Time Is But A Stubborn Illusion

You arrive
Time is peace
Pretty, pretty, pretty; the world seems so
Colors explode in the corner of consciousness
I fear if I touch they will explode into million suns
So this is what it feels like to love
For times like this, God created us

You leave
Time is chaos
Pain, pain, pain; the world feels so
My phantom heart bleeds your name
And I will again drown in your absence
So this is what it feels like to die
For times like this, we invented God

Funambulist

An Acrobat moves on a rope
Like a century-old art hung in a somber museum
Life is a question of proportion; pay attention

Inside her head, thoughts form in unknown alphabets
Like shipwrecked hearts dive into azure evenings
or stones were thrown into a silent lake

Summer lightning
A sad breeze passing through Asoka trees
Sentiments balance on the golden silence of wings

You who ache for the calmness of a second
And yet hurry off on a rope for a change
Remember

Those words are only true, which do not insist on meaning.

Post No 4,07,00,00,001 on the Internet: Nature’s curve may not be exponential and other odd thoughts

As I write this article and made a search with keyword COVID 19, the search engine retrieved 4,07,00,00,000 article in 0.43 seconds. Why not another one?

Few of my odd thoughts are as follows


Thought 1: Nature’s curve may not be exponential

When nature starts to dance to the music of death, the curves it shows may not be exponential but in the current situation the articles/forwarded messages related to the topic are taking an exponential form. I do not have enough knowledge to explain why network-based epidemic modeling is a better approach than exponential modeling with R0. (The future reviewers/editors of my articles will be so proud that I am using the technical jargons of which I do not have any clue) However, those of you have any clue, let me direct you play a simple game based on the same theory. https://vax.herokuapp.com/game


Thought 3: Survival of the fittest. Don’t make it survival of the “shittiest”


In the unprecedented time we live in, I remember the scene from heath ledger’s iconic performance in Joker and the words he uttered “When the chips are down, these... these civilized people, they'll eat each other.”. I understand the act of panicking helped our so-called uncivilized ancestors to run away from wild animal attacks, angry spouses but in today’s world when we call ourselves civilized we should have minimum decency not to hoard essential supplies.


Thought 5: Remember those who helped us in our bitter times when the time gets better


Most of us will survive this and maybe in a few months, we will go back again to our old tantrums of hating Mondays, blaming system failure everywhere with our perfect hindsight biases. But I hope we will remember those frontline workers, doctors, nurses, the workers in essential services and all those common men and women who stand guard in this uncommon time.


Thought 7: A Certified Introvert’s Guide to survive lockdown
Most of the cities across the world are in lockdown and governments are taking necessary steps to ensure that people stay at home. A plethora of advice on creating new hobbies, learning new skills floating around in proportion to the growth of the virus.


My advice is to try to sit still for a few minutes’ a day without the constant chatter of the mind. I guarantee you, if you do it for 21 days, if nothing else happens at least you will be older by 21 days.


As of me, paraphrasing the dialogue from the movie “Seventh Seal”; "I will carry the memory of these times between my hands as if it were a bowl filled to the brim with fresh milk. I will be grateful for the near and dear ones in whose prayers I take a position as per Heisenberg uncertainty principle."


In case you liked this article, do read my other imaginary article on “How to play Sudoku with imaginary numbers”

Wildflowers not Roses

Next time show me a wildflower near a stream
Roses in a vase do not sing the same song as me
No more I want to go to viewpoints and
stand in line to take pictures in front of monuments
I am happy to sit across a old railway station and watch passing trains

Never ever I want to go to water parks
Let me go back to river in my village to collect my paper boats back
No longer I want to dance in a concert in a daze
I am happy under a moonlit night in your assuring embrace

And in case I do not pick up phone or call often
May be I have gone back to write postcards and believe waiting is fun

Survival of the ‘Married’

The survival value of the God meme in the meme pool results from its great psychological appeal.

                                                                                                       (Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene)

After the idea of God what can have more psychological appeal than idea of marriage.

Over the years, against my better judgment (believe me, I too can think), most of my friends have marched happily to sacrifice their freedom in the altar of marriage. As if the child ego state inside them lured by all the fireworks, hullabaloo of marriage ignores warnings of adult ego state and says ‘qubool hai’.  

The reasoning they gave can be grouped under several clichéd excuses such as parental pressure, time-tested tradition or obligation to evolution etc.

I do not blame them. But I do blame the reasons they gave. I can understand someone marrying for love. But marrying for tradition!

Irrespective of your gender, once you cross the magic age 25, it seems universe starts conspiring against you. Your relatives start bringing proposals of perfect matches, neighbors have a single agenda ‘Why Mr. X’s son/daughter is unmarried till date’, Colleagues have single lunch-table discussion topic ‘When are you getting married’’. Even the neighborhood shopkeeper does not hesitate in asking, ‘When will I get sweets’.

Over the years, movies, novels, TV serials shaped our understanding and made us believe that marriage is the answer to all problems; A Happily Ever After kingdom exists. Rarely someone said ‘Hey dude/dudette, sometimes light at the end of tunnel is not the escape route but the incoming train’. I am not saying that all marriages end ill or there are no happy couples. My only objection being leaving this important matter to chance rather than own choice.

Yes I do understand that not everyone is a born Casanova or Cleopatra and not all have equal opportunity to get that they want. But that doesn’t mean you flip a coin and base your life decision on it.

I know my argument lacks some merit. Man is supposed to be social animal. Individuality is a dangerous idea. Hence our society is not very fond of bachelors or spinsters and they will be seen as abnormalities in a perfect system. Married couples have better access to rented houses, restaurants and even they get discounts for club entries. The ‘Survival of the fittest’ translates to ‘Survival of the married'.

