Journal of a varumayin niram sigappu graduate

no, just another unemployed person's mindless ranting.

"so, gautham, why have you come back?"

catch-22's for now:

# I want to read papers to learn about the news in parts of the world, but news item scares me with all the talk of global recession and nonsense, so i don't want to read papers.

# i don't have experience because i don't have a job, and i don't have a job because i don't have experience. wow, huh?

Imagine my consternation when people asked me to write and explain things that I had no idea about; or that which I read hundreds of years ago, when there were only dial up connections in this world, the pre-facebook era. The person sitting in front of me was asking me questions about 2-dof systems, and there i was, in a different land where anna kournikova and michelle pfeiffer had magically transformed my elementary dynamics knowledge into their own selves in picture format. As it is, education has completely escaped my mind to be replaced by all four seasons of blackadder and the first two of the thin blue line.

Do you know something about boundary elements?

No.

So, what do you think they are? any guesses?

Are you deaf? or mad?

Interestingly, there is a 'no breeding' alarm going on in my mind these days, becoming stronger with every passing day. All we have to do is look at ourselves in the mirror everyday, and ask 'is perpetuating something like this meaningful?' I am not sure if its because of my brain playing games with me or its par for the course at this age for any fellow with weird ideas due to reading a lot of tragic nonsense. I happened to watch chandni bar, in which madhur bhandarkar seamlessly extrapolates a person's life tragedy to more tragedy to a point when the people in the theater go out to buy extra strength cyanide pills. Movies, for me, are a way to relax, not to think about the woes in the world. I would do that sitting in my house. Also, don't read orhan pamuk, or barry unsworth. They were the reasons why god created the word 'suicide'.

I am going to admit to doing something that I would never would have done otherwise, if it hadn't been for my friend's father's persuasion. I actually lit a 'nei dheepam' in a temple! Before you all jump to conclusions and picture me in a garb with a pattai and sandhanam all over my body, parading myself semi-naked in a temple chanting some slokas while thinking about how hot the floor is, let me assure you, it was a chance happening. You would not believe it, and I am a strong advocate of skepticism, so I would ask you all not to believe it. Anyway, the lamp, the wick, and the ghee. I learnt three things:

# skepticism has no place inside a temple. If you are a skeptic, don't go inside one.

# Lighting the lamp is embarassing but even more embarassing is being told by a very sweet lady to dip the wick in the ghee and light it again for better combustible property-I felt like an idiot, six and a half years of engineering education and I didn't know this.

# Now, I had half a mind to abandon the temple visit, in view of my increasing mental instability, but it felt nice-NOT the temple, but the trip to the temple. The chennai-bangalore highway is very impressive. (for some people's information, this is the govindha wadi temple in agaram, near kanchipuram, dedicated to lord dakshina moorthy, someone who has abandoned me ever since i started learning my alphabets and got hit on the head mistaking hindi for english. that's where it all started. *sigh*)

Strong warning: Anyone who is going to call me religious, from now on, will be made to sit with me for one full day while I explain the pros and cons of playing rail road tycoon on hard level difficulty, and then start dissecting the stories of mahanadi, million dollar baby, chandni bar, and the likes in the order of increasing mental agony.

To all those who think I am a temple hopping, medieval, traditional freak, let me tell you this-I go to temples that are old, and not crowded; old things always fascinate me(don't let your imagination run wild). They seem to have some charm that is absent in anything that is referred to as 'modern'. Yes, I am a bit of a bore, with a yearning for the good old days when transistor was a device used to listen to cricket commentary and apples were eaten, but I am not averse to technology assisting us. I think there needs to be moderation in anything.(perhaps ogling doesn't need any). also, i may have pontificated enough, so, i will stop imposing my views on one and all.

So, temples, for the sake of preserving my past, and cherishing its beauty and probably, vicariously living my peaceful past self...

Anyway, Madras is beautiful these days. Its becoming increasingly beautiful, and with the advent of monsoon she will be wrapped in all her finest glory(setting aside potholed roads and cholera for a second). So much for absurd imagery and metaphors, screw it, the place looks good during rains. Please don't be offended by my use of the word 'she' here, its a little tacky, but 'it' feels too...itty.(insert some stupid smiley here, and for god's sake boys, don't add a t to the word)

Cheers, and see you all in the next post!

Why Life must listen to us.

For the most part of it, life, currently is unintelligible, because it is unintelligible, and I also wanted to use this particular word. I had no idea what it meant, and since I have looked it up on a online dictionary, I find that it is perfectly okay to use this word here. Life is also very aimlessly prowling around the streets of ambattur in search of taj mahal, knowing very well that its in Agra. Life is also making me come up with obnoxious imageries and metaphors, stupid comparisons that would reduce the size of an average adult by half. Nearly half a year of unemployment has damaged most of my brain and all of my sanity, I kindly request you all to discard your logical part of the brain like you would when you go watch a vijay movie. or a hindi movie. or any movie they make these days.

When life does things like this, it is only nice to blame life for everything. Life is bad, and it deserves a good spanking, it has been very naughty(okay, we are drifting). So, Life must learn to behave properly. In order that life behaves, I have come up with a list of things that life should do:

1. Make coffee every time I want coffee. In general, life must understand my tastes, and my aversion to too much sugar. So, if life is listening, I like my coffee strong. very strong, like a wrestler. preferably, female wrestler. but with grace. not with the muscles showing. okay, i am drifting off again.

2. Listen to me every time I want something to happen, and make it happen. So, when I say I want to be in california, I need tickets to california. I dont know how life will do it, but life should do it. after all, that's what all lives are for, ask any software engineer. Some tell me they have very good lives that listen to them, unfortunately mechanical engineers' lives don't listen to them-they are very arrogant lives, i suppose(No, I don't want to go to california. Not to switzerland either. Yes, I am not lying my posterior off).

3. Life must know that I would like to be happy at times. It is important for life to do this, because it should know that some other lives are happy, and my life alone cannot be miserable. My life can suck, given two conditions:

everyone on the planet is miserable, and doomed.

everyone on the planet is doomed, and miserable.

In addition, life must teach me proper punctuation at times, and not include the stupid oxford comma. Life should learn to be sadistic/masochistic like me.

4. Life must teach me to stop telling things by bullets and numbering, and get out and live life. Life must, in addition to all this, buy me a playstation 3 and an iphone, so that I may lead a mediocre life of a ordinary human being professional who has his eyeballs glued to some screen, with the occasional visits to hawaii for vacations.

5. Life must provide me with enough crap to upload on facebook and twitter and irritate the living 'four letter expletive' out of other people. My post, should be other peoples' laxative.

6. Life must also provide me opportunities for ogling. enough opportunities. if possible, all the time. Any time. 24*7. Okay, this one is top priority.

7. It would be nice if life helps me something other people have in their lives-life. something meaningful, like a job or something. back to madness again. see you all in the next post then.

