Unborn

Before she died, she had one last look at the sky. She has been sleeping since then, only to keep waking in another dream.

Now she found herself on an island with no trees and three crystals. The crystals were the shiniest she had ever seen.

“Do you like them?” said a voice which came from nowhere.

The sparkles told her that she wasn’t in a dream. Nothing so pure can be untrue.

“They were sons of the same mother.” the voice continued.

“Sorry??” she mumbled, uncertainly.

“I’ll explain. What was Newton’s greatest accomplishment?”

“Calculus? Laws of motion?”

The voice smirked.

“No, child. Newton became ‘The Theory of Relativity’.”

“So, the dead turn into theories or crystals?”

“Yes, they do, into ideas, into events, into all things that are beyond the realms of meek, the living beings. Mona Lisa, the Ninth Symphony, Zero; each one of them came into existence after centuries of suffering of the dead. ”

“What about the beginning, when there was no one to die?”

“No creation is free of the guilt of destruction.”

“Then who died for Big Bang? Was it God?”

“A force more potent.”

“What was it?”

“Loneliness.”

Even the waves paused for a moment.

“Nothing else explodes with such magnificence.”

And then the voice disappeared. And the crystals melted into tears and were stolen by the momentary breeze before the sand could swallow them, leaving her alone on the island of melancholy, till the day she turns herself into lyrics, yet unsung.

(My entry to the contest here . 250 words-limit and the story must be based on the image above. The contest is still open July 28.)

All Apologies

I did this guest post here at Preeti's blog last week.

And then Atrisa has tagged me with honest scrap here. Thank you Atrisa :P.

The post fits in well (since it's of confessional nature) with the tag. So here goes :

All Apologies:

1. Apologies Led Zeppelin, for using one of your songs in a game of Antakshari. Couldn’t help it, the opposite team had stooped to using regional songs. It was “Stairway to Heaven”. “The” se gaana tha.

2. Apologies Rats. I persuaded a friend of mine to study biology. He has dissected hundreds of your lot since then. Honestly, I didn’t foresee that at all. My soul is as pure as yours.

3. Apologies nations playing in World cup football, for one of my countrymen did this. On similar lines, if you are a proud Mallu, you better be prepared with explanations for this .

4. Apologies that person who studied Electronics for four years simply because your elder brother was a vague acquaintance of mine. Long back, your elder brother asked me whether you should opt for Electronics or Computers and I convinced him for Electronics just to see whether I could do that. I hope you are doing some kickass solid state physics work at Princeton. Fat chance though.

5. Apologies Berlin sky, for I have peed in open, right beneath your stars and inspired three others to do the same. While we are at it, apologies Miami sky too.

6. Apologies the interview candidate whom I rejected a few years ago. You sneezed on my hands and didn’t apologize. There is yet to be a study which reveals a correlation between bad manners and ability to crack complex algorithms. I suspect it to be positive, but clearly I got carried away with that fine gesture of yours.

7. Apologies Megan Fox, but I can’t marry you.

8. Apologies all those who were beaten up or appeared stark naked in my dreams. Although I seek redemption in the fact that more often than not, the victim has been me, myself. Megan dear, you belong to one of the two mentioned categories. Excluded from this apology is a fellow who was the only one to be murdered. Thrice.

9. Apologies person X, for, well, whatever.

Hello World

This poor thing has been starving for months. And so, here’s an update on what I was up to during this time. Not that I expect/wish/accept that anyone would care; it’s just that something must be written for the blog to be not declared dead and there’s nothing worthwhile brewing in my mind for the time being. So here’s the list of things I did in chronological order during this period of absence:

1. Turning Thirty: Yes, pity me, but kindly keep the feelings to yourselves. No sympathies in comments, please. I know age is just a number, but that number right now is greater than 29, is twice that of 15 and it’s sad to think that I have an experience greater that of ten kindergarten kids combined. Henceforth, I fervently support replacing decimal system with hexadecimal; a respite for two more years. (If you didn’t get this, congratulations.)
2. Visited Germany: Well, I mention the trip because it was fun and I was drunk for five consecutive nights and everyone in my neighborhood in Dewas knows that I have been to Germany. I must confess (with Desi pride), that I peed right below the stars in a Berlin street (it was 4 AM). Also, an empirical rule is that at any point of time, someone in Berlin is jogging.
   
3. Visited Dewas and other nearby furnaces: A cousin got married in Jalgaon on the hottest day in memories of all those who were present at the wedding. Folks over there, in their infinite wisdom, have marriages at noon in the month of May. And so it happened that I danced on “Mangtaa hain to aa jaa rasiya” at 1 in the noon when the temperature was 49 degree Celsius. Later that day, we learnt that a groom in another wedding died due to heat while he was still sitting on the horse. That became the topic of discussion in the region for next two days and we all were really proud of our groom. Here's a shot of mango trees in our farm. The mangoes, although not fully ripe, were delicious.
4. A Qualified Mathematician: Given what mathematics has done for me, it would have been a disgrace to die without a degree in the subject. I am now B.Sc. in Mathematics and Economics from London School of Economics. Please excuse me for reiterating: I am now B.Sc. in Mathematics and Economics from London School of Economics. With that, I am a bachelor three times over and none of the ways has been easy.

