The Try : Part 1

Yesterday, Sagar made a startling revelation to all his buddies, including me.

'I love her, guys. I am the Next.'

'Whom?', we asked in chorus, as if rehearsing for some third-rate, forcibly-make-believe street play. Though I never used to get his unnecessary jargon I did get a hint of what his 'next' would be about.

'Aastha, you dumbos.', I heard from him and thought 'who's the dumbo ?'

For a second there was the silence of confusion. I suppose all of us were ten percent happy and ninety percent amazed at his courage. Happy for his face was lighted with cheer, a face that had just managed to smile mildly for a second when he got a cent in his Numerical Analysis paper, and then made up by yawning for a minute. Amazement, was even more obvious. Aastha had dozens of aspirants dreaming of her, and half of them were listening to Sagar at this moment. Though the amazement was at his imagination that made him believe he could win the race. The other day a seminar on 'Heights of Imagination' was arranged by the cultural society people. We never knew he had attended it even as he told us he's going to sleep in his room. Now we were sure he did.

Probably he attended it sitting on the front bench. That is his trademark. Sagar isn't a stud, apart from his grades. But no one knows about his grades. Yes I forgot he's unknown too. Half the class wouldn’t recognise him on phone, because they'd not have ever heard his voice.

'Its DCE mate! Where every girl with two feet and a nose considers herself an Aishwarya Rai and all of us some Rajpal Yadav duplicate. And you're talking about the best goddamn material there is.', yelled Abhay. Pretension was never Abhay's forte. But he could have done without this one, I thought. So I went ahead to mend matters so that Sagar doesn't get depressed.

'Great Man! Who knows, you might not even talk to this funny Abhay once you're done. You know what I mean.', I added with a superficial smile followed by a wink of an eye that didn’t come naturally with the mood either.

'What the hell. I thought you guys would be happy on hearing this. You guys are no friends. You are hopeless.'

None of said a word, and we agreed to him partly. Apart from Vaibhav who chuckled, 'Better be hopeless than a hopefool!' and then laughed loudly and raised his palms before mine hoping I'd clap my hands to his. That was a tough situation for me. I had already resisted laughing out along with him, but now I had to refuse his clap too. I couldn't resist the temptation. On the spur of the moment, I clapped my hands against his, and then immediately looked back at Sagar and winked an eye to him indicating to him that Vaibhav's the fool. Sagar looked foolishly confused.

After about an hour of conversation in which most of us were hell bent towards pessimism, Rajat finally agreed to help him out. Rajat had a better track record than all the others, so that made Sagar all the more bullish on his chances of success. Though I'd still call the bullishness, pure foolishness, but they were both very proud of their optimism.

Rajat has got this better reputation than all of us, all for nothing I believe. I have never believed his tales about his sky high feats. And none of those feats had been achieved in front of our eyes, we were just told about them. By none other than Rajat himself. All I held about him was that he is my friends' friend who knows nothing better than occupying one computer centre seat all the time and never taking his ass off it, however important the waiting guy's work on the computer might be. He was as happy about his fanlist on orkut reaching two hundred as Mika might have been at the Rakhi Sawant pappi. He is known to have more than a thousand friends there, and doesn't forget to mention at the slightest provocation that he has more people in his fanlist as you'd have in your friends' one. The addict that he is, I wouldn't be surprised if he answers his exam sheets starting with a 'u there?' and putting a :) following correct answers, a :( following presumably incorrect ones, brb before his 'may I go to toilet/drink water' breaks, and gtg at the end of the exam. That might as well be the case infact, coz hiz marx r a bl8ant p8h8ic. He is a humble guy though, lolzz.

Anyways, I went back to my room then, my eyes already strained by the excessive winking.

( ...... Shall be continued )

Yeah!!! Its october the fourth.

It always makes me think a lot - how to start a post when I have no clue what is it going to be about. So today I just thought I'd write 'It always makes me..' and get away with it.

The Indo-Pak final, first of all. There was something electric about the atmosphere at Common Room , JCB hostel, DCE. Many guys have told me that they saw it on the big screen and some who saw it with beer and some who saw it with the 'crowd'. But all that still leaves me sceptical as to whether one could have enjoyed the match more than us, 100 of us squeezed inside the common room which refuses to accommodate more than 30 people at a time if anything else is up on TV. Anyway, I think I am incapable of reflecting the true feel of that day in writing, so I'd rather stop here than understate the excitement.