P.s:shameless networking idea: any possible contacts/people you might know who can help me build me my network and get a job, let me know via email-sgauthamkrishna@gmail.com

if you have plans to come to India and if I know you on back-slapping terms(not the butt) get me a snickers candy bar. cheers. :)

If you want real adventure,if you feel the need to get in touch with the 'rebel' side of yourself, and if you have to be a part of a mass-chaotic-homicidal-ill disciplined-senseless-ear and brain deafening ritual, i promise you, t.nagar is the place. I am an idiot(I konw you know that). Because, I thought I could drive. A 2-wheeler. On the roads. In Madras. On a weekday(doesn't matter though). With the deepavali festival soon approaching(don't say its a good two months from now, i will take you down to the adayar bridge and throw you into the cooum in the area with the maximum amount of disturbing foul looking things).

You see, madness, has no cure. There is only palliative cure. That is why, most of the bus/auto/lorry/other such big things are driven by extremely careless, stone-faced, haughty, I-don't-care-for-the-mere-mortal-down-there types, who are immune to criticism, constructive, destructive, or any other severe forms of it are free to roam around in the streets of the city. I know, I whine now, like a little girl, as if I have never driven in Madras before. No, you don't understand what this place has become-too heavy and congested for its own good. I slowly get a sinking sensation that we might be headed the bangalore way.

Going ahead, I have nothing against auto people. Most cavalier, trustworthy, well-behaved, disciplined and neat lot. I know you would want some of what I am smoking right now, and I know you wouldn't believe me if I stripped naked to prove the veracity(I don't know how that would prove anything, but the picture is vividly voyeuristic, and strangely exciting and disturbing at the same time). As I was saying about the drivers, they all have a healthy disregard for anything that is on a sign board; of course, if the sign board has a picture of a skimpily clad silk smitha, then things are different.

MTC bus drivers have to be taught two main things.

1. There are other human beings driving on the road, and sometimes there are some creatures called pedestrians.

2. The clutch, is located right next to the left leg, at the bottom of the seat in which the driver usually sits;it must be employed when changing gears, or some engineers feel the need to press their ears against the seat in front and close their eyes and pray tearfully when they hear the meshing gears cry for mercy.

Some serious suggestions, even though they might be temporary(from the trip to, er...ok, US. I am not showing off, I thought some of 'their' rules made sense):-

Left and right only lanes

More number of one way streets to regulate traffic

Lane discipline at least on all arterial roads that are wide enough to have 4 lanes

Speed limit enforcement(I mean enforcement, not like on the boards)

better training and better facilities for drivers(MTC buses)

No horn zones

Autonomous traffic regulating body to study effective methods to monitor and improve traffic bottlenecks in the city(not CMDA, though i have no idea what the hell they do)

It would be become much worse if nothing is going to be done about the current state of affairs, and no amount of metro trains can save the city if every other part is going to be choked. Seamless inter connectivity, feeder routes from stations, and what not; Will anybody listen?(At the cost of sounding like a same bit news the whole bloody day news channel)

Now you are in Madras...(like alicia keys)

A wailing shrieking bawling toddler kept me up all through the flight from NY to Brussels. I was not the only one who was absolutely cold and shaking with fury. There was a man in front of the seat where the baby was sleeping, and he got up and actually asked the baby to stop. That was how non-stop it was. The captain just finished briefing us about the flying time and the weather, as if we were going out for a stroll in the middle of a flight-'wow, such a lovely wind'; thus started the crying menace, its then that i wanted to ask myself this question: why breed?

As much cold-hearted as I appear, given the fact that all babies are supposed to cry and puke a la shakespeare, I could not understand this need to cry for six bloody hours. Ok, you get hungry for a while, you get uncomfortable for a while after you eat, but what is with the continuous wail? On top of this, Jet airways serves paneer with all your meals. I am pretty sure I had paneer in six different forms, with the same taste, and at the end of the last meal, I would have gladly taken off my shoes and eaten them rather than eat that paneer. My stomach was begging me to stop seeing it, I forced myself to eat it.I had to actually lodge the food down my throat using a fork as a shovel. Not that it was bad, just that, I had to eat the same thing again and again. A little more paneer and I would have started to look for the cows and the farmers responsible for the paneer; a earful of my fury and a mouthful of their paneer.

There was a young boy sitting next to me, who looked a little like me when I was his age-plump, glasses, no etiquette to say thanks when somebody helps with your headset etc. His mother was seated in the front seat with his brother(probably). I know parents can be quite irrational. I mean, they are, aren't they? In the name of being concerned, they do the silliest of things, and embarrass the child throughout his life. Some pride, isn't it? When people ask you, is it your son, the parent beams with the widest smile possible, and says yes! oh, god help us mortals and our attachment to life and its paraphernalia(I have always wanted to use this word, yay). Coming back to the story, she asked the boy to actually go to sleep, when he was wide awake watching some hindi movie. Slowly, 'the please go to sleep' became 'go to sleep beta', 'give me your glasses', 'give them or I'm going to smash every bone in your little face'(ok, that was from me), and the boy handed them over finally. He fell asleep, and he started to snore. Yes, one more reason to keep me awake. Yes, I need to know what sleepless nights are, after working with a jackass of an advisor and bed bugs, now it was the turn of a toddler and a juvenile brat to keep me up. All ages, both the sexes will keep you up at some point in your life, let's just be prepared was the message. Great.

Back in Chennai airport I felt primitive, disconnected, lost, enigmatic, furious, disturbed, dysfunctional and chaotic all at the same time. I was back!Haha, Madras. It took the baggage conveyor 90 minutes to tell me that one of my baggage was missing. I went out of the airport to a blast of hot air, the stink of urine and god knows what else. Truly, I had arrived. The first thing I noticed in my house was-high ceilings! I had forgotten those rooms! Of course, the truly beautiful journey of using the Indian style toilet: ha, the amazing concept, which so many people fail to understand and appreciate. Its a beautiful construct of the human imagination. Thanks to whoever created it. Screw toilet papers. Yeah baby.

What else is beautiful and disturbing? The advertisements on the crumbled buildings right next to the sewage river, the street corners being turned into public restrooms, complete disregard for pedestrians everywhere, the joy of walking over the garbage bins on the side of the roads, and the sight of betel leaf stains in every single wall on the city. This is what I saw when I left, and somehow, I thought India would be developed in the two years gone by. No, I was an idiot. But, it will become beautiful. It will be a great place.(Not because I am back, but partly could be!)

We need to give ourselves some time.

what could be the most boring act that you had ever performed in your life?

stared at your computer screen mindlessly till you wait for the internet connection to resume? what is it, your eyeballs have the power to plug fibre optic cables across the atlantic?

waited for a bus that will be here any minute now? The minute they talk about, is pure evil. It hides, elusively, preys on the human mind, making him weak and feeble until he realizes that he should give up, and kill himself.

spent hours and hours trying to clean up the toilets when they have molds which would require any human to possess the strength of three hundred whoppers to clean them?

Sat there all day, looking at the ceiling fan, complaining about life, talking nonsense to self, making very poor jokes about everyone else, mocking everything else on the planet, I am sorry, I think that was my usual routine...got carried away.

This one is what comes to my mind, as the daredevilry, a mindblowing and phenomenal act of boredom, the master of all boring acts, the king-if you will:

Cleveland, on a weekday.

Its such a small sentence, but you would see that everything is wrong about this. Almost everything. Cleveland, is the biggest mistake. The next one, is of course, weekday. It is a pardonable offense, and pales into insignificant insignificance in comparison to the first c word.(shhh....)

