies and ample honest signs;
I'm free.
I am free…. neither nonsensical everything nor sensible nothing
accountable to none and no one to me;
I'm free.
I am free…. under the stress named society
as well as indignant expectations and future almighty;
I'm free.
I am free…. within me, within you, within we
free from freedom plus heavier words such as these;
I'm free.

God, Me, You, Us, Everyone Else

2011-04-24T15:27:00.006+05:30

You believe in rumours, don’t you? What a stupid question! Everyone does. Period. The very essence of conversation is based on doubts. God is a rumour too. I won’t be exaggerating if I stated that God is the longest-running rumour of all time. This is so because no other creature believes in scaremongering. For the record, I’m not against God. In fact, we are close chums the way Calvin and Hobbes are. He speaks to me in Sanskrit with a strong Arabic accent. At least in my imagination.

You see, being an atheist can be tiresome sometimes as there is no God to blame for your f-ed up life. And you don’t want to beg to a Superior Power up there lost deep in heaven. To be brutally honest, praying never worked for me and I'm certain it didn't work for God either. On the sly, I do request Him to kindly grant me the strength to overcome the urge to pray. He hasn’t responded to my ironic appeal YET. Amusingly, I keep telling Amma that God is not a Mangalorean but she insists on praying in Tulu.

Like I said, I’ve got no issue with God. I never make fun of Him. I have respect for those who are considerate enough not to exist. I may be sounding allergic to Him but it’s nothing compared to what I feel for religion. The fact remains: There's nothing religious about being God. It's always religion that keeps yapping about God. The Dude never uttered a word about religion. He acknowledges my indifference for religion and he's fine with it. Wait a minute, perhaps, what we truly need is a God-proof religion. That might as well solve our problems. Once and for all.

To me, God is everywhere. Being an Indian, Sachin is God, too. On a lighter side, whenever I try to picture God, Al Pacino pops up in my head. Maybe he is God. Or maybe I need less cinema and more sleep. Whatever. Even right now, as I’m typing what you’re trying to make sense, this sleeky lizard on the wall is acting as if it's God. Well, it might be. Who knows?

God is a crazy creature. And the most intriguing part is He is very polite and very suave. Like Marlon Brando in Godfather. Someone who knows how to get things done. In spite of such charm, He doesn’t like to be praised. Have you ever seen ANY other creature singing hymns or reciting odes? Don’t lie. It is simply a retarded way of wasting endangered time. In any case, how can our mortal applause affect someone as mighty as Him? Anyway, even if I were God, I wouldn't have easily succumbed to flattery in the name of religion.

God was created by theists. You know them. You could be one of ‘em. The ones who believe it was God, not alarm clock, that woke them up this morning. Majority of humans just can’t do without His omnipresence. Despite not being on social networking sites, God still remains the world's most famous imaginary friend. For the time being, let’s assume God created humankind and humankind returned the favour by creating God. Comforting, yeah.

We love stories. And stories are nothing less than an extended version of rumours which unfortunately stood the test of time. We read stuff where God doesn’t give a shit about science and goes on to create a wonderful world in 6 days flat. And on the 7th day, He sits down to figure out what drove him on the 1st day to such madness. I haven’t even visited the Garden of Eden but am damn sure no flower out there can match God's fart in terms of sweetness. No, seriously. This is somehow the vague logic behind religions created by diehard fans of God.

Coming back to atheism (read: ignorance with benefits), I often challenge my overtly religious friends to show me their God and I’ll show my faith in return. No one wins the debate. To be fair, God is a lot like Osama. No one sees or meets him but every once in a while, he lets out signs that he do exist. God forbid, I become a believer like the rest of us.

On a second thought, I shouldn’t have written this verbose garbage today. After all, it’s time we acknowledged the fact that God doesn't like to be invoked on weekends.

A Prison Full of Tomatoes

2011-04-18T06:07:00.006+05:30

Once upon a time, there was a boy named Boy who loved tomatoes. Fondness of food ain’t a human novelty but not everyone falls for a tomato. In fact, Boy took a shine at a very young age and grew up stealing them from kitchen, if urge demanded. However, he remained a fidel for a long time ahead. But fate believes in surprises. And how!

And before Boy could realize his penchant for slipping tomatoes, he had become an infamous klepto. And before he could fathom the extent of his kleptomania, he found himself in a crowded prison on charges of theft. And before he could do anything about anything, the jewels he burgled from a local store proved costly.

No one likes crowded place, and least of all, prisons. Not only are convicts struggling for oxygen and privacy, they are also stuck with each other’s incivility. Hygiene is a far-stretched idea in such banal existence. You are no more you. Personal identity is reduced to numbers and the days spent enclosed. Individuality suffers the loudest. Conclusion: Life in a prison sucks big time.

Boy often reminisced his school days and how promising he could have been had he made better decisions. He realized how everything has transformed right in front of his nose except for one thing – his appetite for tomatoes. He still craved that plump red piece of nature like anything. He thought life is not THAT bad. At least he thought so.

It seemed the prison authorities loved tomato more than Boy ever did. The reason being they employed the vegetable in almost all the meals they cooked and served. One might have called it a culinary potpourri of La Tomatina minus the funfare. Needless to say, Boy wasn’t complaining. He relished whatever the prison was dumping on his plate. He never displayed a smug face unlike his fellow prisoners. He never sulked at the excesses of tomatoes or at the apparent lack of choice. He was content with tomatoes and vice versa. Just like he thought, life is not THAT bad.

Well, that was about to change.

As time passed on, he was growing tired of loneliness. The ironical element couldn’t escape the presence of loneliness in a place full of people confined against their wish. He started missing his folks back home who hardly paid him a visit. Sleep was the toughest part. Nightmares were longer than the minutes he kept his eyes shut. Memories of carefree days kept replaying in his insomniac mind. Ergo, prison was growing on him.

Out of sudden, he found tomatoes repellent. Maybe it didn’t happen overnight but he surely got a hang of his co-prisoners’ opinions about prison food. His intense liking for it was now replaced by deep abhorrence. At least, others, despite their daily cussing against slammer order, ate what was laid in front of them on the table. Boy couldn’t. He blamed tomatoes all his misery. At last, he found a scapegoat who was responsible in making him what he was today. And it was rather impossible for him to consume his enemy.

Corrup(na)tion

2011-04-08T09:09:00.005+05:30

Lately, there has been a huge hue and cry over corruption. No wait. I mean, a huge hue and cry AGAINST corruption. As if someone shook us from an age old slumber. The point is people have started talking about it instead of just being privy. We’ve got to start somewhere, right? Of course, we are not entirely against it. After all, it’s a way of life here. Not a place in this country is untouched by this menace. Everyone is equally responsible as it’s a walk-in party. In such scenario, having a voice matters. And that’s where Anna Hazare chips in. He has a clean-cut image and is a staunch Gandhian. His call to the nation to rise up and fight against corruption is centered on the introduction of Jan Lokpal Bill. As of now, he’s on a hunger strike and won’t budge until the govt meets his (read: our) demands.

It sounds like a bit unusual for India, doesn’t it? Straight out of an inspirational movie! Well, it’s a sign of things to come. Whatever unfolds in the coming days is going to be an interesting episode of our post-independence history. On the funnier side, people are getting caught up in the brouhaha. They are frantically forwarding mails and SMSes supporting Hazare, liking Facebook pages dedicated to the *cause* and tweeting incessantly. Now, there is nothing wrong with feeling revolutionary once in a while. As one can sense, the Middle-Eastern rebellion is in the air and masses are bound to be lured by its call. Better stand up for something than not do nothing at all. Fair enough. Can’t debate with such pragmatism. But the trouble doesn’t lie in the passing of that hopeful Bill. It lies somewhere else.

If you think about it, corruption is just a stupid idea. Like most other things, it begins and ends with you. The ferocity with which it is practiced depends on the scale of power one holds. It’s like a business, not barter. All the parties involved are fully aware of the reach of their action as well as the consequences of their inaction. The purported Bill will certainly help in bringing the more powerful party to question. It’s more like obstructing the bigger cog wheel of an engine. You stop it and the smaller cogs don’t exist anymore. For the time being, that’s the logic. And that’s precisely also the reason why it’s garnering such lethargy from the corrupt idiots we elected all the way to the Parliament.

Now, the question arises: Will this Bill bring a round about change in our daily functioning and eradicate corruption once and for all? The answer is simple: No. Remember the Right to Information Act? Does every Indian make the best possible use of it? Or, is every Indian even aware of the kind of reach it vests in them? Or the number of RTI activists who were murdered thanks to their altruistic whistleblowing? Exactly. That’s what I’m trying to put forward here. These are basic doubts that have to be part of the anti-corruption Bill curriculum, too. The fact remains that Bills, legislation and eventual laws do very little to change an ugly picture like ours.

The onus falls squarely on the society. The kind of principle an offspring is imparted with is what makes a difference in the long run. Virtues like honesty, punctuality and humanity should be the cornerstone of change. Yes, we should be glad that citizenry is at top gear with people gathering and emulating Hazare’s fasting methods. That’s a good omen for a society which has nurtured selfish individuals for years now. Perhaps we’ll have our own version of Egypt or Tunisia soon. But then, corrupt babus are pretty keen on carrying forward the tradition of failure, without fail. So we’ve got to create a barricade against them. If you don’t indulge in the payment or reception of bribe, you’ve done your part. That’s that.