A lot more insignificant and/or secretive (nothing scandalous, sadly) events transpired during this period of absence, but let’s stop this self-indulgent show now. The number of 'I's in this post makes me shudder with shame.

Facebook Agony Aunt

Pokers
Q. I am being poked and tickled a lot. Yesterday, a classmate I haven’t met for seven years pinched me. How do I react?
A. It would have helped if you had mentioned your gender. Having said that, such gestures are common online displays of affection and are not considered violating any norms in the book of facebook etiquettes. Go ahead old bean; throw a sheep at the one who pinched you.

Bitch Diaries
Q. My name is Rita and I am a final year B.com student. Lately my classmate Rosy had been posting all the ugly pictures of me and she never forgets to tag me in all of them. Am I being too suspicious? Please help.
A. No Sweety, you aren’t being too suspicious at all. Don’t we know how bitchy girl friends can be towards each other? I bet all your requests to remove those snaps have been shrugged away jokingly. You must not revert to posting groggy pictures of her lest both of you would end up scaring away all the suitors.
Effective communication, as always, is the key. Try and take snaps of her oversized clothes (preferably inner-wear) with size in focus. Initially allow access only to her and tag her. Next day you will find only pretty pictures of yours in her albums. In turn you must knit a scarf for her.

Mama moments
Q. I have a 2 month old kid. Is it the right time to create a facebook account for him? What pages should I join from his account? What is the optimum number of fan-pages that will have a positive long term impact on his personality? What kind of pictures can I upload through his account?
A. First of all, congratulations on your motherhood. Well done. Rest assured that all your worries regarding your kid’s FB account are ill-founded. He is going to chuck off all the internet accounts that you would have created for him before he turns twelve. And whatever fan pages you join now, he is sure to avoid each one of them. Refrain from posting nude baby pictures of him; you are only increasing the chances of dealing with a rebel teenager.

The Optimistic Testosterone
Q. A girl in my friend-list has been sending me mugs of beer on facebook. I think she wants to have sex with me. Any tips?
A. A friend of mine once asked the time from a random guy in office. Three months later, she ended up resigning and the Romeo is still unmarried.

Postmodern pets
Q. Is it ok to have an account for my cat?
A. It is perfectly legal to have FB account for your pets. There haven’t been any surveys yet that measure the effectiveness of FB on general well being of an animal. Be careful not to throw a barrel of monkeys at your pet; though you can have a bubble bath with it on a regular basis.

The spy who tagged me
Q. How can I see all the activities of a friend that she has done since June 2007? I had to click on “more” 86 times to read all her activities.
A. Facebook has nothing against voyeurs like you. They show only one page at a time to avoid loading the entire data in one go. Moreover, if you are not able to draw helpful inferences about your prey in 4-5 pages, then you are anyway doomed to fail in your endeavor.

Status Spoilers
Q. I sweat my head all day to come up with clever status messages. Many times I steal them from unknown twitter handles. However, no sooner do I update my status, a dumb-wit replies and takes away all the charm. Take this for example: “From the Club, where Diamonds are held dearer than Hearts, Spade away o Joker; such Blank souls are not on your cards.” He replied “Playing too much cards, eh?”
A. Honey, first stop trying so hard. But I do understand your dilemma. You don’t want to block him, lest you lose one guaranteed commenter. You should simply smile in reply to his comments while giving elaborate answers to other commenter. Sometime, ignore him totally. Be careful not to snub him completely. Your ultimate goal should be to make him simply “like” your status and not utter a word on your wall.

Office Hours
Q. My boss and colleagues have added.
A. Be glad for the opportunity presented to you to impress them. Use status messages suggested here.

We, the Deluded
Q. I don’t like Facebook. Please advice.
A. Unfortunately, Facebook hasn’t yet come with a functionality to dislike. You can do unlike to an already liked post. However, unlike the usual usage of the work unlike, which means that two or more things are not like each other, the FB unlike simply implies that whatever was liked earlier isn’t liked anymore; no questions asked.

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You may empty your Facebook woes here and the agony aunt will try her best to soothe you.

The Trip to Chilka Lake

Couple of weeks ago I went to my friend Chitto’s wedding in Bhubaneswar. Yes, another man down. Back in Kharagpur, his room number was C-209, mine was C-206. Also attending the wedding were Satwik C-207 and Piyush C-208.

The day after reception, Piyush, Satwik and I drove to Chilka Lake, about 100 Km from Bhubaneswar. Chilka Lake is the second largest lagoon in the world and a globally renowned sanctuary for migratory birds. It is also home to a rich mix of rare species of aquatic life, not to forget the dolphins. Now, none of us are nature lovers per se; we were doing it for the “been there, done that” factor and take back pictures of exotic birds to show off.

The night before the trip, we planned to reach Chilka OTDC (Orissa Tourism) office by 1PM; the next day we were there at 3 PM (don’t ask). At the counter, they told us that we are late and don’t have enough time to go to the place where dolphins are sighted. There was a standard trip of 1.5 hours available which takes to a small island which has a temple but not any colorful birds to speak of. We paid extra money to hire a boat for 3 hours so that we can travel to another island a little farther where some of the Caspian Sea birds migrate.