Its like saying Voldemort(wince) out loud. But voldemort is the most handsome and chivalrous gentleman when compared to the cleveland torture. Its a place, for all those who are not familiar with it. Its a place, that is probably the worst thing to have ever happened to human kind, after sarah palin. Its located in American mid-west, which by itself is gloriously dry and boring, unbelievably sparsely populated and has 0.1% of the sensation that Venice has. What is fascinating is, there are people living here. Real people, like you, like me(ok maybe not me), and they live here. You know, live.(laughing, very very hard, going to throw up now)

The first thing that captures your attention as soon as you enter the city is, it is a son of a b**chy bore. The downtown, boasts of some beautiful sights that are hardly worth remembering, so I am not going to go into the details. I cannot even if I want to, because that is how exciting it was. Next must visit, is the Cleveland's rock and roll hall of fame museum of crap. It has some of the most exquisite nonsense about rock stars-people who had no idea that they would be commercially exploited in the name of tourism couple of years down the line when they were living in s**t poverty, trying to sing their butts off for living a decent life.

Weekdays are fun. Everybody else totters off to work, spending time usefully, contributing something to the taxes, making the planet a better place to live, exerciseing their brains lest they become defunct, making more social contacts, on the whole, they do something with their lives.(There I go again). I went to cleveland, because my roommate had an interview. I know, can there be any more worse excuses? I mean, this must be the worst of the worst of them. This is bottomline insult to the basic reasoning pattern of the human adult. This is ignorantly being arrogant of the dangers of no thinking, or some people would say this a the 'dimwit revolution'. People like us, should not be allowed to think and take decisions, it might prove to be very dangerous for the society. Much worse than those gun waving, hate speech shouting lads, or those three piece suit wearing, policy making, cigar smoking blokes.

Slowly, life unfolds. And folds again. and unfolds. and I will keep writing this, because I have time, but for the sake of the reader's patience, I will just say this-Life is unfolding, and all that we get to see is a either a beautiful canvas of hope, dreams, joy, fulfillment, and magic, or a tarnished, derelict grey hued, bleak and foreboding picture of styx. Its the mind, that understands that the portrait is not of these dualities, it is a portrait of us, a portrait of our strength, endurance, humility, perseverance,humor, of our belief, and of our ability to look at ourselves as a human being, rather than as a marketable product-only they have successes and failures. As human beings, we must be something more than that. That's enough philosophical nonsense.(if my repressed emotions dictating me to write nonsense qualifies as philosophy).

Cheers. See you all in the next post then.

ps:

#1

none of the he/she stuff indicates my chauvinistic tendencies. Anything that is applicable for he is also applicable for a she, in most of the cases(pregnancy, menstruation etc.)

#2

No gender discrimination, we are an equal opportunity blogger A/F/V/T/5/O/X/"/D/tongue rolling out/screw you we don't hire you/

#3

also, read the post below if and only if you want to read some foul mouthed comments on Indian politics, very foul language.

"always look on the bright side of life"-whistles.

I bow my head in shame for a grave, unacceptable, irrecoverable error of judgement, a blunder that I had committed a few months earlier. I am yet to recover from the trauma and grief of this tragic mistake that I have been looking for redemption from this sin for the last few days like a thirsty traveller in the deserts, looking for the oasis, but dreamily. I should not have done what I had done, and there is no repentance for this sin. A confession would ease my burden, so here goes:

(fumbling with the keys, sweating and panting very very hard, a little asphyxiated)

I said tendulkar is getting old, and he should not continue playing cricket.

I know. You are probably ashamed of me. Shocked, disgusted, outraged, confused, and benumbed by this atrocious crime of mine. I deserve every single moment of your disgust, every single word of your invectives, every single syllable of the sounds of admonishments and reprimands; but I am thankful to the few who would be willing to pray for me for this grave error; I know I have now overburdened myself with bad karma. I cannot find solace for neither kailash nor vaikuntam would forgive me for this, but I will tell you this-If tendulkar were to be reborn as tendulkar again in my next birth, I will relive every single moment of this birth minus this impetuous display of careless judgement of one of the single biggest phenomenon of our country.

As it is, from reading my posts, you would understand that I am a little confused, borderline mad, and bottomline stupid. The incident I am going to narrate now, would tell you how I managed to surpass all these, that I would categorically go into the 'bats**t' stupid classification. I went into a fast food joint. I ordered for a veggie platter. You know what I said after that? I said, 'No meat.'

So, I said, 'Veggie platter, no meat'.

Repeat slowly after me, and take your time-'Veggie platter, no meat'.

I thought I was a human being until then, but after this, I am seriously starting to question my roots. What would I have to be? More importantly, which planet in which galaxy? Which other planet in this universe produces idiots who can surpass the ones of this planet?

The clerk at the counter excused himself for a second to go into the kitchen, and when he was back, I saw that he had changed his pants. The old wet ones have to be washed...

After seeing Inception twice, I believe I have some right to make some noise about it, in addition to the existing clamor. Don't watch the movie trying to understand the movie, but pay attention to the attention Nolan has paid for the details. Such meticulous attention to details, elaborate detailing, mind numbing stunts and such a genius of a plot. I still think this movie deserves more than the attention it already deserves. I am not going to write off the criticisms of the movie as blasphemous. The movie is an engineering marvel, and the man who created this deserves the glory-a la matrix, lord of the rings, etc.

This humble good-for-nothing couch critic's opinion: Not even Nolan can create a Dark Knight again, God bless heath ledger.

Now, for some lessons: Don't ever stop. Don't bow down to life, when it tries to break you. Live, and break it. Life is tough for the strong. Its a challenge for the adventurous. Its the most beautiful song for the poet. Its a series of blinding directionless turns for the lost(and lady drivers). Its a blog for the hopeless. Its a frightening dream for the realists. Its a struggle for the meek. Its a lost cause for the downtrodden. Its a worst case scenario for the dreamers.

Life is always good. So, lets do something stupid!(be careful when you drive with all that weed in your car).

June 2010

The most important part of my life right now, is being disturbed in my sleep by something as tiny as a nail. It is usually creepy to see it, and it goes under the scientific name "bedbuggia fockinirritatica". This particular species is doing what wives give to husbands when they are in a foul mood-sleepless nights. I am told they are not present anywhere else in the house, other than the occasional visit to some other room. I am a permanent host, because I seem to have the blood that tastes like palak paneer to them. I also found that they are safer than mosquitoes-they do not transmit any form of communicable disease, but they can do the one thing that can put you in the vicious of tempers-wake you up.

I am sure my friends would endorse my statement here-I dont like to wake up sleeping people. This is based on a very solid scientific background-my amma once told me, that I would be born as a lizard if I wake up someone who is sleeping heavily. If this does not deter you from doing it, what will? Already a pig this birth, now a lizard in my next? I must have asked god for animal magnetism, and he must have taken a perverse sense of my request. 

Its normally, abnormally hot in columbus every year if you talk to the local people. 'Its so much hotter than last year!'. Yes, last year, it was 35 C. This year, it is, well, 35.5 C. Some human beings are very sensitive to temperature change, like algae or something. They thrive only in the ambient. Anything beyond 30 C is unbearable, and anything less than -5 C is the coldest winter ever. The minute it starts being sunny, the clothes come off, the bikini is out, and spring is at its full naked glory...Well, not completely naked of course. Maybe I was shocked by this last year, but this year, its very boring. I am really tired of bikinis, cleavage, and anything that usually excites a man's mind. It definitely does not mean i am becoming homosexual, it only means, i am too tired of seeing the same damn thing...