However all matters aside, as an individual we all are curious to take a new step with hope that it will be a welcome change in life. There is always a certain void in our ever-wanting heart for love & happiness that we try to fill by getting into new relationship(s). We are like drowning people; whoever comes in our way we clutch into hoping that we will be saved by him/her.

As Philosopher Michael Sandel once argued that, whatever we might like to think, we are never entirely free, nor would we want to be. The very ties that give our lives meaning also constrain us and it is precisely by constraining us that they give us meaning.

What they don’t teach you in B-school

I do agree with my friends  that the topic of this article is misleading. Because the list can be pretty long and no doubt why so many best-selling books available on this topic. However keeping in mind the considerable amount spent for earning this degree, I will try to keep the list short ( limited to few theories). 

‘Spiked CV’ theory:  Irrespective of what they tell in the interviews or write in the SOPs,  most of the students (around 99.41%) join B-school so that they can end up with a high-paying job. And to make  this dream come true, the one and only pass is a ‘spiked CV’. Those mortals who have recently earned or want to earn the right to passage in a B-school must not get mislead with the term ‘Spike’. The dictionary meaning of the word i.e ‘having sharp points’, justifies its position before the word  ‘CV’. Let me enlighten you.

The HR manager in any company have a horrendous task of going through thousands of CVs,before summer placement/final placement, to shortlist few lucky mortals who will be in GD/PI round. He doesn’t have the privilege or motivation to allot more than 5-10 seconds to a single CV. After these few seconds , either your CV is at one side of table to be considered for further rounds or in the dustbin to be recycled. Hence unless your CV contain some sharp points (no pun intended) which will not force the HR Manager out of his slumber , your CV should be in a place where it rightly belongs i.e dustbin.

So how one can make hi/her CV ‘SPIKED’? That’s an important and big question. And my personal philosophy is to avoid big questions of life. And also each B-school have its own theories/procedures  for adding spikes. Hence I will restrain myself from disclosing the details.

However ,  the basic concept of ‘spiking’ is to write  powerful, adjective-studded lines about whatever you have done or imagined to have done in life till that period , your actual/imaginary interests and hobbies etc.

For example, if your interest is playing games in PC/console , you need not be so straightforward while writing this in your CV. You may write ‘Vast experience in using/testing software applications’. Suppose you were in the bottom 1/3 rd portion  in your class , you have to tweak the sentence to ‘Graduated in the top 66% of my class‘ or ‘Finished eighth in my class of ten’ (highlight the word eighth) . Same concept  as glass half empty , half full.

‘It depends’ theory

I was pondering about the origin of this theory and am still not sure whether it started with the origin of zen philosophy which taught there is no single definitive answer to any question. But surely once you enter a B-school, this theory will save you in all class participation.

Be it academic questions ,  ‘Which is the better option to finance the project?’ , ‘Which marketing strategy will work for this product?’ , ‘What is the impact of increase in CRR rate on economy?’

Or Non-academic ones ‘Who is the hottest girl in class?’ , ‘Which is better whisky or Vodka?’ , ‘Who is better player Sachin/Lara , Federer/Nadal , Messi/Ronaldo ……?’ , ‘Where to eat tonight, in the college mess or outside?’

Or personal ones ‘Are you in love or just flirting ?’ , ‘Do you smoke , drink ?’etc

All the questions of Universe can be answered by the simple statement. So next time you are in the class without any clue to answer the question  and you have angry professor looking at you with owl eyes , just try out with the answer ‘It Depends’.

After two years, this is going to be the point of difference between a person with a MBA and a person without it. You will belong to the enlightened few , who don’t jump into conclusion at once , don’t give any straight answer. Because by that point of your life, you would have realised that be it in classroom or in real world  there is no question which cannot be answered by a simple two-word statement ‘IT DEPENDS’. 

'Free-rider' Theory

This is one of the much debated theory in campus. Everyone seems to oppose it. But I guarantee that once in a while everybody has been benefited by it. But of course , some lucky ones will be able to do a PhD  on this theory with their own strategies for application.

Let’s go to origin of this theory. When our ancestors climbed down from tress and and stared living in a community,  they went in groups to hunt. Initially each member in the group has to work hard to gather food or hunt animal. Gradually one member must have realised ,without his contribution in the work, food can be gathered / animals can be killed . He need not strain his body for the work. He just has act his part as a member in the group and can get his share. So he can be the ‘free-rider’.

Unfortunately there is written acknowledgement of that unknown ancestor’s patent on this theory. Hence we the generations who received the theory without any patent cost, overused it as it happens anything we receive free.

But in a B-school , each other Guy/girl you meet is as smart or smarter than you. Hence necessary precaution should be taken while using the theory so that you don’t get caught and ostracized from the group. But of course there is no one who hasn’t used this once in a while. Even those who are vehemently against it also have taken help of this theory in need.

The above may work as a guide/warning (pun intended , I hope) for the aspiring MBA students.

DISCLAIMER: I know that you believe that you understand what you think I wrote, but I'm not sure you realize that what you read is not what I meant.

10 commandments from hel(L)

Three days into term-II, I already feel the pressure of elephant sitting on my head and myself racing to
break the 100m record by usain bolt. If term-I was about standing on the toe , this term is all about
standing on the toe nails and ballet like natalie portman as in Black Swan.

