Let me say I am weak at mythology. All my experiences with Indian mythology are limited to the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Nandan (a Hindi Children's monthly), Chandamama, B.R. Chopra, Ramanand Sagar and Anant Pai (rather Uncle Pai!). Introductions with Norse and Greek one's are further constrained to the odd articles here or there and the occasional stories found in folk-tale collections.
Still, there are some mythological characters that just stick on you. Some, who while lurking in the background, away from the great heros, present a fundamental heart wrenching reality in their own microcosm. Be it Astavakra, Eklavya, Jatayu... they are the ones who often steal the show. While the great events often adapt themselves as phrases in the normal language, its the small characters that many a time remain sketched in minds and memories, reminding, reinforcing in a sacrosanct way what you always knew.
One such character I came across while in school was that of Icarus. One of the first few and one of the only characters I remember from greek mythology. But the story then had immediate implications for me. It is not uncommon for a child to disobey his parents. But to learn of the fatal implications of such an act, could bring rude shocks. Insubtly. My very first feelings for the character were pity. He knew the follies of venturing near the sun or the damp, there was no tangible benefit which attracted him there. But he travelled, he went right upto the sun, right till he had no feathers to fly. I had left the story there, sympathising, living with the character etched in my memory.
As I came across the character a little recently quite by accident, I was reminded of my first encounter. But the emotions which the story evoked, were not the same. What Icarus displayed to me was a fundamental lack of rationality. An irrationality that can be linked from global warming to the next promotion. It tells you why a child risks disobeying his parents at the risk of a spanking. It displays an an irrationality that pervades most of our problems and defines most of our solutions.
When was the last time you ate that last chocolate cake knowing its not good for diabetics, when was the last time you overslept, procrastinated, stayed up late at work for that promotion, ignored global warming to be problem of the future while starting that car. I don't profess to know why you did this, but certainly, if you have ever exchanged a small short-term gratification for a long-term loss, you know why Icarus travelled to the sun.
[continuing another half written article - completed and published on 28th May 2.48 a.m.]
Irrationality and immeasurability in the world of the defined, rational and measurable is what keeps us human perhaps. Research(links would be provided if asked for), has shown that most gifts are overpaid for and represent a waste of money. Given the option what would you like, money splurged on expensive gifts or drab demand drafts.
Imagine for a second a world in which Icarus does not ever fly to the sun, imagine the world where we don't take risks, imagine a world with no global warming, imagine nuclear disarmament, no hunger, no unplanned chocolate cakes, no surprise gifts, no Edisons and Teslas, no imagination, no mythology, no motivation. A world devoid of discoveries and filled with improvisations. A world that runs with six sigma precision, a utopia.. a dystopia.
What Icarus stands for is recklessness, a playful spirit of disobedience, a capacity to take risks, a carefree spirit that lives for the moment! Even at the risk of life itself...
Sunday, December 24, 2006
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
The Profanities of Existence
A desire to uniquely place myself undergoes the ritual daily manifestation. Whenever I get my overly large posterior off from the mattress and manage to get the bulging adipose away from the quilt. It takes effort to bear the chilly morning and see your watch telling you that the time has passed for lesser (and slower) mortals to reach the class today. It is that time when the desire is strong, a desire to transcend beyond the immediate needs and requirements – the profanities of existence. A desire to weave eloquence in the undertones of getting up, brushing your teeth, forgetting to comb your hair and rushing to the class, missing the lecture for the nth time this week (Actually its only 5 times a week, but n shows better effect!) . It is then that reality dawns. Transcending the daily routine and wishing for something higher might take more of my time but I realize the HR issues plaguing my life. As the day passes that I seriously realize the need to employ someone other than the full-time employed Mr. Nobody who takes care of all my chores presently.
Wishes to transcend do not translate the wishing away to physical reality. As I aim for the higher purpose (All I think of is high! I practice it too. You really have to see the pile of junk in my room to see that I only believe in things going up), I realize mundanities have made it a habit to hamper solitary contemplations. Soliloquies on what I would do in the absence of quotidian demands on my precious seconds. Perhaps someday, I will get down to finding time for it. Someday I will read the pile of BS (that’s Business Std., what did you think?) lying on the cupboard. Someday I will even get that list of papers I wanted to check out, perhaps even write those DVDs and get some of the laundry done. If I am really lucky, perhaps my 7-book strong book collection will get some much needed dusting. Someday my table will not resemble the eternal dumping ground of all things torn and wasteful.
I discern a few words now and then: costs, processes, culture, equity, value-chain, realignment - the words fly by as I try to catch hold of them. Some of them just come by to spite me I think, to make me realize the futility of getting Mr. Nobody off the job. That fellow has unreasonably high replacement costs. Life goes on, on autopilot. There is the steering wheel somewhere around nearby, but when no one’s holding it, it’s a bit difficult to exactly pinpoint the location. And autopilot is comfortable. You even get to say, you enjoy the moment, that you see the present as a gift. Even put on display some other remarkable facets of imbecile wordplay. To put on the greatest spin, perhaps I can even correlate it in a Calvinistic fashion (the only Calvin I know is from Calvin and Hobbes) to building character. The higher the time it takes you to dig out that Kotler, the more is it a test of your tolerance and perseverance and the more is your inherent ability to withstand stress and the onerous responsibilities of physical labour. The daily effort in finding a place to sit, to lie down is enough to keep one on one’s edges in a character-building roller-coaster.
I do not wish to belabour the point, but it also indicates altruism of character that distinguishes a benevolent personality. Consider this, the total amount of junk in the world is going to remain constant. And if I fill more junk in my room, I make the rest of the world cleaner. If not absolutely, then atleast relatively in a Birbalesque fashion of making a line seem smaller by drawing a longer one next to it. If my room serves as a reference point, most people would be praising the excellent civic spirit of cleanliness in the city of
And think about the drive for cleanliness I spread around. Consider the inspirations and ramifications of the piles of plenty that permeate my room. The day is not far when case-studies on waste management will advise whom not to emulate. ‘Clean it up!’ speech sessions (to be inspired after an inspection of my humble abode) will quote me as example on for a possible futuristic scenario.
Again, to start cleaning up now for worldly ostentation would only show a cheapness of spirit and lowliness of thought. It would be plain and simple cruel to the environment. My room has generated its own healthy little ecosystem. A couple of lizards, incidental mosquitos and a variety of visitor insects dot all corners, building their homes, carrying out their whole life-cycles. Think of the decorations of the spiders, the intricate webs – to destroy them all in one ruthless stroke of maniacal sanitization, would rob the world of its colour and vibrancy. I simply do not have the heart enough to do it.
By the way, to all those on a perpetual cleanliness drive, I would just repeat the old cliché – Cleanliness is next to Godliness. Only next……
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
First Term at L
The glass mellows, filters, numbs the intensity of the noon sun. Any sounds extrinsic to the coach face a no-entry as they try to board. The temperature is artificial as might be many things inside. It feels insulated. It is insulated, reinforced insulation. The wheels turn fast, kissing the tracks, holding on to them. I move homeward.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
What I miss in IIML
I read a newspaper today! For one whole hour!
Here at IIML, this statement would signify nothing less than a momentous achievement. And this is what I miss second most here (The first being home cooked food!). The delicious joy of following the intricately constructed arguments about 'national interest' and losing yourself in the reams of paper expounding the 'intellectual underpinings' of this 'great democracy'. Yup, I am speaking of the unadulterated pleasure of following the nation's politics. Its something I have really begun to miss. Chronically humour depreived would be a precise description of my state now. For those who have never experienced the pleasure of indulging in political specatatorship, allow me to explain.
Reading politics and better still watching it is unbelievably entertaining. Some of the most unintentionally hilarious moments on television have been on the live telecast of the Lok Sabha in session. On another level, it also appeals and invigorates all the dormant pious instincts that you may have preserved to this day. After all, divine intervention is the only plausible reason that the national framework still stands. If you have never seen the parliament in session, let me share some enriching experiences:
It was the question hour of parliament and a backbencher was questioning the telecommunications minister. I was surfing channels and the words 'UMTS' and 'WCDMA' caught my attention.
'What would be government's policy with regards to frequency allocation for emerging technologies like UMTS and WCDMA?' (This is not the exact question, but the gist as I remember it.)
I was surfing channels and the words 'UMTS' and 'WCDMA' caught my attention. Being an electronics engineer who had spent nights framing SoPs on how he would like to contribute to 4G technologies, I was surprised to the point of stupefication that such things were actually discussed in the Lok Sabha. My immensely mistaken impression then connected the sole utility of this structure as a primary medium for slogan shouting, walking out and congregating in the well. The minister started replying and I did not have to work too hard at restraining my newfound sense of awe:
"We will leave it to the market forces. (some non-specific generalized sentences).The government is not going to discriminate between CDMA or GSM."
I rolled over the statement in my head. Surely, there was something missing. But the backbencher was satisfied. And I was hooked. Enlightenment. The arcane mysteries of policy making started unravelling around me. I looked up the telecom minister's website. His astute discriminating worldview emerged perhaps from the years he spent studying economics. A degree in economics, ofcourse, eliminates the need to fiddle around with trivial acronyms of dubious utility. I also saw his 'vision plan' for leapfrogging directly to 4G.
And I cried after that. My head bowed in respect to the unparalleled efforts of the Indian decision makers towards providing comic relief to a saas-bahu laden TV scenario. From then on, perhaps as a mark of appreciation for this effort, I caught up with the parliament broadcast whenever I could. And day after day, this belief of mine was reinforced!
An angry Somnath Chatterjee and the honourable MPs teasing him. These were lessons in stress release that I will never forget. To blend a childlike unrestrained mirth with the travails of policymaking was exemplified in their behaviour. Again there were a few spoilsports like BhairavSingh Shekawat who managed to enforce an superficial discussion and suppress these natural instincts, but thankfully they kept their hands off the Lower House.
And speaking of Unity, this is where you see the best examples. Infact, this is one place where you actually learn that walkouts and protests are a better idea than discussions in the parliament. The second event I remember during the sombre and worklike mood of the parliament (the first being my brushes with 3G and 4G) was in the days before the introduction of the 93rd constitutional amendment Act. It was a BJP MP who raised the issue of the 'deprieved' classes being not able to secure their rightful place in private institutes. It was a UPA minister who answered the concern with plans to bring about a Constitutional Amendment to correct this 'injustice' (became famous some months later as Mandal II). To this day whenever I hear the Congress and the BJP harping the same tune, I often start sweating!
This visual vividity of perennial laughter is what led me further to explore the vicarious pleasures of the recorded words - the saved records on the Parliament of India website. And it was remarkable. Yes.. there was mine to dig but the tireless were rewarded with true jewels. Like on the debate on uniform civil code, a recorded argument against uniform civil code - 'Shariah is the word of God and no one can challenge it'. And for all those hounding Advani for his Jinnah remarks (for the lesser educated, he praised Jinnah's secular vision for Pakistan based on a speech of Jinnah), the Indian constituent assembly actually praised Jinnah's spirit which led him to carve out the state of Pakistan. No this is not my interpretation. It is present in those many words! (A link would be provided if asked for!)
And now I miss that. IIM Lucknow has led me away from the intellectual joys of ineffectual democracy. From the puppet prime minister and the 'progressive' leftist opposition to the 'supportive' rightists and the IIMAed Lalu, I no longer can enjoy their unique attempts at public service. We certainly do not have the best politicians in the world as part as governance is concerned, but when it comes to public entertainment, its a challenge to come up with better.
Here at IIML, this statement would signify nothing less than a momentous achievement. And this is what I miss second most here (The first being home cooked food!). The delicious joy of following the intricately constructed arguments about 'national interest' and losing yourself in the reams of paper expounding the 'intellectual underpinings' of this 'great democracy'. Yup, I am speaking of the unadulterated pleasure of following the nation's politics. Its something I have really begun to miss. Chronically humour depreived would be a precise description of my state now. For those who have never experienced the pleasure of indulging in political specatatorship, allow me to explain.
Reading politics and better still watching it is unbelievably entertaining. Some of the most unintentionally hilarious moments on television have been on the live telecast of the Lok Sabha in session. On another level, it also appeals and invigorates all the dormant pious instincts that you may have preserved to this day. After all, divine intervention is the only plausible reason that the national framework still stands. If you have never seen the parliament in session, let me share some enriching experiences:
It was the question hour of parliament and a backbencher was questioning the telecommunications minister. I was surfing channels and the words 'UMTS' and 'WCDMA' caught my attention.
'What would be government's policy with regards to frequency allocation for emerging technologies like UMTS and WCDMA?' (This is not the exact question, but the gist as I remember it.)
I was surfing channels and the words 'UMTS' and 'WCDMA' caught my attention. Being an electronics engineer who had spent nights framing SoPs on how he would like to contribute to 4G technologies, I was surprised to the point of stupefication that such things were actually discussed in the Lok Sabha. My immensely mistaken impression then connected the sole utility of this structure as a primary medium for slogan shouting, walking out and congregating in the well. The minister started replying and I did not have to work too hard at restraining my newfound sense of awe:
"We will leave it to the market forces. (some non-specific generalized sentences).The government is not going to discriminate between CDMA or GSM."
I rolled over the statement in my head. Surely, there was something missing. But the backbencher was satisfied. And I was hooked. Enlightenment. The arcane mysteries of policy making started unravelling around me. I looked up the telecom minister's website. His astute discriminating worldview emerged perhaps from the years he spent studying economics. A degree in economics, ofcourse, eliminates the need to fiddle around with trivial acronyms of dubious utility. I also saw his 'vision plan' for leapfrogging directly to 4G.
And I cried after that. My head bowed in respect to the unparalleled efforts of the Indian decision makers towards providing comic relief to a saas-bahu laden TV scenario. From then on, perhaps as a mark of appreciation for this effort, I caught up with the parliament broadcast whenever I could. And day after day, this belief of mine was reinforced!
An angry Somnath Chatterjee and the honourable MPs teasing him. These were lessons in stress release that I will never forget. To blend a childlike unrestrained mirth with the travails of policymaking was exemplified in their behaviour. Again there were a few spoilsports like BhairavSingh Shekawat who managed to enforce an superficial discussion and suppress these natural instincts, but thankfully they kept their hands off the Lower House.
And speaking of Unity, this is where you see the best examples. Infact, this is one place where you actually learn that walkouts and protests are a better idea than discussions in the parliament. The second event I remember during the sombre and worklike mood of the parliament (the first being my brushes with 3G and 4G) was in the days before the introduction of the 93rd constitutional amendment Act. It was a BJP MP who raised the issue of the 'deprieved' classes being not able to secure their rightful place in private institutes. It was a UPA minister who answered the concern with plans to bring about a Constitutional Amendment to correct this 'injustice' (became famous some months later as Mandal II). To this day whenever I hear the Congress and the BJP harping the same tune, I often start sweating!
This visual vividity of perennial laughter is what led me further to explore the vicarious pleasures of the recorded words - the saved records on the Parliament of India website. And it was remarkable. Yes.. there was mine to dig but the tireless were rewarded with true jewels. Like on the debate on uniform civil code, a recorded argument against uniform civil code - 'Shariah is the word of God and no one can challenge it'. And for all those hounding Advani for his Jinnah remarks (for the lesser educated, he praised Jinnah's secular vision for Pakistan based on a speech of Jinnah), the Indian constituent assembly actually praised Jinnah's spirit which led him to carve out the state of Pakistan. No this is not my interpretation. It is present in those many words! (A link would be provided if asked for!)
