After every seven years, you are a new biological person. Defining the boundaries of a new generation is a difficult question and doesn’t have any objective criterions. As against the present times, a man released after 30 years in jail in 550 AD wouldn’t have had to deal with the strangeness of cellphones, cable-TV, high rises and short skirts.
In Indian context, I would say that those born after 1987 are the current generation. They don’t know that Door-Darshan was simply called TV, those driving Maruti-800 were considered rich, they probably have never heard about Cibaca Sangeet Mala and the SurTaaz Bigul, and they didn’t witness the emergence of Sachin Tendulkar. By the time they were five, the waves of globalization had begun engulfing the country.
You hear a lot of “Kids these days are so smart” chat these days just because they know a lot and can play with gadgets. They absorb a lot of filth shown on TV. Life used to be simpler in those days when we just had Ramayana and Vikram-Baital for our fantasies.
My younger brother (Bala) and I used to have Yudhha with bow and arrows. It was a pattern with every game that I played to win while he played for fun. However, one particular day he was extra ferocious and caught me by surprise with his Brahmastra baan. The moment I died, he walked two steps towards the wall and shouted “Pushpa Varsha”. Three kids were waiting with flowers on terrace and threw them on him chanting “Dhanya ho Bala! Bala ki Jay ho!” Watch this video to gain the perspective.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC987YJCqvY&feature=related
Inspired by the Olympics of 1988, we used to have a fight-hour everyday after the school which included boxing, karate, kushti etc with strict rules like no pinching, hair-pulling, ijjat se khelna (pulling down shorts) and no going to momma crying after getting beaten. The last rule used to be broken sometimes or to shut him up I had to carry my brother on my shoulders (Vikram-Baital style) while he used my ears to navigate left and right turns. To begin pillow fight, we used to pretend as if we are laborers carrying heavy sacks (pillows) on the back and looking up at a fictitious aero-plane in the sky. Then we would collide and shout at each other “Abe saamne dekh ke nahi chal sakta” and then in rage, attack each other with our sacks.
Whenever there was any chat of naughty toddlers at home, my mom would start “Humara chotaa bahut badmaash tha…” When I confronted her once for any tales of my childhood adventures, the only claim to fame was “Isko to jahaan chodd do, 2 ghante baad wahin baitha milta tha”.
And then there were trips to villages, where we ran around in fields in 45 degree Sun, sat on bullock carts, bought 5 paisa burf-ka-gola and saw death been taken lightly. There was no need to divide players while playing cricket. Caste did it for us. It used to be Patils vs us. I was in a pretty good form in one such match and when I played a shot high in the air on leg side, the Patils shouted “Sursyaaa, Catch Ghe” who was supposed to be fielding there. Suresh becomes Sursyaaa in Marathi. However, Sursyaa was shitting outside the boundary at that time. For 70% India, the whole world is a toilet. I am probably the only batsman in cricket history whose catch has been dropped because the fielder was squatting to answer nature’s call. I wish I could show that video to bowlers when they angrily scream for catches that even a fifteen footer couldn’t have taken at the boundary.
Given a choice though, I would like to be born in present times. The only disadvantage I see is that there is a lot of borrowed wisdom nowadays due to easy accessibility to knowledge. It is a painful experience to read about a 14 year old blogger impressed by Ayn Rand’s philosophy since she was eleven. I am not against 14 year olds blogging and reading books. In fact, not very proud of myself that I read my first book at 19. But they must be shielded from stupid ideas until they acquire the abilities to judge them.
Taking things to be cool because they are western and different happens a lot these days. In Kharagpur, I once entered into the room of a friend who was shouting “We Don’t Need No Education” with Pink Floyd. That was the age when many of us spent days with drug, masturbation and rock n’ roll. Ok, replace drug with alcohol.
My reaction to that guy was “Saale nakli. Din me 25 ghunta padh padh ke IIT clear kiya hain. Abhi Stanford me Ph.D. ke liye apply kiya hain. Sun-na hain to sun ye gaana. Lekin feeling ke saath chillane ka natak mat kar.” I mean seriously. I don’t get the head-banging people over here do in rock concerts while listening to a number on Vietnam War when they can’t even locate it on the Map, let alone know reasons behind the lyrics. And they yell with rage “Daddy what you leave behind for me..”. Bhai , bharat ek parivarik type ka desh hain. We have mostly loving families here who want to leave behind as much as possible for their kids. The only single parents you would find in India would be Preity Zinta in “Kya Kehna” or Sushmita Sen in adopted reality. Teenagers here stay with their parents and the only ones who are independent and start earning by the age of sixteen, usually don’t have access to such songs.