As we started the journey, a group of sea-gulls started following us. They were white and not that big, but no one debated once I suggested that they must be from Siberia. We hadn’t taken all the trouble only to see good old local birds. Here’s a video of them. I would continue to deny that they are regular Indian birds.


All this while we were guzzling beer and the evening-sun was shining beautifully on the water surface. Below are a some photos. Click on them to enlarge.






Just when we were getting into a dreamy mood, the boat-owner told us that we don’t have enough time left to go the island which was promised to us at the counter, instead he can take us to another place called Cheerihaagu. We didn’t have any option in the middle of water. Satwik told me that Cheerihaagu means bird shit. That place has whitish rocks which look as if birds have covered them with their shit; so much for the exotic experience.

On our way to Cheerihaagu, we sighted a few birds which we all agreed amongst ourselves, must have migrated from Mongolia even though they too were not colorful.



As we continued moving, the photo of the day was clicked:



It evokes so many stories. A lonely being on a lonely island; a somber evening hue; the bird which belongs to the wind, standing on a piece of land amidst an endless sea of water. A further dimension was added once we learnt that this bird is sitting on Cheerihaagu.

On our way back, a fly came and sat on my hand. It was green, blue and black. At last a colorful flying being was sighted and it didn’t matter that it was very much Indian. I honored it by taking a video. At the end of the video you hear the first line of this lovely song in a desi drunk accent.




And so the trip ended. There I was, in one of the most surreal places on the planet, on the verge of a uniquely romantic experience with promises of a million colors and shades, and all I am left with now is memories of bird shit and a house-fly. Déjà vu and Déjà vu, and Déjà vu again.

Facebook Status Messages If Your Boss Is In Your Friend List

You can’t escape having colleagues and bosses in your Facebook friend-list. Why not make the most of it. Have status messages which show how much you value your work and your boss, how devoted you are to them and how much you deserve that salary raise. Below is a sample list:

1. Out in the woods, all alone by myself, no food to eat, no water to drink. All I can think of is, "Wish my boss were here!"

2. I have seen heaven. It's my office.

3. Monday. Lovely :).

4. Free trip to Miami can wait. Work beckons.

5. Filing Divorce. Ground: Spouse asking me to put her first instead of my manager.

6. It’s time for that weekly coffee break.

7. My three favorite animals: Ant, Dog and Worker-bee.

8. No Electricity. Ran out of money to pay the bill, again. I hope that raise comes my way soon.

9. My boss strongest.

10. If it were my boss in place of Adolf Hitler, the Second World War wouldn't have happened.

11. During my marriage vows. I say" I’ll give you all the happiness in this world, but I expect just one thing from you. Respect for my manager".

12. I’ll like to dedicate this song to my boss: "Everything I do, I do it for you".

The list was compiled with the help of one of my colleague Rekha, a real quick wit. Please join and add your quips here in this FB group. I will be regularly updating it.
Be gentle folks; I am a boss too :).

A Tree, A Lizard, And A Dementia

This is not a “proper” post, in a sense that it is being done just for the sake of discipline. Am working on something interesting (hopefully) which is taking time. However, I would hate to break the “at least one post per week” rule. Can’t let the weekend go dry.

Be careful what you wish for: Three mornings ago, I saw a lizard in my bedroom as soon as I woke up. It was a big fat one. There have always been a few cobwebs near the ceiling, but they pretty much keep to themselves. But the lizard was a new intruder. Plus it had the ability to move. And you don’t want to see a big fat lizard first thing in the morning unless you are a lizard of opposite sex (with due respect to homosexuals and to those with weird fetishes).

I did what the helpless do. I cursed it. I pointed my finger at it and kept staring it, wishing it death. (You can get away with almost anything if you stay alone). After a while I got up and went to office.

When I returned at night, I saw my bed covered with red ants. They were feeding on the corpse.

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Heisenberg’s psychology principle: In my previous office, many a times if I was late, I had to park my car outside near a park (haa haa). In general, you’ll expect that most cars will be parked in areas which are shaded by the trees. But most of the employees left only after 7PM which meant that the cars had sufficient time to cool down. So they sought areas which were NOT under a tree to avoid having bird-poop on their beloved possessions.

One such area was my favorite spot; it was closest to office. Over two years ago, I saw a tree being planted near that spot. It seemed harmless then, the little one. I continued parking there for the next one and a half years, which is when I got shifted to another office.

Last week, I happened to go to that previous office and mechanically parked my car at the same old spot. As you might have guessed, it was found covered with bird-poop when I returned. There the tree stood; the big boy; still not fully grown, but big enough to attract birds on its shoulders.

What surprised me was that it must have been growing for the one and half years when I used to park there and I simply didn’t see it all that while. Strange, how sometimes the more one observes, the less one notices.

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That’s it. Those two were the only out of ordinary events in my life last week.
Wait. Well there was this minor detour which had me having a beer, an ice-cream and a chocolate pastry, simultaneously. The pastry was named “Dementia”.