And now I miss that. IIM Lucknow has led me away from the intellectual joys of ineffectual democracy. From the puppet prime minister and the 'progressive' leftist opposition to the 'supportive' rightists and the IIMAed Lalu, I no longer can enjoy their unique attempts at public service. We certainly do not have the best politicians in the world as part as governance is concerned, but when it comes to public entertainment, its a challenge to come up with better.
Saturday, July 22, 2006
On Power Cuts and Perspectives....
And into one end [of the Total Perspective Vortex], he plugged the whole of reality as extrapolated from a piece of fairy cake, and into the other, he plugged his wife: so that when he turned it on she saw in one instant the whole infinity of creation and herself in relation to it.
To Trin Tragula's horror, the shock completely annihilated her brain........
-Douglas Adams
(The Restaurant at the End of the Universe)
We experienced a power cut on campus today. I was walking down the corridor, towards the water cooler at around 9 pm, when suddenly all lights went out. Black. That was how the scene looked. Or perhaps it did not look that way at all, for I could not claim to see anything. It took me a few seconds to realize that the whole campus was experiencing a power cut. As I ambled on roomwards, with the support of the wall, I reached the outing towards the terrace, or the 'Titanic', to speak colloquially (The architect here displayed some very obvious emotional influences from James Cameron's masterpiece. Hint: Think of the I am the king of the world scene).
I looked out and started onto the terrace. It was a sight I had perhaps never seen in Mumbai. A night sky unpolluted, uninhibited by any sort of light, or buildings, skyscrapers, skylines. The stars twinkled in thousands, millions. There were no neon signs to distract. Moonlight was still nascent, growing with each night. The clouds had also spared the skies on this instance. It was just the stars, the moon and the night sky. No lights except for a lonely motorbike rider near Nescafe.
A group of seniors gathered on after a few seconds.
"Beautiful", I heard that muttered somewhere. Could not agree more. Beautiful, astounding, confusing, flabbergasting, discombobulating and all the other unpronounceable adjectives you can think of. It was the beauty of eternity and infinity. And this beauty is frightening. You never know when eternity will end. You can never guess the boundaries of infinity. Until ofcourse you consider chocolate cakes...... To get a better idea, imagine an infinitely long chocalate cake and time you would take to eat it all. Also consider all the indigestion you would have to suffer if the chocolate cake is made in the mess. All this chocolate cake stuff quickly put a lot of perspective on my appetite for deserts. It disappeared faster than the sputtering electricity supply to a certain management institute in Northern India.
Beauty, especially that which challenges all your concepts of proportion, either degenerates all thoughts in vicinity to poetic enchantment or drains all the guarded optimism you had been preserving for such a day. Believe me it is a shitty feeling to think about the cosmic importance of 'Effects of changes in the foreign exchange rates - European and Indian Accounting Standards' while watching more than an eyeful of stars staring smugly at you. This leads to cynicism about the whole process of living in general or begets creative rationalizations about the importance of accounting standards in alien galaxies. Both of which are not good thoughts to have when a host of quizzes are lined up for the coming week.....
The power was back in two minutes. Everyone trundled back to their rooms. I did too. I was bit disconcerted, for I had seen something obvious. Something so obvious, that I had never seen it ever before. Something so obvious that its better left ignored. It will take some time to recede into mundanity but I will succeed....
To Trin Tragula's horror, the shock completely annihilated her brain, but to his satisfaction he realized that he had proved conclusively that if life is going to exist in a Universe of this size, then one thing it cannot afford to have is a sense of proportion.
To Trin Tragula's horror, the shock completely annihilated her brain........
-Douglas Adams
(The Restaurant at the End of the Universe)
We experienced a power cut on campus today. I was walking down the corridor, towards the water cooler at around 9 pm, when suddenly all lights went out. Black. That was how the scene looked. Or perhaps it did not look that way at all, for I could not claim to see anything. It took me a few seconds to realize that the whole campus was experiencing a power cut. As I ambled on roomwards, with the support of the wall, I reached the outing towards the terrace, or the 'Titanic', to speak colloquially (The architect here displayed some very obvious emotional influences from James Cameron's masterpiece. Hint: Think of the I am the king of the world scene).
I looked out and started onto the terrace. It was a sight I had perhaps never seen in Mumbai. A night sky unpolluted, uninhibited by any sort of light, or buildings, skyscrapers, skylines. The stars twinkled in thousands, millions. There were no neon signs to distract. Moonlight was still nascent, growing with each night. The clouds had also spared the skies on this instance. It was just the stars, the moon and the night sky. No lights except for a lonely motorbike rider near Nescafe.
A group of seniors gathered on after a few seconds.
"Beautiful", I heard that muttered somewhere. Could not agree more. Beautiful, astounding, confusing, flabbergasting, discombobulating and all the other unpronounceable adjectives you can think of. It was the beauty of eternity and infinity. And this beauty is frightening. You never know when eternity will end. You can never guess the boundaries of infinity. Until ofcourse you consider chocolate cakes...... To get a better idea, imagine an infinitely long chocalate cake and time you would take to eat it all. Also consider all the indigestion you would have to suffer if the chocolate cake is made in the mess. All this chocolate cake stuff quickly put a lot of perspective on my appetite for deserts. It disappeared faster than the sputtering electricity supply to a certain management institute in Northern India.
Beauty, especially that which challenges all your concepts of proportion, either degenerates all thoughts in vicinity to poetic enchantment or drains all the guarded optimism you had been preserving for such a day. Believe me it is a shitty feeling to think about the cosmic importance of 'Effects of changes in the foreign exchange rates - European and Indian Accounting Standards' while watching more than an eyeful of stars staring smugly at you. This leads to cynicism about the whole process of living in general or begets creative rationalizations about the importance of accounting standards in alien galaxies. Both of which are not good thoughts to have when a host of quizzes are lined up for the coming week.....
The power was back in two minutes. Everyone trundled back to their rooms. I did too. I was bit disconcerted, for I had seen something obvious. Something so obvious, that I had never seen it ever before. Something so obvious that its better left ignored. It will take some time to recede into mundanity but I will succeed....
To Trin Tragula's horror, the shock completely annihilated her brain, but to his satisfaction he realized that he had proved conclusively that if life is going to exist in a Universe of this size, then one thing it cannot afford to have is a sense of proportion.
Friday, July 21, 2006
Life starts
[Post incomplete, no intention ever to get down to completing it!]
"We have to write our CV's.. Find your (tor)mentors".
It started with this. Phone calls, engaged, busy, not available... Call again.
"You are not going for the health run ! First go there and then come for getting the CVs checked"
The 'Health' Run involved running around 2 rounds of the ring road which is loong (3 kms is a conservative guess I think!) and being all happy and cool about it while your seniors snapped your photographs riding bikes. It also involved the pretty 'healthy' aspect of getting cramps in your feet good enough to trouble you for the whole of the next day.
The more than healthy over, I call again. Meet.
"This is childish."
"You expect someone to believe this!"
"Don't tell me you call this an ethical mistake!"
Everything short of tear this sheet away and get lost! After begging, borrowing and some (unsuccessful) attempts at forging signatures, finally submitted the CVs exactly at 12.00. Whew! This work is done. Now I can rest.
" You heard about the case discussion tomorrow ?"
Whaaat!
Skitter of to the CC. Read the case till I hear the mynahs chirping.
"We also have a test later on!"
Meanwhile the 8-hour per day registration modules are on! Goodbye sleep!
Case over! Test over! Time for sleeping....
"Get your groups together. There is a presentation tomorrow."
Phone calls, meetings, presentations prepared...
Registrations started too. It was then that I understood the institute's way of inculcating physical fitness. I stared unbelievably at the pile of books kept on the desk. It took my brain some time to comprehend the ingenious plan that they had in hand. Two days of doing this, and all my cultivated and preserved flab of 21 years will go down the drain.
Anyway, presentations or the rather 'we will have fun at your expense' ragging sessions were done with before we were called for a batch meeting.
Now was the time when the results would be announced, as to who got in which section!
[In the interests of preserving sanity and some traditions, I will leave the story here!]
"We have to write our CV's.. Find your (tor)mentors".
It started with this. Phone calls, engaged, busy, not available... Call again.
"You are not going for the health run ! First go there and then come for getting the CVs checked"
The 'Health' Run involved running around 2 rounds of the ring road which is loong (3 kms is a conservative guess I think!) and being all happy and cool about it while your seniors snapped your photographs riding bikes. It also involved the pretty 'healthy' aspect of getting cramps in your feet good enough to trouble you for the whole of the next day.
The more than healthy over, I call again. Meet.
"This is childish."
"You expect someone to believe this!"
"Don't tell me you call this an ethical mistake!"
Everything short of tear this sheet away and get lost! After begging, borrowing and some (unsuccessful) attempts at forging signatures, finally submitted the CVs exactly at 12.00. Whew! This work is done. Now I can rest.
" You heard about the case discussion tomorrow ?"
Whaaat!
Skitter of to the CC. Read the case till I hear the mynahs chirping.
"We also have a test later on!"
Meanwhile the 8-hour per day registration modules are on! Goodbye sleep!
Case over! Test over! Time for sleeping....
"Get your groups together. There is a presentation tomorrow."
Phone calls, meetings, presentations prepared...
Registrations started too. It was then that I understood the institute's way of inculcating physical fitness. I stared unbelievably at the pile of books kept on the desk. It took my brain some time to comprehend the ingenious plan that they had in hand. Two days of doing this, and all my cultivated and preserved flab of 21 years will go down the drain.
Anyway, presentations or the rather 'we will have fun at your expense' ragging sessions were done with before we were called for a batch meeting.
Now was the time when the results would be announced, as to who got in which section!
[In the interests of preserving sanity and some traditions, I will leave the story here!]
Thursday, July 20, 2006
A Warm Welcome
IIM Lucknow has active students, enlightened faculty, competent doctors, enterprising (and some may mistake this for fleecing) shopkeepers and pretty helpful watchmen. But what often escapes the eyes of the general media is the army of insects that reside on its lawns. The day I entered the institute, the day when it rained, that was the day when the insects decided to welcome me.
Man! Was my room colourful!! Green, Black, Brown, blue - just think of any colour and I could all colours of insects. I was pretty overwhelmed with this show of affection. Infact, some of these were friendly enough to get physical. Which was the time when I too decided to reciprocate. Physically. Most of the insects too were overwhelmed by my display of gratitude I guess for most of them never woke up after this. As for the ones who did, I made sure that they had their throat choked with emotion.
That was the day I realized what they meant when they said you will learn more out of class than inside it during your MBA. I mean how many people can learn to become human replacements of HIT in one day. Not many I guess. But most of us here at IIML did that. And you cannot even imagine the pride of being a 'TeesMaarKhan' (The khan who killed thirty) till you actually accomplish it. Talk of extra-curricular achievements and job satisfaction! All this even before the classes had started!
The rest of the day was spent exploring the campus, from the mess which cooks paneer every other day and a sweet everyday to the Nescafe outlet where you get Polo. From the temple to the guest houses, from the slums to the suburbs this was the place that I was going to live in for two years. So, two years it is with classmates, faculty, staff and most-importantly : the insects!
Man! Was my room colourful!! Green, Black, Brown, blue - just think of any colour and I could all colours of insects. I was pretty overwhelmed with this show of affection. Infact, some of these were friendly enough to get physical. Which was the time when I too decided to reciprocate. Physically. Most of the insects too were overwhelmed by my display of gratitude I guess for most of them never woke up after this. As for the ones who did, I made sure that they had their throat choked with emotion.
That was the day I realized what they meant when they said you will learn more out of class than inside it during your MBA. I mean how many people can learn to become human replacements of HIT in one day. Not many I guess. But most of us here at IIML did that. And you cannot even imagine the pride of being a 'TeesMaarKhan' (The khan who killed thirty) till you actually accomplish it. Talk of extra-curricular achievements and job satisfaction! All this even before the classes had started!
The rest of the day was spent exploring the campus, from the mess which cooks paneer every other day and a sweet everyday to the Nescafe outlet where you get Polo. From the temple to the guest houses, from the slums to the suburbs this was the place that I was going to live in for two years. So, two years it is with classmates, faculty, staff and most-importantly : the insects!
Sunday, July 02, 2006
First Impressions...
(Describes day on 26th March 2006)
There were 4 extra people inside the compartment. So 12 people shared space that meant to accomodate 8. The train was Pushpak Express. Mumbai to Lucknow in 24 hours. Or 26 perhaps to welcome the uninvited guests hopping in. PNB picked me up from the coach itself for a free trip to the campus (and also made me ponder on the kind of sea-change the PSU has gone under).
There were 4 extra people inside the compartment. So 12 people shared space that meant to accomodate 8. The train was Pushpak Express. Mumbai to Lucknow in 24 hours. Or 26 perhaps to welcome the uninvited guests hopping in. PNB picked me up from the coach itself for a free trip to the campus (and also made me ponder on the kind of sea-change the PSU has gone under).
Rains, reasonably heavy rains, welcomed me to the city. The first rains of the city. Rains which made the station crowded, the taxi late and the journey long. Ones which robbed the summer of its ferocity, laid a patina of wetness on all seeable existence and declared loudly, the state of the blocked gutters. The PNB car veered through the streets, between bungalows and gardens, skirting the edges of the impromptu pools near the 'Parivartan Chowk', and finally giving up and wading through the submerged streets of Aliganj. Political posters presented themselves with an unremarkable ubiquity. Only the face of Sharad Pawar, Bal Thackeray and Co. were here replaced by Messrs. Mulayam Singh and Amar Singh. The rest of the journey was quotidian and marked by attempts at pretty mundane small talk.
The campus is 3.4 km from Sitapur Road, a fact which lends its name to the institute band '3.4'. It is another fact that the only thing musical in that journey was the vibrating car and the rattling luggage it was loaded with. A road sign proclaimed proudly, 'IIM Lucknow'. This was followed by many quotations of the usual quota of personalities on whom has been thrust the responsibility of being the 'visionaries' and 'missionaries' of the world. The car took a turn to the right.
A sharp turn. There right before me were the images of the most famous charioteer ever guiding the chariot, the horses and a substanial part of the rest of the world with it. In the hands of his rider, one of the most redoubtable archers ever, the Gandiva stood ready. In sharp contrast or perhaps synergy, stood leading the man whose philosophy of non-violence was inspired by the charioteer and the archer waging the war of righteousness.
As the car drove in the enormity of the campus sank in. Names of the inventor of Yoga and the progenitor of Indian ecomics (rather politics) passed by, as did the hostels.
I was finally in IIM Lucknow.......
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Visa Power
Nothing beats an interview which starts with a beautiful brunette (BB) looking wide eyed and smiling congratulations at you. Trust me, I speak with experience.
Bluedart delivered my passport today, with a US Visa (F1) for five years. And this Visa followed quite a laborious and to-a-no-end journey of digging through convoluted personal finances, capricious university websites and breezing through 45 seconds of pointless chatting (OK! Not the pointless, but it did not have much of a point to it either). Preparation for visa interview usually entails engaging the (quite needless) services of a Visa counsellor, creating pretty creative balance-sheets, learning by rote a sum total of fifty questions and pursuing with equal vigour, the relation between the number of visa rejections and the hair colour of the visa officer.