I usually run along the olentangy trail right by the river whose name is, you guessed it right-olentangy! Its a good 5 mile jog, and when i say jog, i mean hop on at a very very slow pace. I am really ashamed when i say pace, because walking is not really pace, is it? I saw a very frail grandma, who was flying past me. And another one, and another. I was a little miffed and i was giving myself reasons-they all eat meat, they have a healthy lifestyle to compensate for my inability to progress, and also to shadow myself from my own shortcomings. ah, such is life.

I continue to surprise myself: I had cereals with two teaspoons of milk and 500 ml of water. This is amazing, not because of poverty but because of laziness. The inability to move the rear part of my body to the nearest store(which is a half hour walk or a half hour bus ride). The minute i open the fridge, my heart starts to thump wildly, hoping to see milk sufficient for my consumption, screw the roommates. Before I am awake, someone else has the same hopes, and the other roommates, (yes, myself too) are screwed. Ah, such is life.

I sleep for 14.5 hours everyday. I cannot stand reality, so I am trying to live the dream. In the dream itself. I have always been one for not compromising on sleep. Even with the most difficult of exams, I could not bring myself up to bring myself up early. It is how i have conditioned myself, and that is how i will be, even if it means sacrificing so many 'good' things in the future. *ahem*

I have started to make plans, every other day, for every other day, and on every other day, i notice that i have not done a single bloody thing that i had originally intended to do the previous day. So, on the lists these days, i make it a point to write 'execute' after the items. No, that is not having an effect either. It is just a fun way to analyze the probability of my success rate. (till now, 13 days, 0% success for executing the plan)

I wanted to catch up with engineering basics, so i went to the library for the first two days after my graduation. I managed to successfully walk all the way to the library, sit on a comfortable couch, and sleep after staring at a painful equation for 10 minutes. I even took papers for taking down notes, and I still have those invisible notes. I only need to decipher the way to read those things.

I cook. like a cook. Wow, I mean, I rule. I can make chakkara pongal without even looking at the recipe. In the kitchen, I am suddenly a renewed America that has Obama, a black no-military service(and now, no recollection of his promises) ex-lawyer at the helm. My culinary skills are only matched by my extraordinary skill to fall asleep at any given point of time, almost all the time.

I find people amusing these days, their talk about submitting papers, getting a job and all that. It is even more hilarious when they ask you what you have been upto. My favorite is usually that I have been spying their house for possible incriminating documents for their connection with KGB. I even like the one where in you tell them that you have started talking with the dead. Apparently, I scare the crap out of people by running random nonsense and tell them they are facts-did you know that  an increase in the sex ratio would cause an increase in the same magnitude of the density of mangrove forests? This serves as a very good tag line for action against female infanticide too, as long as these people support global warming. (prevention against tsunami, get it? *chuckle*)

ஆசை முகம், மறந்துபோச்சே,இதை ஆரிடம்  சொல்வேனடி தோழி?
நேசம் மறக்கவில்லை நெஞ்சம், எனிற்  நினைவு முகம் மறக்கலாமோ?
கண்ணில் தெரியுதொரு தோற்றம், அதில் கண்ண னழகு முழுதில்லை
நன்னு முகவடிவு காணில் அந்த நல்ல மலர்ச் சிரிப்பை காணோம்!
ஒய்வு மொழிதலுமில் லாமல் அவன் உறவை நினைத்திருக்கும் உள்ளம்;
வாயு முரைப்பதுண்டு கண்டாய் அந்த மாயன் புகழ் இனிஎப்  போதும்.
கண்கள் புரிந்து விட்ட பாவம் உயிர்க் கண்ண னுருமறக்க லாச்சு;
பெண்க ளினத்திலிது போலே, ஒரு பேதையை முன்புகண்ட துண்டோ?
தேனை மறந்திருக்கும் வண்டும், ஒளிச் சிறப்பை மறந்து விட்ட பூவும்,
வானை மறந்திருக்கும் பயிரும் இந்த வைய முழுதுமில்லை தோழி!
கண்ணன் முகமறந்து போனால், இந்த கண்கள் இருந்துபய னுண்டோ?
வண்ண படமுமில்லை கண்டாய், இனி வாழும் வழிஎன்னடி தோழி?

autobiographical compound woes...(a very old entry, publishing after a really long time!)

"It sometimes happens, even in the best of families, that a baby is born.  This is not necessarily cause for alarm.  The important thing is to keep your wits about you and borrow some money. "

at about the time when kim jung was trying out something with his nuclear arsenal with destruction and madness in his mind, i was born, a warm december afternoon, in a hospital in madras, with people scaring me with their big eyes, big hands, big faces and their big dreams and big expectations of me. somehow, i overcame the first obstacle. I managed to breathe. Till this day, some people who are faced with dire poverty, or who live under extremely hostile environments of bombs would agree with me, that this was the biggest mistake ever.

#1 do not blame anything or anyone for what you are right now. you are a victim of your own actions, and if you cannot take responsibility, too bad. there are people who have to live through nightmares everyday, your life is not exactly like helen keller or suu kyi like.

if people do not believe that mathematics is simple, it is because they do not understand how complicated life is...john von neumann

the next few years are a blur. i can hardly remember a single thing. i must have done some idiotic things, which, thankfully have not been retained in my memory, which is an extraordinary feat-my mind is capable of remembering all the useless, tiring and painful memories, and discarding the good ones.

and then diana died, pokemon released and created a frenzy in 1997, when i was drowning in my own inability failing to take stock of my poor mathematical ability, plummeting to the lower rungs of the scary grade list. what does this tell us? comparison takes us nowhere. and it took me there in no time, when i couldnt look my friend in the eye, because my performance was dismal and he was looking like a  max planck or galileo. with passing time,my math skills became as unpredictable as dhoni, and in the end, it crashed finally over a span of two years,slowly, steadily.and that is when they decided to have the board exams.

 #2 stop that incessant worrying. nobody cares. not even you would care in a few years from now.

"some persons are very decisive when it comes to avoiding decisions..."

i had to make a decision-if you sucked at mathematics, had no talent for arts, were capable of documenting everything, you had to be an engineer, after being dumbed down by an unbelievable crass method of rote learning in your high school.(squarely blaming tamil nadu for my inability to understand partial differentials.)

but no, a decision was difficult because i was young. so, my parents did the right thing, put me in a school indifferent to its pupils,(better than the previous one though), and the vice versa.

 #3 sometimes you have to take tough decisions. maybe they might not work out, but that doesn't mean you should give up on it completely.

"what is the difference between a banker and a large pizza? a large pizza can feed a family of four"

somehow, i managed to go through the engineering drudgery, and survived. and then, i made a decision- to quit a perfectly good job in a very decent company, probably in design, going on to design better things; to go to america, without support, in a market that was squirming and choking at the hands of bankers, to the midwest, where the manufacturing sector had completely died a inglorious death.