Speaking for myself, I'm trying to connect the dots between my hesitancy in standing up against corruption and a noble old man's insistence on fighting with hunger. Hopefully, I shall get somewhere someday.

Champion's Night

2011-04-03T21:11:00.003+05:30

I had a terrible dream in which I was a die-hard cricket fan and rather enjoying it. No, just kidding. Anyway, isn’t it funny when a self-confessed non-cricket-fan keeps on harping about cricket? Touché. But trust me, it isn’t my fault. Indian cricket team has to be blamed. They have been AMAZING and surprised me and millions of my fellow countrymen (who are all bona-fide-cricket-fans) with their recent performance. Last night, they did something exceptional by defeating Sri Lanka in Mumbai to win the Cricket World Cup final. After exactly 28 long years.

Cricket is synonymous with Indian subcontinent but when it comes to CWC, even India never had a decent fill. We won it way back in ’83 so it’s almost as if it never happened. I mean, of course, the legacy is always there but we suffer from collective amnesia. Victory has to be repeated again and again to register into our blank memory. And frankly, we had to win this time to generate a new cycle of history, a new history instead of the old one. And history it was that was created last night.

I’m sure not many adhered to their usual bedtime after the match ended. It was time to celebrate and prolong it. Firecrackers were reminiscent of Diwali. Or should I add, a national Diwali instead of the religious one. People were out on the street high-fiving strangers and hugging as if they were waiting for each other since ‘83. It is like the sports version of Fall of Berlin Wall or something. This victory is overwhelming. Euphoria is not the word. You can’t explain such emotions where you want to cry because you can’t deny the significance of being alive and to witness it right in front of your own eyes.

To top it all, Dhoni ended the match in style with a spectacular six that is fated to be part of cricket folklores. Before the climax, Sachin got out without getting his much prophesized 100^th century and Gambir missed his by mere 3 runs. Yuvi and Kohli convinced us that Indian team is not a one-man-army anymore. It’s a team now. Good for us. The bowlers did a good job, too.

On the Sri Lankan side, Sangakkara proved why he, along with Dhoni, is the coolest captain-wicketkeeper-batsman in the world. Muralitharan’s noteworthy comeback from retirement fell a little short of ultimate glory. As usual, Jayawardane displayed his eminence with bat. And Malinga, well, we better not talk about him. I’ve got no issues with his hairdo as he doesn’t sledge nor pretend to be haughty. He was the best bowler in the Lankan squad and made Sehwag limp on a duck and Sachin walk with just 18 runs. On a side note, as a kid, my bowling style was similar to his. My peers thought it wasn't appropriate. And thus a promising career ended prematurely.

Gary Kirsten has to be mentioned. He was cool, composed and methodical. He doesn’t harbor any desire to be the cynosure and last night was his final assignment as India’s coach. The lap of honour said it all. He will be sorely missed.

For the moment, it doesn't matter whether you're a cricket fan or not. Being an Indian will suffice. At least it’s working for me. My dour dad who has fond memories of ’83 win was speechless and letting triumph sink in. Besides, this is what cricket is all about in India. Whatever we witnessed on the TV as well as outside will stay etched in our minds.

Folks I met today on the streets are jubilant and you don’t even need common sense to sense their sense of achievement. Everyone seems too happy to be true. The upside is they are not sad. The downside is this too shall pass. But before it does, this weekend is going to last forever.

After the EPIC match!

2011-03-31T17:08:00.003+05:30

Well, we won. In other words, one-sixth of humanity had collective orgasm last night when India defeated Pakistan in the Cricket World Cup semifinal. And with that, our clean record against them remained cleanest. As one can imagine, the euphoria is beyond words and I better not try to unravel it. What I can envision though is the humungous depression we as a nation could have slipped into had we lost this match. It could have eventually affected our country’s economy in the long run. Maybe even a recession, who knows? OK. That’s stretching it bit too far.

To begin with, this was the first ODI match in which Sachin played seven innings. No, seriously. He was the luckiest guy on earth yesterday. I haven’t seen anyone get so many “lives” in a single match. He was playing some really erratic shots there but not a single person could have blamed him for being stupid. Perhaps that is what godliness is all about. Any which way, Indians are born Sachinians. He eventually stumbled at 85. It’s a pity he couldn’t complete his 100^th century. Whatever, he steered us to victory and that matters.

On the other side, Pakistani team looked in control but gradually lost it somewhere and just couldn’t get haul themselves back. Afridi’s face during the final overs said it all. They say it was an empathetic version of PontingFace. Being the best skipper Pakistan could have had for this tourney, the defeat must have saddened him like anything but he’s a hero to millions of Pakistanis and cricket loving folks for his exemplary leadership. Wahib was chosen over swansinging Akhtar and that made a huge difference to their bowling attack. He ended up with five-wicket haul. If you ask me, Wahib should have been awarded the ‘Match of the Match’, not Sachin. Sachin was simply ‘God of the Match’ for being extremely fortunate.

Thankfully, the usual banter on the field was almost inconspicuous. All the players kept their *friendly* language as well as body language at check. The entire game was played with the best of sportsmanship spirit leaving hardly any space for controversies. On the contrary, the ambiance on Twitter and Facebook was way too ugly, to be blunt. People from either side of the border were unrestrained with words and haphazard with nationalistic passions. Expecting anything different with such a crucial match in the background might be insensitive towards these hardcore fans. Maybe it takes an Indo-Pak match to reveal our true jingoistic nature. Rest of the time, we just pretend to be civil. There were moments when more action was going on on social media than on TV. I’m sorry for my Pakistani friends who would have been equally sorry for me had they won.

So, we are all set for the final against Sri Lanka. Whichever team wins, the World Cup’s going to stay in Asia for a change down under. That’s the bonus point. Like crores of Indians, I too want us to win this one. After all, Kapil Dev must be tired of holding up that cup in photos for nearly three decades now. It's time he passed it to Dhoni.

Before the EPIC match!

2011-03-30T09:30:00.008+05:30

If you’re into reading crap, you must have read my piece on how cricket sucks and all. Well, I’m not going to renege on what I said (or at least tried to imply) but then I had no idea India and Pakistan were destined to clash in the Cricket World Cup (CWC) semifinal. My superpowers failed to predict its certainty and we are less than 6 hours away from this passive war.

As of now, I hope everyone wakes up healthy today for even if you're sick for real, your office won't believe you. Everyone’s damn excited about this game so productivity is better not discussed. I’d say Indo-Pak match makes AWOL a very legitimate option. The entire country is going to be stalemated once the coin is tossed. That’s a given. Even the sparrows and pigeons outside my window seem to be mighty excited about it. If only they knew the way to Mohali.

By the way, Mohali is the most happening place in the Indian subcontinent right now. After all, it’s playing host to a contest that doesn’t happen quite often. One can sense the hype with huge expectations from the 22 players who will be on the field amid roaring pressure. It’s going to be a riot of emotions. I guess even clouds got emotional last night and shed some tears over Mohali stadium. If rain continues to disrupt, then this match will be a more contentious issue than Kashmir. Anyway, according to my sources, God is a cricket fan so I’m pretty sure weather won’t be a hindrance.

The maxim that politics and sports shouldn’t mix sounds like a remote possibility when India and Pakistan are engaged. I like to call it diplomushy in which emotional bond is practiced between rival countries. Nevertheless, Indo-Pak cricket makes the most of it like it always has, be it in Sharjah or Toronto. Apparently, for countries like ours, sports are a blessing in dissguys. The rivalry is unmatched and so is the language used between players. The other day, I also watched that infamous Afridi-Gambhir-expletives-filled-clash video on YouTube to brush up my token patriotism. As you can imagine, it’s tough being a non-cricket fan in India but you have to give it to crossborder tension.

Today, Indians will be praying for their unblemished record against Pakistan in CWC to remain so whereas Pakistanis would be expecting the opposite. Of course, Indians also want their God-elect – Sachin – to score his 100^th century and make Afridi eat his words and cricket ball (yet again!). They'll conveniently neglect the fact that their cheering is nothing less than a jinx for the Little Master.

Pakistani team has done a marvelous job under Afridi’s mercurial leadership so far. They have been like phoenix if you take the bad press showering into consideration. On a longshot, I even see them lifting the Cup while surprising everyone the way we did back in ’83.

Yea, I know I must be sounding like a cricket pundit here. But since I’m cricket crazy for a day, what’s the harm in abusing the privilege! You see, being a fan makes you feel like an expert on things you know nothing about. Like who’ll win or lose. In fact, the best outcome of this semifinal is that it has created a Nostradamus out of everyone in the subcontinent.

With the kind of hostile history we share, Aman and Asha can take a break today. May the match be played in the best of sportsman spirit and without any major controversy. A few minor ones here and there will do. Today would be remembered for a long time. At least until we play Pakistan again. But the worst part is, even after this match ends, noise on either side of the border will continue.