The first step, that of Visa counsellors is a cottage industry by itself. The small scale industry that helps people emigrate and ensures that they leave this country for good. (Ironically, increasing prosperity in India, propels an increasing number of students abroad, year on year.) The second step is one with enough intricacy and arcane mystery to defeat any old sherlock holmes story you loved best, the financial documents created by an Indian wishing to emigrate... Oops! Sorry! an Indian wishing to go to the US for higher studies. The third step involves knowing fully well how to pronounce the 'oops!' and 'sorry!' and to never introduce them in the context that I have used in the previous sentence. The fourth step is completely voluntary and more often than not indulged in with a speculative fervour in sync with the land without a Las Vegas: where repressed feelings find a variety of outlets. My favourite, atleast from this day, would be dark brown.
After a few sleepless nights and misplaced attempts at comprehending finance and discovering a new fullform for the acronym BS, I decided to place all my bets on a not-quite-digitally-touched up photograph to scare the interviewer into granting me a visa. Anyways, I reached the vfs office, (my worshipful emulation of this Japanese concept still intact) just in time. Before I could finish the quite steeply charged 150 bucks cup of coffee (which reminds me, coffee with too much sugar tastes as crappy as one without any), we were called to board the bus which was to transport us to the embassy. It was quite an uneventful journey (the only worth mentioning non-event being that I did not have to fight for a window seat with a resourceful five-year old).
At the embassy, I passed through a door where people confused pull with push (quite personifying that eternal dilemma that is every door's destiny). Following this I subjected myself to the indiscreet inspections of a metal detector and was fingerprinted. Digitally. Digital fingerprinting reminded me of the travails I had to undergo at the Indian passport office, first for finding an inkpad and then sqeezing any molecules of ink left on it to my thumb. Digital fingerprinting is better. Much better if the screen is not dirty and the attendant there does not clean your fingers 10 times, forgetting in her earnestness that its the screen that is dirty. I also got a token here, a pink slip with a number, which was to be my identity till the time that this number is called out on the speaker. After getting the token, all I did and all that everyone does is sit quietly, listen carefully and just pray that you don't have to visit the loo anytime soon. Because the number is announced only once.
Nervous and not so nervous faces were scattered in the waiting room. Providence (or rather an anonymous VISA officer), being especially gracious, my token number was called, along with 10 others, before 10 minutes of waiting were over.
10 people make for a long queue, but at the grocer's or the railway counter. It's faster at the US consulate. You get your yes or no in 30 seconds flat. I was fifth in the queue when the BB called me inside.
BB : Hi!
Me: (forgot the good morning M'am I had parotted, and with that, in a chain reaction, forgot a whole lot of other things) Uh.. oh... Hi!
BB: (Smiling) Can you pass your token please ?
Me: (Passed the token, still in a daze, forgot to smile oh.. sure.. as I had practiced)
At this point in time, BB gets my documents out of the envelope that has been given to her. Then gets my form out and stared wide-eyed. Raises her eyebrows. I see her looking at the photograph. As I eliminate the chances of any hair-raising and frightening details on my face, I consider the possible of malicious intentions disfiguring my countenance. I prepare an elaborate answer on how the al-quaida may have had a role any size mismatches of my photograph.
BB: (The raised eyebrows and the wide eyes are followed by a wide wider widest smile) 1570!! You got a wonderful GRE score! Congratulations!
Me: (Feeling quite gratified but at a loss of understanding. I mean, these people are supposed to be some of the rudest on the planet, right.) Thanks!!
BB: So, what degree are you going to go for at Rutgers ?
Me: MS in Electrical and Computer Engg
BB: MS.. (Some guy comes behind her and starts talking with her. I wait for a few seconds). So, who is going to pay for your education.
Me: My parents. (Suddenly remember the lines I had rattofied) My mother and my father.
BB: So, what do they do?
Me: Tell
BB: What is your income ?
Me: Tell
BB: What are you savings ? You must have savings right ?
Me: (No I don't but I especially created them for thsi day!) Tell... If you want, I can show you the documents..
BB: (Starts writing something and waves her hands, as if she does not have time to deal with such petty trivialities)
Me: (feeling relieved at not having to explain something I did not myself understand)
BB: (Starts typing something) Why did you choose Rutgers ?
Me: Its got a wonderful wireless program. I want to specialize in wireless communication....
BB: (Body language interrupts me) Take your I20 please... (Then holds her voice like Amitabh in KBC. The pause continues for some time after which, the eyes behind the spectacles start smiling) Ok! Your Visa has been approved and you will be getting your passport in 2-3 weeks.
Me: (Finally return this smile) Thanks!
I visit the loo after this and experience the fact that US consulate toilets are not very different from other ones.
(Completing this post from IIML. Call it an irony. Call it poetic justice. Btw, only I can understand the latter. So you better refrain from guessing. )
Bluedart delivered my passport today, with a US Visa (F1) for five years. And this Visa followed quite a laborious and to-a-no-end journey of digging through convoluted personal finances, capricious university websites and breezing through 45 seconds of pointless chatting (OK! Not the pointless, but it did not have much of a point to it either). Preparation for visa interview usually entails engaging the (quite needless) services of a Visa counsellor, creating pretty creative balance-sheets, learning by rote a sum total of fifty questions and pursuing with equal vigour, the relation between the number of visa rejections and the hair colour of the visa officer.
The first step, that of Visa counsellors is a cottage industry by itself. The small scale industry that helps people emigrate and ensures that they leave this country for good. (Ironically, increasing prosperity in India, propels an increasing number of students abroad, year on year.) The second step is one with enough intricacy and arcane mystery to defeat any old sherlock holmes story you loved best, the financial documents created by an Indian wishing to emigrate... Oops! Sorry! an Indian wishing to go to the US for higher studies. The third step involves knowing fully well how to pronounce the 'oops!' and 'sorry!' and to never introduce them in the context that I have used in the previous sentence. The fourth step is completely voluntary and more often than not indulged in with a speculative fervour in sync with the land without a Las Vegas: where repressed feelings find a variety of outlets. My favourite, atleast from this day, would be dark brown.
After a few sleepless nights and misplaced attempts at comprehending finance and discovering a new fullform for the acronym BS, I decided to place all my bets on a not-quite-digitally-touched up photograph to scare the interviewer into granting me a visa. Anyways, I reached the vfs office, (my worshipful emulation of this Japanese concept still intact) just in time. Before I could finish the quite steeply charged 150 bucks cup of coffee (which reminds me, coffee with too much sugar tastes as crappy as one without any), we were called to board the bus which was to transport us to the embassy. It was quite an uneventful journey (the only worth mentioning non-event being that I did not have to fight for a window seat with a resourceful five-year old).
At the embassy, I passed through a door where people confused pull with push (quite personifying that eternal dilemma that is every door's destiny). Following this I subjected myself to the indiscreet inspections of a metal detector and was fingerprinted. Digitally. Digital fingerprinting reminded me of the travails I had to undergo at the Indian passport office, first for finding an inkpad and then sqeezing any molecules of ink left on it to my thumb. Digital fingerprinting is better. Much better if the screen is not dirty and the attendant there does not clean your fingers 10 times, forgetting in her earnestness that its the screen that is dirty. I also got a token here, a pink slip with a number, which was to be my identity till the time that this number is called out on the speaker. After getting the token, all I did and all that everyone does is sit quietly, listen carefully and just pray that you don't have to visit the loo anytime soon. Because the number is announced only once.
Nervous and not so nervous faces were scattered in the waiting room. Providence (or rather an anonymous VISA officer), being especially gracious, my token number was called, along with 10 others, before 10 minutes of waiting were over.
10 people make for a long queue, but at the grocer's or the railway counter. It's faster at the US consulate. You get your yes or no in 30 seconds flat. I was fifth in the queue when the BB called me inside.
BB : Hi!
Me: (forgot the good morning M'am I had parotted, and with that, in a chain reaction, forgot a whole lot of other things) Uh.. oh... Hi!
BB: (Smiling) Can you pass your token please ?
Me: (Passed the token, still in a daze, forgot to smile oh.. sure.. as I had practiced)
At this point in time, BB gets my documents out of the envelope that has been given to her. Then gets my form out and stared wide-eyed. Raises her eyebrows. I see her looking at the photograph. As I eliminate the chances of any hair-raising and frightening details on my face, I consider the possible of malicious intentions disfiguring my countenance. I prepare an elaborate answer on how the al-quaida may have had a role any size mismatches of my photograph.
BB: (The raised eyebrows and the wide eyes are followed by a wide wider widest smile) 1570!! You got a wonderful GRE score! Congratulations!
Me: (Feeling quite gratified but at a loss of understanding. I mean, these people are supposed to be some of the rudest on the planet, right.) Thanks!!
BB: So, what degree are you going to go for at Rutgers ?
Me: MS in Electrical and Computer Engg
BB: MS.. (Some guy comes behind her and starts talking with her. I wait for a few seconds). So, who is going to pay for your education.
Me: My parents. (Suddenly remember the lines I had rattofied) My mother and my father.
BB: So, what do they do?
Me: Tell
BB: What is your income ?
Me: Tell
BB: What are you savings ? You must have savings right ?
Me: (No I don't but I especially created them for thsi day!) Tell... If you want, I can show you the documents..
BB: (Starts writing something and waves her hands, as if she does not have time to deal with such petty trivialities)
Me: (feeling relieved at not having to explain something I did not myself understand)
BB: (Starts typing something) Why did you choose Rutgers ?
Me: Its got a wonderful wireless program. I want to specialize in wireless communication....
BB: (Body language interrupts me) Take your I20 please... (Then holds her voice like Amitabh in KBC. The pause continues for some time after which, the eyes behind the spectacles start smiling) Ok! Your Visa has been approved and you will be getting your passport in 2-3 weeks.
Me: (Finally return this smile) Thanks!
I visit the loo after this and experience the fact that US consulate toilets are not very different from other ones.
(Completing this post from IIML. Call it an irony. Call it poetic justice. Btw, only I can understand the latter. So you better refrain from guessing. )
Friday, June 09, 2006
An August Guest
(Post started on: 13th May 2006 12.57 a.m.)
August is a regal month. Grand like the emperor it is named after. It is the month of showers, of holidays, of Raksha Bandhan, of semester beginnings. But perhaps I will remember it for one more factor. 'It' had come uninvited in August. Turned up. Just like that. Then 'it' was murdered. Who did it? Perhaps one. Perhaps many. Perhaps none. I will never know. Perhaps this is what happens when you lack legs, when you prefer coiling up to sitting down and to top it all, when you turn in uninvited. It's a killer concoction. Literally.
It was a few days after the 'flood' and a few days before the date I had chosen to grace the Graduate Record Examination. The inundation had, in the most indiscreet and depraved fashion, played havoc with my time-table. The disorientation, impairment, haste, panic had finally given way to sense, calm, order, reason. I thought I had settled down, by that day atleast. Finally, to life with its mundanity, to satisfaction with the ordinary and the expectation of the quotidian.
That day started like the usual days started then. Late. At noon almost. The day was not sunny. But it was also not raining. The heavens were a mixture of black and blue. The light was soft. The winds were weak, more like a breeze. The skies had been more than extravagant earlier. The weather was trying its best to appear threatening. It only managed to appear exceedingly pleasant. That happens when you have spent yourself, done much more already than you ought to have. Transience of thought and an impending fear were the only facts that bound me inside reading wordlists. It was not that important but it doesn't matter. I thought it to be important.
As the clock chimed two, I sat down. For my daily tryst with morality, ethics, art, science. Condensed into 45 minutes. Simple, sweet and served at short notice. The only area of intimate concern and worry to me here, was that I was supposed to prepare, spice, season and serve it. They also call it an exercise in essay writing, an exercise in presenting views, notions, contentions; easily chewable, digestible, assimilable. It was worth 6 points in the GRE. It was the part every test, mock or otherwise, inaugurated with. The Kaplan mock tests did not display their rebellious non-conformist attitude in the beginning, for the initial test of writing skills. They stuck to morality, ethics, art, science, the whole deal.
The topic did not disappoint me that day. It dealt with ethical dilemmas.The usual dilemmas, everyday stuff. Right, wrong. Correct, incorrect. Black, white. Or grey. Custom-made, for custom-made answers. I started thinking. Then, I started typing. Ethics are very important, especially for the GRE. Typing is also important: 700 words, 45 minutes.
I was somewhere in the somewhere in the middle of quantifying and comparing the estimable the heinous, when I could make out the first traces of the commotion outside. Something was unsual. Perhaps a raucous child was separated from his fragile ego, the whole and sole of which was invested in his only toy. Expectations and approximations however, have an irritable and infallible tendency of conforming rarely with reality. I listened some more, pretty unsurreptiously interrupted and disrupted. My hands dealt with the keyboard like everyday. Thought took a backdrop, but expression continued. It seemed the commotion was drawing near. Individual words were perceivable. Snake... Its moving fast... Its entered his house. My doorstep was host to an assortment of neighbours now. The proximity of the cacaphony indicated that the reptilian visitor had chosen my abode. I sat still. But my hands refused any attempts to tranquility. They were still busy churning out words. Perhaps it was a tranquil state for them. It happens when you do something too many times.
My family was at the doorstep now, greeting the stranger, the stranger from the strange land. Its moved beneath the cot. I sat up with that, perhaps physically. My fingers were talking, dancing, typing. The excitement in the air was palpable. You could touch it, feel it, kiss it and preserve it for a later day. A later day when the talking fingers could give it a handful. Close the doors. Communicating with a stranger is laborious, if the tongues are different. It is downright impossible, if they are physically so. A language does not merely communicate, it connects, endears, bonds, it makes the stranger feel at home. But stranger was not home. A flood does not discriminate. It also does not rehabilitate. Get the stick out. It was thirty minutes. My fingers stopped dancing, playing. The greater good was justified. 600 words is enough justification.
I rushed outside, somewhere between the triumvirate of the still cot, the panicky neighbours and the agitated household. Insecurity was pervasive, the air reeked of it. It passed through your nostrils and inundated your senses. Insecurity was stamped under the cot too. No language made the stranger feel home. Whack! It hit the tail.But no one cried. Language, expression and communication lead to trust. Trust that allows humans to exist. Trust that prevents people from roaming around the streets weilding bludgeons and trashing each other at the slightest suspicion. Everyone on the street is not out to get me and I am not out to get anyone else. This is one of the fundamental axioms of humanity. A calibrated trust pervades society, permits existence and enhances growth.
Its moving from beneath the cot. A flash of black followed that statement. Home! It searched for it. Lunged for it, from beneath the cot. The one place where understanding prevails, where security does not cause the air to go foul. A reptile does not have legs, but it moves fast. It can even descend steps, faster than me. But it can only run in my land. It cannot leave for its own.
A bicycle parked makes for a makeshift, eventful home. It also makes an insecure home, for a stranger in a strange land. It will trouble someone else now. The first blow missed the head by a whisker. The coiled form was agitated, searching. There was no space for uncoiling between the front wheels. Whack! The head was pulp. Mistakes may happen once but they do not continue in perpetuity. The searching eyes were obliterated. It was still, almost coiled. The air was losing its heaviness. The ruckus was subsiding. There was a crowd around it. A crowd of civilization, education, security.
I rushed inside, within time. 45 minutes were just over. Another section was waiting for me.
August is a regal month. Grand like the emperor it is named after. It is the month of showers, of holidays, of Raksha Bandhan, of semester beginnings. But perhaps I will remember it for one more factor. 'It' had come uninvited in August. Turned up. Just like that. Then 'it' was murdered. Who did it? Perhaps one. Perhaps many. Perhaps none. I will never know. Perhaps this is what happens when you lack legs, when you prefer coiling up to sitting down and to top it all, when you turn in uninvited. It's a killer concoction. Literally.