In time, I've felt that the only people more saddened by this Indian victory than the Pakistanis and the Bookies are the Indian Hockey people. I really feel they could've done without this 'meri bhi tareef karo naa' gimmick. Its understandable when they say their Asia Cup victory wasn't applauded as much as the Indian victory, although hockey is the national game. Yeah really, that's what Joaquim Carvalho said. But what about reconsidering Hockey's status as the national sport itself. It just does not reflect mass preferences keeping hockey the national sport, practically speaking. I followed the Hockey Asia cup too and personally was perhaps equally happy at the sight of India's smashing victory in it, but I still consider the Carvalho statement as one being in bad taste at a time when we should join the cricket team in the celebration of their hard fought victory.

Having said that, I'd also want to mention the growing nuisance that that the Indian Media has become of late. And this does not include India TV, Total TV, and yeah IBN 7. You'll agree they can hardly be put under the category 'Media', if you've ever watched their Afternoon's sequence of programmes. Even the others have been far too immature in their coverage of Cricket, far too aggressive in their coverage of Politics, far too Ignorant in their coverage, or the lack of it, of Hockey, and far too lost otherwise. In hailing Dhoni's tactics as the coolest captain, I think they've been hasty in this judgement, to say the least. Having accepted and rejoiced the Laurels that the men in blue brought, giving the last over to Joginder Sharma who had just gone for 2 sixes included 16 runs in his previous over, was far from sensible thinking. Fortune favoured India, as Pakistan , which came so close to victory as 6 runs off 4 balls lost it due to a poor shot. Had that misfortune not struck the Pakistanis , we might have had oodles of criticism meted out against the same Dhoni, which would have been unfair no doubt, but so was the incessant praise too. I think I've made myself clear.

Its the season of College CultFests in Delhi. Unlike last year, I haven't been to many this year but thoroughly enjoyed the only one I went to - LHMC fest. The reasons for not missing the LHMC one are obvious, and precisely the same reasons hold for why I enjoyed it so much. And I realised I can appear drunk without actually drinking. Money saving habits I guess.

Finally, CAT race has begun for me. More than just a means for chasing a fat paying job, for me it is the reason to spend the year and more in doing something worthwhile. It will keep my wandering mind at one place. It will give me a reason to spend time into. For quite some time now, my biggest qualm had been the absence of one thing I'd like to keep myself engaged with for days and days. It gives me purpose, more than the lure of money minting machinery that it has come to be considered as. I hope to make the best of the coming time. I'd love to make it a passionate affair. I'd love to do more things, but its time to stop now.

Some more things

It was sometime last month that I wrote I'll leave it. Yesterday, I thought I'd better do blogging rather than indulging in things that were doing me no good, and made me feel somewhat bad about myself too. So, like always, I have no clue what I'm going to write in the post. But, visitors kindly bear.

Sometimes one wishes all sorts of things, probably out of a ingenuous childishness in all of us. When these wishes fall flat, it hurts. But if you can stand up when it hurts, you can at least be content with yourself, though not necessarily accomplish your wishes. Anyway, enough of the philosophizing.

I learnt a few lessons over the last one month or so. Not from the textbooks though, I still have to learn those. So I think I shall be making some modifications in my mindset and the way I perceive things, if I am able to. To start with, I feel I need to shoot my expectations with myself on the professional front to something may be just short of dead high. Equally importantly, I need to keep the expectations on the personal front to something may be just a notch more than zero. And if instincts are to be believed I think I am already well on my way in this process. Though this agenda sounds a bit like making a robot out of oneself, but you'll agree that robotic is any day better than moronic.

The other day I was having a discussion with a classmate about what separates truly successful people from potentially successful ones. No prizes for guessing where I fit myself in these two things. After about an hour of talking I finally arrived to the conclusion that what we lack is that we want acknowledgement for whatever good we are before proceeding to enhance ourselves towards greater excellence and betterment. While the truly successful people, I assume, never aspired any recognition or acknowledgement midway. And may be that is what kept them going to follow their dreams through to their conclusions. In this respect a key area, I feel, that needs working on , on our part, is developing a sort of comfort with solitude or rather a love affair with solitude. None of it might appeal to the readers, but I'll just let you know this is one thing I'll be trying to work on.