However as the line goes in the Charlize Theron starrer 'monster' , 'The thing that people never 
realise about me is that  I can train myself into anything'. This holds true for the students here.
And I hope that will  also hold true for me in the coming days

So after so much brain scratching and smoke surfing , I postulate the following 10 commandments
for MBA students straight from hel(L)

S No	The Ten Commandments in Bible	The Ten Commandments in MBA
1	Thou shalt have no other gods before me	Thou shall have no other dream or thought than MBA
2	Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is  in heaven above, or that  is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth	Thou shall not remember your family or old friends nor foster any kind of relationship till the day you walk through this hallowed gate
3	Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord  thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.	Thou shall not take your CV in vain ; for the companies will not hold him/her guiltless who taketh their CV in vain
4	'Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy	Remember the exam day and appear in it
5	Honour thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee	Honour thy Professors and thy seniors : or the days will be long upon the road you walk
6	Thou shalt not kill	Thou shall not sleep neither in day nor in night
7	Thou shalt not commit adultery	Thou shall not maintain CGPA less than ten
8	Thou shalt not steal	Thou shall not bunk classes
9	Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour	Thou shall not fail to earn CV points
10	Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.	Thou shalt not covet other’s girlfriend, nor friend of girlfriend, nor other’s PPO, nor other’s CGPA, nor anything that is other’s

1/6 TH MBA*

As you already know and must have seen in countless advertisements the '*' at the end of an
announcement suggests that 'conditions apply'. So I thought to put it at the end of this blog's
title as my term-I results are yet to come.

Ideally I should have written this one week back , when the term-I exam was over. But ask
any student pursuing  MBA, about two things he/she would like to do after first trimester/
semester is over , the answers will be 1. Go Home ,  2. Sleep a Lot. Same emotions as a
prisoner first time in parole. So in the spirit of keeping the traditions of those who have
completed this first part of the stint in hell and who will complete in the future , I went home
and slept a lot for last few days.

However while going home , I tried to apply theory of marketing (i.e creating , communicating
and delivering the value) into laws of attraction. At 30,000 ft above ground, I  positioned
my upper part of the body at 21.7 degree angle to show the college logo and name on the
t-shirt to the high cost (pretty) air hostess in the low cost airline. After several attempts ,
her looks conveyed the message that she is not that into me. At that height , I did not have
the option to walk out. So I stayed with a sour heart and as I had nothing else to do I
started to think whether I learnt anything in the last three months from this costly course.
The verdict was 'not much' ( in terms of opportunity cost)

Then I started thinking about 'What to do next'. I remembered what Mr Shivram Apte
(guest lecturer for a course)  had  told about the options after MBA.

The picture , I think is self-explanatory (as it took more than 15 minutes of my time and
patience to complete it in MS Paint). To put it into words , those with high ambition and
ability to withstand pain will constantly change their jobs for better opportunities, those
with high ambition and willingness to do something different  will become CXOs (CEO,
CFO  etc) , those who want to be the change and can withstand pain with no high
ambition will join NGO and at last with all the three i.e ambition , ability to
withstand pain and willing to bring change will become entrepreneurs.

I don't know what I want to become. Beyond the fascinating colors , large white space
remains and  it seems that is my domain.

Another aspect about choosing profession I got while reading the book 'The Black Swan'
by Nassim Nicholas Taleb , where he had postulated the following theory

"The distinction between writer and baker , speculator and doctor , fraudster and prostitute
is a helpfulway to look at the world of activities. It separates those professions in which one
can add zeros ofincome with no greater labor from those in which one needs to add labor
and time (both of which are in limited supply) - in other words , those subject to gravity"

So as the term-II starts I begin to think which profession to chose when the course ends ,
a 'scalable' one ( in which you are not paid by the hour and thus subject to limitations of
the amount of your labour) or a 'non-scalable' one

MBA : First Impression

I admit that , with only few days of experience in college(to be specific 10 days) am not qualified to
comment on the programme or people. However as seniors and faculty members have told again
and again that getting time for yourself will be become a illusion in days to come , I thought it is
better to write whatever comes to mind. And I must tell beforehand that whatever statements am
going tomake now may be not completely true as I gather more experience here


1. Induction Programme : As per college manual , objective of the programme to initiate
interaction between faculty and new students and between final year and new students.
I am not going toelaborate the process as it will take the fun part of the programme.
However one suggestion 'pleasedon't miss it' as you will miss the whole concept of MBA
programme

One personal experience that I can share is , in the first day of induction when the faculty
asked all of us the question which we had prepared best during interview days ,'why MBA'
nobody raised handamong hundreds of students. It was quite satisfying experience for me
as I really do not know the answer.

2. Difference between Night and Day : I am a person of simple habits when it comes to sleeping.
If  I remember correctly last time I had less than six hours of sleep in a row was during 12th
board exam.I can assure you that from then on I had never have problem of sleeping 7-8 hours
in a day. I have followed that regime for the last 12 years , even  during graduation in my engg
college when friends were active in various extra curricular activities (watching movie , playing
computer games andother things) or during the years after that when I had a job

However in these few days, I have a sincere doubt whether people ever sleep here. It's like
twenty four hours a day and nobody is complaining.

The reason may be in following picture

When this Sunday , I went to bring the books from academic block a surprise was waiting for me.
I signed the acknowledgement sheet and received the books shown above and the madam
distributing the books shared the addition information (shock) that these are not for a whole year .
These are meant to be read in a trimester (10 weeks period) . Other than the above books one
can borrow reference books from library and may be provided additional reading assignments by
profs.

3. Class Participation. : I belong to those marginal section of students who went to govt schools
and colleges. So , whoever in the class raised their hand to answer or question, we used to make
fun of him/her as the 'show off person of the class'. Times change and so as places. Here the
motto is to show off else suffer in your grades.