It was a few days after the 'flood' and a few days before the date I had chosen to grace the Graduate Record Examination. The inundation had, in the most indiscreet and depraved fashion, played havoc with my time-table. The disorientation, impairment, haste, panic had finally given way to sense, calm, order, reason. I thought I had settled down, by that day atleast. Finally, to life with its mundanity, to satisfaction with the ordinary and the expectation of the quotidian.
That day started like the usual days started then. Late. At noon almost. The day was not sunny. But it was also not raining. The heavens were a mixture of black and blue. The light was soft. The winds were weak, more like a breeze. The skies had been more than extravagant earlier. The weather was trying its best to appear threatening. It only managed to appear exceedingly pleasant. That happens when you have spent yourself, done much more already than you ought to have. Transience of thought and an impending fear were the only facts that bound me inside reading wordlists. It was not that important but it doesn't matter. I thought it to be important.
As the clock chimed two, I sat down. For my daily tryst with morality, ethics, art, science. Condensed into 45 minutes. Simple, sweet and served at short notice. The only area of intimate concern and worry to me here, was that I was supposed to prepare, spice, season and serve it. They also call it an exercise in essay writing, an exercise in presenting views, notions, contentions; easily chewable, digestible, assimilable. It was worth 6 points in the GRE. It was the part every test, mock or otherwise, inaugurated with. The Kaplan mock tests did not display their rebellious non-conformist attitude in the beginning, for the initial test of writing skills. They stuck to morality, ethics, art, science, the whole deal.
The topic did not disappoint me that day. It dealt with ethical dilemmas.The usual dilemmas, everyday stuff. Right, wrong. Correct, incorrect. Black, white. Or grey. Custom-made, for custom-made answers. I started thinking. Then, I started typing. Ethics are very important, especially for the GRE. Typing is also important: 700 words, 45 minutes.
I was somewhere in the somewhere in the middle of quantifying and comparing the estimable the heinous, when I could make out the first traces of the commotion outside. Something was unsual. Perhaps a raucous child was separated from his fragile ego, the whole and sole of which was invested in his only toy. Expectations and approximations however, have an irritable and infallible tendency of conforming rarely with reality. I listened some more, pretty unsurreptiously interrupted and disrupted. My hands dealt with the keyboard like everyday. Thought took a backdrop, but expression continued. It seemed the commotion was drawing near. Individual words were perceivable. Snake... Its moving fast... Its entered his house. My doorstep was host to an assortment of neighbours now. The proximity of the cacaphony indicated that the reptilian visitor had chosen my abode. I sat still. But my hands refused any attempts to tranquility. They were still busy churning out words. Perhaps it was a tranquil state for them. It happens when you do something too many times.
My family was at the doorstep now, greeting the stranger, the stranger from the strange land. Its moved beneath the cot. I sat up with that, perhaps physically. My fingers were talking, dancing, typing. The excitement in the air was palpable. You could touch it, feel it, kiss it and preserve it for a later day. A later day when the talking fingers could give it a handful. Close the doors. Communicating with a stranger is laborious, if the tongues are different. It is downright impossible, if they are physically so. A language does not merely communicate, it connects, endears, bonds, it makes the stranger feel at home. But stranger was not home. A flood does not discriminate. It also does not rehabilitate. Get the stick out. It was thirty minutes. My fingers stopped dancing, playing. The greater good was justified. 600 words is enough justification.
I rushed outside, somewhere between the triumvirate of the still cot, the panicky neighbours and the agitated household. Insecurity was pervasive, the air reeked of it. It passed through your nostrils and inundated your senses. Insecurity was stamped under the cot too. No language made the stranger feel home. Whack! It hit the tail.But no one cried. Language, expression and communication lead to trust. Trust that allows humans to exist. Trust that prevents people from roaming around the streets weilding bludgeons and trashing each other at the slightest suspicion. Everyone on the street is not out to get me and I am not out to get anyone else. This is one of the fundamental axioms of humanity. A calibrated trust pervades society, permits existence and enhances growth.
Its moving from beneath the cot. A flash of black followed that statement. Home! It searched for it. Lunged for it, from beneath the cot. The one place where understanding prevails, where security does not cause the air to go foul. A reptile does not have legs, but it moves fast. It can even descend steps, faster than me. But it can only run in my land. It cannot leave for its own.
A bicycle parked makes for a makeshift, eventful home. It also makes an insecure home, for a stranger in a strange land. It will trouble someone else now. The first blow missed the head by a whisker. The coiled form was agitated, searching. There was no space for uncoiling between the front wheels. Whack! The head was pulp. Mistakes may happen once but they do not continue in perpetuity. The searching eyes were obliterated. It was still, almost coiled. The air was losing its heaviness. The ruckus was subsiding. There was a crowd around it. A crowd of civilization, education, security.
I rushed inside, within time. 45 minutes were just over. Another section was waiting for me.
Saturday, June 03, 2006
Fun? Nah.....!
"There is Aamir, there is Kajol, coming back after a really long time, the production is Yashraj. How bad can it get?" Those were my thoughts as I marched into Chandan for the evening show of Fanaa. I seriously did not have an idea of how bad it could get! To call it fatally boring would be an understatement. The whole team of Fanaa deserves a pat on their backs. With such a rocking starcast (one which ends all requirement for any sort of publicity) and such a famous production house to boot, it would take real effort to produce such a dud. With so many things going in your favour, it takes all the sweat and toil possible to make an audience cry for mercy as the film inches towards its hair-tearing climax. We can well nigh salute them, for they have achieved the nearly impossible.
I think the Gujrat BJP had truly humanitarian concerns and economic motivations when they (unofficially) banned this movie. The hangover that comes after enduring it can render a mortal human incapable of any productive endeavour for atleast a day. And after looking at the crowded hall massaging its forehead (at Mumbai), I can safely assume that Narendra Modi is truly against all activity that negatively affects the economy of Gujrat. By the way, if you really have a grudge against someone, buy them a ticket of Fanaa. I promise you the person won't leave while the movie is still in progress, hoping against hope that it going to be good. Its really worth it. Those who still plan to see the movie and care about jokes (in Fanaa's case) called 'story', 'plot' and 'climax' can stop reading now.
The movie starts with a subtle scene introducing a blind Kajol. She has her back towards the flag while saluting it. Thats it! The subtlety ends here. And from here starts a misplaced attempt at melodrama that seeks to combine Yash Chopra style tear jerker romance with James Bond and Rambo. Its not all intertwined but served piecemeal, one at a time. So you have romance, followed by rambo, backed up by some more romance mixed with crying, then a James Bondesque spy thriller and following close on its heels, some crying while James Bond is still in action. Seems confusing? It's more when you actually get down to seeing it. First of all, you have this five day love story. Kajol, i.e., Zooni Ali Beg, lives in (Poland passed of as) Kashmir with her parents. She is blind but she is still going to be the lead dancer of her troupe for the program on 26th January. And this programme is at the Rashtrapathi Bhavan we are told, at night! This is where the inanities begin.
Anyway, Ms. Zooni comes to Delhi, and meets Rehan, the tour guide (that's Aamir Khan). Then they forget how normal people speak. Why do they do this? Thats because the dialogue writer has a cell phone and he wants to flaunt his technical abilities which involve composing and reading SMSes. To achieve this end he showcases his long archived collection of SMS shayaris as dialogue between Aamir and Kajol. When the first shayaris appear, you can appreciate those, but slowly you start getting restless and after half an hour of celebrating SMS wit, you can almost scream, "Gimme back the plain and simple Hindi/Urdu back. No one speaks like this". This was not my opinion alone. I could hear a just perceivable 'Oh God!' from the row in front when they start with the corny poetry again and yet again. Anyway, after boring us with shayaris for around one hour, the director gets bored and decides to marry the main characters off. So, you have Aamir madly-deeply-passionately in love with Kajol in five days after which he sleeps with her and brings her back from the train (when she is returning to Kashmir). As for her colleagues, they let him take their blind friend. Forget about calling her parents, its too much trouble!. In the next scene Kajol decides she needs to tell her parents about this. This is how the conversation goes:
(This is not exact. Just the approximation of the conversation which was as short.)
"Mom I am in love!"
"Who is he?"
"Rehan. I want to marry him. I want your permission."
"Yes my daughter yes. We trust you completely. We will come to Delhi shortly. You can start preparing for the wedding."
This about it.The happy family of AnK (Aamir and Kajol) goes to the doctor, who immediately puts Kajol on the table for a retina transplant and before her parents arrive, lo and behold! She gets her sight back. But poor Aamir dies (You actually know that he cannot die because they do not show his dead body anyways), before Kajol ever sees him, in a bomb blast near Rashtrapati Bhavan. Now comes my favourite part. This is the mother of all unintentionally funny moments. They actually call Kajol, who has never seen Aamir (She was blind, duh!) to identify the badly burnt body of Aamir. The doctor actually puts this in words:
"Identification main karne wala tha, par body itni boori halat mein hai ki tumhein hi identification karna hoga."
This was supposed to be a usual emotional scene, to get the lachrymals work overtime, but I was laughing my ass off. I could imagine the director laughing his ass off too while shooting this scene:
"Do you think this will actually go down people's throat? Blind girl, Identification et all.."
"Hey! Listen buddy, our viewers are STUPID. Let me spell that out to you S-T-U-P-I-D. They will swallow anything we show them."
"Oh.. but .."
"I have been in this business a long time. There are a lot of dumb people around. My audience has its IQ in single digits. They will enjoy this scene.... HA HA HA HA HA..."
I didn't feel quite right after this and stopped laughing. Coming back to the movie, the sad family goes on to their home and we are introduced to the anti-terrorist squad headquarters investigating this scene. Here we are introduced to Tabu, who tells us that the militant group IKF is fighting for Kashmiri independence. They are terrorizing both India and Pakistan. Now call me biased, chauvinistic, or simply realistic but I take a strong exception to absolving Pakistan of all crimes in Kashmiri Terrorism. I even do not agree that Pakistan today is not in concert with the militants. The movie however, makes it amply and painfully clear that the terrorists are independent of any national identity and are threatening both India and Pakistan. Since, Indian movies are already banned in Pakistan, any ideological or economic motivations behind these clarifications were lost on me. A possible reason occured to my brother later on : Paksitani diaspora pay for Indian movies!! So much for clean entertainment.
Tabu goes on to introduce us to the chief operator of IKF, who is expectedly, even for the most numb-skulled, an Aamir Khan with a different haircut. He may be a terrorist but because he is Aamir and because this is a Yashraj movie, he apologizes to Kajol's photograph, tears it and throws it down on the road with a flamboyant disregard for any civic sense that a terrorist with his chic should possess.
Like all good conventional Hindi movies, the story is picked up and dropped exactly 7 years into the future, not a year less, not a year more. Now starts the rambo like spy-thriller. Aamir the terrorist goes on to procure the last component (called the trigger) for making a nuclear missile (they have already collected all the other parts, dont ask me how!!). For this he impersonates a Captain Rajeev from the Indian army. All this while Tabu puts on a oh-so-tough look, spouts a case for plebiscite in Kashmir and decides that she wants to play chor-police (in the modern avatar of terrorist and anti-terrorist squad officer). While, Aamir runs from the commandoes and kills them one by one in the Kashmiri (or Polish) Jungle (a la Rambo: First Blood), you think he is only doing a cheap imitation of Sunny Deol. Deol is much better at this. Trust me! I have seen Gadar. Deol can atleast make me laugh. Aamir makes me squirm. As cinematic fate would have it, after killing everyone around, our zakhmi anti-hero lands up in a snowstorm in the middle of nowhere. He knocks a door in the middle of nowhere. And guess what? Kajol opens the door (she lives in the middle of nowhere!!). Then they show a kid behind Kajol and this is like the second most unintentionally funny moment in the movie. He got a kid!! Like all good, dutiful and sincere Hindi movie couples, their one and only attempt at procreation had met with unprecedented success. Aamir is so shocked at this point that he goes unconscious. (The audience too gets shocked but God in all his mercy does not make them unconscious.)
Then proceeds the romantic movie part 2, by which time you really do not care what happens to the characters. Live, die, go into a coma, do whatever you want, just end this movie. (A welcome change in this part is the low frequency of the ubiquitous shayaris, there are only corny dialogues and a oh-so-cute kid thrown in for free.) It is now that you understand the whole point of Kajol's blindness in the first part. She is not supposed to recognize the living Aamir (even though she has already identified his badly burnt dead body). Anyway, here Aamir suddenly remembers that inspite of defacing the streets of some country with Kajol's torn photograph, he still loves her. Kajol fulminates and tells him of her perpetual state of mental delirium where she cut and pasted ears, noses, lips, eyes from various photographs to form Aamir's photo. (The fact that the travel agent with whom Aamir worked can give her a description and make life easy never occured to her, but then as I said before, details are certainly not the strong point of this movie.) The next day Aamir tries leaving. Here comes the third most unintentionally funny moment in the movie. Kajol runs after him and then gives him ONE TIGHT SLAP. My friend summed up the emotions welling up properly when he said, "That should have been the director!" So, AnK marry officially now and live happily ever after. Except that we still have the IKF and Anti-terrorist squad angle to be taken care of.
There's the mission too after all. At this point the screenplay turns into a word for word reproduction of the climactic scenes from 'The eye of the needle' by Ken Follet. The climax is suitably Indianized, but Kajol (quite unnecessarily) kills Aamir in the end. Logic ofcourse, is as oblivious from the finale as from the rest of the movie. Kajol gets the trigger, escapes from a mad Aamir (just a bad impersonation of any action hero worth his salt here, nostrils flaring, eyes pretty large and emotionless). She contacts Tabu who advises her to.. well.... do nothing (she has to kill Aamir in the end, which she won't be able to do if she destroys the trigger now). Keeping true to the long lasting tradition of the police coming in at the movie's end, Tabu et al come in the end and the quite dreary movie ends on a drearier note.
Aamir and Kajol try to act their best but are still confused as to what they are supposed to do. Rishi Kapoor drinks and cries for all he is worth. Kiron Kher appears again in the ideal-mother role (Am I the only one who feels she is getting typecast?). Shiny Ahuja and Lara Dutta have roles so short, that you suspect they were put into the movie for a game of find-me-if-you-can. Tabu, does mostly nothing except for frowning, ordering and coming in towards the end. To sum up, efforts of the cast are valiant but they are no match to the incompetent story, confused editing, corny dialogues and directionless lack of entertainment. The movie is confused as to what it wants to be, shifting from one mode to another, confusing the audience and disorienting any sense of continuity. Good movies are not always logically correct ones but they are always ones where the audience experiences a 'suspension of disbelief'. A state wherein he/she can vicariously experience the travails of the character. They know its all untrue but they still believe it. If the movie is funny, it persuades you to get the main idea. However, the only state Fanaa put me in was 'suspension of all belief'. I didn't care two cents for the characters, and movie does not have any central idea.
Inspite of it being such a dud, I know the movie is going to do well. Since you have no work in life (how did I find out? coz, you read this post upto here!), you are probably already making plans for the movie. I know what you are thinking right at this moment, "There is Aamir, there is Kajol, coming back after a really long time, the production is Yashraj. How bad can it get?".... Another victory of hope over experience.
I think the Gujrat BJP had truly humanitarian concerns and economic motivations when they (unofficially) banned this movie. The hangover that comes after enduring it can render a mortal human incapable of any productive endeavour for atleast a day. And after looking at the crowded hall massaging its forehead (at Mumbai), I can safely assume that Narendra Modi is truly against all activity that negatively affects the economy of Gujrat. By the way, if you really have a grudge against someone, buy them a ticket of Fanaa. I promise you the person won't leave while the movie is still in progress, hoping against hope that it going to be good. Its really worth it. Those who still plan to see the movie and care about jokes (in Fanaa's case) called 'story', 'plot' and 'climax' can stop reading now.