Finally, some minute updates. Got selected in Mensa. Bhai left for his MBA and is doing very nicely, I hope he continues to make the most of his strengths and that God bestows upon him all the health and wisdom he'll need.

Anyways, I hope to keep coming back once in a while.

As true as it gets, and as boring

Life in hostel wasn’t like this before. I think there is not much of a difference between living at home or at the hostel with your roommate, if you compare it with living alone in a single room. The third year students in DCE are allotted single rooms, subject to their back paper free academic status. Since I just about managed that somehow I am living alone now for four days, for the first time in my life. As luck would have it almost al the friends I made here during the last two years have been allotted different hostels and the Delhi ones haven’t checked in so far, I guess I am the only one from among them so far to have checked in. And with my long nurtured lazy habits, the case for looking for other alternatives gets a little stronger than walking down three storeys, walking some more and again going up three storeys to hang out with these guys. It was a bit difficult for the first day, there were no interesting alternatives. So I thought I’d make do with forced alternatives until I start finding them interesting. A chance game basically. I had issued three books on my way back from classes, and I decided to read them over. Usually, infact invariably, I return the library books unread courtesy laziness. These books, combined were a good mix of cognitive and recreational, I forced myself to believe. I started with ‘INDIA : what it can teach us’ by F Max Muller . In two hours, I had tears in my eyes. I couldn’t believe it. No, it had nothing to do with my pain at india’s historical miseries. Iwas just too sad at the boring state of my life that I had to find interest in this super boring book which seemed to have been written by this author while watching some bombed documentary film at some crappy theatre where only people with specs with a number greater than six and some matter at their eye-nose interface were permitted to enter. One could find something interesting in watching a repeat telecast of a five year old ‘Krishi Darshan’ episode, but not in this book. I kept it aside and began moaning to myself about the unfortunate catastrophe I thought I was in. Just then a ‘kya haal – bas badiya – chal ok’ friend of minecame to my room and asked which room had I been allotted.

‘The room that you’ve entered’, I answered in an exasperated voice. He laughed loudly as if he caught me mending broken zip of the jeans I was wearing.

As he continued with some thought provoking questions like ‘So classes started..’ ‘H’m staying in hostel?’; ‘H’m new courses?’ I kept nodding my head in agreement when he dropped the most meaningful of his questions, ‘What’s up?’. I quickly began vomiting my grouses out as if waiting for this question to be put up. He looked like he repented asking this question too much. I sensed that and shut up. After a while I asked him if he had ‘Five Point Someone’ or ‘One Night at the call Center’, I’d heard they were interesting and that almost everybody in the hostel had them. He said yes and I borrowed them promptly from his room a floor below mine.

I read both of them in succession – Five Point Someone and then One Night in the Call Center. I think I started at four pm and ended at 3 am, I skipped the dinner I’d had skipped even for moaning to myself – I just cant stand the mess’ Kofte ; don’t go by the name. As I went to sleep I was surprised at reading so many letters in one day and continuously too. I couldn’t ever achieve this sort of concentration even before the exams I was too cautious not to fail. And more importantly, I was cursing myself for not having done a call center stint in the vacations rather than the ngo thing. The novel showed call centers in a dark light, but the utilitarian mind that I have – I preferred to look at the promise it held.

‘Life would have been so much more happening that way’, I wondered.

I don’t know when I dozed off after that.

I got up late the next morning and barely left on time for college. As a matter of fact, I am a pre final year student now and it happens that most of the students I come across on the campus turn out to be my juniors. Not that it means anything to me – a seniority by default. But as a newly admit asked me – Bhai engineering ki classes kahan hain ?’, some faint recollections of two years back flashed before me.

#

Me ( two years younger ) : Bhaiya, Kshitiz ka room kaun sa hai ?

He (one year my senior) : bhaiya kaun hai ******** , ******* hai tu, Sir bol **** ** ****.

And some insignificant duel followed.

#

Flashback over. I told him, 'tu jahan aaya hai vahan har jagah engineering ki hi classes hoti hain, koi yahan silaayi bunaai seekhne bhi aaya hai kya ?’

Fresher – mera matlab drawing ki, engineering drawing ki .

Me – Mechanical mein hoti hain.

He – Vo to hoti hi hain, lekin kahan ?