Recently I read a blog of a teenager who was 17 and worried about getting older. She already has doubts that she would die a lonely dame. Let me recite a recent incident for her. Bala and I would be going home next week. We’ve been playing cricket on our terrace since the time it was built. Bala told me that when he informed Mom of our plans to come, she said this to the maid “Baai, chat (Terrace) achche se saaf kar dena. Bahche aa rahen hain. Cricket khelenge.” Of course, if my mom would have had her way, it would have been our kids for whom the terrace shall be cleaned.
PS: Preeti has tagged me here with the title of the post.
Showing posts with label IIT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label IIT. Show all posts
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
The Bribe
Just when I am supposed to study Econometrics and Statistical Inference, the urge to blog overwhelms me. Escapism is a widely prevalent vice. During exam-time in Kharagpur, we wing-mates had a tendency to elaborately plan a trip for the vacations to follow. Everyone knew that there won't be any trip, but no-one acknowledged it as long as the planning kept our minds off the exams. To make the planning more credible, we would get down to the minutest logistical details like where would we stay and of course covered the basic necessities like how much whisky and cigarettes to pack. One such fictitious trip to the nearby Digha beach was postponed because one guy pointed out that there would be a high tide; so we instead planned for Darjeeling.
However, we did manage to have an extremely successful trip to Gangtok after the final year exams. In a similar spirit, I did go for a jog one particular morning in the eighth semester; unfortunately no one saw that and now I myself doubt whether that was a dream, an illusion created in subconscious as a response to unfulfilled yearnings.
Another forgettable thing about those days was my contribution to the final year project. It's rare to have two or more people working on the same project, but since the project assigned to me was a sponsored one and relatively difficult (Speech Controlled Toy Car), my project guide assigned it to two of us. The toy-car was really cool: red with jazzy stickers and big enough for a four year old to sit and drive it.
We were supposed to develop a speech-recognition software that could decode the basic verbal instructions and then interface the hardware to control the navigation of car. That is all I can tell about the project. Most of it was done by my partner. The partner was also kind enough to give me some slides to show in the final review and told the review committee that I contributed in a few modules. My only contribution was cleaning the rat-poo inside the car after we returned from a month long winter break. Kabhi kabhi kapda bhi maar deta tha car pe. I sacrificed one of my old T-shirt for the purpose. Though I did feel sorry for letting down my professor and sent him "Happy Teacher's Day" mail after passing out.
My stay in KGP isn't all about failures and disappointments though. I was a regarded as a master in manipulating data extremely fast such that it doesn't look manipulated. Friends used to drop by in case they failed to get their experiments done on time. One more high point was that I and my Bridge-partner Piyush managed a Bronze medal in the year we learnt how to play the game. What must be considered here is that Kharagpur is a Bong's den and I really can’t tell you how well versed Bengalis are in doing things that involve sitting for hours.
There were quite a few wildly funny incidents which involved ragging, nudity (male) and intoxications; let's take up a cleaner one below.
Our wing of 12 guys had a open door policy; anyone would walk-in for a sutta( cigarette) and find people playing cards at almost any hour of the day. Piyush and I were aspiring Instrumentation Engineers in our third year and firm believers in cycle-pooling.
One fine evening a sincere branch-mate walked into a smoke filled room and tells us that next day there is a class-test on MicroProcessors. He also informed that last year the professor had given 20 questions from the GATE exam and hence deduced that he should be studying the GATE paper. We inferred that it would be an objective type question paper and hence deduced that we should create a cheat-sheet. We wrote 1-20 on a sheet of paper and idea was to keep exchanging that sheet in exam hall with correct answers written on it. Satisfied with our preparation, we meandered into the world of Kings and Queens, and Hearts and Diamonds.
Next day Piyush and I wore shirts which had front pockets. Two guys wearing formal shirts riding double-seat on a cycle is a rare seen in KGP, we were men with a plan and least bothered about the general expectations in accordance with non-existent fashion trends of the campus .I kept the neatly folded sheet in my pocket. Piyush entered the classroom first and sat behind a bright chap and then I managed to sit behind Piyush. Luckily another studious fellow named Bornik sat behind me. We were all set.