The movie starts with a subtle scene introducing a blind Kajol. She has her back towards the flag while saluting it. Thats it! The subtlety ends here. And from here starts a misplaced attempt at melodrama that seeks to combine Yash Chopra style tear jerker romance with James Bond and Rambo. Its not all intertwined but served piecemeal, one at a time. So you have romance, followed by rambo, backed up by some more romance mixed with crying, then a James Bondesque spy thriller and following close on its heels, some crying while James Bond is still in action. Seems confusing? It's more when you actually get down to seeing it. First of all, you have this five day love story. Kajol, i.e., Zooni Ali Beg, lives in (Poland passed of as) Kashmir with her parents. She is blind but she is still going to be the lead dancer of her troupe for the program on 26th January. And this programme is at the Rashtrapathi Bhavan we are told, at night! This is where the inanities begin.
Anyway, Ms. Zooni comes to Delhi, and meets Rehan, the tour guide (that's Aamir Khan). Then they forget how normal people speak. Why do they do this? Thats because the dialogue writer has a cell phone and he wants to flaunt his technical abilities which involve composing and reading SMSes. To achieve this end he showcases his long archived collection of SMS shayaris as dialogue between Aamir and Kajol. When the first shayaris appear, you can appreciate those, but slowly you start getting restless and after half an hour of celebrating SMS wit, you can almost scream, "Gimme back the plain and simple Hindi/Urdu back. No one speaks like this". This was not my opinion alone. I could hear a just perceivable 'Oh God!' from the row in front when they start with the corny poetry again and yet again. Anyway, after boring us with shayaris for around one hour, the director gets bored and decides to marry the main characters off. So, you have Aamir madly-deeply-passionately in love with Kajol in five days after which he sleeps with her and brings her back from the train (when she is returning to Kashmir). As for her colleagues, they let him take their blind friend. Forget about calling her parents, its too much trouble!. In the next scene Kajol decides she needs to tell her parents about this. This is how the conversation goes:
(This is not exact. Just the approximation of the conversation which was as short.)
"Mom I am in love!"
"Who is he?"
"Rehan. I want to marry him. I want your permission."
"Yes my daughter yes. We trust you completely. We will come to Delhi shortly. You can start preparing for the wedding."
This about it.The happy family of AnK (Aamir and Kajol) goes to the doctor, who immediately puts Kajol on the table for a retina transplant and before her parents arrive, lo and behold! She gets her sight back. But poor Aamir dies (You actually know that he cannot die because they do not show his dead body anyways), before Kajol ever sees him, in a bomb blast near Rashtrapati Bhavan. Now comes my favourite part. This is the mother of all unintentionally funny moments. They actually call Kajol, who has never seen Aamir (She was blind, duh!) to identify the badly burnt body of Aamir. The doctor actually puts this in words:
"Identification main karne wala tha, par body itni boori halat mein hai ki tumhein hi identification karna hoga."
This was supposed to be a usual emotional scene, to get the lachrymals work overtime, but I was laughing my ass off. I could imagine the director laughing his ass off too while shooting this scene:
"Do you think this will actually go down people's throat? Blind girl, Identification et all.."
"Hey! Listen buddy, our viewers are STUPID. Let me spell that out to you S-T-U-P-I-D. They will swallow anything we show them."
"Oh.. but .."
"I have been in this business a long time. There are a lot of dumb people around. My audience has its IQ in single digits. They will enjoy this scene.... HA HA HA HA HA..."
I didn't feel quite right after this and stopped laughing. Coming back to the movie, the sad family goes on to their home and we are introduced to the anti-terrorist squad headquarters investigating this scene. Here we are introduced to Tabu, who tells us that the militant group IKF is fighting for Kashmiri independence. They are terrorizing both India and Pakistan. Now call me biased, chauvinistic, or simply realistic but I take a strong exception to absolving Pakistan of all crimes in Kashmiri Terrorism. I even do not agree that Pakistan today is not in concert with the militants. The movie however, makes it amply and painfully clear that the terrorists are independent of any national identity and are threatening both India and Pakistan. Since, Indian movies are already banned in Pakistan, any ideological or economic motivations behind these clarifications were lost on me. A possible reason occured to my brother later on : Paksitani diaspora pay for Indian movies!! So much for clean entertainment.
Tabu goes on to introduce us to the chief operator of IKF, who is expectedly, even for the most numb-skulled, an Aamir Khan with a different haircut. He may be a terrorist but because he is Aamir and because this is a Yashraj movie, he apologizes to Kajol's photograph, tears it and throws it down on the road with a flamboyant disregard for any civic sense that a terrorist with his chic should possess.
Like all good conventional Hindi movies, the story is picked up and dropped exactly 7 years into the future, not a year less, not a year more. Now starts the rambo like spy-thriller. Aamir the terrorist goes on to procure the last component (called the trigger) for making a nuclear missile (they have already collected all the other parts, dont ask me how!!). For this he impersonates a Captain Rajeev from the Indian army. All this while Tabu puts on a oh-so-tough look, spouts a case for plebiscite in Kashmir and decides that she wants to play chor-police (in the modern avatar of terrorist and anti-terrorist squad officer). While, Aamir runs from the commandoes and kills them one by one in the Kashmiri (or Polish) Jungle (a la Rambo: First Blood), you think he is only doing a cheap imitation of Sunny Deol. Deol is much better at this. Trust me! I have seen Gadar. Deol can atleast make me laugh. Aamir makes me squirm. As cinematic fate would have it, after killing everyone around, our zakhmi anti-hero lands up in a snowstorm in the middle of nowhere. He knocks a door in the middle of nowhere. And guess what? Kajol opens the door (she lives in the middle of nowhere!!). Then they show a kid behind Kajol and this is like the second most unintentionally funny moment in the movie. He got a kid!! Like all good, dutiful and sincere Hindi movie couples, their one and only attempt at procreation had met with unprecedented success. Aamir is so shocked at this point that he goes unconscious. (The audience too gets shocked but God in all his mercy does not make them unconscious.)
Then proceeds the romantic movie part 2, by which time you really do not care what happens to the characters. Live, die, go into a coma, do whatever you want, just end this movie. (A welcome change in this part is the low frequency of the ubiquitous shayaris, there are only corny dialogues and a oh-so-cute kid thrown in for free.) It is now that you understand the whole point of Kajol's blindness in the first part. She is not supposed to recognize the living Aamir (even though she has already identified his badly burnt dead body). Anyway, here Aamir suddenly remembers that inspite of defacing the streets of some country with Kajol's torn photograph, he still loves her. Kajol fulminates and tells him of her perpetual state of mental delirium where she cut and pasted ears, noses, lips, eyes from various photographs to form Aamir's photo. (The fact that the travel agent with whom Aamir worked can give her a description and make life easy never occured to her, but then as I said before, details are certainly not the strong point of this movie.) The next day Aamir tries leaving. Here comes the third most unintentionally funny moment in the movie. Kajol runs after him and then gives him ONE TIGHT SLAP. My friend summed up the emotions welling up properly when he said, "That should have been the director!" So, AnK marry officially now and live happily ever after. Except that we still have the IKF and Anti-terrorist squad angle to be taken care of.
There's the mission too after all. At this point the screenplay turns into a word for word reproduction of the climactic scenes from 'The eye of the needle' by Ken Follet. The climax is suitably Indianized, but Kajol (quite unnecessarily) kills Aamir in the end. Logic ofcourse, is as oblivious from the finale as from the rest of the movie. Kajol gets the trigger, escapes from a mad Aamir (just a bad impersonation of any action hero worth his salt here, nostrils flaring, eyes pretty large and emotionless). She contacts Tabu who advises her to.. well.... do nothing (she has to kill Aamir in the end, which she won't be able to do if she destroys the trigger now). Keeping true to the long lasting tradition of the police coming in at the movie's end, Tabu et al come in the end and the quite dreary movie ends on a drearier note.
Aamir and Kajol try to act their best but are still confused as to what they are supposed to do. Rishi Kapoor drinks and cries for all he is worth. Kiron Kher appears again in the ideal-mother role (Am I the only one who feels she is getting typecast?). Shiny Ahuja and Lara Dutta have roles so short, that you suspect they were put into the movie for a game of find-me-if-you-can. Tabu, does mostly nothing except for frowning, ordering and coming in towards the end. To sum up, efforts of the cast are valiant but they are no match to the incompetent story, confused editing, corny dialogues and directionless lack of entertainment. The movie is confused as to what it wants to be, shifting from one mode to another, confusing the audience and disorienting any sense of continuity. Good movies are not always logically correct ones but they are always ones where the audience experiences a 'suspension of disbelief'. A state wherein he/she can vicariously experience the travails of the character. They know its all untrue but they still believe it. If the movie is funny, it persuades you to get the main idea. However, the only state Fanaa put me in was 'suspension of all belief'. I didn't care two cents for the characters, and movie does not have any central idea.
Inspite of it being such a dud, I know the movie is going to do well. Since you have no work in life (how did I find out? coz, you read this post upto here!), you are probably already making plans for the movie. I know what you are thinking right at this moment, "There is Aamir, there is Kajol, coming back after a really long time, the production is Yashraj. How bad can it get?".... Another victory of hope over experience.
Friday, June 02, 2006
Over and Done !
I never thought I would get mushy about it, or that I would even retain an iota of sentiment about it. I never thought it would hit me with such a feeling of awe and leave me dumb, grasping for words, struggling for expressions. God knows why, but I started feeling a bit empty today. Unless I am one of the chosen few personally stamped unlucky by the almighty, I finished with my engineering today. I guess I had finished it an year ago when I had given up hopes on my college, but yet, today I was done with it. Officially. Over, done, finished, completed... like a THE END they show at the end of the movies. The only difference is: the movies actually end with the THE END. Engineering and what I did here or rather failed to do here would remain with me for a long time.
It had grown upon me painfully, but it was something I liked almost with a spirit of masochism. It was wasting, gangrenous, but it was a part of me that was gangrenous and you don't cut away a part of your body that easily. The boring lectures, ineffectual practicals, cutting edge copy technique inventions for the class test, assignments, had all seeped inside somewhere, almost ritualistic. It is something so commonplace that even though you hate it, you never expect it to go anywhere. The feeling that emerges is of chasing the ephemeral days, like running after a an elusive butterfly, yet hoping, in your heart of hearts, of never catching it. Waiting for the days to become better but not wishing them away, for these are something that no new step can ever be : stable.
I am feeling this void perhaps because stability does not come easy. As each phase ends and another begins, so starts a struggle for adaptation, for existence, for survival. What I hate most is uncertainity. However futile may have been this exercise in the pursuit of education, it scarcely left me in doubt to its futility. It did not leave open any scope for idle speculation. What is today, will remain tommorrow, my thoughts decreed. It has become only habitual to assume that after 4 years. However, when what is today, does not remain tommorrow, it is then that change sets in, bringing with itself uncertainity. Perhaps the tommorrow will be better, perhaps it would be worse, but it wouldn't be the same. The smug, self-assured look is difficult to maintain now, as the mind wanders and speculates on what might happen. It is as if, a rug has been pulled from under your legs. You were standing on the edge anyways, but you are off your balance now, atleast for a few seconds till you get your bearings. The only difference in my case here is that my search for my bearings is taking me much more than mere seconds or minutes or hours.
As the feeling seeps inside, the thoughts slip outside. One by one. No one is in a hurry here. But it accumulates, the baggage of experience, stuffing till the seams are on the verge of bursting. Then perhaps the seams actually burst. What do you say when that happens? What do you say intellect loses control and comprehension, when intuition rules and hope cheers. I say to the hopeful, first let it sink in, let me wait till I feel complete again.
It had grown upon me painfully, but it was something I liked almost with a spirit of masochism. It was wasting, gangrenous, but it was a part of me that was gangrenous and you don't cut away a part of your body that easily. The boring lectures, ineffectual practicals, cutting edge copy technique inventions for the class test, assignments, had all seeped inside somewhere, almost ritualistic. It is something so commonplace that even though you hate it, you never expect it to go anywhere. The feeling that emerges is of chasing the ephemeral days, like running after a an elusive butterfly, yet hoping, in your heart of hearts, of never catching it. Waiting for the days to become better but not wishing them away, for these are something that no new step can ever be : stable.
I am feeling this void perhaps because stability does not come easy. As each phase ends and another begins, so starts a struggle for adaptation, for existence, for survival. What I hate most is uncertainity. However futile may have been this exercise in the pursuit of education, it scarcely left me in doubt to its futility. It did not leave open any scope for idle speculation. What is today, will remain tommorrow, my thoughts decreed. It has become only habitual to assume that after 4 years. However, when what is today, does not remain tommorrow, it is then that change sets in, bringing with itself uncertainity. Perhaps the tommorrow will be better, perhaps it would be worse, but it wouldn't be the same. The smug, self-assured look is difficult to maintain now, as the mind wanders and speculates on what might happen. It is as if, a rug has been pulled from under your legs. You were standing on the edge anyways, but you are off your balance now, atleast for a few seconds till you get your bearings. The only difference in my case here is that my search for my bearings is taking me much more than mere seconds or minutes or hours.
As the feeling seeps inside, the thoughts slip outside. One by one. No one is in a hurry here. But it accumulates, the baggage of experience, stuffing till the seams are on the verge of bursting. Then perhaps the seams actually burst. What do you say when that happens? What do you say intellect loses control and comprehension, when intuition rules and hope cheers. I say to the hopeful, first let it sink in, let me wait till I feel complete again.
Sunday, April 23, 2006
Scribblings of a soon-to-be 15 year old - II
The astounding 10-comments-success of my first essay amongst my peers, convinced me of the reality of my ambitions towards the NP (Nobel Prize). Not willing to let
"
My Maths Teacher
(As seen from the eye of Ankur Saraf)
She enters the classroom and what a grand entrance it is. Armed with the maths textbook and answers to sums 'inspired' from the guide and self-study. Medium in size, both in length and breadth, clad in a saree, does she come presenting a tough fight for us.
Ah! School-days have their own memories and her memory will be fresh in the top of my head forever. She will never escape the memories of the most terrible experiences of my life. If everything has pros and cons, certainly I could not see anything that signifies a 'pro' in her.
She glares at me through her specs. The look of a blood-thirsty hound in search of its prey catches my attention. The butcher is waiting, with a knife in her hand to sacrifice lambs. Blood is dripping from here eyes, her tongue is tasting the taste of our heads. Well, she really does enjoy eating our heads, it is but obvious.
She has three periods today, that completes a full one and a half hour of struggle to live, of struggle to suppress our laughter at her typical accent, of struggle to bear her, of struggle to see, hear, talk to her. It certainly is an endless strife.
She starts her lessons. Her typical south-Indian accent, flows out of her mouth, like the river
She says "A,P,B, [symbol for angle],[symbol for rectangle],x,y,z" and God knows what. "Blah, blah, blah, blah,......" She goes on and on and on and on and..................... Her mental frustration getting down at us. For the first time in my life, I regret joining the school, I regret attending the Maths period, Oh! was I born and brought up only to see this day!
She catches two boys talking and playing. They stand victorious. She scolds them out of the class, "You go now, out, out of the class,". Her sharp voice pierces my ears. They march out the class, those lucky ones. Oh! how jealous am I?
Seconds seem centuries, hours seem millenia. It certainly is a tiresome and tedious job. Well she goes on with her rubbish talk, useless theorems, meaningless words. Oh! If only I had not been educated, I would have not seen this day!