As in today's class , most of the people animatedly discussed for an hour on difference between
values , morals and ethics , I was searching  for soul like me who was getting bored and when I
find none , the hindi tune kept ringing in my head 'ye kahan aa gaye hum'

4. Friendship or Networking : Here rarely you are going to make Friends .You have to make
networks then Friends (if any) will come to you . I am still learning the concept , hence cannot
detail on it. IfI mange to decode it , which has a near zero probability , I will elaborate in the
next blog(s).

So this is for now. If I do not get sucked into the supersonic pace of life that is a norm here ,
I will come and share my experiences soon.

As the song goes

"Yesterday all my troubles seemed so far away.

Now it looks as though they're here to stay.
Oh, I believe in yesterday"

Good Bye & Good Luck Vizag

You can say goodbye to people. But can you really bid farewell to a city.?

I came to Vizag in Septmber 2006 with a single agenda of earning livilihood and in a way revive my
self respect which was lost in the turmoil of being jobless in preceding three months.

I have to admit that initially I hated this place. There was no particular reason. May be unrest in my
heart brought the worst of me. But at the end I submitted to the temptation the city provided and
fall in love with the place.

In these last 57 months , in between hundred hangovers,  I cherish those night drives with friends ,
numerous office gossips , alone moments in the beach measuring weight of sand in hand or on the
rooftop making figures in cigarette smoke or roamings through city on my bike when it rained.

But all the moments are lost forever like tears in the rain. And life goes on.

I can remember the first lines of a old ghazal ' Ab ke hum Bichde to shayad kabhi khwabon mein
mile , Jis terah sookhe hue phul kabhi kitabone mein mile '(In case we get separated this time ,
we may meet in our dreams like those dead flowers we find inside books)

And the first few lines of New Slang (The Shins), which goes as follows

                    Gold teeth and a curse for this town were all in my mouth.

                    Only, i don't know how they got out, dear.
                    Turn me back into the pet that i was when we met.
                     I was happier then with no mind-set.


                     And if you'd 'a took to me lik A gull takes to the wind.
                     Well, i'd 'a jumped from my tree
                     And i'd a danced like the king of the eyesores
                     And the rest of our lives would 'a fared well


So without any pretense or confusing emotions , I bid farewell fom Vizag as I bid farewell fom a friend  , 'Good Bye and Good Luck Vizag'


 

Color of Blood is BLUE

Long back somewhere I read that 'One Glorious moment under the sun is worth a thousand lives'.

Three hours back,  for the Cricket team of India there was a glorious moment . May be not only for them , but for all those thousand  Indians  in the stadium , millions at home , shops , hotels , clubs , streets , borders , everywhere watching and praying for India to win the World Cup it was a glorious moment of
our lives. A moment to hold forever.

In a day or two , again we will fall back to our daily routine, those who are employed will go to work and unemployed will serach for work. We will be again trapped into casual happenstances of life. There is no escape from reality. However for those few moments when the Indian Capatain Mahendra Singh Dhoni
scored the winning runs by putting the ball outside the boundary in a most fashionable way and rotate his
bat like a gladiators' sword , we Indians were happy. For a moment we were not separate individuals ,
we were all part of single joy. Even those pretty Emirates air hostess by the side of World cup standing
for longtime giving digital smile , tired commentators hoping to return home soon were happy.


You may argue what is there in the game . Is it going to solve crime , reduce poverty , make some new technological innovation ? No , it was never meant to. This was to look beyond our daily failures to something refreshing. It is a choice to make that never lose hope.

From the moment , when Srilankan Captain won the toss and was asked what will be a good score and he answered that anything they can put on board will be a good score, I hoped it will be close contest. And it was , a fight between tiger and lion , where tiger won. When India was 31-2 , I was dreading whether it will be like a previous World Cup Final defeat . But this time we won for the brilliance of our players who went that extra step, that extra inch to clinch victory , to claim immortality. They made us , the 1.2 biilion people of India winners.

Whoever says winning isn't everything may be a loser. Winning is everything. And it feels good to be
winner after long time.

Though like most of Indians I was hoping for a Fairytale ending to the fablous contest , by Great Sachin
scoring his 100th Internationl Hundred and bringing the world cup home after 28 years , I cannot
complain now.

May be God of Cricket has to wait for few more months for his next milestone.

At the end thank you team India for giving me one of the best moment of my life. Thank You

Cricket , A religion , A revolution

Fewdays back when I was preparing for some Interviews , I was reading about recent uprising in
arab countries and the cause behind it , hoping that in the interview I will be asked about same.
I did read about Psychology (Pluralistic igonrance ) , Economy ( inflation , unemployment) ,
technology (facebook , internet) of modern revolution. And I was thinking I had quite grasp
about it

But today evening , after India'as semifinal win over Pakistan , when four of us went to hang out in the beach , my understanding got a quiet beating. There were thousands of people cheering for India. It is
a weekday , most of them has to wake up early in the morning got to school , office , have to cook etc.
There was no reason behind standing there at the middle of the night. All are strangers , nobody fixed a
time to gather there , no pamplets , no SMSes , facebook messages but everybody was there. It was
like a string attched to everyone bringing them together to that place

How come a win in silly game of longitudinal wood stick making love with spherical ball can attract
thousands of people of all ages , religions , regions into the sleepy beach of vizag in middle of
night was incomprehensible to me.

Then , like a lightening a idea came to mind. Like love there is no reason for revolution . It has to
happen so it happens , there is no reason behind it.

In the end , I am hoping for final win so that again I will be part of small revolution in saturday evening
at Vizag beach

HAPPINESS

The number of articles , books which have been written or going to be written on the subject 'Happiness'
is so vast that one doesn't feel happy to have to read all those to know what happiness is

And I don't think there was ever a single human being or ever going to be , who has not thought about
this subject. May be he/she was intelligent or lazy enough not to write books or songs on the issue.