Numbai

2011-03-27T07:07:00.008+05:30

Mumbai is a strange village. It’s either hot, hotter or hottest in this part of the planet. Sweating goes hand-in-hand with breathing. It can be unbearable at times. For the record, about 70% of Mumbai’s population lives in slum and the remaining 30% complain about harsh living conditions. Interestingly, poverty adds to the equation. It is like the most glaring cosmopolitan feature but somehow gets camouflaged by people’s never-say-die attitude. The very faceless folks who know nothing other than the hard learned art of survival under sweltering sun. It’s like a never ending struggle against one self. Against time. Against space. Coincidentally, the crowded local trains are one of those devil-kissed marvels where every single millimeter of space matters and people literally breathe into each others’ lungs and you are just a fart away from asphyxiation.

It’s safe to say that Mumbai is bursting not only at the rim but at the very center. It just can't wait to get back to restful evening. In a lot of ways, it’s hopeless but in others, simply incredible. You’ll never hear anyone say “Amazing how people can be so cold in a warm city like this”. Never.

It is a land of chronicles, mostly unbelievable but truer than death. That’s what years of migration do to a place. It fuels passion and ambition giving birth to countless tales of human endurance and triumph. A few stories are repetitive but the moral remains the usual: Resilience is the word.

There were some kids who used to study during nighttime under beacon at Mankhurd railway station. These kids have homes but not the kind we have. I mean, the privileged lot. They live in shanties but dream of getting an education that their parents couldn’t, so as to get ahead in life and make a respectable living. In simpler words, they just want to get the heck out of the shithole they are currently in. In most cases, their fathers are drunkards who created ruckus almost every single night at home, making it almost impossible for them to concentrate on their books. So that’s the reason they used to gather almost every single night and burn the midnight dreams. As of now they don’t do the same as the board exams have ended and vacation has commenced. They’ve got themselves part time jobs to kill time. Yes, jobs to kill time and not by staying online on Twitter or Facebook. It’s a poignant tale of tenacity. These are the kids who learnt the importance of education as well as electricity on their own. I know this coz I know them.

Dawn marks the time when street dogs go back to being pussies and humans venture out to replace the dogs in the street. But what happens before that? Well, these dogs literally rule. They chase every vehicle that passes on the street. It’s not like they wish to take a ride on it or something. They just want you to get out of their 'territory’ ASAP. In that context, we better not talk about rag pickers who start their day pretty early so as to pick their *stuff* before the dump trucks scoop up its daily roll. As one can guess, the dogs can’t bear to share either the street or the garbage fill with them. Amid the barking, we forget what a fabulous (read: hopelessly courageous) job these rag pickers are doing for the society by helping us with the recycling of things we discard as rubbish.

And just like that, a new day begins. Cynical as it is, with sharp sunlight on the face anyone can get an idea that this city has a long way to go before it can call itself what it is already calling itself – a city.

Cataclyseismic

2011-03-15T14:17:00.008+05:30

Fortunately, it wasn't Japan's fault. It was Earth's fault by default. Unfortunately, Japanese citizens had to pay a heavy price. And this scenario is witnessed from above the water. More horror lies within the surface with thousands still missing. Yes, we are talking about the latest tsunami-earthquake combo that was unleashed on a nation that holds nearly 2% of the planet’s human population and is the world’s third largest economy.

The stupefying pictures and videos posted on Internet and shown by our media depict scenes straight out of a multi-million special-effects-filled Hollywood movie. The only problem being this time it was for real. Living beings, both marine and terrestrial, were affected and in most cases, fatally. When you are alive in an era constituting of such cruel events, you’re bound to have infinite questions in your dumb head.

What is the purpose of living like termites? Why is death more mysterious than J.M. Coetzee? Does God believe in Karma? Were the Mayans really that good with math? Did Aryabhatta have any liaison with them? Are we approaching Judgment Day faster than planned? What is the dress code for that once-in-a-deathtime occasion? Did Steve Jobs spread the ‘world-will-end-in-2012’ rumour so as to sell off his iPads? Will religion save our corrupt colourless soul? What the fuck am I doing writing (reading, in your case) this tripe? And many more such ineffectual doubts.

The worst part is you can’t throw a careless joke and feel wise about such catastrophe. This is no TV show or political gimmick. Real people are dying here. People die in wars too but wars don’t involve God. God is just an imaginary spectator on bloodsheddy battlefields. Here, God is like an active stockholder provided he cares to exist. But still you don’t give up. You just don’t want to lurch in a jocular fix. Otherwise, you’ll start sounding serious and destroy whatever is left of insanity. You come up with weird theories. For instance, earthquakes prove that there is life beneath us and every once in a while, they like to party. Or that God loves Twitter for he never fails to provide the unemployed ones with topics to discuss with the employed ones (who then themselves don’t work much!). Anyway, Twitter is to conversation what bonsai is to trees. Fair enough.

On a serious note, whenever some thing like this happens, instead of making God feel guilty, we pray and make him arrogant. People go ballistic with emotions and almost get close to invoke God and convince him to sign up for Social Media. We’ve got to understand that it doesn’t make any difference. Our so-called concerns are as significant as the letter 't' in the word tsunami. You see, it’s like asking a burglar to undo the theft. The praying lot are the most hypocritical, I must add. They are aware but still they do it as it relieves them of guilt associated with life and luck. The unpraying tribe simply marvel at the extent of our Creator’s inability to summon a less painful design. Moreover, if this disaster was a prologue to the play called Armageddon, I’d be very disappointed in the director named God.

My respect for Japanese people has increased a thousand fold for their sheer resilience. They keep their chin up and try to get on with life with discipline despite impossibilities surrounding them. History has it that they are the only ones to face atom bombs. By their record, they’ll emerge soon. Hopefully, much stronger than before. Of course, we ain't talking about the deads here.

Happy International Women's Years Ahead!

2011-03-10T16:06:00.006+05:30

Humankind recently celebrated International Women’s Day. Nothing unusual happened, as usual. It too had the nondescript 24 hours of misery but it symbolizes femininity and the beauty associated with it. So, net-net, it ought to be an important event on the calendar. Also, I too wanted to post something on that very day but procrastination has its way with me. Anyway, better late and now than later and never.

Let me remind you what you already know -- the true legend of fairer sex’s struggle for equality and gender prejudices prevalent in our quasi-modern society. Rural regions are even worse off than ours. Crime and age-old prejudices against women are never out of fashion. And the worst part is we are getting used to it. We shake our heads in premeditated disbelief whenever we read about untoward actions meted out against women, be it in any part of the world. But that’s that.

If you ask me (which you won’t!), I’d state that the sole objective of having an Int'l Women's Day is to check whether we, as human beings, can stay unsexist at least for a day or not. Sad as it is, we have designed a men-friendly world and one can only ponder if such a calamity was possible without women’s active participation. Think of the support and care one receives in the form of mother, grandmother, sister, wife, aunt and female friends. It’s an amazing case of working for your enemy’s interest. I know this might sound oh-so-feministic but things are bleak as always and whatever light we witness is hardly enough to dispel reality.

In an ideal world, we could have done without religion. Or at least, we would have dismantled the nexus of book-based faith. But that isn’t so. I find religion contemptuous because it has generally acted against womenfolk. If religion is genuine, then the possibility of God being misogynist must be true, too. Just look around yourself. Religious bodies want the womenfolk banished to the claustrophobic kitchen lest they rebel to demand what is rightfully theirs. Such societies fulfill their ulterior motives by denying them education. Illiteracy is rampant among girls in almost all listless countries and it’s quite easy to connect the hapless dots. Again, I must be sounding vain and pompous but then I’ve got a reputation to maintain and a futile argument to sustain.

Digressing over to the positive side, there are women who have made a place for themselves on this sexist planet mainly on the strength of their merit. It’s a healthy encouragement to see them on the pedestal of their respective fields. They are not only successful but also creating avenues for others. Fortunately, these are the women who inspire millions of little girls and fellow women to aspire to do something worthwhile with their life.

Closer home, we’ve got our mothers and grandmothers and sisters and all who by their selfless love and hardship keep us buoyant. We know we can’t thank them enough. Maybe that’s why we never thank them enough.

Cricket, Cup and Countries

2011-03-07T12:19:00.010+05:30

Cricket sucks. I could have started this piece in a milder tone but I’ve got to warn the cricket-lovers before I sound nastier than I intend to. We all know it's just a lazy sport involving a lot of furniture. Wooden bats, stumps, bails. You get the idea. I must add cricket is a lovely sport as long as you’re not interested in it. Once you become a fan, it’s a frigging downhill thereafter. You get absorbed into this tedious circus of run-bowl-bat-field routine. No wonder this sport is played in less a dozen countries. Nonetheless, they have something called “Cricket World Cup” (CWC) going on as I type this polemic. It’s beyond humour that an event comprising of only 14 nations uses the word ‘World’ matter-of-factly. Unlike Football World Cup, you don’t witness cut-throat competition to qualify for CWC. On the contrary, non-cricketing nations like Ireland, Canada and Holland are invited to fill in spots against established cricketing biggies like India and Australia. There is nothing wrong with setting minnows against Goliaths but it just illustrates the helplessness of a sport in popularizing itself globally at the grassroot level.