Me- oh mera matlab block mein, mechanical block mein. Floor pe hoti hain.

He – floor pe ???

Me – Haan floor pe, mera matlab third floor pe.

He left quickly after that. I saw him giggle as he turned. That seemed girlie to me. I even tried to visualise him for some time as clean shaven and with long hair, that is, as a girl. It was futile. He’d look horrible. Then I left too, thinking I was more polished than this junior – I called that senior ‘bhaiya’ not ‘bhaai’ ; and more polished than that senior who called me ********. I tapped my head in self admiration. Suddenly there was a dust storm which spoiled away all the polish from my shoes and in minutes there was drizzle which cleaned them again. Anyways, it was nice as long as the college was on. While I was coming back from college, I was again in thoughts over what to do once back.

That friend came again. He wanted to know how I found the novels. He looked so eager to know, I wondered for once if he had some role in writing them. I told him they were good, but he wasn’t satisfied.

‘After all the effort I put into writing them!!’, he seemed to look like.

Then I said they were outstanding, captivating, mesmerizing and stuff, and he appeared so happy he dropped his sandals and lay himself on my cot, certain now to spend the next of the evening here with me. With hardly any common interests between the two of us ‘Do you have a girlfriend’ was the obvious next step from me to keep afloat some conversation. His face beamed with vigour and he described at length how he went about the wooing business, and how she’d never let him pay all the bills, and that her parents are quite broadminded – ‘I meet her at her home, man!’, he chuckled. Initially I thought ‘I’d pass my time well today’. But as his anecdotes grew and grew, from a story to a novel to an epic, I thought moaning was better. And his flurry of achievements had given me more topics to moan over my under-achievements. Slowly I stopped making the odd remarks intended to cut the awkward gaps of silence. When he still stuck on, I had to ask him to leave saying I had to go for a snack outside. I left with him, locking my room, so as to conform to him I was leaving. Then I wandered around for five minutes and came back to my room. I realised that I hated the loneliness, but I also wanted it.

I plugged in the ipod, switching off the lights and played some Jagjit Singh numbers.

‘Aas jo toot gayi fir se bandhaata kyun hai ..’

‘Kabhi yun bhi to ho ..’

I reaffirmed to myself his position as the ultimate escapade after a mush mush self confidence drowning conversation.

There was more to blurt, but seeing that it’s a lot more, and it has already got very longish, I think shutting up is a nice idea.

An idea can change your life.

That night at the masseur's.

Training at college has come to an end. A weird end it was. On the third last day, a staff guy saw a game of solitaire being played on my computer while I was reading the newspaper. It was my partner for the computer playing that game. I saw that he saw it. I was expecting a remand. It didn't happen. The next day, this partner of mine goes on leave. And when the professor came, he was told of games being played on computer no. 7. He called me in. I was screwed for around 45 minutes and then informed about subsequent 'fails' I should be certain I'll get. All that for playing a boring little game like solitaire in the three hour slot in which we had absolutely no other task to complete. All that for playing a boring little game I never played ! Not that I don't play games while in training hours, why should I pretend to be such a good boy I am not. But its true that on that occasion it wasn't me. Its also true I never play solitaire, I play only need-for-speed, and its also true that I never get caught. But tell the professor these truths and he makes such frightening faces, and saliva gushing out of both the ends of his lips as he scowls, and all he can think of that moment is 'suppli suppli suppli, chahe jis se bhi keh dena, HOD se, principal se, sab mujhe jaante hain main kya cheez hoon'.

It's another thing that about half an hour later he aggresively asked me if I, like other students in the past, am gleefully willing to offer them a party at the close of the training month together with more students from my class. As he changed tracks, the flowing saliva rushed back on his tongue while he visualised smelling the dishes he will be served, and then overflowed again as a result of excess of visualisation. It was a classic example of high pressure - low pressure - high pressure sequence of fluid flow. He is the fluid dynamics professor, so you know how much pain he takes to illustrate his topics in a real setting. In this new mood, his expression changed swiftly from one scary Sadhu Yadav to one smiling Rajpal Yadav. And he promptly remarked, ' tum to mere bete jaise ho, mujhe kya achha lagta hai aise tumhe punish karne mein he he hu hu ha ha ha'.