So without any pretension to lift the veil from the mystery subject , here are some thoughts which was
result of a discussion during lunch hours.
During lunch hour yesterday , one senior colleague suddenly put down the question 'What is happiness' .
After seeing so many english movies (yeah yeah of course with subtitles) , I thought I had enough
intelligence and experience to answer the question. But I couldn't. Because I believe that no definition
is good enough to define such a term.



He was making a good point on how are desires for materiliastic things makes us unhappy . And how
by not worrying about the result of our actions or efforts , can keep us from being unhappy. And to
attain that state of mind where there is no difference between pain and pleasure , knowledge of
life is must.

Another colleague told a very beautiful thing , how strange is that God created this marvellous world
for us to be happy and how come we always find ourselves to be unhappy. How each person , no
matter how successful or accomplished he/she has become , seems to be unhappy. Each has to deal
with his/her own demons.

Both of them were right in their own ways. However I have difficulty in acknowledging the fact former
has said that knowledge makes us free.

I may be wrong but I think once you have enough knowledge you are no longer part of this world.
You will just become a observer. You will start to see good and bad in people and in such case
it is difficult to have pure faith in anything. As you will have the understanding to question everything
even the things that you believe to be true. That is numbness and not happiness. However I cannot
prove this  as I lack that knowledge.

You may not be remembering first time you saw the face of the person who you call your mother,
that moment you may not have the knowledge of understanding or recognition but still you were
truly happy. The first time you learnt to walk without the knowledge of gravity or your first time on
your bicycle. The first time you won a prize and saw your family proudly standing there. The
first time you fall in love and each moment when you have glance of her/him , the happiness
you felt inside is without any knowledge or reason. The first time you kissed . That may lasted
for few moments only but for you it was a eternity. The first time you hold the tiny tiny fingers
of your new born baby and found yourself to be born again. The first time when worshipping
your God , whoever may be, you were aware that you are part of that light.

The problem is that we cannot hold those moments forever.

In between those moments comes a thousand twists , turns , heartbreaks , rejections , failures
of life and we are left unhappy and sad.

I think we are unhappy because at those moments of our life we chose to be unhappy. Or may
be happiness is just a word , a futile word to lure us and kept us attached to this world.

The following are  the memorebale lines from movie 'In pursuit of Happiness' (Will Smith starrer)
'It was right then that I started thinking about Thomas Jefferson on the Declaration of Independence and the part about our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And I remember thinking how did he know to put the pursuit part in there? That maybe happiness is something that we can only pursue and maybe we can actually never have it. No matter what. How did he know that?'

MAY BE ABOVE IS CORRECT. WE ARE ALWAYS IN PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS AND
THAT IS WHY WE WILL BE NEVER HAPPY.

Reason of those reasons

Today morning I received a SMS from close friend , which in the end  read as follows

"Everything happens for a reason. But the hardest part is still finding out what the reason is"

In the early morning rush to go to the office , I didn't think about it. But as the day progressed
I realised how true the message in every one's life.

We take some decisions , chose some way , neglect some and always hope that everything will
end fine. We walk , we see , we fall in love , we laugh , we get separated , we cry , we fight with
each other , we do mistake , we run , we realise our mistakes, we hide , we laugh , we cry , we
wander , we fall,  we get up, we run , we lie down and so on life goes on. And with all these
things  we  come to believe that our life follows a grand plan may be unknown to us , but it is
still there. All those things that we could not understand in the past , cannot understand now and
will not be able to understand in the future will work out to be have a  good reason. All those
eccentricities  of life will make sense at the end. Our lives are for a purpose.

But as time fly by , with certain disappointment  in our heart , most of us realise that nothing
makes sense at all. With a single life to live , we cannot compare what we did with our life
was the best thing to do or not.

You remember those story magazines in childhood days , where you have to connect the dots
in a sequence so as a figure of some animal or face will emerge.

I was never able to complete that unless some sequence number are given for the dots. Otherwise
I always used to end up with random lines criss-crossing others. And I was always jealous of my
sister who could complete those in no time. So to make her think that I did better than her , in
those days I used to look at those meaningless lines and imagine some figures to prove that I
solved the  puzzle better than her

And it seems , with life we all have to do the same. In the end we just have to connect the dots
in a way to have a correct plan  emerge out of that randomness of our life. In case we fail to
do that, we just have to imagine some good plan that our life followed and put the events
of our life in that imaginary plan. As they say the end should be good otherwise it is not a end.

So how hard it may seem , to have good ending , we have to believe earnestly that our life did
not go waste , without a purpose. In the end it meant something

 In the movie 'Hitch' , last scene while trying to stop his lady love , Alex Hitchens (Will Smith)
jumps into her moving car , falls down and when she protests why did he jump , he says

"Because that's what people do. They leap, and hope to God they can fly, because
otherwise you just drop like a rock, wondering the whole way down, why in the *hell* did
I jump? But here I am, Sarah, falling, and the only one that makes me feel like I can fly... is you."

To live life fully , without worrying about reasons , sometimes we have to take some blind jumps
and hope that someday somewhere someone will come to rescue us , to save us from falling as a rock

Early Morning Musings and a happy new year

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL OF YOU. MAY THE REST OF YOUR LIFE BE THE  BEST OF YOUR LIFE.

4 hours already over , when we said goodbye to the year 2010. From the last two hours of 2010 to initial half an hour of 2011,  I was dancing with a crushed toe. Next three hours, I was discussing friends about management policy of the company , though we are not the ones who made it

Did we achieve something . NO

Was it worth it. YES , Every f*** of it.