One thing that well nigh sets CWC apart from other sports’ World Cups is the fact that it has the distinction of being hosted in all inhabited continents, something even football and hockey is yet to achieve. I know you must be wondering when did South America which might confuse cricket for an insect held the CWC. For the record, it happened in 2007 CWC when Guyana hosted a match and Guyana is a part of South America.

Cricket is a colonial vestige, at least in India. We were matchless in hockey during the time of our independence from British Raj. So naturally, hockey was chosen to be our national sport. As of now, if you look around, you can clearly point out the discrepancy in our attitude towards hockey. For the first time in 80 years, Indian hockey team couldn’t even quality for Olympics held at Beijing. It sounds like a death knell to something that put India on the global sporting map long before we could even call ourselves a free country

Cricket flourished in the subcontinent under the pretext of being the gentlemen’s game. It was called so not because all cricketers were certified gentlemen. They were not. It was just the nature of the sport. To begin with, it’s a non-contact sport, unlike football or hockey where players physically clash with each other. Cricket, on the contrary, is a collective display of individual space. The bowler has his predetermined run-up. The batsman has the 22-yard limited sprinting arena. The wicket-keeper stays put at his spot. The fielders have their designated area of concern. Even the umpires hardly move. The only thing that really helps this otherwise stationary act is the ball that can be shot in any direction by the batsman and occasional castling of stumps by bowlers. That keeps the momentum and excitement alive among the hapless fans.

And talking of ‘gentlemen’s game’, cricket is quite free from hooliganism that is prevalent in football and other popular sports. But then that is discounted passion. In cricket, the “gentlemen” do something worse. They are known to manipulate match results through match-fixing, spot-fixing, slow-overs and whatnot. It’s pathetic, to say the least. Moreover, cricketing body is known for its leniency towards drug abuse which is conspicuous in its reluctance to work with World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). The recent sacking of three Pakistani players on doping charges is just a start.

Take a look at our cricketers; you just can’t miss their paunch. It just demonstrates the level of fitness a “sport” like cricket entails. Or at least our cricketers believe it entails. Besides, even on newspaper, cricketers are mostly shown practising all other sports except cricket to “stay fit”. It’s like a colossal joke that has been tolerated for too long.

As you can guess by now, I’m not a cricket fan. But it doesn’t diminish my Indianness. Of course, I’d love to see India win CWC coz the last time we did, it was more of a miracle and less of everything else. I can’t deny cricket is the only thing that actually binds our diverse country north to south, east to west. Nothing else comes even close to cricket in fulfilling this arduous task. Not even Bollywood. And then there is Sachin-factor too. I want him to retire with that one laurel missing on his legendary mantelpiece.

Lastly, this drivel won’t bring a revolution of sort and there must be millions of people who won’t agree with me but it doesn’t change the home truth that we nearly don’t exist in other sports despite having 1.2 billion people under one flag. Cricket’s unprecedented (read: commercial) success has a lot to do with this dismal scenario. It’s a shame but in ways more than one, cricket alone is not to blame. There are lots of other factors that goes in to play and when I say play, I don’t mean sports.

And the Oscars goes to the dogs!

2011-03-01T09:56:00.007+05:30

Some things are better watched live and some things, alive. You have to give it to Oscars for being the most articulated celebrity circus in showbiz. Well, this year’s Oscars fell somewhere in the middle of nowhere. It wasn’t an epic disaster, so to speak, but still it lacked its quintessential spark. For starters, it lacked jokes. I don’t know about others but I don’t watch Oscars for fashion policing. I watch it for hilarity – the innocuous digs that the host takes at the A-list actors who in turn are left with no option but to join the laugh parade. This year’s Oscars was not only bereft of such could-have-been jocular moments but also the guy (read: TV show hosts/comedians) who usually carry out the deed.

At the risk of sounding ruthless, the emceeing wasn’t up-to-mark. But James Franco was as high as sky. The poor guy was stoned and on top of that, he had to act sober but failed miserably. He was way too busy smirking, giggling and forgetting his lines. His co-host, Anne Hathaway had to overcompensate for his lack of participation. Out of the two, Anne obviously did a better job. Her charming personality coupled with her singing and rapid wardrobe changing skills made her screen-time worthwhile. Yet it wasn’t enough.

There were some spectacular moments too. Thankfully. Like Kirk Douglas’ appearance on stage to present the Best Supporting Actress Award. At 94, with heavy breathy voice, he still remembers the art of entertainment. He cracked jokes on Australians, Colin Firth and even flirted with Melissa Leo before handing out the bald statuette. For the minutes he spent on stage, you couldn’t help thinking: Yes, Oscars is the country for old men. After all, the Academy ensures legends and the not-so-legendary oldies are paid their due respect.

This time around, they had Billy Crystal (who tickled the starry audience pink within seconds of entering) reminiscing an *encounter* with his idol Bob Hope on the very jocular stage he was standing, years ago. Then there were Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law who shared the stage and effortlessly created laughs. Randy Newman’s acceptance speech for Best Song crafted some genuine yet laughy instants.

Acceptance speeches are rarely pleasing to ears, let alone audacious or inspiring. This year was no different. But I liked the Best Documentary 'Inside Job' director Charles Ferguson’s assertive stand about the absence of recession-tainted corporate executives in jail. I remember Sean Penn doing something similar for gays’ rights when he won Best Actor in 2009. Then there was Tom Hopper who won Best Director for ‘The King’s Speech’ advising everyone to listen to their mothers for he did the same and was going home with the golden statue.

Needless to say, like millions of fellow Indians, I too dream of Oscars and revel in its unsubstantiated glory. This year had some Indians (Bollywoodians, to be precise) on the red carpet including Abhi-Ash and Ashutosh Gowariker. AR Rahman performed “If I Rise” on stage. Moreover, the musical engineer had two nominations for Danny Boyle’s ‘127 Hours’ which he didn’t win. Boyle who struck gold two years ago with ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, was the biggest loser this year as his movie couldn’t pick up a single win out of six nods.

And yes, there was Tariq Anwar who failed to grab the award for Best Editing in ‘The King’s Speech’. This was his second nomination after ‘American Beauty’. Had he won, he could have become the first post-Slumdog Indian to grab an Oscar. Sigh.

Christian Bale won the Best Supporting Actor for his skinny role in ‘The Fighter’. Natalie Portman bagged Best Actress for her irritating but awesome portrayal of a ballerina in ‘Black Swan’. Colin Firth was anyway the sole man in Best Actor’s race with his stammering in TKS so there were no surprises there. TKS also won the Best Picture award. Deservedly so, I must add.

When I say Oscars has gone to the dogs, I’ve got undeniable reasons. Christopher Nolan was snubbed as usual. He wasn’t even nominated for direction. Just imagine ‘Inception’ without Nolan’s imagination. Difficult, isn’t it? For all we know, the Academy has issues with geniuses like him. Darren Aronofsky and Roger Deakins (and many more) also belong to this helpless club. Formidable movies like 'True Grit' and 'Winter’s Bone' went home empty-handed. Well, '127 Hours' wasn't the favorite in the first place.

In some way, watching Oscars, having no inkling what the Academy is all about, I mean, who are these people who get to vote, helps a lot. Perhaps, for all its annual exaggerations, Oscars deserves a lifetime achievement award as well as retirement.

Whatever.

No matter how dull it was on television, we, on Twitter, successfully snubbed Monday morning blues thanks to Oscars. Yup. So that’s a brownie point there. Meanwhile, I learned a trick or two for my celebrated “career”. You see, I’m thinking of doing a James Franco in my office some night. I’ll let you know once I do it. Or maybe after I undo it.

A weekend to remember

2011-02-19T07:51:00.004+05:30

Here I am. Bryan Adams was here, too. I mean, in the city. For a concert. There were thousands of bulbs (fans is a depreciating word). I was there, too.

It was one heck of an event. Being someone who literally grew up listening to his songs, I'm glad I attended it. Besides, it was also my first open air gig. On any given day, I'd hate crowd but on that particular evening, I begged to differ with myself. Classical concerts in a packed auditorium soothe your nerves but this was something else.

When you're in a faceless event as such, no one recognizes you and you are just another aficionado or worse. You gradually seep into a maddening rush to be part of an experience that it doesn't matter even if the person standing beside you is howling, whistling or throwing his limbs into whatever space available. It is as if you were just part of something big, something much bigger than you. I know I must be sounding exaggerating as usual but trust me, it was beautiful. Especially for a bonafide-weekend- hikikomori like me. Additionally, I wonder if a gig could be so adrenalinistic, how would a revolution with all its charming protests feel like. No surprise, Arab countries are having the time of their life out on their streets.