#4 you make mistakes in your life all the time. move on, its not worth brooding over it. live it, and make peace with yourself.


"all the things one has forgotten scream for help in dreams"
and now what?where are going with all this? i keep thinking about the next crash in the stock market, or the time when unemployment is going to cross the triple or the four digit mark.(i think it already has...). my research is routine. so just how many people come up with breakthrough research every other day?  we always think of life in purely binary terms. its much more fuzzy than that, in that it has states in between these too(two, pardon the pun)! i was amazed when i was listening to the song "ithu oru ponmaalai pozhudhu" yesterday. i was translated to a land where the song's meaning was everything i could see. 
வான மகள் நானுகிறாள், வேறு உடை, பூணுகிறாள்...
ஒரு நாள் உலகம் நீதி பெரும், திரு நாள் நிகழும் சேதி தரும்...
ஆயிரம் நிறங்கள் ஜாலமிடும், ராத்திரி வாசலில் கோலமிடும்....


#5 all we care about in life are too much to handle, when the simple things that we can handle and cherish, we dont care at all!


(p.s:i admit without a trace of shame-i stole all quotes from the net.)

 2010 april

certain questions you should never ask a graduate student, who has recently graduated.

1. are you looking for jobs?

no, i am looking to settle down next to a dumpster and eat the stray bits of smelly cat food, live in winter shelters to protect myself, and smell like four hundred pigsties that havent been cleaned in four hundred days.

2. the market is looking bad for entry level grads, isnt it?

 your careless sympathy makes me feel like a bird who has just been crapped on by a plane full of people. thanks anyway. now that you put it that way, i see it clearly, what i didnt see when i was applying every single day, pulling  every single hair out of every single body part.

3, what after this?

sod off you sick disgusting mangy revolting nauseous flatulent *fill in*.

what happens to you is not your fault. No, what happens is your fault, but you are at complete liberty to blame it on other people; make sure you come up with pretty damned good excuses, or you just might be made to hang upside down in a pile of horse manure, hence people would ask you to physically do what is  metaphorically intended-rot in your own pile of steaming s***.

if you are uptight, depressed, worried, anxious, and are not able to see the future clearly, it means you have a severe case of *uptight depressed sick complains all the time bi***itis*. make sure you wake up everyday and go to sleep immediately. anything you may think may have serious consequences. When the thinking stops, everything is bliss. 

all is well. (holy f***, how can i say such things.). when people want to ask favours of me, they say 'if you are free, can you help me with this?'. from now on, i will carry a sledge hammer, and wear a t-shirt that says that i am unemployed and free the whole bloody day. some one who fails to notice this, and tries to be polite will visit the 72 virgins that god had intended him to have after his life.

i also think of how some of my friends are getting married, or getting bikes and cars, or how they have managed to be happy *censored*. i am being consistently reminded of how women dont look for looks, but only for the size of wallets. so these days, i manage to stuff my wallet with every other conceivable piece of nonsense just so it looks big.

some of my best mates have turned mentors, with my best interests at heart. they want me to seriously look for jobs. now, where were these people when i was ogling at that hour glass chick during the college days? why didnt they ask me to pursue that seriously? ok, she was way out of my league, but some support? some encouraging words, like 'she would look at you like she would look at a snail', or 'you have as much chance as mandira bedi has of being topless on the extra innings'.

what is so cold(cool) about that?

the literary definition of cool, is lacking in warmth, something that promotes cold. i can understand the consternation about the definition itself. cool is being cold? hot is what? being hot? or the lack of cold? much worse is the current usage of the phrase: that's cool.sorry, its technically a sentence, it makes complete sense,so it is not a phrase to begin with. all the english sticklers, please bear with me. what exactly do they mean by: "that's cool, buddy". 

person 1:i did not bring your notebook, i will get it tomorrow.

person 2:that's cool, man.

what is cool? the notebook? or are we talking about tomorrow's weather? why is it that an unabashedly irrelevant statement has become the fad?

person 2:he just slept with her, and never called her back.

person 1: that is so uncool.

uncle? did you say uncle? what kind of a planet has this become? why is it uncle when you sleep with someone and never call them back? because aunts take offense? 

let's rephrase: that is so aunty...that is so maami...(in my language)

you are such a cool dude. why, did you measure his body temperature with a non contact thermometer? 

it has become worse, that you can no longer use the word cold it was originally meant for. i saw a bus on my way, it was very crowded. but i was shaking because of the cold. i casually remarked to the person standing next to me:

it is so cool, isn't it?

he said: yeah man, never seen a bus this full! like, totally awesome.

i was stunned by this answer. i am still fuming at this inconceivable piece of twisted wit that he threw upon me. he turned my meaningful words into his choice meanings, and i was left at the mercy of his meaning;suddenly, it was his conversation. i wanted to swallow my tongue. i was frothing, that i would have actually spat at him had i told him that mine was a remark about the weather, not about the bloody bus or the bloody crowd.

***********************************

a bus stand is the worst place where you want to be in sever cold/wind chills more than 5. i was fully covered from my head to toe, hardly anything visible but my eyes(faintly), and the person next to me notes this pehnomenal observation, one that is brilliant to the core:

"its cold, isnt it?"

normally, i am by nature not a vindictive person. i usually do not get strong urges to rip people's throat out. but sometimes, it is only human that you react to intellectually profound statements like these. Its cold. so, when the display board says that its 11 degrees below zero, the person next to me has suddenly discovered that it is cold. in the long history of human evolution, of the many ages that we have passed through, the many winters that have gone by, this person, has finally found it. he has now solved one of the 10 unsolved problems of the world. he has found the answer. he has made me see light. light hearted banter, my frozen right butt. 

thankfully a bus arrives. people see a halo behind my head, because of my enlightenment. i am divine now, and i have a frost bite in the small toe.

***********************************

i was in one of the bluest of funks, so, to gather some cheer, i wanted to read some newspapers for hope. sample this:

more job losses on the way. 

unemployment rate steady, not likely to fall

obama cuts tax breaks for outsourcing companies

all hell breaks loose in USA, mid west, ohio, columbus, 43201, worthington, narrowing down...

so now, i am a shining ball of radiant sunlight, cheerfully strolling through the gates of hell to meet lucifer. The great depression, they called it. that is what i was going through as i finished reading the papers. anyway, too many people have told me that i would find a job, which is the exact precondition for getting a job. The more number of people you meet, the more you get a chance to whine about your woes, and the more sympathy in the form of "you will get a job", and the more your chances...So, i am sure almost 94 % of mid western population knows that i am unemployed, so i am now bloody sure that i would get a job. I have people's sympathies, isn't that  the only thing you need, other than a strong resume and some mental grit?

when people are being supportive, be cautious. they might want something; it is simply impossible to have people sympathize without wanting something. it is like being approached by the sexiest girl who wants to talk to you-you would know, wouldn't you, that there is something deeply wrong about the setting? i mean, its you, and a attractive girl. anyone around you would have done the math. almost everybody is waiting for you to respond-are you going to blush uncontrollably and make stupid gargoyle noises, or are you going to ask her what she wants? (what if she says, "i want you to kiss me passionately?" sorry, i am not doing anything these days, so my perversion levels are high).

happy birthday, indian republic.