Seeing her I remember the news telecast, "600 children freed from bonded labour." Well I am myself a slave now. A slave of time. The Human Right's Commission I feel should certainly interfere in this matter, a certain violation of human rights, oh yes, thats what it is.
Time is running, it is runing, the clock is ticking, only 20 minutes have passed. Oh no! It cannot be just 20 minutes. It seemed years and years fo broedom. My watch I feel is running unusually slow today, yes, certainly it is running slow.
My ears long for the welcome ring of the electric bell, the one installed outside the classroom. That bell is certaily one of the greatest pranksters I have seen in my life. During the recess tiem when I don't ask it to ring, it ring's and now when I am really in need, it does not.
She's coming towards me, well I don't believe in filling my book with rubbish and she takes notice of my this good habit. I wonder, why does it not please her. After all, I am saving pages and in a way, helping in saving trees. We all know trees are necessary for a healthy environment. My ear experiences an extreme word of warning from her. [All of this is the fiction part. I never had any guts in school not write in the lecture. Case of chronic sincerity I guess!]
Hearing her lessons, I remember George Bernard Shaw. He had rightly said, "One who knows what to do, does, one who does not, teaches." It implies fully well on her [sic]. She is like....... like a nightmare come true. I remember seeing a bore film called a 'Satvan....' something or the other. It was very very boring. I left the theatre hall in the interval itself (it was my only chance to escape). Now, I am locked in the classroom, with every means to torture me, I dave a thought for the creator who created her and me. perhaps 'cause he wanted me to worship him for some reason, there certainly cannot be any other reason or was he extremely offended with humankind to send this angel of hell on earth.
Now, I hear the iron armature, hitting the gong, the bell has rung at last. The time of her 'sad' (rather) departure arrives. She leaves the class. From her face, it is clearly evident that she was enjoying herself, in an extremely cheerful mood, she departs and the whole class wakes up to the dawn of a new period (of Geography).
Tomorrow again, she will come armed with her Math book and overloaded with extra intelligence and inventing new ways to torture us to the full extent.
-[My signature goes here]
(Ankur Saraf)
(I do not intend to hurt anybody's emotions. I have written this essay only for fun and it should not be misunderstood - [My signature goes here])
[I was still chicken of the said teacher finding this essay circulating in class while I was busy in my comment gathering spree]
Please write your comments on the adjoining page. Don’t forget to mention if the essay is worst, bad, O.K., good or very good.
[The adjoining page is a sad witness to the disinclination of my voracious readers to comment, that is another story I will come to in a moment]
“
This essay was broke all records that were susceptible to shattering in a class of 40. Perhaps, an (equally) awful understanding/usage of the English language coupled with an innate hatred of that monstrosity called school were to blame. Anyways, this spurred me towards promoting my essays from the rough book to a 200-page book of their own (The one which I stumbled upon recently).
Aware of the fact that no one in my class is Swiss or part of the NP committee, I ventured for outside opinion. I don’t know about the NP winning capabilities of my essays but they sure made workaholics of all my relations. All the adults I gave this book to, suddenly remembered all kinds of important work, the calls they were supposed to make, the ones which were waiting for them, by the time they reached the third page. By the by I also realized that Rabindranath Tagore was the only other Indian to have the NP honour and he had to wait a goddamn long time to get that thing. No wonder, he must have spent all that time trying to convince people to read his full book or so I thought. This effectively killed the bright young writer in me. :(
As for the aforementioned teacher, the last I heard of her was in FE when I learnt she died in a car accident. They had shown it on TV. I had my own two minutes of silence to pray for her.
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Scribblings of a soon-to-be 15 year old - I
Stumbled upon something today. An old essay book from school. NO! Not the Navneet style printed essay book with 'My favourite festival, colour, country, planet, toilet etc. '. It was the book where I had written some pretty 'un'academic essays, the first ones I was not obliged to write academically. Retrospectively, I don't find any signs of a budding genius in these essays :P (Though, in those days, I felt that the removal of the budding tag is an accurate description of my literature) and I shudder thinking of how I was the 'best' in English in the matriculation class of Umedbhai Patel English School.
I am documenting these here to preserve my ideas for posterity (who knows a future biographer may stumble upon it someday and document my legendary lifetime :P). And a warning to the regular readers of this blog (even those who are addicted to the trash I churn out!); before you consider reading this, consider the background of the author:
The writer is a soon to be 15 year old who holds great airs about being the best in English in his class. His experiences with literature encompass great authors like Enid Blyton and the Grimm Brothers. His readings include everything from Champak to Chandamama, from Hardy Boys to the Famous Five. His experiences with humour in the Queen's language have been confined to a one chapter excerpt from 'Three Men and the Boat' and he still equates Wodehouse with a habitation constructed from dead and hardened carboneous plant life.
Ok so here follows the first of the two essays from the book, with all the spelling mistakes and grammatical errors intact. [My comments, the present me I mean, are in square brackets like this one.]
"
[Page 1]
My book of absurd Essays
-Ankur Saraf
All the events and persons mentioned in this essay are fictional. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely co-incidental (and co-incidents occur too often)
This book is registered under the trademark of Ankur Saraf [This is followed by my signature]. No part of it may be printed or reproduced in any other form of binding or cover in which it is now without the prior permission of the author.
[Page 2]
Preface:-[Page 2]
I have written a few essays in this book on persons I have met and incidents (rather, accidents) in my life which I remember (dread). I hope you find it enjoying to read these essays. I have prepared a column in the last pages for your review. Please consider them. Happy reading.
-Ankur Saraf
P.S.:- You might find it a little difficult to understand my handwriting. [This is one situation which has only taken the downward path since then. Thankfully a computer and keyboard are here to help.]
[Page 3]
1) The elocution competition Pg.No.1
2) My Maths Teacher Pg.No.10
(As seen from the eyes of Ankur Saraf)
[Page 4]
The elocution competition
The day started as any other. I got up lazily at 6.40 in the morning, got ready for school unaware of the disaster that was going to befall me on this very dreaded thursday of 16th Sept 1999. We had a half day at school due to an elocution competition to be held in the school. I lazed away my time at school with the boring lectures [Somethings never change, do they?] being delivered by one of my teachers I disliked. Joking and passing time, the disaster was approaching near. [sic]
Time sped up. We were asked to wait in the school compound. Our class teacher had informed us that we were given the 'privilege' of being audience to the event (which would mark history and of course I needn't explain why?). One of our teachers had been given the responsibility (dreaded by everyone, the teacher of course) to see to it that we don't play truant and spoil their plans of spoiling our day. My teacher announced that the 'privilege' would be denied to us because of the lack of enough seats but the 1st three rankers were granted the calamitous oppurtunity. (unfortunately, I was one of them.)
I marched towards the hall where a batch of the greatest orators known till now waited for the competition to start. The competition started as soon as we arrived (hunters always wait till they get their guns ready and innocent animals slowly approach the most terrible trap set for them)
First, the juniors were called on to deliver a 3-minute speech (of course, 3-minutes wasn't the real time. I certainly felt the timer's watch running slow).
I was given the first taste of the hunter's gun. Then we were all asked to clap. (After all, the formality had to be finished like it or not). I could easily go over 2 or 3 speeched but the whole lot of 15 was lying in ambush to attack my 'tiny' [you will understand this if you see me!] little self.
The sharp woices attacked my ears and went right to my head which slowly started aching. I tried to stop this using a handkerchief but they excelled in the art of carrying forward with the only thing they had got to do. The only aim of their life seemed to bore me to the full extent. The voice on the mike grew louder and louder. Blah, blah............ went on their non-stopping mouths. The only one I liked was the one who said nothing. The first prize should have been awarded to him (in the name of humanity)
Seconds seemed hours. Minutes passes like centuries. Many millenia passed till one by one they tortured me mentally. Compulsory, literal mental torter [sic] of the highest service was served
before me with a kind cruelty. To top it all, a teacher was made to sit behind me, all parts of a pre-made plan.
The luckiest person seemed to be the chief guest. She ran away during half the competition.
Then the senior group started. I had been tired to a great extent and the noblest thing I could think about was to kill the organiser, call my best friend Dracula to suck every drop of blood out of him, kill his friends, relatives everyone, to down his house and sing comic songs on his grave. It was my moral responsibility to save my fellow spectators from this calamity.
Hitler should have called these people in his concentration camps to torcher the POW's and take my word for it, every piece of information would be lying at his feet. And the Mumbai police could certainly make good use of them.
I saw before me, each of them passing by, a demonic smile on his lips. What humour was, I didn't see. My objective now was to reach home alive. I kept thinking of this beautiful world and how less I have seen of it. My science teacher (who was sleeping a quiet sleep with a serene and divine look upon her face) had explained us that mental stress often led to heart-attack.
The deadly giants of the devil himself had started hitting my ears. I began to feel sick, ill, my time, I felt had come. Suddenly, the prizes were announced. The judges had been the expectators [sic] of the trauma. The prizes were given to those who persecuted [sic] their task with perfection. But, I think, the audience were really worthy of being rewarded for going through these demanding situations. One of the participants spoke on child labour in inhuman conditions very similar to the present situation. Now, the golden words were uttered, "The programme is over, thank you.". Well I thought I ought to thank them for letting me out of this tedious experience. I rushed out, a bird freed from a cage, proud of my brave self.
-[My signature went here]
(Ankur Saraf)
[Something I added later as an afterthought. It is written with different pen.] Please register your comments on the adjoining page after filling the details and please don't forget to mention if the essay is worst, bad, O.K., good or very good. For eg.
Name:- A. Saraf Sign:- [My sign]
Remarks:- O.K. ............
[The 'adjoining page' is quite hopelessly empty]
"
And if you thought the above post was not worth blogging about, you are not getting the job of my biographer. Get that? :P This essay was written in my rough book the day after the elocution day. The girl sitting next to me read it and passed it on in the class. I had got some pretty good comments on my rough book, sufficient enough to egg my soon to be 15-year old ego, to write a another essay.
I marched towards the hall where a batch of the greatest orators known till now waited for the competition to start. The competition started as soon as we arrived (hunters always wait till they get their guns ready and innocent animals slowly approach the most terrible trap set for them)
First, the juniors were called on to deliver a 3-minute speech (of course, 3-minutes wasn't the real time. I certainly felt the timer's watch running slow).
I was given the first taste of the hunter's gun. Then we were all asked to clap. (After all, the formality had to be finished like it or not). I could easily go over 2 or 3 speeched but the whole lot of 15 was lying in ambush to attack my 'tiny' [you will understand this if you see me!] little self.
The sharp woices attacked my ears and went right to my head which slowly started aching. I tried to stop this using a handkerchief but they excelled in the art of carrying forward with the only thing they had got to do. The only aim of their life seemed to bore me to the full extent. The voice on the mike grew louder and louder. Blah, blah............ went on their non-stopping mouths. The only one I liked was the one who said nothing. The first prize should have been awarded to him (in the name of humanity)
Seconds seemed hours. Minutes passes like centuries. Many millenia passed till one by one they tortured me mentally. Compulsory, literal mental torter [sic] of the highest service was served
before me with a kind cruelty. To top it all, a teacher was made to sit behind me, all parts of a pre-made plan.
The luckiest person seemed to be the chief guest. She ran away during half the competition.
Then the senior group started. I had been tired to a great extent and the noblest thing I could think about was to kill the organiser, call my best friend Dracula to suck every drop of blood out of him, kill his friends, relatives everyone, to down his house and sing comic songs on his grave. It was my moral responsibility to save my fellow spectators from this calamity.
Hitler should have called these people in his concentration camps to torcher the POW's and take my word for it, every piece of information would be lying at his feet. And the Mumbai police could certainly make good use of them.
I saw before me, each of them passing by, a demonic smile on his lips. What humour was, I didn't see. My objective now was to reach home alive. I kept thinking of this beautiful world and how less I have seen of it. My science teacher (who was sleeping a quiet sleep with a serene and divine look upon her face) had explained us that mental stress often led to heart-attack.
The deadly giants of the devil himself had started hitting my ears. I began to feel sick, ill, my time, I felt had come. Suddenly, the prizes were announced. The judges had been the expectators [sic] of the trauma. The prizes were given to those who persecuted [sic] their task with perfection. But, I think, the audience were really worthy of being rewarded for going through these demanding situations. One of the participants spoke on child labour in inhuman conditions very similar to the present situation. Now, the golden words were uttered, "The programme is over, thank you.". Well I thought I ought to thank them for letting me out of this tedious experience. I rushed out, a bird freed from a cage, proud of my brave self.
-[My signature went here]
(Ankur Saraf)
[Something I added later as an afterthought. It is written with different pen.] Please register your comments on the adjoining page after filling the details and please don't forget to mention if the essay is worst, bad, O.K., good or very good. For eg.
Name:- A. Saraf Sign:- [My sign]
Remarks:- O.K. ............
[The 'adjoining page' is quite hopelessly empty]
"
And if you thought the above post was not worth blogging about, you are not getting the job of my biographer. Get that? :P This essay was written in my rough book the day after the elocution day. The girl sitting next to me read it and passed it on in the class. I had got some pretty good comments on my rough book, sufficient enough to egg my soon to be 15-year old ego, to write a another essay.
Goodbye ! Goodluck !
It was a fine morning. I was sitting, my neice was tugging the corner of my shirt (hellbent upon making my PC a guinea pig for her 'My first computer' practical sessions) and my aunts had a nice conversation running in the background. I was arranging a seat for myself in the crowd, warding off my crying neice, ignoring my aunts, checking emails, cursing spammers, when suddenly yahoo buzzed. I was not in a great mood to chat but the conversation turned more interesting than the 'Hello dude wassup?' kind. My internet connection, acutely distressed by this blasphemous act, rebelled and fainted. Next thing I know, Akshat posted it on his blog. This is the reason for this blog. I wasn't going to write all this but what the heck!
17th April 2006, or last Monday was the last day BE Electronics collected in the classroom as a class. I realized this fact later that day, while having dinner (Four submissions and eight hours of non-stop writing leave you weirdly numb, don't they?) Strangely for many, and rather not-so-strangely for me, I was feeling kind of happy. I could remember the other farewells I have had. The time I had to leave school, I was a bit sad but also full of hope. Leaving Sathaye was kind of neutral, since I did not have time to spend time there. No feelings. But leaving SPCE was different. I was positively happy I was going. I was also kind of sad, but not about leaving. I was more sad I had to stay on this long. Four years is a pretty long time you know. An especially long time if you have endured it and not enjoyed it.
But lets begin from the beginning.....
I still remember the day I had entered SPCE for the first time. After all, one had to submit the forms for engineering admissions. Long queues, badly managed, perhaps it should have given me the hint. But I too awestruck at that moment in time. And awe inspires imperviousness. I still considered it a privilege to walk on the hallowed corridors of this superhuman structure.
(I had put in this post as a draft. Perhaps stopped writing because of some interruption and did not continue. Let us see if I ever get down to completing it.)
17th April 2006, or last Monday was the last day BE Electronics collected in the classroom as a class. I realized this fact later that day, while having dinner (Four submissions and eight hours of non-stop writing leave you weirdly numb, don't they?) Strangely for many, and rather not-so-strangely for me, I was feeling kind of happy. I could remember the other farewells I have had. The time I had to leave school, I was a bit sad but also full of hope. Leaving Sathaye was kind of neutral, since I did not have time to spend time there. No feelings. But leaving SPCE was different. I was positively happy I was going. I was also kind of sad, but not about leaving. I was more sad I had to stay on this long. Four years is a pretty long time you know. An especially long time if you have endured it and not enjoyed it.