And yes, how can I forget Bryan Adams? The guy is 51 but will stay 18 till he dies. He had this aura of a stage performer and a sandpaper voice that didn't betray a chord. He crooned almost all his hit songs with his trademark guitar in hand. What struck me was the sheer power a musician of his stature holds. He asks you to hold your cellphone high so as to lighten up the ground a la full moon night and you gladly oblige. He goads you to join him in the song and you shout at the top of your throat in your frog-kissed voice without a care. That's what I loved about the whole thing. You are free in spite of being trapped in swarm of strangers. There must be thousands of singers out there but not everyone can get people involved. A good performer never does it alone. He makes sure the audiences are invited in the party. I can go on and on about Bryan Adams. Maybe it has a lot to do with the fact that I've never seen an international singer perform before. Whatever it is, I can still go on and on about him. He duly deserves it. Plus, his crew, especially the guitarist Keith "Fastest Fingers" Scott, was damn lively. Interestingly, whenever they displayed Keith's lightning fingers strumming on the big screen, people turned quiet due to undeniable electric awesomeness whereas Bryan's voice brought the spoilt schoolkids in us out. Again.

Amazing as it was, there wasn't any sign of fatigue or boredom. It was indeed a weekend to remember and *helped* in churning out an usually positive post, for a change.

In related news, I must stop cribbing and start going out more. Not.

Just Another Stupid Post

2011-02-17T10:38:00.006+05:30

I talk a lot about life. And death. And everything that mingles in between. But I mostly stick with life. It’s easier to tattle on something you’re experiencing on a daily basis. Of course, death is a handy topic too but being alive is the biggest reality. Trying to sprinkle some gyan about life is an intriguing exercise. It may make others go “You need to get a life!” or something in that line but trust me, they don’t say anything to your face and whatever they think in their empty head is their own personal business. Whatever. I can even bet that almost each one of us spew philosophical nonsense on life, knowingly or unknowingly. It’s like a validation of all the time you spent on this lonely planet.

Interestingly, we refer to life as a third person. Most of the words we use to describe it is inspired from songs we hear, dialogues we rote on screen, news we read and stories and poems we learnt as a kid. Yes, not to deny that considerable amount of it is based on personal inexperiences, too. Situations vary. Expressions vary. For example, when we are happy, we don’t jump around thanking our life for being so kind and shit. The same reaction isn’t true when unfavorable events take place. Why me? How unfair! FML!...... follows. Needless to say, life is exaggerated so it’s quite normal to see its nuances pumped up via words. I

Almost everyone’s ultimate dream is to lead a perfect life. It could be for anything – love money, fame, peace, industry, benevolence, etc. In truth, very few pursue this relentless dream as the idea of perfection is hard to overcome. For the rest of us, talking helps. Hearing your voice may be the easiest task but that’s when reality kicks you in the balls. The thing is, our approach towards life is totally different from the way life approaches us. We are like life’s guinea pigs. Most of us have no clue what we want to do with our lives. Some do. But the worst are those who know exactly what they want to do but are doing nothing about it.

Moreover, there is no dearth of words of wisdom when it comes to how you should live. That’s how it is.

After reading this, you must be cursing “You need to get a life!” to me. Fair enough. If I had the kind of life I wish I had, I wouldn't have been bothering myself with this stupid blog either.

Life's Storry

2011-02-07T06:51:00.006+05:30

Since I’ve got absolutely nothing to blab on, I’ll try my bad luck with stories. Like you know, stories go back a long time. For most of us, our grandmas held the password to the magical world of endless tales that kept us engrossed when we were less-stupid little kids. And then one day you grew up and stopped paying heed to impossible fibs. In simpler words, you became a part of your own story called Life. You were the main character, for a change. Of course, you realized every now and then that you weren’t cut-out for the part but still you carried on with it. Needless to say, you often wondered, “How the heck did I bag this role?” So you started looking around and acknowledged the fact that this whole world is an exotic stage and we are all mere hams, diligently trying to act professional, ad-libbing every now and then to add a twist to the script. But in the end, you get a story to call your own.

No matter where you come from, you always carry some f-ed up story with you. These stories, so to narrate, are mostly based on personal inexperiences and utter disregard to consequences. That’s exactly what makes it so damn captivating – its raw unpredictability and undeniable authenticity. Somewhere down the line, we learn that our story can’t be perfect the way they show in movies. Our stories are basically sad, to be frank. We love melancholic drama and not even attempt to get tired of it. Maybe this is the reason why our stories mostly turns out very hospitable to tears and warms heart. Luckily, a fortunate few find the silver smiling lining amid this charade and laugh their heart out at the trivialness of breathing. And some join in the laugh riot.

This story we’re talking about here is alive. It has procreative gifts. For instance, it can give rise to spiteful rumours, adulterated anecdotes and misquoted quotes, too. Far from being dead words, this story is life itself. It may so happen that once in a while, life may abandon you and digress towards loneliness, lethargy, maudlin and other such inviting corner. Despite this interlude, the story goes on.

"Dearest Life, January was here but you weren't, where were you? February is here but you aren't, where are you?”

The search never ends nor the hide-and-seek routine. Just for a story’s sake.

Chancing on a Change!

2011-02-04T08:34:00.004+05:30

If you ain't living on some deserted island or in deep Amazon, there is a pretty good chance you'd be nodding to the fact that something is brewing in Egypt, or should I say in Arab world, at large. They say it is history in the making or a dictator in the breaking. The experts believe epic events like these don't take place often. Well, the people in the know love to dig past, analyze present and predict future. That's their job. But one intriguing word is doing the rounds – Revolution.

People love revolution. Everyone desires a change even at the price of not knowing what exactly that change is all about. Give them an affable leader and a common enemy and then lo and behold. The emotions will unfold on streets, the very place where we're expected to do the very opposite. Every single time the media flashes pictures of people gathered on a city square, you can feel euphoria, anguish, hope, ecstasy, all served on a single plate. You see a crazy crowd shouting slogans, waving flags, pelting stones, burning vehicles and everything that isn't within the definition of civility. And yes, do note that revolution almost never takes place in rural areas!

The chaos that promptly spills on roads actually begins with a society. We, being the herds that we are, love to let society guide us in spite of knowing perfectly well that human society is a failed experiment. One of the biggest reasons why it flunked lies in our inherent selfishness. Small wonder we ended up here, deservedly though. We belong to the kind that not only hunts on full stomach but also qualmlessly boast about it. We don't have to travel far to know what I'm blabbering about. Just take a look at your place. The place you like to call your home. Make a list of all the stuff lying there that isn't of any use to you but it is still there, nonetheless. It could be anything from the clothes you don't wear anymore to the food that gets wasted every single day. The bottom-line is we are neck deep in materialism. The concept of sharing with the less-privileged never kicks in. After all, we are busy 'getting ahead in life'. This is where society fails abysmally and such imbalanced societies proceed to give birth to so-called revolutions. History reeks of struggles where collective human suffering was the winning difference.

Now, the daunting question is who do we want to change – the society or self? The simpler choice would be changing the society. People have being doing that aeons now – trying to change others. The more difficult task would be changing oneself voluntarily. It's high time we washed off this thick coat of want and get a better sense of other's pain and misfortune.

Coming back to the breakthrough happenings of North Africa, let's hope this time it's a revolution for real, not political checkmate or a religious knockout. Revolutions always leave behind its share of ignominy. In fact, the only revolution that passes off without any controversy is the one our planet takes around the sun.

Let's see.

In praise of Coke Studio...

2011-01-27T08:24:00.009+05:30

The other day, someone who read my blog (I know it’s hard to believe that just like it’s hard to believe you are reading now!) concluded that I write less and complain more. Well, I told him I've got the divine right to rant and he, the divine wrong to get offended. But I guess he had a point. My writing is bleak and I ought to apply the positive elements too, and most importantly, try to project myself as less of a loser than I already am.

Movies and Music are my closest friends. Since I’ve already done a bland piece on cinema, I’ll try to replicate its *success* with a on songs. No, no, I won’t be listing out ‘20 Names in Music’. That won’t happen for a very simple reason: I don’t know much about music except that it’s almost like a medicine that puts the heal in health. So here’s what I’ll do. I’ll just talk about the songs I got hooked to lately and what makes them so special.

Before I get started, I must confess I’m smitten by Coke Studio. For those who aren’t aware of it, go Google it. It’s one of the finest things to have ever come out of Pakistan and you can’t afford to miss it. There are hundreds of musical gems flowing thanks to this TV Show. And one such song that has been at the top of my personal chart is ‘Mori Araj Suno’. This song by Tina Sani is electric, to say the least. It is Sufism meet God meet Tina Sani meet talented musicians meet Sufism. Perfect harmony.

Besides, do check out Nawai Ney. It is a melting pot of flute, violin, drums and everything else that pitched in well with Tina Sani’s tuneful voice, powerful words and the chorus of three pretty girls. Needless to say, Sufi music has this unexplainable purity that engages mortals with our so-called Creator and back.

Arieb Azhar’s Husn-e-Haqiqi too belongs to the same stable. Here, Khwaja Farid-inspired lyric questions the vanity behind naming Almighty and draws parallel between nuances that goes unnoticed in our day-to-day existence. And then there is also his Na Raindee Hai which extols the virtue of truth and invokes the supreme power as well as Bulleh Shah in the concluding line. I’m in awe, is a gross underunderstatement.