பிறந்த நாள் வாழ்த்துக்கள்  gops.

பிறந்த நாள் வாழ்த்துக்கள் அம்மா  :)

i had completely forgotten republic day. also, gopal's birthday. also, my mother's birthday. also, the fact that i have to live and sometimes be happy. happy birthday to all those who will be celebrating birthdays sometime after this day. If you want a birthday present, celebrate birthdays on the same day:present tense. that is all the garbage i can come up with for this post. see you all next time, have a fun filled(ok, i take that back) time till then!

சென்றதினி மீளாது மூடரே!நீர்
எப்போதும் சென்றதையே சிந்தை செய்து
கொன்றழிக்கும் கவலையெனும் குழியில் வீழ்ந்து
குமையாதீர்!சென்றதனைக் குறித்தல் வேண்டாம்.
இன்றுபுதி தாய்ப்பிறந்தோம் என்று நீவிர்
எண்ண மதைத் திண்ணமுற இசைத்துக் கொண்டு
தின்றுவிளை யாடியின்புற் றிருந்து வாழ்வீர்;
தீமையெலாம் அழிந்துபோம்,திரும்பி வாரா.

அனைவருக்கும் என் பொங்கல் வாழ்துக்கள்.

i was asked what i did for pongal. i would like to ask them, what have i ever done for any of the festivals, that they would expect some kind of a sane answer from me for this question. the next time someone asks me, i am going to give them totally irrelevant or nauseous answers. so, what did you do?:

#i was cleaning toilets all day, and in the morning, it failed to flush.

#i wanted to find inner peace, and i am going to do penance sitting inside a dumpster.

#i was flying high in the USS enterprise in the KC42342DD cluster that i failed to see what the earthlings were up to.

#blood, i am covered in blood. somebody help me, i killed my roommates. aaaaaaaaahhhhh...

#i am going to fly to the moon and come back, can you please hold the line when i do that?

#i have a early meeting with the president of the naked ladies society.

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i am torn apart. i am in great pain over the great loss that seems to be happening to me. I was so appalled by myself, that i wanted to tear off my arm as soon as i did it: i said "go fast", instead of "go fast". I assure you, i have not gone mad. simply put, my allegiances seemed to have changed, and have swung in favor of the western hemisphere, the american english. i no longer am comfortable saying "karma". i have to say, "kaarma". i am very humiliated at reporting this, but i will still tell you this: i said calsium, and i say aluminum these days. all those in my country, who are scornful of this, who are now shaking their heads in agony at this betrayal, should know that my loyalties are always with the queen's english. I am very conscious of the "aah" sound instead of the "aeh". fast, should be fast. it should never be fast. forgive me, my fellow men, i bow down in shame, and i deserve nothing less than a hearing with the council of big pretentious englishman's-english- sycophants. I should say this in defense: it was just the one time, the emotional duress was overpowering, and i had to do it. I cannot say that this is a justifying argument, but that i am only human, and i have to surrender to my weakness at times.

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too many times have we wandered down the path when we question ourselves about the purposelessness of the lives that we live. we seek solutions, and more importantly, happiness. but what is happiness? is it the fulfillment of our desires, to be successful? to accomplish something? to help others? i would like to twist the definition of happiness a little: its a brand new ipod nano with 8 gig memory, with video recording capabilities, and a radio tuner. it is probably the most beautiful thing on the planet, right after some of the best derrière shows, right before "the dark knight". its so slim, that you can hardly feel it, but once you get to see her, you cannot but fall in love, and understand that every other philosophy is absolute nonsense. advaita is not our final goal. the ipod touch is.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

shaking my head, i shrug off the snow deposits on my coat, as i take it off, it amazes me to notice how warm it is inside the hallways and rooms. heating concepts are simply amazing. i am sitting here, a comfortable 23 C, and just 20 cm away from me, a window separates me from an atmosphere not quite suitable for even polar bears. think about it, the temperature difference is more than 25 C!! Engineering is beauty personified. Though these days engineering has been reduced to a status of being science's witch(read with b); we cannot do anything but humbly and bashfully accept the dictates of science.

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என்ன வரங்கள்,பெருமைகள்,வெற்றிகள்,
எத்தனை மேன்மைகளோ!
தன்னை வென்றாலவை யாவும் பெறுவது
சத்திய மாகுமென்றே
முன்னை முனிவர் உரைத்த மறைப் பொருள்
முற்றுமுணர்ந்த பின்னும்
தன்னை வென்றாளும் திறமை பெறாதிங்கு
தாழ்வுற்று நிற்போமோ?

"This is my December, these are my snow covered trees..."

#either of these two things is happening: i am getting old, or i am starting to grow an aversion to movies(vide avatar) with lots of bullets and crazy animal noises. i have come to understand that the third secret alternative-both of these happening, is what is really happening.

#at some point of time in life, we all spend our time lying around, writing about the wretched existence that we lead, about the futility of everything around, about how the happiness of the millions gets on our nerves, about why we should probably be sent to mars...

# there are stages in people's lives: we grow up, we live, we die, we live, we die, we live, we die, we live...

#there are times in our life when we will be happy. but the most stupid part is, we will not realise that. No, like idiots we go around thinking, "good, its just another day". if only somebody could yell- "this is one of those days, you moron, you better do the best of it".

#when you are running at 6 miles an hour, and the girl on the next treadmill is running at 9 miles an hour for more than an hour, what does that mean? does it mean that you are getting old, or you are fat and plumpy, or both of these?(oh my god. worst fears)

#peace on earth appears to be continually evasive. let's all do something about this: shut up when we want to talk about how someone else is a pain, and think of one's own ideological flaws.

#there are other things beyond the mundane existence in this world-super man(not mundane), obi won(not in this world) to name a few. So, unless you are either one of these(or like these), just get a move on and clean that toilet, or you are in one big stink.

#இன்னிக்கு செத்தா நாளைக்கு பால். நாளைக்கு செத்தா, நாளானைக்கு பால்.இதுதான் வாழ்கை தத்துவம்...

#be calm. but not too calm, or that rattlesnake in front of you might just kill you. react, but don't over do it. we are people, not robots; it is imperative that we respond normally to the environment around us. unless you have adrenalin deficiency, or severe brain damage. worse, you could be a monk, or an ascetic.(comment in jest, not to be taken too seriously)

#if you are young enough, chase skirts and drink beer. if you are young, go after your dreams. at some point, we will grow up, and we would not even know that!