Only thing I understood that living one life with certain conditions and constraints , it is impossible to understand the problems and promises of another life limited by certain other conditions and constraints

No matter how mature we claim to be , we will never understand  another person completely.

I know , I am sounding bit philosophical. But in the morning 4 o clock of 1 st day of new year , only
thing that I  have left wth is my broken philosophies. Even my water bottle is empty.

Yesterday evening when I was coming back from office I saw daily labourers in work , I saw a mad
woman crossing the road without any care about the traffic , and later in the evening I  watched the
guitarist in the show playing guitar without any concern for new year or unruly audiences ,
and a singer singing when all the audience have left. And I understood  that there is nothing special
about new year for them. And I realised the same applies to all of us. It is same as  the old year .

Only thing , we have one less year to live.I don't konw whether the fact is matter of regret or rejoice.

I ran out my vocabulary to write something more about philosophy . So it is time for giving thanks.

Thanks to all the people who have made differences in my life  for all these years , my parents ,
my sisters , relatives , friends , colleagues , bosses and those unknown persons to whom I am
connected consciously or unconsciously.

I want to thank my bike and laptop to be able to survive me for one more year, You guys rock

Above all, I want to thank God for forgiving me ( I think He has forgiven as I am still here) though I sometimes ate non vegeterian food in auspicious days.

I ran out of vocabulary for giving thanks also. That's it. Live more and love more

WINTER OF 99 & CRICKET (PART I : MORNING SESSION)

Come winter , I always travel back in memory lane to that winter of 99 , some 30 odd boys playing
cricket in early morning. Yes , I know , as per cricket rules, number of players should be 22 , but
when the rule was made nobody had asked us for our opinions , so we ignored it. Also the rule makers
didn't know about the attendance records , proximity of girls cycle stand and law of ' love after thousand sight' etc. Also as a simple rule of economics , when shareholders are more risk per person is less .
 (In this case buying a ball or repair the bat takes the place of risk)

Why only winter , did not we play in other seasons . Yes of course we did . Batch of 99 of the our College (including some people of next batch who played with us) can proudly say that , there was not a single day in those two years we haven't crowded that college field.

But imagine a cold morning  , a hard plastic/leather ball traveling at 100-120 Kmph , assisted by the hard cement floor / uneven ground and kissing your unprotected fingers or sometimes your most vulnerable spot under the belt , you will never forget that winter. And the aftermath , when you curse to kill the bowler and decide that you don't give a damn about the game. But next morning again , you will standing at the same place , is a different matter incomprehensible to normal human logic.

Before I write further about the college routine , let me tell there were two kinds of people in the group ,

THE IMMORTALS : (IM) : who never attended classes

THE LESSER MORTALS (LM) : People who sometimes attended due to some other reasons 
                                                      (not study related , of course)

The simple routine we followed were like this :

MORNING SESSION

7.00 AM : Start from home to attend classes in college

7.10 AM : Take the other route directly to college field

7.30 AM : All gathered , select the two captains and attach players to them , select the rules
                ( yes most of the days we made our own rules depending upon the boundary created
                   by roaming cows and not so roaming cow dungs )

7.45 AM : Let the game begin

8.00 AM : Ist period (Physics / Chemistry) over , attendance less by 30 boys , Girl to boy ratio (1:1) ,
                 who says we do not care about gender equality

Ist group batting : 2 overs gone , score 11 / 2

9.00 AM : Lab class starts (lab attendance is must to appear at final exam , as if we will make some
                 new invention in those two hours)

                 (response of people , in case their LAB class is on that particular day

                 Immortals : abe light le yaar , next time class karenge (WTF , next time )

                 Lesser Mortals : chal attendance deke ate hain (Let's go give the attendance & come  WTF)

(Now you can understand why 30 peoples were playing. who is going to play in place of those who will attend class , the rule maker ?

Ist group batting over : Score 98/12 in total 15 overs

11.00 AM : Mathematics / Biology Class starts ( Girls to boy ratio 20 : 3 , Those were the days we
                    were very serious about gender equality , in this case inequality I suppose )

Ist group batting : Score 15/ 0 , 3 overs ( Ist match is already over , this is second match Ist innings)

12.00 AM : Girls started coming from class , all attention to girls cycle stand and on the road

                    Some lesser mortals , who have already had the chance to bat and there is no chance
                    of them  to get to bowl , sneak out from the ground to prove the law of 'love after
                    thousand sights' following anyone of fairer sex giving a glance

Ist Group : Score 67/9 , 12 overs ( Generally total overs in subsequent match is less than the I st match due to time constraint)


2nd Group : Score 27/4 , in 5 overs

12. 30 PM : Match over , 2nd group won the match

Now remaining 20 odd people will take 3 separate ways

Ist way : Cricket crazy bunch (some 7-8 people) will shorten the boundary & start 6 over match

2nd way : Indoor game specialists (4-5 guys) will move to the college club to play carrom , TT , Chess etc

3rd way : Rest others will return home . (of course some of them will go and join the ones who left earlier in their  search of their queens on cycle and rickshaws

AFTERNOON SESSION FOLLOWS

P.S : This is a work of fiction. Maa , I always attended class.

Farewell to life

The following I wrote , in the final year of graduation as a farewell to life that never going to happen again.
Only thing I didn't know that what I wrote 4 years back will come true

For all final year students….. (Rendezvous with backbenchers)

Hi guys,

Good morning/good afternoon/good evening

depends upon the time you read it. We all waited all these years for this to end, but when the end is near celebration is the last word that comes to mind.

Here is the story of our failures & successes.