Add Arif Lohar & Meesha Shafi's spirited Jugni and Zeb & Haniya's Afghani folk number Bibi Sanam Janem to the list and you're a fan for life. And please let Sanam Marvi's Pritam tickle your musical curiosity.

For those who aren’t Sufially-inclined and found the aforementioned reccos dull, either go stab yourself with a plastic knife or try Damien Rice’s The Volcano and Rootless Tree. The haunting but assuasive cello at the very beginning sets the tone for the song and the two beautiful singers with melancholic swagger do the rest. Enjoy.

Expression of Depression

2011-01-24T06:20:00.004+05:30

There’s something about depression that grows on you. Maybe it’s depression itself. Maybe not. You keep on falling down and down to a point of absolute comfort. You are zoned. Most of the time, you take a U-turn and come back to your senses and deal with the fall. But sometimes, you just fade away.

Once in a while, life makes you realize you were born to be depressed. Of small things. Of big things. Of nothings. But you’ve got to be depressed to be part of the crowd. Perhaps, you are not content with the way you look or smell or think or express. And worst of all – no wait, worstest of all – people think they know you. It’s like you are a guinea pig in a huge social experiment. Society is, after all, an invisible layer of stress, constantly wanting you to act in a certain way or the other. But at the end of the day, no can harm you more than you. That’s an unestablished fact.

We keep chasing happiness only to realize it was peace of mind, not happiness, we were after. No wonder sadness is never out of fashion. It’s always there around the corner waiting to pounce on you and won’t give up until you yield to its magic. A big part of the problem dwells in our mindset too. We shape our desires and ambitions and worldly hoo-haa-haa according to elements encircling us. We are never really free, you reckon?

Some of us confuse depression with disease. Even science wants us to believe so. Well, it’s a personal take but if depression is a medical disorder, then happiness is too. Shrinks may not agree as they are too busy stuffing you with drugs that go smoothly with your hollow system and your supremely f-ed-up mind.

We are facing our own creations. Moreover, sadness is underestimated for all the power it holds. In reality, it is more powerful than happiness. A happy moment doesn’t stick with you for long. Blame it on biased amnesia but that’s how it is. Smiling randomly reminiscing about gone good days doesn’t take place much often but crying hoarse over how life had been unfair in the past is quite a famous exercise.

As usual, there was no straightforward intention to come up with this piece. Just plain depression at not being able to come up with anything better.

Unoccasional Poetry

2011-01-21T06:03:00.003+05:30

Of His Own

He knows not how to win
nor to break hearts asunder,
all he does is speak his mind
leaving the devil to wonder…

He gets alone wherever he is
and secretly cries his eyes out,
while enjoying the noise of a distant smile
calm as a cold and cold as a clam…

He is not what folks think
as they aren't worth the trouble,
has no reason to do otherwise
for he tells no truth, he tells no lies…

He rises under the sun
and sweats in the noon,
kisses the sweet breeze
and sleeps with the moon…

He's well aware of death
as well as the mysteries breathing beholds,
yet he wants to try his best
to keep his chin up when he falls dead…

Quite or Quit!

2011-01-13T07:17:00.004+05:30

I’m thinking about my job. Gotta quit either one of them. OK, I quit thinking. Bad jokes apart, this is a serious issue. Nah! Don't worry. I'm not going to advocate nihilism-hedonism-combo-supershit philoSOURphy here though I'd love to do exactly so but I'll try not to. What I really want to do is convey the importance of getting a proper job which one LIKES. The type where you don't have to ask yourself, "Is my job worth the piss I'm holding back?" Nevertheless, the term 'workaholic' doesn't apply to you if you don't like your job. As streetforward as that.

I'm emphasizing on the likeability factor as I ain't particularly someone who is very much happy with his job profile like majority of my fellow-employees in this universe, aliens included. I'm not exactly excellent at what I'm doing but I'm not the worst case scenario so I can say that I know my job better than the back of my hand. But then, what the heck do i need to know the back of my hand for, eh?

Throughout my sorry life, I always wanted to be somebody. And I'm still not THAT somebody. It's like a fading reverie where I see opportunities being gutted right in front of me. In reality, I'm rather busy writing stupid pseudofunny lines and feel like a monk with a monkeyish grin. I may not be as hopeless as this piece is turning out to be but trust me, one must get a job one dearly loves. Although it's hard to believe I too used to love my job from the bottom of my fingers once. Today when I look back, I wonder if they drugged me or something. You see transcribing is not the world's best job and transcription is hardly known outside our small thriving circle. Honestly, my job and I are simply destroying each other but we both pretend as if we are unaware of the fact. Plus, the nocturnal nature of my work doesn't help much. There is hardly any social life left of whatever was left before I left diurnal existence. No, Social Media doesn't count! And the ugliest part of all: I'm getting screwed by my job while my cronies are getting laid.

Maybe it's time to quit. But what next? I don't need this stupid job as long as no one mentions money and I'm wearing a pocketless trouser. My parents won't allow a 24 year old crazy son to stay at home tied to his PC watching never-ending movies. That is just not happening. So I guess I'm at the crossroad of my life. Perhaps, I should go back to what my forefathers used to do – farming. Not a bad idea to be frank but I'm not harboring that Lucky Ali moment. At least, not yet. On a second thought, I must become a fisherman and go back to the sea. After all, according to Darwin, that's where we all come from. On a third thought, I guess I should escape into the deepest of jungle and fulfill the penultimate dream of emulating my childhood hero Mowgli's life. But again, I guess I'm too old for that kind of nonsense.

Enough of trivializing the "serious issue" I noted in the very first line. Maybe, I'm overreacting as usual. Maybe it's just a phase and like all other phases, this too will burn out. Some days it feels great to have a job. Apparently today is not such a day.

Whenever I'm in office I keep reminiscing about all the stupidities I committed and how little I learned. Anyway, it's never too late to improve, quit or die. Or write another futile piece and undo whatever you blabbered in the previous post.

P.S: Just thought of doing something more insignificant than my job. Hence this blog post. *cruel laughs*

Boredomination

2011-01-08T01:58:00.002+05:30

Boredom is the most happening thing on this planet. And I'm sure it is not restricted to humankind alone. Seen birds and animals doing nothing but trying to be still? Exactly! That's what I'm talking about.

As far as I know there are 24 hours in a day and out of these 24 hours, about one-third is spent on sleeping in its various forms. And that leaves less than 16 hours to "live". So the real question is how much time is actually "lived" and not "bored". Now don't get into etymological pogrom and insist that even being bored is part of the grand scheme called living process. Trust me, it's not. Living is to be alive, not zombified. In fact, we shouldn't worry much about nuclear proliferation when boredom proliferation is a bigger and more immediate threat to our existence. That sounds like exaggeration, isn't it? No, not really.

Roughly put, boredom is like being in a quicksand; the only difference is you don't sink. You are not aware when it strikes you but once you feel it, you want to escape it. Unless of course if you are working in an environment (read: office) where there is no such thing as an Escape button. And worse, if you are working graveyard shifts where your eyelids are put to test almost every single night and very thin line is left between being bored and being asleep. And then when you're caught napping on the desk, you exploit philosophy by saying "Eyelids are not meant to carry such burden of boredom!" and then you're promptly fired from the job. Happens.

I love talking about workplace and all the vagaries attached that pass of as occupational shite. Given a choice, boredom is anytime a favourite against workdom. Not many come to work to work. Most of them are here for the pay and if given an opportunity, they'll do everything but work. Any given day. You don't have to be a communist to know this. There are millions of us who would rather be bored to death than worked to death. So you see, now people are ready to get bored given they don't have to be productive at the same time. There are companies where employees hardly grind but stream videos online and spent time on social networking sites as if it will make their company's quarter-end graph kiss the face of sky.

You should be working in my office to know what different levels of boredom can do to your brain (or lack of it). Very few things may pique your interest when you're at the top of Mt. Boredom. But it's a good thing. Sometimes. Like you come up with stupid lines that you decide to tweet thinking, "Lo! There I break the code of this universe!" and then get back to fighting deadline. Under its spell, your mind is not completely dead and is gifted with the power of imagination. You think of better things in life than toiling for bread and butter – both of which you don't eat ANYMORE! But that's how it is. Everything gets boring after a while. Pessimism seeps into your soul and wait for the day your stupid heart will get bored of creating its beautiful beat music.

People have this very pathetic habit of taking credit for things they have nothing to do with. They all go ballistic when they are bored as if they invented boredom. Take a break. Breathe. It was always here. We are just passing through.

P.S. Since you are reading this crap, I owe you something. The tripe above doesn't make sense. I know. I wrote it as I was bored and so thought of boring you too. Anyway, do you hear that? That's boredom talking in a deeper voice.

New Year Nosolutions

2010-12-29T11:15:00.005+05:30

It's that time of the year when the year seems to be ending quicker than the previous one. Of course, it’s just an illusion. And these are moments when Albert “Theory of Relativity” Einstein can’t stop rolling in his coffin. Actually the problem lies somewhere north of our eyes. We are “blessed” with a brain they say, a wet mesh that imagines and fantasizes and whatnot.