#i have to borrow gopal's tag line for the denouement: be happy, that's the bottom line. (thanks gops.)

life and times of an(a?) entry level resume

dear sir,

i know not who you are. but you seem to be observing me with the same concentration as you would when you are in a urinal, staring at the flush knob. but you have to concentrate more than this when you do that, or you might end up wetting your front. that is not admirable, for someone so high up in the corporate playground, is it? 

i know you wouldn't give two seconds for me, and your trash can would listen to my profile, and learn about my projects and my experiences. but its unfortunate that the corporate culture relegates trash cans to not take decisions, but only...collect trash. from the minute you receive me via email to the minute you send that automated email to reject me, it takes what? two minutes? i am so glad that i could get that time. also, why am  i always ending up in your spam folder? is that a regular detour to the inbox? but i am not selling Viagra, all i am trying to do is sell a poor cow, desperate to find a job. some might call that skilled work prostitution. but i call it, symbiosis.

thanks anyway, dear spam folder, for listening to my woes. wait, you cant talk back, or you would sympathize too. 


most often than not, you will be surprised that i am not a bag of lies or an account of exaggeration, concealing a desire to make ridiculous amounts of money. but, how would i know the value of money, a 60 gsm paper is all i need. but these living things called people, they always seem to want more-more money, more cars, more children, more misery, more pain, more hardwork...how do i know this, you ask me. i am one of the reasons why they have what they have. 
but we are digressing. i was thanking you for the time you allot for me. and my many brothers. or sisters. it really doesnt matter, we are not too concerned about sex unlike you, with all your hormones, abnormalities and prejudices about race, religion, sexual orientation and political affiliations! the last one is my favorite. how can you ever be so foolishly blinded inasmuch you start to believe politicians!


i am often told that i do not meet the requirement criteria-match with the required skill set.if you want a fully customisable engineer to perfectly match your requirements, you can order one in one of the universities, and tell them to create prototypes just in case he does not perform well enough. in case you haven't noticed, an entry level engineer does not technically have anything called skills. he is naive. and clueless. but his mind is fertile. as soon as he starts to type me, i make him understand that he has nothing to market himself with. i try to teach him that he has to learn more and be different than others. but isnt that what he is? isnt that what he would do?

but why do you ask people to even submit me, and my many many brothers? i wouldn't be surprised, if some day, we would all join forces and plot and scheme to throw you out. you are probably thinking, this is an empty threat. but sir, think again. i am sure, you would have noticed, its only because someone noticed your good friend, one of our brothers-your resume, that you are now here.

but not for long, and that is how they play the game sir...

10 observations for the month

1. the bus does not come when you keep looking at your watch, rice does not cook when you keep staring at the microwave, plates do not clean themselves by looking at the kitchen sink, problems do not get solved by sitting idle and whiling away your time.

2. the most sought after thing is opinion, but never trust opinions. "this movie is awesome" equals the movie blows, sucks, and i paid the terrible price of sitting through it on top of shelling out money, you have to too. "the movie blows" equals its for high brows who think it falls on them to make this place a better world by watching such movies.

3.money comes and goes, they say. it does not come, but yes it does go. so why do they say, it comes and goes? because it comes for all other people, goes for you.

corollary: you will get money, when you need it the least.

corollary to corollary: you will get those things that you dont want, but never get the ones that you need badly.

4. the winter winds are always early, severe, biting and 'this winter is always much more severe than the previous one.

5. problems are always easy in the classroom. its only the exams, they assume the form of  "top 10 mathematical problems that have perplexed the greatest minds of the planet". solutions are always wrong, but when a professor gets it wrong, it doesnt mean he is wrong. it means, there is more than one solution to the problem.

6. everything goes right until the professor steps into the lab. he is the initiator of the domino effect, the chaos theory. and he is the butterfly which causes that hurricane, but he is also the hurricane.

7. not all the people in the planet are entitled to luxuries. not all people are entitled to live a peaceful and a prosperous life.  not all people are entitled to lead a decent life. not all people are entitled to a two-room dwelling in a poor suburb. a 10*4 box in a slum in mumbai. space in the kolkata railway station. you see where i am going with this?

8. appetite is inversely proportional to the amount of money you have. if you are poor, chances are, you eat like a hungry hog, gobbling up anything that comes your way,run around for money. more money means, you are likely to eat slim, stay slim and run around for 'feeling good' .

9. the universe is a strange place, but the college is not. there are those noisy undergrads, noisy parties, noisy neighbors, noisy libraries, noisy lounges, noisy gymnasiums, and you, with that noisy brain.

10. the most important thing in life, is not success, not satisfaction, not peace. its only a little smile on your face, the only crease that is acceptable at large in public, the only sign of acknowledging that everything that is happening is just one big joke, and a very simple solution to life's complicated and unanswerable questions.

reflex

observation 1:

irritating jerk. 

by this, i do not mean the clumsy friend, who tries to get on your nerves inspite of himself. no, i am talking about the physics of the human body. just when you are about to cross the road, the mind plays a very clever game-the car is a good 75 metres away, and at the speed of 40km/hour, roughly 11 m/s, you assume that you have 7 seconds to cross the road. you dont exactly do the math standing in the middle of the road, or you would end up on the non-existent cow-catcher of the car, wondering why that happened when suddenly you see St. Peter at the pearly gates.

no, its impulsive. binary. cross, or dont. 1 or 0. hit, or miss. and your foot responds. but in a different way. can and cannot.or can. or cannot. 1 and -1.or 1, or -1. if only we could understand more of the human body.

observation 2:

genuine jockey?

you see a person jockeying, because the current queue is too long. the other one is short. what do you do? think? hardly. lets weigh the possibilities. the other line is short, so the only criteria is service time. say the people on the shorter queue are chatty-they start talking about their wedding plans to an equally avid listener on the other side of the counter...

what if it is not? what if they live by the value code and finish on time? the worst part, what if they finish early? arent you stranded on this queue for a much longer time than the person who just happily got served and is leaving home early to watch india kill pakistan in the final one day?

again, 1 and 0. i should probably read on involuntary actions.

(*i am sure you are aware, that jockey is, not the next best thing to being naked, but in this case, switching queues. it makes the modeling of stochastic systems even more complex, apparently.)

observation 3:

the bus conundrum

ever been on a bus ride to nowhere even though you had an idea that you should not have gotten on the bus? i lose myself very easily. because, i always take the wrong bus. every time i feel like asking the driver/conductor, i am afraid that he would snap-as much civility we expect from civil servants, they are not readily dispensed with. just at the cusp of getting in, i become aware. ok, i am definitely going to arumbakkam instead of kodambakkam today. impulse. zero this time; maybe one next time! 

how I got kicked, got maniacal and landed hard on my butt...

let's start with why recession happened. pre fannie and freddie days, no worries, all is good on the western front.

and then, i got into my final year.

i started working on my project, and the economy crashed like the world trade centre, the babri masjid, the dunlop factory in ambattur.(but wait, the place is alive. with cobwebs, snakes, stray dogs and the occasional share holder who wants to buy the stink).

we have to go back to my project first. my friend had abandoned me, the fellow who was supposed to work with me on this project, for something so petty-he ended up with an internship in paris,(yes, gay paree, the hot chicks, nude buffs, champagne, and jean reno;hell they have a kiss named after their country). and i had to endure my head of department's taunts all alone. i had to explain, why figure had a small f in one place, a capital f in other; why the page number looked slightly offset from the centre. after discussing all these serious issues, i somehow managed to submit a thesis, which in retrospect is a big pile of rubbish.(as every self-respecting engineering student knows)

The time when you usually start applying to the universities is much before all this. recommendations(butt cheek kissing, both sides- of the professors and those pompous seniors who pretend to be supremely busy with nothing), statements of purpose(i had a purpose, but now that i am here, i am left purposeless, must find one soon), and the exams. I have dreams, i told everyone. i have dreams these days too, but of topless dancers going up and down the pole, wanting something. Me. and that's when i realised that these dreams are as vain as the previous ones...