Professor distributed the question papers. I knew answers to 2 out of 20, Piyush knew none. Everything was going as expected. I passed the sheet to Piyush with my 2 answers and then he returned it back without any value addition. I hurriedly pushed the sheet back into my pocket. We were sweating and nervous.
Then I saw Bornik’s left palm slightly open behind me. Even though he wasn’t in the loop, I decided to slip the cheat-sheet to him and rely on his presence of mind to comprehend its purpose. When the prof was about to turn, I got hold of the paper in my pocket and squeezed it into his hand, keeping my eyes all the time on the prof’s movements. Heartbeat-rate trebled. Bornik was apparently shocked by the action. The following conversation ensued:
“Ye kya hain?” (What’s this?)
“Khol ke dekh. Sab samajh jayega.” (Open it and you’ll understand)
“Aisa kyon kar rahan hain? Iski kya jarurat hain ?”(Why are you doing this? What’s the need of it?)
“Abe saale, discussion ka time nahi hain. Khol ke dekhaa ?” (Not a time for discussions; did u open it?)
“Mein aise hee bol deta hun. Mujhe nahi chaiye ye. Wapis le le.” (I’ll be telling you verbally. I don’t want this.Take it back).
“Abe likh ke de Ghochu. Kuch nahi hoga. Durr mat.” (Write it down #&@&#. Don’t worry)
Of course there were gaps in the above conversation, the words were not clear and we spoke whenever the professor turned. After a few such frantic and confusing verbal exchanges, he simply started dictating and we could manage 4-5 answers amongst us.
Then the bell rang and prof collected the answers. I leaned forward to Piyush and we exchanged that once-again-fucked look. I told Piyush that Bornik didn’t have the courage to exchange the cheat-sheet; he kept the sheet with himself and hence I couldn’t pass it along.
Meanwhile, Bornik stood up and took two steps to my desk.
He thumped his palm loudly on my desk.
When he lifted his palm, I saw a ten rupee note there.
He walked off in anger.
I was baffled for a second. Then it dawned.
I checked my front pocket. In it, lay the sheet which was supposed to sail us through.
However, we did manage to have an extremely successful trip to Gangtok after the final year exams. In a similar spirit, I did go for a jog one particular morning in the eighth semester; unfortunately no one saw that and now I myself doubt whether that was a dream, an illusion created in subconscious as a response to unfulfilled yearnings.
Another forgettable thing about those days was my contribution to the final year project. It's rare to have two or more people working on the same project, but since the project assigned to me was a sponsored one and relatively difficult (Speech Controlled Toy Car), my project guide assigned it to two of us. The toy-car was really cool: red with jazzy stickers and big enough for a four year old to sit and drive it.
We were supposed to develop a speech-recognition software that could decode the basic verbal instructions and then interface the hardware to control the navigation of car. That is all I can tell about the project. Most of it was done by my partner. The partner was also kind enough to give me some slides to show in the final review and told the review committee that I contributed in a few modules. My only contribution was cleaning the rat-poo inside the car after we returned from a month long winter break. Kabhi kabhi kapda bhi maar deta tha car pe. I sacrificed one of my old T-shirt for the purpose. Though I did feel sorry for letting down my professor and sent him "Happy Teacher's Day" mail after passing out.
My stay in KGP isn't all about failures and disappointments though. I was a regarded as a master in manipulating data extremely fast such that it doesn't look manipulated. Friends used to drop by in case they failed to get their experiments done on time. One more high point was that I and my Bridge-partner Piyush managed a Bronze medal in the year we learnt how to play the game. What must be considered here is that Kharagpur is a Bong's den and I really can’t tell you how well versed Bengalis are in doing things that involve sitting for hours.
There were quite a few wildly funny incidents which involved ragging, nudity (male) and intoxications; let's take up a cleaner one below.
Our wing of 12 guys had a open door policy; anyone would walk-in for a sutta( cigarette) and find people playing cards at almost any hour of the day. Piyush and I were aspiring Instrumentation Engineers in our third year and firm believers in cycle-pooling.
One fine evening a sincere branch-mate walked into a smoke filled room and tells us that next day there is a class-test on MicroProcessors. He also informed that last year the professor had given 20 questions from the GATE exam and hence deduced that he should be studying the GATE paper. We inferred that it would be an objective type question paper and hence deduced that we should create a cheat-sheet. We wrote 1-20 on a sheet of paper and idea was to keep exchanging that sheet in exam hall with correct answers written on it. Satisfied with our preparation, we meandered into the world of Kings and Queens, and Hearts and Diamonds.