But lets begin from the beginning.....
I still remember the day I had entered SPCE for the first time. After all, one had to submit the forms for engineering admissions. Long queues, badly managed, perhaps it should have given me the hint. But I too awestruck at that moment in time. And awe inspires imperviousness. I still considered it a privilege to walk on the hallowed corridors of this superhuman structure.
(I had put in this post as a draft. Perhaps stopped writing because of some interruption and did not continue. Let us see if I ever get down to completing it.)
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
Testing Times!
The tension in the air was palpable. The group of 40 were crowded around the door, waiting, with a bated breath. As the lights came on, the faces became visible. As the clock ticked, the numbers mounted. The trepidation on each face was increasingly evident. They were all waiting. Waiting for the watchman!
'I should not lose out this time. Perhaps, this would the last occasion I will have to attempt this. A last chance of being party to the stellar example of class unity.' My thougts were racing as I raced up the stairs. (Ok! Ok! I confess... It was more of dragging myself up!)
"Twenty-two", went the chorus I reached my destination. Many of my would be partners-in-crime had already arrived. The Counting was a feeble attempt in introducing a much-needed comic relief. It was exciting.
Beating the system is strangely pleasurable. The anticipation of popular rebellion is always shrouded in mystery. It never wears off. The initial excitement, the covertness of the act, the sense of achievement that follows, makes it worth the effort.
The strained muscles on the tired hands were conspicuous. After all, the weight of the book they had held, for more than an hour, could easily give a dumbell a run for its money. The Counting went on. With it, rose the impatience. Before the unity, came the competition. The seats were limited, the contenders - numerous. Mutual tolerance was not the first thing that dominated collective consciousness presently. As moment by moment passed, the jokes flew thick and fast. It was the jokes that highlighted the all-pervading stress. Underlined it.
The confused eyes stared at the alien figures; trying to make sense of the outlandish diagrams, attempting to remember the convoluted examples. 'Arre khali index padh le', sanity screamed from somewhere. I smiled.
9.00 a.m. - that was the time at which the test had been promised. But a gruelling examination had already commenced. A common thread spun through the crowd. An indomitable belief in their teacher's immutable methods. This was what had attracted them an hour before time. The door was bent, but not broken by the incident pressure. On display was some excellent engineering.
A spark of expectation ignited in the crowd. The imminent arrival of the treasured one fired hopes. The watchman climbed up.
'Yay', went the collective exclamation.
The saviour disappointed. He went past his waving fans. But he would return - they knew that. Patient. But he stopped. The armour of the knight lost its sheen. The mob intimidated him. The air was rife with the sense of adventure. Adrenaline was pumping in each body. He took a few courageous steps, towards the periphery - towards me. The pack made way for him.
It happened too fast then. 'Ankur uske peeche jaa..', shouted a voice. I sensed the opportunity and lunged for it. Before the sea became one, the Jews guided by Moses had crossed to the other end. The key went in. Click! The crowd screamed forward, easily rivalling any Virar local. Legs spattered over the wooden dias. First, second, third.... the fourth row, that was the place for me. I rushed, battling the oncoming pressure. The last one was gone. But I was not late yet....
Exhilaration. Ecstacy. I had conquered the second last bench. My fiefdom was established. In half a minute, the class was full. Victory crowned my forehead. My eyes were shining and my hands were trembling, still incredulous of my brave attempt. Finally, passing in today's class test seemed a distinctly realizable possibility.
'I should not lose out this time. Perhaps, this would the last occasion I will have to attempt this. A last chance of being party to the stellar example of class unity.' My thougts were racing as I raced up the stairs. (Ok! Ok! I confess... It was more of dragging myself up!)
"Twenty-two", went the chorus I reached my destination. Many of my would be partners-in-crime had already arrived. The Counting was a feeble attempt in introducing a much-needed comic relief. It was exciting.
Beating the system is strangely pleasurable. The anticipation of popular rebellion is always shrouded in mystery. It never wears off. The initial excitement, the covertness of the act, the sense of achievement that follows, makes it worth the effort.
The strained muscles on the tired hands were conspicuous. After all, the weight of the book they had held, for more than an hour, could easily give a dumbell a run for its money. The Counting went on. With it, rose the impatience. Before the unity, came the competition. The seats were limited, the contenders - numerous. Mutual tolerance was not the first thing that dominated collective consciousness presently. As moment by moment passed, the jokes flew thick and fast. It was the jokes that highlighted the all-pervading stress. Underlined it.
The confused eyes stared at the alien figures; trying to make sense of the outlandish diagrams, attempting to remember the convoluted examples. 'Arre khali index padh le', sanity screamed from somewhere. I smiled.
9.00 a.m. - that was the time at which the test had been promised. But a gruelling examination had already commenced. A common thread spun through the crowd. An indomitable belief in their teacher's immutable methods. This was what had attracted them an hour before time. The door was bent, but not broken by the incident pressure. On display was some excellent engineering.
A spark of expectation ignited in the crowd. The imminent arrival of the treasured one fired hopes. The watchman climbed up.
'Yay', went the collective exclamation.
The saviour disappointed. He went past his waving fans. But he would return - they knew that. Patient. But he stopped. The armour of the knight lost its sheen. The mob intimidated him. The air was rife with the sense of adventure. Adrenaline was pumping in each body. He took a few courageous steps, towards the periphery - towards me. The pack made way for him.
It happened too fast then. 'Ankur uske peeche jaa..', shouted a voice. I sensed the opportunity and lunged for it. Before the sea became one, the Jews guided by Moses had crossed to the other end. The key went in. Click! The crowd screamed forward, easily rivalling any Virar local. Legs spattered over the wooden dias. First, second, third.... the fourth row, that was the place for me. I rushed, battling the oncoming pressure. The last one was gone. But I was not late yet....
Exhilaration. Ecstacy. I had conquered the second last bench. My fiefdom was established. In half a minute, the class was full. Victory crowned my forehead. My eyes were shining and my hands were trembling, still incredulous of my brave attempt. Finally, passing in today's class test seemed a distinctly realizable possibility.
Monday, March 27, 2006
Dil Dhoondta hai....
'Dil dhoondta hai, phir wahi fursat ke raat din
Baithe hue tasavvur-e-jaana kiye hue.....'
Bhupinder was crooning on RadioCity. It was a few days before the IIM Lucknow GD/PI. I had heard this song many times before, but never before could I relate to it better. My heart searches for those days of leisure - 'woh fursat ke raat din'. That I would have a lot of 'fursat' in hand a few days later was my optimistic attempt at self-consolation. The past days had been hectic. In fact, the past year had been hectic. And one hell of a hectic year. I started leafing through the pages of my memory. In search of the time that had flown away..... and left in its wake, an eventful year bursting towards the end. Eventful and hectic, perhaps I have chosen the correct words here. You decide.
March - May
Jaadon ki narm dhoop aur aangan mein letkar....
I can still remember last March and my frustrating efforts at trying to master the intricacies of the English Grammar with the Cambridge English Skill Builder. Ten days of bunking college and studying for TOEFL. Cannot call it hard work but whatever it was, it paid of in the end with a perfect score on the TOEFL. My only regret, this score does not matter at all to the admissions committee, so maybe whatever it was, it did not pay off that well. Then came the painful realization that even though I have postponed my GRE to August, I will still have to study to study for it sometime. But because I ha developed procrastination to a fine art, I didn't have any problems ignoring studying for the GRE.
April came knocking and with it a few shocks as project groups were formed. Class politics does not stop anywhere. I decided even I want to do a project. A new realization also dawned that scoring marks is the way to meaningful life. I also discovered that Ghalib was one of India's most famous poets.
May the great God repeat last may this May. I did something then I have shunned ever since. Studying for the exams. The almost daily guiding sessions with friends helped me remember that I have to pass, maybe also score, this semester. As the exams began, for perhaps the first time in my life, I experienced not regretting not studying in the PL.
June
Aankhon par kheench kar tere Daaman ke saaye ko...
"No vacations this time!". Those were my first thoughts as I read about the upcomig campus placements. I went around collecting interview tips and sifting through the sand for my 'resume'. Being reduced to a single page, didn't help especially help ease mental stress but had to live with it. Shakuntala Devi replaced Dan Brown as the author of the season for most of the crowd. (It seems Infy questions were 'inspired' by that book.) Apparently both TCS and INFY had lots of places for communication-skills-disasters, so I was accepted at both places (inspite of the pitiful interviews whose transcripts I will not blog!). Immediately after my acceptances arrived, I rushed for my internship (If you can call two-three weeks of timepass an internship). The tension of the impending GRE, now less than 45 days away, was gnawing into me. Trudged along to Vashi everday, pitifully trying to mug wordlists, day by day, everyday.
July
Aundhe pade rahe kabhi karvat liye hue
July held lots for me other than July 26th. Intership ends. Full-on GRE mode. Come to terms with the fact that I need to write essays now. Other facts too dawn on me : wordlists really do not matter and the no-logic required b******* they teach in GRE classes (mine was IMFS) is just that. Realize that I have enough potential to score in the GRE as I know the meaning of b*******. Start writing essays in all earnestness. Then comes 26th July, which told me that I can live in stress. Even if only for a day, but I can keep my cool when required. It also told me that Mumbai is not all that bad, after all. I also started reading Ghalib.
August
Ya garmiyon ki raat jo purvaiyan chale...
My essays improved with time. And effort. D-Day came and went. I don't know whether I changed but the world around me sure did. The class next day was a welcome surprise. From being a non-entity, I was directly catapulted to the hall of fame. I remember around 30 people congratulating me in a space two minutes. My 15 seconds (or rather 2 minutes) under the sun. Either these people had no idea how little the GRE score mattered or they were just being good for the sake of it. I suspect the former, as I suffered from the same ignorance. I love double helpings of everything and providence was feeling bountiful. I received my highest score in engineering till now. Nothing that great relatively but still great. Relatively.
The rest of the month was spent adjusting to college and life post-GRE.
(I had my first thoughts about starting a blog when I experienced this month. The details are still etched out in my memory, of my imaginary posts on my imaginary blog.)
September-October
Thandee Safed chadron par jaage der tak...
Early september was spent gloating over the astonished faces of counsellors as I told them my GRE scores. Finally decided I have to start applying and have to 'build' a profile. There are supposed masters of this art in existence. Then there are those who suffer from ethical qualms. But ethics are expendable. Was into 'Ghalib' by now.
I was talked into trying the CAT too. Just to get the feel you know, if the MS stuff does not work out. That would give me sufficient ground to plan for next year. Also appeared for my first Sim-CAT. Didn't even know about what or how many questions does the CAT have. Then I saw my first result. Seriously thought that IMS has goofed up its checking. Also realized one warm sunny day what Nehru meant when he critically analyzed Aurobindo's statement "The pure virgin moment."
Built my profile in October. Did little else. (Profile-building is not an easy exercise you know. This was also the first year I forgot my own birthday while busy in this task.) Was disabused of my notions about the GRE. Also reconsidered my decision to apply for MS for the umpteenth time. Another claim to fame this month. A seventh rank on the 'black list'. But it had more white on it than black I think. Gloated again on reading encouraging replies to my query on the CAT yahoogroup.
Baithe hue tasavvur-e-jaana kiye hue.....'
Bhupinder was crooning on RadioCity. It was a few days before the IIM Lucknow GD/PI. I had heard this song many times before, but never before could I relate to it better. My heart searches for those days of leisure - 'woh fursat ke raat din'. That I would have a lot of 'fursat' in hand a few days later was my optimistic attempt at self-consolation. The past days had been hectic. In fact, the past year had been hectic. And one hell of a hectic year. I started leafing through the pages of my memory. In search of the time that had flown away..... and left in its wake, an eventful year bursting towards the end. Eventful and hectic, perhaps I have chosen the correct words here. You decide.
March - May
Jaadon ki narm dhoop aur aangan mein letkar....
I can still remember last March and my frustrating efforts at trying to master the intricacies of the English Grammar with the Cambridge English Skill Builder. Ten days of bunking college and studying for TOEFL. Cannot call it hard work but whatever it was, it paid of in the end with a perfect score on the TOEFL. My only regret, this score does not matter at all to the admissions committee, so maybe whatever it was, it did not pay off that well. Then came the painful realization that even though I have postponed my GRE to August, I will still have to study to study for it sometime. But because I ha developed procrastination to a fine art, I didn't have any problems ignoring studying for the GRE.
April came knocking and with it a few shocks as project groups were formed. Class politics does not stop anywhere. I decided even I want to do a project. A new realization also dawned that scoring marks is the way to meaningful life. I also discovered that Ghalib was one of India's most famous poets.
May the great God repeat last may this May. I did something then I have shunned ever since. Studying for the exams. The almost daily guiding sessions with friends helped me remember that I have to pass, maybe also score, this semester. As the exams began, for perhaps the first time in my life, I experienced not regretting not studying in the PL.
June
Aankhon par kheench kar tere Daaman ke saaye ko...
"No vacations this time!". Those were my first thoughts as I read about the upcomig campus placements. I went around collecting interview tips and sifting through the sand for my 'resume'. Being reduced to a single page, didn't help especially help ease mental stress but had to live with it. Shakuntala Devi replaced Dan Brown as the author of the season for most of the crowd. (It seems Infy questions were 'inspired' by that book.) Apparently both TCS and INFY had lots of places for communication-skills-disasters, so I was accepted at both places (inspite of the pitiful interviews whose transcripts I will not blog!). Immediately after my acceptances arrived, I rushed for my internship (If you can call two-three weeks of timepass an internship). The tension of the impending GRE, now less than 45 days away, was gnawing into me. Trudged along to Vashi everday, pitifully trying to mug wordlists, day by day, everyday.
July
Aundhe pade rahe kabhi karvat liye hue
July held lots for me other than July 26th. Intership ends. Full-on GRE mode. Come to terms with the fact that I need to write essays now. Other facts too dawn on me : wordlists really do not matter and the no-logic required b******* they teach in GRE classes (mine was IMFS) is just that. Realize that I have enough potential to score in the GRE as I know the meaning of b*******. Start writing essays in all earnestness. Then comes 26th July, which told me that I can live in stress. Even if only for a day, but I can keep my cool when required. It also told me that Mumbai is not all that bad, after all. I also started reading Ghalib.
August
Ya garmiyon ki raat jo purvaiyan chale...
My essays improved with time. And effort. D-Day came and went. I don't know whether I changed but the world around me sure did. The class next day was a welcome surprise. From being a non-entity, I was directly catapulted to the hall of fame. I remember around 30 people congratulating me in a space two minutes. My 15 seconds (or rather 2 minutes) under the sun. Either these people had no idea how little the GRE score mattered or they were just being good for the sake of it. I suspect the former, as I suffered from the same ignorance. I love double helpings of everything and providence was feeling bountiful. I received my highest score in engineering till now. Nothing that great relatively but still great. Relatively.
The rest of the month was spent adjusting to college and life post-GRE.
(I had my first thoughts about starting a blog when I experienced this month. The details are still etched out in my memory, of my imaginary posts on my imaginary blog.)
September-October
Thandee Safed chadron par jaage der tak...
Early september was spent gloating over the astonished faces of counsellors as I told them my GRE scores. Finally decided I have to start applying and have to 'build' a profile. There are supposed masters of this art in existence. Then there are those who suffer from ethical qualms. But ethics are expendable. Was into 'Ghalib' by now.