coming back to the united states capital a america, the polls are held, everybody votes, obama asks everybody to start spending their (***) off, and says everything's ok, under control. he mildly asks people from other countries to pack their bags and not make a noise on their way out.

now,i land in america.
 research funding drops, there is no money in the automotive sector, oil prices fall, real estate crashes, dow jones is not seeing anything positive, the world gets to know a soulless leach named madoff and many like him,  and its cold as hell just froze over because its 14 freaking degrees below zero.

my parents and all those i know were telling me that things would get better. and they got worse. unprecedented rates of unemployment, screamed the wall street journal. so much for optimism.

till this day, my parents and my sister believe that things are getting better. and it will always be getting better even if i start cleaning gutters and wash dog poop off the streets; to them, i am always a source of hope and pride. they will make sacrifices in the process of making me a better man.

the camaraderie i shared with my friends, who took me out for vacations, who shared the occasional weekend meal with me, and who cracked  jokes about the next hot girl/aunt on the street, and talked about love and life and philosophy.

my books, cheering me up with stories of people falling and falling hard, and some moments of happiness; sadistic you say? no, it is the rule of life, and not just schadenfreude.

my blogs, making my friends shudder in disgust as to the number of times i have to whine, and how i badly need to get a life.

this is how you tide over a crisis in your life. surround yourself with life, or you might end up being a plastic bag. and all that is left of you would then be a mummy, fit to be wrapped and entombed. for all the misery in the world, those few moments of happiness are a great balance. they more than balance the equation, in that they instill something in you that would be good to tide over another wave of despair.

Before i could even think properly, the year is gone,  but i did add a lot of new things,loosely called memories-strangely, they would come and haunt me when i am down, and cheer me up, like a mirage which is like a temporary stimulant that makes your heart skip a beat as you walk down the path of the times when life was so simple. simple, as in the time you spent unnecessary money on a super cool watch, when you pestered your parents for the 8-bit video game with mario and islander because your friend was moving up the levels and you needed practice, when exam results meant squat, when the next game of cricket was at 1 in the afternoon in the month of april in madras, when the electricity went out and shouts of abuse chorused through the hall like a symphony, the long meaningless talks with your friends that led to more meaninglessness ,the hostel playground and the times you spent with your friends are all that you remember of your undergrad life.

cheers everyone.

have you seen madras when it rains? 

what is it with rains and us?
when it rains, i take a chair from inside our house, and place it outside underneath the sun shade that is at best, a shade against 1/100th of the sun's intensity. when it rains, it does nothing to protect you from the rains, allowing you to get moistened by the beautiful rain drops, and soaking the parts of the chair which is not occupied, only to seep into your body through what you are wearing. i love this feeling, as much as it irritates-nothing can be more pleasant than a rain in madras. why? because the people toil under the heavy gaze of sun almost all throughout the year, that the complaints about improper roads and the water-flooded drains during rains is a very comfortable pretext to hide their inner childish happiness. after the rains, i see those rain drops on the electric cables, and the wooden poles in some places gaining weight that they had lost to the sun, the roads as full with water as a pregnant women's belly is big(nera maasa garbini!) as she is almost about to deliver, my terrace slab, dripping water onto the floor, into our house, like a stream collecting dust and sand and everything on its way, not wanting to let them behind  to wherever it is going. there is water inside the traffic signal shelters of traffic constables, on the ceiling of our house, on the leaves of the trees on the roadside, on the light posts, on the onyx garbage bins, on the gopuram of temples trickling down to the bottom, on the corporation ground, on the park benches, on the hoardings, everywhere! such a sight, that we fail to see, to understand that it is important to appreciate the little things in life-only these things really matter.

once the rain stops, it is moist everywhere. the temperature is down, and it is as if a scorching earth drank a full bottle of water after a really long time, and is longing for more, not just because she is thirsty, but because she relishes the taste and does not want to let go of that taste that lingers on her tongue.The people huddled together in local shops, or outside the tea kadai, or under the bus stand with their rooftops leaking, dripping water onto the people occasionally(always?!), the bikes that waddle through the water pool on the road to see all this, an amazing sight of human endurance, and equally enchanting.

i for one, never complained about rains. those are the best times. come october, i would wake up everyday morning to smell that rain breeze, that is probably the closest thing to bliss(bliss,as i mentioned in one of my earlier posts, is my amma's chakkara pongal). when my mother would come to wake me up, i would notice something different. the smell of rain! i would recall that line from the English literature reader (tenth standard,i think), "the  intoxicating smell of wet earth" that would make the day for me! and if you want to see god, just sip coffee watching the wide gray expanse pouring down on the people of the city!

in the nights, when it would start to drizzle, you would see the street vendors hurriedly pulling tarpaulin sheets over their thallu vandi, and the pedestrian moving at a gradually increasing pace that would increase with the intensity of rain. the cars would start the wipers hoping that there would be more rains, equally frustrated, equally exhilarated. but wait, what about the kids who badly wanted to play that cricket match that they had planned for days together? what about the eager employee waiting for a bus on the water clogged streets to take him to his office? what about the street side digging of the telephone companies and the chennai corporation workers, which is now no more a pit than a well? a break! that is what they all get! a break from the rigour of sweating and toiling and playing in more than 35 C temperatures for months together!

much better, the railway tracks! they gleam like platinum and the oily patches form a unstable pact with their water counterparts to not disturb each other, as the water floats on top the oil patch, making it look like mercury! the train compartments and the buses-the window seats(my favorite!) are completely wet, there is a big puddle, and you would have no other choice! have you noticed the electric rails on top of the tracks suspended on rectangular structures over regular intervals? they would be dripping wet, and the trains with their pantograph(the antenna like things on the trains, that conduct electricity?) would hit those drops of water, and the drops would understand and fly away, understanding the hurry the train is in to get to madras, to see how beautiful she had become since it had rained! the garbage on the roads would be a mix of organic paste and water, flowing down the roads, and like a slimy trail would lead on to a bigger puddle, to settle down finally!

every one talks about rain. be it good or bad, they talk about it, because it is not normal! it is a strange phenomenon, that can throw life out of gear, still create happiness in people. when i was really young, i would wish that it would rain for days together heavily, so that the schools would close for a long time. my dream did not materialize, i hope some one else's does!

right when i thought of writing the blog about rains, the first thing that came into my mind was the train ride from madras to arakkonam with my cousin brother amidst heavy rains. and from there, we had to take a bus to sholinghur, when it rained even more heavily! we were completely soaked when we got to my periamma's place.

my amma told me, the day before i was born, it rained very heavily. maybe i got out the next day because of the whiff i had caught the day before, it must have been strong enough to reach me!

i completely agree with shashi tharoor-no matter where you go(away from india), there is a inexplicable pull that the mother india exerts, that she just wont let you go!

take care of my madras for me...

p.s:

1. we are not talking of floods, i would cautiously like to steer clear of some of the disastrous scenarios.

2. when i say i loved rains, i am not talking of rains that destroy crops in the rice growing hinterland of thanjavur or ramnad district. i feel sorry for the millions who depend on rains, but when it does come, it causes them damage for some sin not of their own. a collective one, maybe.

3. kindly discount the possibility of the outrageous spreading of pandemic due to water borne infestations, due to which a number of people suffer.