Next day Piyush and I wore shirts which had front pockets. Two guys wearing formal shirts riding double-seat on a cycle is a rare seen in KGP, we were men with a plan and least bothered about the general expectations in accordance with non-existent fashion trends of the campus .I kept the neatly folded sheet in my pocket. Piyush entered the classroom first and sat behind a bright chap and then I managed to sit behind Piyush. Luckily another studious fellow named Bornik sat behind me. We were all set.
Professor distributed the question papers. I knew answers to 2 out of 20, Piyush knew none. Everything was going as expected. I passed the sheet to Piyush with my 2 answers and then he returned it back without any value addition. I hurriedly pushed the sheet back into my pocket. We were sweating and nervous.
Then I saw Bornik’s left palm slightly open behind me. Even though he wasn’t in the loop, I decided to slip the cheat-sheet to him and rely on his presence of mind to comprehend its purpose. When the prof was about to turn, I got hold of the paper in my pocket and squeezed it into his hand, keeping my eyes all the time on the prof’s movements. Heartbeat-rate trebled. Bornik was apparently shocked by the action. The following conversation ensued:
“Ye kya hain?” (What’s this?)
“Khol ke dekh. Sab samajh jayega.” (Open it and you’ll understand)
“Aisa kyon kar rahan hain? Iski kya jarurat hain ?”(Why are you doing this? What’s the need of it?)
“Abe saale, discussion ka time nahi hain. Khol ke dekhaa ?” (Not a time for discussions; did u open it?)
“Mein aise hee bol deta hun. Mujhe nahi chaiye ye. Wapis le le.” (I’ll be telling you verbally. I don’t want this.Take it back).
“Abe likh ke de Ghochu. Kuch nahi hoga. Durr mat.” (Write it down #&@&#. Don’t worry)
Of course there were gaps in the above conversation, the words were not clear and we spoke whenever the professor turned. After a few such frantic and confusing verbal exchanges, he simply started dictating and we could manage 4-5 answers amongst us.
Then the bell rang and prof collected the answers. I leaned forward to Piyush and we exchanged that once-again-fucked look. I told Piyush that Bornik didn’t have the courage to exchange the cheat-sheet; he kept the sheet with himself and hence I couldn’t pass it along.
Meanwhile, Bornik stood up and took two steps to my desk.
He thumped his palm loudly on my desk.
When he lifted his palm, I saw a ten rupee note there.
He walked off in anger.
I was baffled for a second. Then it dawned.
I checked my front pocket. In it, lay the sheet which was supposed to sail us through.
PS : Bornik, to this day, thinks that I tried to bribe him for helping me in the test. He would never talk to me for the unintentional humiliation caused.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
A Word Game
I’ve got almost three hours left, as these very words are typed, before I default on the grand promise made to myself of writing at least one post per ten days. So let me hurry up and write about a word-game I used to play quite often, long ago.
It’s about getting from one word to a totally unrelated word using synonyms.
All you need for the game is a tool (a Software or a Website) that gives you the synonyms of a word, e.g. Word-web, Dictionary.com. So here are the steps to play the game:
1. Think of any two apparently disconnected words like “Deep” and “Formula”.
2. Find Synonyms of the first word using the tool.
3. From the list of Synonyms, select a word that, you think, could take you closer to the second word.
4. Find Synonyms of the selected word in step 3.
5. If the second word (here “Light”) is not in the list obtained in step 4, then go to step 3. Else, celebrate.
So for the Deep-Formula example, the sequence using Word-web could be:
Deep-Mysterious-Occult-Eclipse-Dominate-Rule-Formula
Of course, there is more than one solution in many cases. The most fun part is trying to get to the opposites through the chain of synonyms. Let’s kill the life:
Life-Spirit-Intent-Captive-Imprisoned-Confined-Bounded-Choked-Died
Try and get to “Clear” from “Close” in minimum number of steps. Why don’t you put a challenging pair in the comments with the number of steps you took to reach the solution.
Not all pairs would have solutions; but that happens mostly if you choose a very restrictive first word, like “Calculator”. Otherwise, you almost always get to any other word through the synonyms. Now, what does that tell us about language and symbols and the way we communicate?