I was talked into trying the CAT too. Just to get the feel you know, if the MS stuff does not work out. That would give me sufficient ground to plan for next year. Also appeared for my first Sim-CAT. Didn't even know about what or how many questions does the CAT have. Then I saw my first result. Seriously thought that IMS has goofed up its checking. Also realized one warm sunny day what Nehru meant when he critically analyzed Aurobindo's statement "The pure virgin moment."
Built my profile in October. Did little else. (Profile-building is not an easy exercise you know. This was also the first year I forgot my own birthday while busy in this task.) Was disabused of my notions about the GRE. Also reconsidered my decision to apply for MS for the umpteenth time. Another claim to fame this month. A seventh rank on the 'black list'. But it had more white on it than black I think. Gloated again on reading encouraging replies to my query on the CAT yahoogroup.
November
Taaron ko dekhte rahen chhat par pade hue
A new low for me. Knew nothing except for the subject names for all my vivas. CAT fever rose exponentially. I knew the tables from 1-1o by now. With only 5 days left, 11-20 was not worth it. Learnt the binomial theorem on the last day. Who knows.... CAT day came. It did not go away that easily. I tried finding the perfect answer-key amongst the ones floating around in the inane media-frenzy. Failed miserably and gave up hopes on CAT. CAT went to the dogs (couldn't resist the pun! sorry!). Exams arrived. Studying helped. Friends helped. CAT did not help.
December
Barfeelee sardiyon mein kisi bhi pahad par...
Exams came to an end. I knew I am not going to score well. But just did not care. No time for caring. University deadlines were approaching and my packets were still not ready.
Worked. Worked fast. Worked sloppy. But worked. Mourned the funeral of another so-called vacation. Came to know that the US of A celebrates Christmas in a big way. Most univs are closed and application packets jammed. Stopped reading Ghalib in frustration.
January
Waadi mein Goonjti hui Khamoshiyan sune....
10, 9, 8, 7...... I was fervently counting the number of universities left for applying. Finally this uncompletable task is nearing a finale. My tired eyes were searching for a much needed relief. It was mid-January when I realized that I will be busy wasting this whole semester too. I was just left with two universities when I got the CATcalls. I almost groaned in happiness. Spent the next day trying to locate Kozhikode on the Indian Map. Also remembered I have a project to do. College started like a rickety BEST bus stuck in the first gear. I did not start. CAT results again brought a flurry of congratulations, many through email this time. Someone wished me 'Happy Republic Day'. I started blogging.
The IMS achiever's batches also started. Gloated again on being called an achiever. Realized pretty desperately that something has to be done about the project. Started reading Ghalib's biography. Stopped gloating after an IMS mock interview with Gaurav Sabnis and the 'VJTI guy'.
February
Aankhon mein bheege bheege se lamhe liye hue
Wiped my sweaty forehead. Had a bout of incomprehension the first time I started reading ET. Realized I will have to miss the industrial visit. Mourned it. Also spent time inventing curses for IIM Lucknow. Finished reading Ghalib's biography. Was desperate for a change of atmosphere. Started attending college.
The interview process started. I thought I am the lost one. Dawned on me that I am simply a lost one. Battled the deprivation of exclusivity. Also received the lowest percentage of my life in the penultimate semester (it happened right when my IIM K interview was on). Had a few enoyable moments at IITB. Tried to emulate those everywhere.
March
Dil dhoondta hai....
Bhupinder was repeating his lines now, lines of Gulzar inspired from a ghazal of Ghalib. All said and done there was nothing more he could say. As for me, I was waiting, searching.
The PresentThe IMS achiever's batches also started. Gloated again on being called an achiever. Realized pretty desperately that something has to be done about the project. Started reading Ghalib's biography. Stopped gloating after an IMS mock interview with Gaurav Sabnis and the 'VJTI guy'.
February
Aankhon mein bheege bheege se lamhe liye hue
Wiped my sweaty forehead. Had a bout of incomprehension the first time I started reading ET. Realized I will have to miss the industrial visit. Mourned it. Also spent time inventing curses for IIM Lucknow. Finished reading Ghalib's biography. Was desperate for a change of atmosphere. Started attending college.
The interview process started. I thought I am the lost one. Dawned on me that I am simply a lost one. Battled the deprivation of exclusivity. Also received the lowest percentage of my life in the penultimate semester (it happened right when my IIM K interview was on). Had a few enoyable moments at IITB. Tried to emulate those everywhere.
March
Dil dhoondta hai....
Bhupinder was repeating his lines now, lines of Gulzar inspired from a ghazal of Ghalib. All said and done there was nothing more he could say. As for me, I was waiting, searching.
The class was enjoying Rajasthani deserts and the invisible tigers of Ranthambore while I mulled over Chidambram's budget. But this would end. It would end on 18th of March with IIM I over. Then I can start being me again. The tribulations shall cease. The celebrations will begin. Life will be fun. The world will be stress-free. I will enjoy the final semester to the hilt. While I was engrossed in my Utopian dreams, 18th came. I enjoyed the next day, a Sunday, still dreaming of the fursat ke din ahead.
I went to college frothing with joy and drooling with hope the next day. After the customary 'How did the interview go?' questions, the barrage started.
'Arre Monday ko PE ka assignment submit karna hai'
'Robotics ka journal market mein aa gaya hai'
'Tera DCN likhke hua?'
'Next week mostly class test hai. Mecha kitna likhna hai kuchh maloom hai kya?'
'Yaar project vivas next month hain. Kitna khatam hua hai?'
I started writing. There was no time for waiting or searching. There was no time. The only thing I could remember was, 'Dil dhoondta hai phir wahi fursat ke....'
I went to college frothing with joy and drooling with hope the next day. After the customary 'How did the interview go?' questions, the barrage started.
'Arre Monday ko PE ka assignment submit karna hai'
'Robotics ka journal market mein aa gaya hai'
'Tera DCN likhke hua?'
'Next week mostly class test hai. Mecha kitna likhna hai kuchh maloom hai kya?'
'Yaar project vivas next month hain. Kitna khatam hua hai?'
I started writing. There was no time for waiting or searching. There was no time. The only thing I could remember was, 'Dil dhoondta hai phir wahi fursat ke....'
Saturday, March 25, 2006
Guesswork does not work (at IIM Indore) - Part II
Recap: (Refer the previous post) I go to Vashi for my IIM I GD/PI in a miserable condition. The GD is relatively good coz it was equally miserable for everyone except one guy. Waiting outside for the PI to start. Random numbers being called in....
......my impatient friend was imploring me to beg the panelists to take me in. I was dissuading him from encouraging me towards such drastic steps when I sensed the presence of P1 in the waiting room.
P1: “Ankur Saraf”
Me: “Yes Sir”
Me: “Sure Sir” (Handed over the ‘certificate’ file with a grand total of two certificates)
P1 suddenly realizes that in an interview, they are supposed to ask questions. He sort of nudges P2 (Like saying, “Arre I don’t know what to ask him, you start. I want to do a doctorate on his two certificates.”)
Me: Repeated same old answer. Since he just asked this question to gain time, he didn’t listen that carefully. Carried on for about a minute.
Me: (F***, he knows what ghazals are? Mar gaye yaar! Band baja dega! Arre sir, just above that I have written reading books. Please read that.) “Yes”
Me: (its high time I started screwing up my case, and I do not disappoint myself) “Gulzar, Hasrat Mohani, Daag Dehlvi, then Ghulam Ali Sahab writes his ghazals, even Mehndi Hassan writes his ghazals…”
P2 (surprised) : “Mehndi Hassan writes ghazals? Are you sure”
Me (pretty happily) : “Yes!” (have dug a 2 feet deep grave by now)
P2 : (I gave you one chance. Now don’t blame me.) “Name one ghazal which Mehndi Hassan has written.”
Me: (Abey yaar, woh sahib aisi urdu mein gaate hain ki padhne sunne ka waqt hi nahi milta) “I don’t listen to Mehndi Hassan but I have read on an online forum that he has written some of his ghazals” (6 feet deep now)
Me: “Yes. He is one of the most famous lyricists of Bollywood.” Take a stupid pause of 1 second. “If you want to think of other ghazal lyricists, then there’s Ghalib, Faiz….”
Me: (Never heard that name. A bit shocked)”Sir, I have no idea”
P2: “You have heard the name or you have not even heard the name?”
Me: “I have not heard the name.” Thought lets clear all the muck up. Otherwise I will only move into deeper shit. “Actually, I started listening to ghazals only about an year ago. I was introduced to this through the internet. I usually go to online forums to get recommendations about which albums are good and then go and get those. I usually listen to Jagjit Singh and my favourite album is Mirza Ghalib. I have gone and read many of Ghalib’s ghazals on the internet as well as listened to other recitations of his ghazals.” (Forgot to mention the main thing that holds attraction for me here, the structure of the ghazal. With that I also lost an opportunity to steer the PI towards safer waters.)
P2: “What is the organization concerned with preserving Ghalib’s heritage?”
Me: “I don’t know”
P2: “What was Ghalib’s full name?” (The condition’s real bad now, he is asking me names!!)
Me: “Mirza Assdullah Beg Khan. Some people say its just Mirza Assadullah Khan as Beg was the name of his father.”
P2: “What language did Ghalib write in?”
Me: “He thought Persian is a better language compared to Urdu, so his early writings are in Persian. But in his times, no one understood Persian, so he turned to Urdu. His most famous work, the Diwan-e-Ghalib is in Urdu. But Ghalib always believed that Persian is superior.”
Me: (Thinking about whether it was early or late nineteenth century) “The nineteenth century”
P2: “What is the lane where Ghalib lived in
Me: (Arre Sir! I have not yet completed my Phd. on Ghalib. Will inform you when I do that) “I don’t know.”
P2: “I asked that because it’s near a very famous monument”
Me: “Actually I have read a book on Ghalib and it does not mention any great monument in his lane. So I have no idea.”
P2: “Tell me universities which have their names based on a religion.”
Me: “
Me: “In UP”
Me: (Cursing my lack of foresight while studying geography at school, I venture with a guess) “The Ganges”
Me: (Geography shud really be made compulsory reading in college!! Accept my guesswork) “I am not sure. I took a guess. But I still think it’s not the Yamuna but the
Me: (still left with a trace of bravado, I am trying to recollect where Gangotri is situated, UP or Uttaranchal) “The starting point is called as Gangotri.” Stop here like a dumb idiot
Me: (having utilized all my risk taking capabilities by now) “ I don’t know.”
Me: (Thinking about how geography can be included the already heavy engineering syllabus) “If I take a guess, I am not sure, but think it would be that it goes through West Bengal and then meets the Bramhaputra and then goes through that big delta.”
Me: (Control the urge to shout out of syllabus. I am also thinking that chokes have probably choked themselves out of existence. What else do you expect with such a suicidal name?) “A choke is necessary to provide the initial high voltage to start the tubelight. So all tubelights would need a choke. We cannot make a tubelight without a choke.” (Bright answer that, seems I have started with my coffin)
Me: (Me – engineer – Thank you sir!) “They may have made the choke small and must have hidden it somewhere. Behind the tube, on the sides, maybe even inside the tube. The choke cannot be done away with.”
Me: “Actually I have only seen one advertisement of chokeless tubelights. That was a long time ago. But I would still say, they manage placing the choke out of sight rather than totally removing it.”
Me: (I know of fuzzy logic. It rings a bell. My logic is always fuzzy-wuzzy. But it’s used in washing machines! That’s news!) “I do not know the answer. Fuzzy logic is not part of our formal curriculum (finally blurted that out) but I would still like to think (better word for guess) of how it would be used. (P1 encourages me here to go on with the all the b******t I had in mind.) In the conventional digital logic we have only two levels 0 and 1. Fuzzy logic defines levels between the 0 and 1. So here I think the complexity of the circuit would increase but the no. of bits required would decrease. There would be better computation. It’s used in microchips in the washing machine.” (By this time I knew I cannot even guess properly, was smiling all the while as I answered)
Me: (refrigerators, washing machines, what are they? I live in the technical Stone Age. Questions should be scrapped as being discrimatory towards disadvantaged applicants.) “Sir, actually the only thing I know about fuzzy logic is a one line definition on the internet. So maybe its used for defining different levels where multiple levels are used. Like you can have different levels of washing or temperature in a refrigerator.”
Me: (The rich fool who does dat deserves a fat electricity bill!! And he should buy everything from me. I wouldn’t need to go to an IIM to earn money then) “It would put a lot of load on the compressor. A refrigerator has this whole system with the coolant being used to take heat from the inside to the outside the refrigerator, transfer the heat energy. The load of maintaining the temperature falls on the compressor. So the life of the compressor will decrease.”
Me: (stare stupidly while contemplating if I should reveal the get-rich-quick plan his question inspired)
P1: “what happens to the temperature… of the room?”
Me: (Great. Where do you think I have come from? Kindergarten. No one will say its gets cooler!!) “Sir, as I said before, the coolant only transfers heat from the inside of the refrigerator to the outside, so the effective temperature will remain the same. Maybe temperature just outside the refrigerator door will decrease but nothing else will happen!”
Me: (assuming air coolers is air conditioners) “It’s the same principle as the refrigerator. Only here the coolant transfers the heat to outside the room. So the room becomes cooler. It takes in air, cools it and then gives it back in.”
Me: (tubelight jali. Remembered the coolers I had seen in Rajasthan at age 5, when life was cool) “By coolers, do we mean air conditioners?”
Me: “Then are those the coolers found in Rajasthan?”
Me: “The ones with the straw mats drenched in water and a fan behind the straw mat.”
Me: (Thinking furiously as to how they work.Want to figure it out at any damn cost.) “Sir, I was very small when I had seen those. They have pretty dry summers over there and so this provides some humidity” (Dimag mein ek ghanti baji… Continue without breaking the flow..) “and when the water evaporates, it takes some heat with it. So the room gets cooler.”
Me: (Happy at getting a repeat question. Harped again about coolant, air going in hot and coming out cool funda.) “…… So it transfers the heat from inside to outside the room.”
P1: “That’s why you have that thing jutting out of air-coditioned rooms.”
Me: (So you came to know how I guessed this one! Big deal!) “Yes, that is the reason.”
Me: “Like the fan, the hard disk, the microchip..”
P1: (continues) “Yes yes, so how do we provide different voltage supplies for all these different voltage levels with the one incoming supply.”
Me: (Sir, I am not electrician, as you said I am an electronics engineer. Why don’t you come to GSM/CDMA, AM/FM, TRAI and the rest of the things?) “We can use a rectifier and a voltage-shifter to provide all the different voltages.”
Me: “See, we can use a rectifier for converting ac to dc and then the voltage shifter to shift dc levels. That way all voltages can be provided for.”
Me: (smiling again..) “No Sir. In fact, I don’t know how it’s actually done. I was just thinking of one way in which we can do it.”
Me: (Again thinking furiously, time for some creative guesswork, I guess) “With the voltage, the current inside the chip would increase. So, the power dissipated would increase and the chip would burn out.” (Not quite satisfied with this, both P1 and me, so I start guessing again) “And the transistors in a chip are placed in such a way that electrons do not cross over from one area to another. But with high voltage the electromagnetic forces (sometimes I surprise even myself!!) become stronger with electrons jumping across regions and this will lead to chip malfunction” (Wah! Wah! Kya thoka hai! No one would think this is an IIM interview going on.)
Me: “Thank you”
Me: (I was so goddamn happy. I gave a big spontaneous smile and picked up a cream biscuit, of the two present.) “Thank you!”
This sorta of woke P2 up. He returned the smile and I started with the biscuit as soon as my back was towards them. Even before I left the room.
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