We sat in the classrooms with apt attention till teacher arrived. After that our mind said good bye and we went to win matches for India in a close match by hitting a century and taking five wickets. Even as
P.M of India we lead our country to be a superpower. Sometimes we took tours of bollywood and of course Hollywood too. And when the weather was good we went on dating with Katrina kaif, sania
mirza& x, y, z. when some of our friends were busy solving problems we thought what ‘xaero’ (Q3)
would be doing without us, might be practicing with rail gun and of course thought how to conquer the
whole world in rise of nations.

From sharukh to sachin, Napoleon to Einstein no one escaped our imagination. We became our
dreams not our disabilities.

Some other moment we just sat down and tried hard to find reasons of life in subjects taught to us. We cannot make ourselves understand how Fourier series will define us, how the data structures will help to solve our own problems, how differentiation will help to clear our excess baggage in life & how integrations will help us to accumulate our joys.

We are sorry for we could not stand to the expectations of our parents & teachers. We could not force ourselves to become someone. Sorry again. We became unsolved mazes with no answers where we lost ourselves often. We learnt everything except what we are taught. But don’t write us off. We are down in the chart but not out of it. We will be back.

We all know that the best thing our college gave us is us.

Final countdown has started. After some days it will be over. We will move away to begin a new life, to lose ourselves into the casual happenstances of life. A journey of 4 years that we started together will end soon. We will get our own summer of 69 to sing. Some of us will keep on touch for sometime, but then with time it will also end. Probably our best is over.

No one will come to give a birthday bashings anymore. We will not watch cricket match together, praying for India to win. No more our “khati” will go on till midnight and sometimes till morning. No more we will get drunk and dream the same dreams together. We will not fight over aishwarya rai anymore. Our volleyball & cricket balls will remember us forever. No more we will watch I.A flights taking off & our dreams flying with it. No more we will watch stars and think that there is still life somewhere there & someway down the lane of time our grandson’s grandsons will go for taking an evening walk there. No more in silence we will dream of our loves to come true, to find a reason to live. No more we will bunk classes to do nothing in hostel. Our holis, republic days, dipawalis will never be the same again. Probably we will never be the same again.

I remember a line, lend me your ears.
“ ab ke hum bichde to sayad kabhi khaboo mein mile
Jis tereh sookhe hue phool kabhi kitabon mein mile”

So many “no” s to deal in life. It is the time to circulate slam books, to capture photos.

So silly of us, we want to catch life on paper and print it. The best ones cannot be printed on paper because they are already printed on our memory. We are nothing but our experiences with each other. Probably doing B.Tech is just a secondary reason. We were here because we were destined to be here.

So how are u feeling now, little nostalgic, little frus2.cool man cool, life goes by like this.

The song below is for you special ones. I read it somewhere months ago.

“How could anyone ever tell you? You were anything less than beautiful

How could anyone ever tell you? You were less than whole

How could anyone fail to notice? That your loving is a miracle

How deeply you are connected to my soul”

Bid adieu,

From piyusa

Arzoo , Art & Aashayeen

Arzoo

First of all , before I forget I want to wish myself happy birthday . Approximately one hour and
26 minutes ago ,  I officially completed 26 years , though my real birthday is one month ahead.
At these initial minutes  of starting 27 years , i remember '27 club' ( a group of influential 
famous musicians who all died  at the age of 27). The notable musicians who died in this famous
age being  Jim Morrison , Janis  Japlin , Kurt Cobain (lead singer of my my favorite  song 'the
man who sold the world' of band  'Nirvana') and  many more.

Though I am at the alpha point of 27 , I am neither a musician  and nor yet famous.

Art

In the evening, I went to attend an art exhibition. This is  first time I attended something like
and that is  because, a colleague has invited .  I went alongwith  friends , who are in same
league as me when it comes to have an  eye for an art (to be frank, we had no eyes),
though we have enough  eyes for other beautiful things (that was one of the motivation , 
we went to that exhibition)

However , few minutes into the gallery , I was struck by the  realisation how ignorant we
are while it comes to appreciating art.  We were in the midst of paintings by budding
Ravi Verma , Amrita Shergills ,but do not have the understanding for it. It was not a 
problem only for three persons standing there.  It is a problem for current Indian culture ,
where getting a degree  is more important  than getting a dream. Appreciating music &
 art takes backsit in the race for earning a living .

It was more a painful observation ,when most of the beautiful  paintings were from the
brushstrokes of some of our senior officers   & their wives , who found time from their
busy schedule & responsibilities to paint while as youngsters all we did crib for lack of
time & tempo to pursue  our dream

As we did in earlier situations to escape truth , this time again we ran & end up in our usual place

Aashayeen

Nevertheless, I would like to believe that though the realisation  seemed to vanish from
collective consciousness of three individuals,  it is still there in our individual
consciousness . (I am not in a state to define & differentiate between the two)

Presently , I am listening to 'days go by (dirty vegas) ' & 'tujhe bhula diya (anjana anjani)
in a way to celebrate by  midnight sorrow and solitude.

Signing off for now .

V for Vendetta , P for Potter , C for CAT

Late in night yesterday , when i was preparing my laptop for its night shift duty by copying a torrent
from torrent site, my mobile started singing in a irritated mood.

The clock was smiling at an ungodly angle of 11.45 PM (IST) .

And the person who just disturbed my phone from its well deserved sleep , was from opposite coast
of India ; a city named Mumbai. And the first question I was asked 'Where did you copy it from' .
I was tempted to answer 'piratebay' but somehow  i realised the question was not related to what I
was downloading  at that time. So I retreated to age old cliche ' what are you  talking about' (In the
same tone you answered the invigilator when caught cheating in exam hall).