Let me know if you find the game genuinely interesting and whether you’ve seen something similar anywhere else. If it’s worth it, then I might create a Software (may be a Facebook application) that would help play the game. It would come up with suitable pairs which definitely have solutions and then show the user/player the route he is taking to get to the destination word. Taking a step further, the software can generate pairs at various difficulty levels based on the number of steps and choices required to solve the problem.
This also reminds me of the silly game of rhyming words, if I may call it so, that almost all of us would have played. Back in Kharagpur, me and one particular friend nicknamed Sanki, seldom had a conversation without the poetic touch. He would knock on my door and ask “Do you have a pen?”; the reply would be “Only if square of Pi is less than ten.” Yes, we were that bad. It did get emotionally draining to be always alert and continue doing so month after month. We earned many enemies in due course, some well-wishers turned agnostic too.
Putting stupid memories aside, let me request you to throw a few challenging pairs and then we can compare our solutions.
It’s about getting from one word to a totally unrelated word using synonyms.
All you need for the game is a tool (a Software or a Website) that gives you the synonyms of a word, e.g. Word-web, Dictionary.com. So here are the steps to play the game:
1. Think of any two apparently disconnected words like “Deep” and “Formula”.
2. Find Synonyms of the first word using the tool.
3. From the list of Synonyms, select a word that, you think, could take you closer to the second word.
4. Find Synonyms of the selected word in step 3.
5. If the second word (here “Light”) is not in the list obtained in step 4, then go to step 3. Else, celebrate.
So for the Deep-Formula example, the sequence using Word-web could be:
Deep-Mysterious-Occult-Eclipse-Dominate-Rule-Formula
Of course, there is more than one solution in many cases. The most fun part is trying to get to the opposites through the chain of synonyms. Let’s kill the life:
Life-Spirit-Intent-Captive-Imprisoned-Confined-Bounded-Choked-Died
Try and get to “Clear” from “Close” in minimum number of steps. Why don’t you put a challenging pair in the comments with the number of steps you took to reach the solution.
Not all pairs would have solutions; but that happens mostly if you choose a very restrictive first word, like “Calculator”. Otherwise, you almost always get to any other word through the synonyms. Now, what does that tell us about language and symbols and the way we communicate?
Let me know if you find the game genuinely interesting and whether you’ve seen something similar anywhere else. If it’s worth it, then I might create a Software (may be a Facebook application) that would help play the game. It would come up with suitable pairs which definitely have solutions and then show the user/player the route he is taking to get to the destination word. Taking a step further, the software can generate pairs at various difficulty levels based on the number of steps and choices required to solve the problem.
This also reminds me of the silly game of rhyming words, if I may call it so, that almost all of us would have played. Back in Kharagpur, me and one particular friend nicknamed Sanki, seldom had a conversation without the poetic touch. He would knock on my door and ask “Do you have a pen?”; the reply would be “Only if square of Pi is less than ten.” Yes, we were that bad. It did get emotionally draining to be always alert and continue doing so month after month. We earned many enemies in due course, some well-wishers turned agnostic too.
Putting stupid memories aside, let me request you to throw a few challenging pairs and then we can compare our solutions.
And am I glad to beat the deadline by a mighty margin of two hours :).
Sunday, February 8, 2009
In Praise Of Routine And In Glory Of Life
The skin is getting its colour back. The blood is pure red now; gallons of alcohol have drained off. Sometimes though, the eyes yearn for the watery horizon. The waves bring a million messages from the end of the world. The meanings and interpretations they represent are overwhelming. I can't wait to write about my conversations with them. But not now.
Now is the time to get out of the Goa hangover and get on with daily life, the reality, the one that sustains, the one that allows for such dreamy patches and so resolutely absorbs randomness. If it wasn't for the half an hour of Yoga and other health practices that each day of my routine life follows, I wouldn't have been able to ride the mighty horses eight days in a row with less than four hours of sleep and more than the same number of beers.
The efficiency and strengths of a disciplined life are enormous. I almost surprised myself last Monday by reporting to office half an hour earlier than usual, full of verve and all prim and proper in my formals ,very much unlike the half naked drunken wanderer in Goa just a day ago. I dig formals to death at workplace .On Fridays, it's easy to spot me in the office even if you don't know me; I would be the only man in the entire office with polished black shoes. I pay my bills at least two weeks in advance, the reason I was able to stay unexpectedly longer towards the end of the month without worrying about defaults. My car never runs out of fuel, there is always some money in my wallet, I always carry a spare pair of spects and almost always have a backup plan for even the silliest things I intend to do e.g. getting a haircut.