We want to make time relevant to us which aren’t always the case. Most of the time, time doesn’t give a damn about us. We are just another fart in the air for it. So to convince ourselves of our importance and objectives, we create New Year resolutions. Yes, that long list of unattainable endeavors that takes you nowhere but back to New Year. This list is very much like the bucket list, the only difference being there isn’t a movie called *New Year Resolutions* yet.

See, we don’t want to age. We don’t want to grow any stupider than we already are. We want to prosper. Some even want to lose weight and gain health. Most of us want to become famous, at least on social media, if not in real life. A few of us also want to get married and then have a resolution of “I won’t marry again!” for next year. And yes, I repeat, we don’t want to age.

People are so centered on the way they look. It’s like neo-narcissism or something. In simpler words, we are becoming narcissists who are badly in love with our ugliness. Aging was supposed to be an indication of wisdom but today it’s more like a testament to the beauty products one applies. It’s not our fault I guess. It’s part of evolution (or devolution, for the simple minded!). C’mon, your beauty belongs to you, not time.

Every year leaves behind a pile of unnecessary lessons to learn and New Year resolutions to scorn. I too have my last year’s promises which sadly I couldn’t see through in ‘10. In fact, I’ve got just 2 more days to go before my 2010 New Year resolutions' top priority – getting a tattoo – expires. But it’s OK. I won’t kill myself – my seventh and last priority.

Methinks more important stuff gets overlooked. Like last year, I was clueless about what I wanted to be but right now I'm full of clues but no definite answer. You know, shit happens. And then repeats itself. Like karmic cycle.

Anyway, I've realized that years will come and go but New Year resolutions will stay with us. Always. They are like our best friends we never thought we had. They’ll stick with us through thick and thin and everything in between.

As of me, I won’t have resolutions, notwithstanding my skin-deep desire to get inked. I’ll be as careless as I can be. I’ll try my best not to give into societal diction. I may sound a goner but that’s what I am. Perhaps I’m just another 24 year old fool afraid of turning into a 25 year old fool, this coming year.

(W)ork (T)hy (F)riday

2010-12-24T05:55:00.003+05:30

I've never before posted a blog piece from office i.e. during office hours. Not that I'm too busy working my ass off for my country's economy but blogging is difficult when you're busy sneaking on Twitter and Facebook. Being a dedicated employee, I've got to make a choice. But today is different.

First of all, today is the last working Friday of the year. Yes, yes, you can go "Thank God It's Friday" as if God gives a damn about Friday. But on the brighter side, it feels like a Friday. I mean, I'm done for the night and can leave for home which obviously I won't as the very reason for going home is not there anymore – work.

For the record, I'm doing absolutely nothing right now. I mean, other than tweeting my usual crap. Office feels like home, so to lie. And you know you are in trouble when you have such inappropriate feeling towards your workplace. Home is no good either if you switch off the PC but then that's another story. Honestly speaking, this is how an office should be. At least on working days. That's not very much to ask for, I guess.

When you're chasing deadlines like they were skirts, good ole memories have a tendency to tease you. You reminisce your childhood days, school and all those carefreeness that you took for granted. I'm not sure about you but I do think of aforementioned stuff before turning clinically depressed. It can get overwhelmingly nostalgic with work on one hand and work on another hand and mind stuck in the middle. It's a point where it's difficult to say whether you are suffering work or vice versa.

Actually my office is gifted with true professionals. Unfortunately, these hardworking folks are not endangered YET. And needless to say, they make my life tougher than it should be. You can't blame them. Nor kill them. You've got to adjust and convince that each one of us is here for the greenbacks. There is enough space for everyone, be it promotion, jealousy or indolence. After all, some of my colleagues do help me with my job and become "my bestest friend ever" for that particular day.

I just work long hours but i don't put my heart and soul into it. I can't be that cruel to myself. To me, like most of you, work is a dirty word. Work loves me but i don't reciprocate. Still, the bitch never gives up. I don't know what i want but i know what i don't want. I don't want to work. Work continues to be challenged by my weak approach towards strong procrastination. In granular words, I'd rather be bored to death than worked to death.

By the way, if you think I'm ranting, you better put yourself in my chair and don't get up until you are done with all my work. Thank you.

Perhaps, that's enough ranting for a Friday.

Speaking of Friday, if there was a vote for the day with most goodwill, my vote will definitely go for Friday instead of Sunday. Honestly, how many of us actually "live" Sunday. Friday is the perfect balance between slavery, hope and then freedom. This is the day when you work thinking of weekend. This can also be the day when you feel everything is getting better and someone reminds you of pending work. However, Friday is worth the weekdays' pain. Seriously.

Like I always say, Friday is and will always be a working class hero.

20 Names in Cinema

2010-12-17T10:20:00.012+05:30

I often lie that I can never run out of ideas as I’m too lazy to run. But this stupid joke doesn’t help me much, especially when it comes to blogging. My mind is mostly blank and I dread clicking on the “New Post” option. But today I’ve come up with something related to my first love. Cinema.

I’ve compiled a list of 20 of my favouritest movies, in no particular order. It’s impossible to pluck just 20 names when there are thousands out there, equally befitting and deserving. Anyway, when it comes to movies, writing/typing is always a pain; true to my very own adage “Watching is the easiest thing to do after sleeping!”

I’ve tried to pick up movies from across the world cinema. For the record, these movies (and many more) shaped me into the deformity that I am today. I won’t be revealing too much of the movie plot and spoil the joy for you.

By the way, this post is dedicated to my dearest Moni who inspired me into writing this post and somehow helped in updating my usually dormant blog.

Okay, here we go!

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1. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

There is a reason why this movie has been at the top of IMDb list for such a long period of time and is in no imminent danger of getting replaced by something else. This movie has everything one can hope for. Good script, great casting, strong storyline…everything. The story is set in a prison and shows us how human fortitude can overcome time and defeat hopelessness. Hats off to everyone associated with this gem. And if you haven’t watched this movie, you don’t qualify as human.

2. Stalker (1979)

Whenever I mention Andrey Tarkovskiy, people usually go ‘huh?’ and that’s a gigantic shame. On us. Here is the movie and the director himself who literally segued direction with cinematography. He, like many masters of cinema, changed the way we look at our screens. Stalker is like an expansive canvas of dreams converting into reality. It covers almost everything out there to behold and lets us close our eyes and go back to dreams, for a change.

3. Fight Club (1999)

This champ is a poetry in commotion. The intensity with which it seeps into your psyche and troubles you is beyond words. Its rich philosophy and in-your-face dialogues shake the very fundamentals of whatever you hitherto believed in. A super book converted into a superb movie doesn’t happen very often but FC is a happy exception. There are many who became insomniac after watching this movie. Anyway, it isn’t a mere movie. It’s a cult, for all the obvious reasons.

4. The Woman in the Dunes (1964)

We all want to escape and we all want to get trapped. What if you escape into a trap? And what if the trap becomes an escape again? Not sure? Then watch this one. That’s exactly what happens in this Japanese masterpiece. The emotions conveyed will stay with you till amnesia takes over or kingdom come.

5. The Secret in Their Eyes (2009)

This Argentine thriller is epic from the word go. Though the movie revolves around a crime, every character is so interlinked to all the human aspects be it expression, deception, sacrifice or redemption. This is one of the finest Spanish movies I’ve ever seen. It’s impossible to remember the entire movie no matter how many times you watch it. We are only capable of remembering few beloved scenes. For me, the final moments of this beauty is simply unforgettable.

6. Cinema Paradiso (1988)

Martin Scorsese smuggled mafia into Hollywood and made some of the finest mafiosi movies but this Italian comical drama has nothing to do with that. On the contrary, this one reeks of nostalgia. It’s about a small kid who is madly in love with cinema and eventually becomes an acclaimed director. You’ll fall in love with cinema, if nothing else. Well, personally, I relate to the kid and I’m sure most of you will. You better watch it.

7. Anand (1971)

Bollywood and I don’t get along very well but then I can’t deny the existence of some marvelous work of art in golden olden days and Anand is definitely one of them. It’s about a guy detected with terminal disease but is too bubbly to fade away with despair. This movie is a salute to undying human spirit. Almost every single dialogue is meticulously intertwined with the flow of the movie. In other words, Anand was way ahead of its time. And still is.

8. Hunger (1966)

To be honest, Danish movies are not always appealing, if you cut out Dogme. But this classic is way above par and one of the most poignant yet engaging experiences of all time. Sad movies often leave you depressed but this one won’t. It will raise your appetite for respectful cinema like never before. You will relate to the character and his struggles even though he is not you.

9. A Clockwork Orange (1962)

I better not say anything about this cinematic rebel. No, seriously.

10. Amélie (2001)

French with their rich names and substance know how to make a movie and Amélie is one such glaring example of it. A story about a good-hearted girl who helps in sorting out other people’s life but has very little idea on how to sort out her own. Beautiful is the word.

11. Children of Heaven (1997)

Often called the best children's movie of all time. And it has nothing to do with animation. Iranian cinema is famous for churning out society-centric movies. This one deals with the innocent relationship between a boy and his sister. The boy has made a promise to his sister and wants to keep it at all cost, even at the cost of losing. Cute is the word for this one. Long live Iranian Cinema!