My question was answered with reiterating the earlier one ,'Where  did you copy it from , the 'about
me' section of your blog . Then I got it & relaxed a bit coming to know that what I was downloading
at that moment is not the matter of discussion.

I was going to tell  that I wrote that section by myself. But I  liked the tone of certainty in question &
as a rule you cannot /  should not lie to persons who know you for so long & so well.

'V' for Vendetta

So here I am confessing that I copied that line from famous dialogue  when the protagonist of the movie
('V' for Vendetta) introduced himself to his lady love . Here the dialogue goes like this:


"V: [Evey pulls out her mace] I can assure you I mean you no harm.

Evey Hammond: Who are you?

V: Who? Who is but the form following the function of what and what I am is a man in a mask.

Evey Hammond: Well I can see that.

V: Of course you can. I'm not questioning your powers of observation I'm merely remarking upon
the paradox of asking a masked man who he is.

Evey Hammond: Oh. Right.

V: But on this most auspicious of nights, permit me then, in lieu of the more commonplace sobriquet, to suggest the character of this  dramatis persona.

V: Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now
vacant, vanished.  However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation,  stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition. [carves V into poster on wall]

V: The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not  in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. [giggles]

V: Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call  me V.

Evey Hammond: Are you like a crazy person?

V: I am quite sure they will say so. But to whom, might I ask, am I speaking with?

Evey Hammond: I'm Evey.

V: Evey? E-V. Of course you are.

Evey Hammond: What does that mean?

V: It means that I, like God, do not play with dice and I don't believe in coincidences. "

The screenplay was written by , Andy Wachowski & Lana Wachowski  (as The Wachowski Brothers)

For half an hour , we discussed about magnificent words used in the above dialogue remembering the old days when preparation for the  ever eluding CAT was in its prime .
Then at the end , a challenge was thrown that we have to write something in the same line (though we
cannot write in the same league of The Wachowski Brothers ) of letters of our choice.

I choose the letters 'P' & 'C' (lets just say some characters  in my future blogs , may be Mr Potter & Miss CAT) .

In the morning , I searched for my old english notes but could  not find them in the dusty corners of my
room. So in my office  (please don't tell may boss) I sought help from omniscient  'google' for finding
words starting with 'P' & 'C' .

And I have arranged them to best of my ability & time

Introduction of Mr 'P' ( Mr Potter)

Physiognomy of Mr 'P' Points a Peripatetic Person , a Panache as a Paean to Pixillated Proselyte . As a Parnassian ,Procrastinating the eventual Perdition , this Progeny of Panaceist Practices Panaesthetism . A Puerile & Philocalic nature makes him Prone to Philogyny & his  Protean self Pursues Putative Propitiation. By Permitting the Paradox, Peradventure he is a Perpetual Problem and his life is nothing but a Perfect Parachronism

 To put in more insaner terms , He is like a dog chasing cars . He wouldn't know what to do with one if he catches it.(yes this one I copied from The Joker's (Heath Ledger) dialogue in the movie Dark Knight , go ahead sue me)

Introduction of Ms C ( Ms Cat)

A Coeval of Mr 'P' , she is a Circean Cynosure . Her Candent & Calefacient self , in contrast to her compeers , is a Compendium of Candour & Cardimelech. However she is a Cosmotellurian , a chiraroscuro  in the canvass of life , confined in the Claudent Confusion. She is a Conundrum of Chance & Choice. In short , for Mr 'P' she is the canorous catch-22.

(Someone like ' Ilsa' (Ingrid Bergman) from Casablanca. Here is looking at you kid)

BY THE WAY , I , UNLIKE GOD , PLAY WITH DICES AND BELIEVE IN COINCIDENCES

Serendipity

Yesterday night , we (myself and two of my friends) were getting bored ourselves to death
as the cable connection was not working , and there  was no movie worth watching left in
laptop or movie hall. Then suddenly one friend suggested to watch 'The sword of Tipu
Sultan', which he has downloaded recently. Though I was apprehensive initially , then
thought it is better than doing nothing.

So we three started watching it from beginning , where tipu's grandfather  (fateh mohammad)
has just won a war. We watched probably 3-4 episodes  upto where fateh mohammad is
killed by treachery of his enemy.

Listening to pure urdu words like guftaguu (talk),marhabaa (well-done), dariyaaft (enquiry),
yalGaar (assault/attack) , thanks to embeded subtitles in english , we could understand the
dialogues.

This chance occurence of watching the old serial , took me in memory  lane to the good old
days. There was a time when we used to impatiently wait for those wonderful saturday
evenings and sunday mornings for watching fun filled serials in dd like dekh bhai dekh,
alif laila, bharat ek khoj,chandrakanta (I remember Yaku Singh most) ,The sword of Tipu
Sultan , chitrahaar,Jungle Book and of course who  can forget Ramayan, Mahabharat.
Half of the village used to gather in  my grandfather's house to watchramayan , mohabharat.
I rememeber some  of the old people used to put hands together in obeisance whenever
Sri Rama or Sri Krishna character appearED in that old onida black & white model.

Even those ads for 'Nirma super' , 'vicco' , 'amul' , 'natraj phir sixer' 'vicks' , 'lizzat pappad'
were in a separate league of their own. The omnipresent Doordarshan Signature Montage ,
Vande Mataram ,  mile suramera tumaraha were part of our life

Who can forget the starting songs of 'mogli ' , 'Jangle jangle pata  chala hai , chadi pehne
ke phul khila hai , and the lyrics of the title song…“Tana na aa tana naanaa aa tana naanaa
naaa'.

I miss those days  before the arrival of  “cable” network.