I shall not bore you further with all the optimizations done for making daily life easier and hence thoughts richer; some of them are heart wrenching. Let me just give an example and move on : while booking the air-tickets I always select the window seat numbered F rather than A, so that I could lean on my right hand for sleeping. Someone told me that my face looks less uglier from left side; so this helps too.
However, point is that an organised day-to-day life allows one to enjoy vacations and other deviations in better ways; but due to thinking and talking about Goa the entire last week, I am not able to get back into that rhythm of the routine. My body, mind and soul thrive on those patterns. That is the reason why I have decided to give a very short break to talking and blogging about the Goa trip and it's experiences and concentrate on other aspects for a while.
Still, I miss the lonely walks late in the nights. One can't go for a walk at two past midnight in Bangalore. I used to do that some times during my undergrad days at IIT Kharagpur. Yesterday I came across the video at this link, which left me with wonderful memories of those days. Yes, I agree that it doesn't do justice to the video of "Where the hell is Matt", but that's not the purpose anyway; just watch it for nostalgia.
The song played during the video is “Praan” by Gary Schyman, and the lyrics are from the poem "The Stream of Life" by Rabindranath Tagore. Below is the translation. One can so relate to the feelings when one stands watching the endless sea under the dark starry sky, and then the waves come, one after the other, and then the most youthful of them reaches out and slowly envelops the feet, bringing one out of numbness; heavenly is the touch of life, coming straight from the source and the infinity . Here goes the poem :
The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day
runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures.
It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth
in numberless blades of grass
and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers.
It is the same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth
and of death, in ebb and in flow.
I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life
And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.
Now is the time to get out of the Goa hangover and get on with daily life, the reality, the one that sustains, the one that allows for such dreamy patches and so resolutely absorbs randomness. If it wasn't for the half an hour of Yoga and other health practices that each day of my routine life follows, I wouldn't have been able to ride the mighty horses eight days in a row with less than four hours of sleep and more than the same number of beers.
The efficiency and strengths of a disciplined life are enormous. I almost surprised myself last Monday by reporting to office half an hour earlier than usual, full of verve and all prim and proper in my formals ,very much unlike the half naked drunken wanderer in Goa just a day ago. I dig formals to death at workplace .On Fridays, it's easy to spot me in the office even if you don't know me; I would be the only man in the entire office with polished black shoes. I pay my bills at least two weeks in advance, the reason I was able to stay unexpectedly longer towards the end of the month without worrying about defaults. My car never runs out of fuel, there is always some money in my wallet, I always carry a spare pair of spects and almost always have a backup plan for even the silliest things I intend to do e.g. getting a haircut.
I shall not bore you further with all the optimizations done for making daily life easier and hence thoughts richer; some of them are heart wrenching. Let me just give an example and move on : while booking the air-tickets I always select the window seat numbered F rather than A, so that I could lean on my right hand for sleeping. Someone told me that my face looks less uglier from left side; so this helps too.
However, point is that an organised day-to-day life allows one to enjoy vacations and other deviations in better ways; but due to thinking and talking about Goa the entire last week, I am not able to get back into that rhythm of the routine. My body, mind and soul thrive on those patterns. That is the reason why I have decided to give a very short break to talking and blogging about the Goa trip and it's experiences and concentrate on other aspects for a while.
Still, I miss the lonely walks late in the nights. One can't go for a walk at two past midnight in Bangalore. I used to do that some times during my undergrad days at IIT Kharagpur. Yesterday I came across the video at this link, which left me with wonderful memories of those days. Yes, I agree that it doesn't do justice to the video of "Where the hell is Matt", but that's not the purpose anyway; just watch it for nostalgia.
The song played during the video is “Praan” by Gary Schyman, and the lyrics are from the poem "The Stream of Life" by Rabindranath Tagore. Below is the translation. One can so relate to the feelings when one stands watching the endless sea under the dark starry sky, and then the waves come, one after the other, and then the most youthful of them reaches out and slowly envelops the feet, bringing one out of numbness; heavenly is the touch of life, coming straight from the source and the infinity . Here goes the poem :
The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day
runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures.
It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth
in numberless blades of grass
and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers.