12. Downfall (2004)

This German movie captures Hitler's final days. One thing that strikes after watching this movie is HOW COME GERMANS' MAKING SUCH GREAT MOVIES? EUROPEAN CINEMA WAS ALL ABOUT FRENCH NOIR! HOW COME THEY ARE IMPROVING BY LEAPS AND BOLLYWOOD BOUNDING DOWN BY DEEPS?

13. Into the Wild (2007)

All young hearts dream of breaking off from the society and moving to a jungle or some faraway land and build a hermit of peace. The character in this modern masterpiece tries exactly the same. And dies in the process. Premature. Emile Hirsch is the one-man army in the entire movie and Sean Penn did a commendable job behind the camera.

14. A Bittersweet Life (2005)

Korean movies are famous for their rawness. Bittersweet Life will take you through cinema’s history with lots of scenes paying respect to the old masters of filmmaking. The movie is about a I-don’t-give-a-damn guy who is torn between his unassuming love for a girl and loyalty to his boss. There are many other Korean pearls like “Old Boy” and but I chose this one for selfish reasons.

15. In the Name of God (2007)

This was the first (and till-date, only) Pakistani movie I ever watched and it was just remarkable. With an international casting and story so relevant in today’s Islamophobic world, it cut through many issues that modern as well as not-so-modern Muslim world face on a daily basis, post 9/11.

16. In the Mood for Love (2000)

Magic is the word. Kar Wai Wong is the name to reckon. Love is just an excuse.

17. The Man from Earth (2007)

Independent movies usually don’t witness independence. They mostly get lost in the path due to weak promotion and weaker distribution but TMFE was quite different. It made its present felt thanks to its unprecedented success among torrents users and became a sensation on internet. Thankfully, the movie was worth the hype. In fact, its out-of-the-box storyline was a subtle killer. In a good way.

18. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)

Jack Nicholson as we know today doesn’t like to share screen. He believes in devouring the entire frame for himself. In this classic about sanity and insanity and chasm separating them, we see young Jack doing exactly the same but with subtlety. The movie is one of the finest movies on the correlation between freedom, humanity and mental problems.

19. In Bruges (2008)

In Bruges is a dark movie which deals with guilt, promise and love. You will watch this one again and again. The dialogues keeps pace with wits. Story is strong. Acting fulfilling. And background music won’t haunt you.

20. Angela's Ashes (1999)

One of the finest Irish-theme movies. An impoverished family trying to survive bad days and how its affects everyone in the house, especially the eldest son who is also the narrator of the movie, is beautifully woven into one simple, heart-warming story.

21. Dil Chahta Hai (2001)

20 is NEVER enough. Though I've already mentioned my dislike for failing Bollywood standards, i'd rather make an exception here. This movie literally kick-started the entire GenNext Bollywood era with its free-spirited urbane middle class colour. Spunky storyline with measured mix of joy and sadness and lessons in life in between. Just like "Andaz Apna Apna" is synonymous with humour in Bolly, this movie is the preface of neo-modern Hindi cinema.

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Needless to say, it's impossible to have do justice to the list. As expected, I missed on a lot of my favourites like The Big Lebowski, Se7en, Godfather Trilogy, LOTR Trilogy, Goodfellas and Martin Sorcesee’s geniuses as well as Woody Allen’s verbosity and of course Tarantino’s eccentricity and THOUSAND more!

I have respect for those who have disrespect for cheap cinema. And this post is just a token of appreciation to some of the finest out there.

On a side note, I had a job to do. I had to update my blog. And I’m running out of ideas, you see?

Weekend Saga!

2010-11-27T09:44:00.004+05:30

For all the weekdays' pain, weekend is worth the wait. This is the time of the week when you start believing in the world-is-a-nice-place shit. But once it arrives, you are as clueless as the moon in the sky. You want to make the best of it considering the fact that it is too little, too precious. After all, two days can’t stand against five days, democratically speaking.

Yet, you want to make it worthwhile with your plans and whatnot. You don’t want to lose it for nothing. Some go holidaying, some visit their friends and relatives, some treat themselves with luxury and some just sleep and watch movies. By the way, I belong to the last category. And my excuse is utter lethargy to try anything that has to do with stepping out of the door. Let’s just say, I’m lazy against my wish on weekends and hardworking against my wish on weekdays. Wishful life, yes.

Well, most of us believe in the liberation weekend stands for. And lot more. But not all of us end up good with the allotted time before a reality called Monday steps in. Moreover, Saturday and Sunday always seems to be in a hurry. Time plots a conspiracy against us poor proles. After all, weekdays are never appears to be in a rush to commit suicide or hebdomadal resurrection.

When I was in school, Sunday meant a lot to me. Today, I can’t figure out when exactly Saturday ends and Sunday begins and Monday sneaks. Most of the blame will squarely fall on my godforsaken graveyard shift job. If you don’t sleep well during working days, you’ll be narcoleptic during weekend and won’t even care about losing free time on dreamland. And when you wake up, there’ll be hardly anything to do other than log onto social networking sites or watch movie after movie after movie. You just don’t care anymore and start pretending there are worse things in life than not knowing what to spend your weekends on.

Yes, you can get productive too. Like visit a salon and get a bad haircut or something. And then wonder whether your haircut is more boring than your weekend.

See, frankly, these are losers’ talk. A brainful person won’t bury oneself under huge expectations. S/he will simply enjoy the weekend in the best possible way.

The bottom-line is they won’t crib on lost time when they go back to work on Monday whereas for the apathetic idiots, the only highlight of their weekend will be spending more time on Twitter or Facebook or other Internet boons. But then again, you can’t judge the social networkers by the time they spent on tweeting or facebooking. To be fair, with every passing weekend, trying to convince yourself life doesn't suck depends entirely on your mind. Nothing else.

Do you feel a sharp ting in your head? If yes, its enlightenment. If not, enjoy your weekend.

Poems.

2010-11-19T07:38:00.005+05:30

mute lanes
I’ve seen some places
where dreams are sold
tears are bargained
smiles are stored,
where hopes are built
aims dropped and prayers failed
like a smile shroud in darkness too
like hearts do
nowhere to escape, nowhere to go
with nothing left to prove,
peaceful days are all left behind
once you cross this line
call it a bliss or a curse
never again you'll find yourself sane,
these words are just a drop
of endless stories untold;
I’ve seen some places
where dreams are sold.

wish was there a world
Wish was there a world
with no boundaries to share
no borders to cross
no anthems to sing
no false glorious tales to remember
no cold songs to render
no paper to buy or sell
no coins to make a sound
no tears wasted on time,
where hatred paid no fear
or wrongs had a way of its own
none lost in rage or pride
no lines drawn between genders,
colors to celebrate, not to discriminate
lifeless' life in art
nature to love and be loved,
no wars to run, no leaders shunned
no bullets to eat, no worries to meet
kids will smile on our streets.

Burmese Connections

2010-11-15T12:19:00.005+05:30

OK. This is historical. No, I’m not talking about Obama’s India visit. I’m referring to Aung San Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest in Myanmar. And with her release comes the freedom to imagine democracy and all the goodness that it supposedly promises. She was awarded Nobel Peace Prize 20 years ago and has been mostly under arrest since for raising her voice against dictatorship that engulfs her nation even today.

When Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in Robben Island prison and then went on to become the first black President of South Africa, there was worldspread jubilation. The reason was pretty simple. Here was a man who with his strong convictions and non-violent methods led a nation against apartheid. And today, looking at the way South Africa is holding a prominent place on geopolitical canvas, one can conclude that it was worth such a long struggle.

Suu Kyi’s devotion to her cause has been timeless but her release doesn’t contain the magnitude Mandela’s did. She has a long way to go now. Military junta is in no mood to concede power and let democracy flourish. That isn’t going to happen too soon but every positive sign is welcome and her cherished democratic voice behooves aspiration, not only in Asia but also across the planet. No wonder, everyone from POTUS to U.K. PM expressed their happiness and are looking forward to concrete political transformation.

It’s pretty obvious by now that Indian government don’t give a damn about democracy in Myanmar. Our foreign minister’s restrained comment on Suu Kyi’s release speaks volume of the catch-22 we are in. Of course, we’ve got our foreign policies too, which keenly demands closer ties with the infamous junta who apparently ensure us security cooperation on North-East front. But we shouldn’t overlook at the sentiments here. After all, its not about some cheap thrill baam-boom photo-op leader. We are talking about a lady who was once handed a choice between her ailing husband abroad and her nation. She chose the latter.

After attaining independence, India was a nation full of issues but had morality at the right place – on top. As of today, we are still in the thick of gigantic problems but our priorities are not the same. In spite of Myanmar being our instant neighbor, we haven’t extended the support Suu Kyi’s fight deserves and needs.

India is the world’s largest functioning democracy and it’s a shame to see ourselves dragging feet on core human rights issues. We can always escape debate by pointing towards domestic shortcomings but for a nation aspiring to be in-the-not-so-distant-future superpower, its time we got our moral math right.