It is the same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth
and of death, in ebb and in flow.
I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life
And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
The Happening
Wednesday evening. Around 9 PM. I called up Chitto to discuss about the Goa-trip that we three (third one being Pravu) had planned for the first weekend of December. Tickets were booked, researches were in progress to have some serious kick-ass fun and my intent for the call was to finalize the place of stay. Having exchanged the pleasantries ( both of us greet each other with a “Hello Sir!” for reasons unknown), we decided to get Pravu too in the conference.. He stays in Gurgaon but was in Kharagpur at that time.
Just when we finalized on a Hotel on Calangute beach, Chitto asked us whether we heard the sounds of bullets in the background. Chitto stays in Colaba and informed us that there’s a gang war going on in Colaba at various place and he has switched off all the lights and bolted the doors & windows. I googled “Colaba” for any such news, but there wasn’t any update till then. I jokingly told him to show some enterprise, become a citizen journalist and take some snaps of the gangsters. He then heard the booming sound of a bomb or a grenade perhaps.
We decided to hang up some time later and I immediately called up my brother who stays in Wadala which is a few Kilometers away from Colaba. He is a party animal and visits places in Colaba quite often. He was at a friend’s place in Dadar at that time and was aware of the “situation” in Colaba. He assured me that he will leave only after the gang war is over. By this time rediff had a headline about shootouts in Colaba; details were missing.
A couple of hours later I checked the news again and by this time it was clear that Mumbai was under an terrorist attack at various places and around ten people have died. Once again I called up brother. He was still with his friend Munish in Dadar. Three of Munish’s friends were missing and not reachable. They were supposed to be in Colaba at that time. Brother told me that he will leave only in the morning now. He had called up our parents & informed them. This is something that we both always do; we both never get calls from home in times of crisis and it is we who inform them that there is a crisis and we are safe.. Last time there were blasts in Bangalore, I was the one to inform my father that there are blasts and that I am far away from the area where blasts took place which was a lie ; the affected areas were at walking distances.
Thursday morning I logged on to the net as soon as I was up. The death count was 100 and the attack was rightly termed as unprecedented in terms of impact and manner in which it was being carried out. All the news headlines were in bold and there was absolutely no coverage for any other news which included state elections. A picture of burning Taj was shown along with the count for dead, hostages and injured. Experiences of narrow escape and horror abounded.
I went to office and then called up Chitto once again. He told me that the Nariman Point house where a Jewish family is taken hostage is just two streets away from his place. There are trucks of army and firemen around his place. He didn’t have any option but to stay locked inside the house. Once again I called my brother. Two of Munish’s friends who were missing last night were shot dead in Leopold Cafe. The bullets went right through their heads. One of them was two years junior to me at IIT Kharagpur and was about to get married in December. The other was from Indore.
The idea of a rocking trip to Goa seemed too perverse at that time and I discussed the same with Chitto. We decided to call it off, but gave ourselves a couple of days before we put a death nail into it and inform Pravu. My brother was going to Dewas the next day and he too cancelled the tickets now. The carnage was still on and the end was nowhere in sight. Contradictory news and rumors abounded. Taj and Oberoi were reported to be free a couple of times only to be followed by with news about raging fire and even more bullets and grenades.
My brother works for Yes-bank and Friday afternoon I got a call from him that Yes-Bank chairman Ashok Kapur was found dead in Oberoi. Saturday morning I went out for a walk and saw some reporters at the Frank Anthony school which is quite close to my place; one can hear “We shall overcome someday” when they sing in the assembly. The reporters were here because the NSG Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, who died bravely combating the terrorists, studied at this school.
By Saturday afternoon, the trauma had officially ended. This was the first time things were happening to people connected to me. Thinking about my feelings about all this seems guilt filled indulgence to me. How does it matter if everything would be forgotten in a few days? Many of us are expressing rage, offering solutions, analyzing the situation, writing articles, commenting on the news sites. Will it be the same short lived patriotism, rage and sadness? Would the voices once again die down without any actions? One-minute-silences would follow, dead would be forgotten and then life will go on, waiting for another day when once again these maniacal devils would come to play with their bullets and bombs and bathe with our blood.
For this one time I wish there is a One minute where entire Mumbai erupts with people shouting at top of their voices. Let there be screams and cries, let there be shrieks, let the city roar. Let the twenty million souls voice there anguish and anger together; the sound would be loud enough to tremble Delhi and Karachi. This time Mumbai shouldn’t be praised for its ‘resilience’, but for its strength and the will to not to forget what was done to it and to not let this happen again. How we all wish that. But would those wishes remain a dream and would we once again allow the reality to become a nightmare.
Just when we finalized on a Hotel on Calangute beach, Chitto asked us whether we heard the sounds of bullets in the background. Chitto stays in Colaba and informed us that there’s a gang war going on in Colaba at various place and he has switched off all the lights and bolted the doors & windows. I googled “Colaba” for any such news, but there wasn’t any update till then. I jokingly told him to show some enterprise, become a citizen journalist and take some snaps of the gangsters. He then heard the booming sound of a bomb or a grenade perhaps.
We decided to hang up some time later and I immediately called up my brother who stays in Wadala which is a few Kilometers away from Colaba. He is a party animal and visits places in Colaba quite often. He was at a friend’s place in Dadar at that time and was aware of the “situation” in Colaba. He assured me that he will leave only after the gang war is over. By this time rediff had a headline about shootouts in Colaba; details were missing.
A couple of hours later I checked the news again and by this time it was clear that Mumbai was under an terrorist attack at various places and around ten people have died. Once again I called up brother. He was still with his friend Munish in Dadar. Three of Munish’s friends were missing and not reachable. They were supposed to be in Colaba at that time. Brother told me that he will leave only in the morning now. He had called up our parents & informed them. This is something that we both always do; we both never get calls from home in times of crisis and it is we who inform them that there is a crisis and we are safe.. Last time there were blasts in Bangalore, I was the one to inform my father that there are blasts and that I am far away from the area where blasts took place which was a lie ; the affected areas were at walking distances.
Thursday morning I logged on to the net as soon as I was up. The death count was 100 and the attack was rightly termed as unprecedented in terms of impact and manner in which it was being carried out. All the news headlines were in bold and there was absolutely no coverage for any other news which included state elections. A picture of burning Taj was shown along with the count for dead, hostages and injured. Experiences of narrow escape and horror abounded.
I went to office and then called up Chitto once again. He told me that the Nariman Point house where a Jewish family is taken hostage is just two streets away from his place. There are trucks of army and firemen around his place. He didn’t have any option but to stay locked inside the house. Once again I called my brother. Two of Munish’s friends who were missing last night were shot dead in Leopold Cafe. The bullets went right through their heads. One of them was two years junior to me at IIT Kharagpur and was about to get married in December. The other was from Indore.
The idea of a rocking trip to Goa seemed too perverse at that time and I discussed the same with Chitto. We decided to call it off, but gave ourselves a couple of days before we put a death nail into it and inform Pravu. My brother was going to Dewas the next day and he too cancelled the tickets now. The carnage was still on and the end was nowhere in sight. Contradictory news and rumors abounded. Taj and Oberoi were reported to be free a couple of times only to be followed by with news about raging fire and even more bullets and grenades.
My brother works for Yes-bank and Friday afternoon I got a call from him that Yes-Bank chairman Ashok Kapur was found dead in Oberoi. Saturday morning I went out for a walk and saw some reporters at the Frank Anthony school which is quite close to my place; one can hear “We shall overcome someday” when they sing in the assembly. The reporters were here because the NSG Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, who died bravely combating the terrorists, studied at this school.
By Saturday afternoon, the trauma had officially ended. This was the first time things were happening to people connected to me. Thinking about my feelings about all this seems guilt filled indulgence to me. How does it matter if everything would be forgotten in a few days? Many of us are expressing rage, offering solutions, analyzing the situation, writing articles, commenting on the news sites. Will it be the same short lived patriotism, rage and sadness? Would the voices once again die down without any actions? One-minute-silences would follow, dead would be forgotten and then life will go on, waiting for another day when once again these maniacal devils would come to play with their bullets and bombs and bathe with our blood.
For this one time I wish there is a One minute where entire Mumbai erupts with people shouting at top of their voices. Let there be screams and cries, let there be shrieks, let the city roar. Let the twenty million souls voice there anguish and anger together; the sound would be loud enough to tremble Delhi and Karachi. This time Mumbai shouldn’t be praised for its ‘resilience’, but for its strength and the will to not to forget what was done to it and to not let this happen again. How we all wish that. But would those wishes remain a dream and would we once again allow the reality to become a nightmare.
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