In one other development, one helluva kewl rocking sexy dude ( this data from his previous orkut testimonials ) offered to add himself to my orkut fanlist if I wrote him a testimonial that would make him win over his Pinky and eventually give him his first kids. And before I could answer this much, in negative or affirmative, he, presuming I cant decline this helluva offer, starting giving me exact directions along what lines I should keep the testimonial - ''thoda banda bond bhi lage yaar samajh raha hai naa, aur intelligent bhi, matlab studious nahi, bas gifted type ke intelligent nahi hote vaise, aur vaise poora harami bhi hai, tu samjh raha hai na kaisa likhna hai'', he knew exactly what he wanted, a quality often attributed to fine film directors. Overwhelmed by his offer, I told him I was willing to wash his undergarments for the next 3 months for that, leave alone a mere testimonial. He didn't persist any more. I think he got the gist. Smart boy. So I wrote him a testi - " SMART BOY ''. Ofcourse he didn’t accept. And didn’t become a fan. I cried lakes of tears that night. And then I thought - why not take a bath in it, as it is its been so many days. I wonder how some people survive months without bathing, I get itches after every two weeks and then just can't resist taking a nice long bath.

Don't mind the title. Nothing to do with the post. Couldn't think of a more seductive one.

Whatever

For those who never seem to get good results, doing good work itself can be a decent consolation prize.

But that’s all it is.

A consolation.

p.s : By the way, the second half of the year just started four minutes back. Just a reminder, in case that holds any significance for anybody.

ha ku na ma ta ta - as tala vista

I have nothing interesting to talk about these days, but since some days have passed, I thought I'd update the blog.

An in-campus training awaits, hardly 7 days from now. And then the vacations are over. I don't know why they call us everyday to do this thing called nothing. When we can do 'nothing' quite splendidly from our homes. Anyways. And some of my friends have joined coaching for CAT already, they showed the courtesy of asking me about it too, but I don't get the point in joining these instis when you have seventeen months in hand. Don't know, so I didn’t.

I have been working for a child welfare ngo for sometime now, and the stint ends in a few more days. Nice experience it was. Rather on june 12th, I had to coordinate an anti child labour rally, and since I've always felt like I've never done anything worthwhile, that experience changed things a little bit. The real feel of going through the stink in the slums, and then making a group of 45 kids from there, and then taking them to some place, and yess a few more things like telling them how to shout slogans and all that, I really felt good about myself though I didn’t do anything requiring extreme abilities.

Then these guys gave me passes for a Shiamak Davar summer funk show. And I enjoyed it so much. With so many lovely girls to first escort to your gate, then to your seat , and then cheering you up to dance along with the rythem, and dancing wonderfully themselves, oooh. But the guys accompanying them were such a put off. With so much beauty around, I felt like a housefly with broken wings and limbs, and yummy dirty rotten food all around at two feet distance.

Finally, some progress in weight loss attempt. After seven days of running I really managed to pull down a full one hundred and twenty grams. Woo hoo. God, I feel so light.

kisi ko hakunamatata aur astalavista ka matlab pata hai ? to bata dena . orkut pe bahot logo ne likha hua hai, jinhe apna naam pasand nahi. par ye naam ??

Tests time takes

The day has just begun. The birds chirping and flying in groups are making exquisite, amazing formations with an orange rising sun making for a spectacular background. Plus the cool and wavy breeze is leaving nothing to chance in contributing its part to make the entire setup breathtaking. On some other day, his mind would have started pondering over the observational and artistic understanding these birds have and the even more astonishing communication and coordination these beautiful birds put up with the meagre quack-quack or crow-crow uttering abilities they are provided with. But today he is far more absorbed in the ugly affairs of his life, to give any thought to this lovely alternate reality. Such is the maze of life, that these are the only days he is getting up early enough to witness these picturesque, cheering, heartening views , and he has no heart left to savour the cheer.

He had been a lazy fellow throughout. As a kid everyday in the morning his father would wake him up to get him ready before his school bus arrived. His dad would pack his schoolbag according to the day's study schedule and get his other affairs in order like polishing his shoes, putting his I-card in his shirt's pocket and his mother would prepare a delicious lunch for him, something new everyday, while he would just hurry himself through the bathing and other morning activities in the super-squeezed time left before him. Harjeet was almost in his third year of engineering now, but these things had hardly changed. 'Some things never change', he would jovially say now and then to his friends telling them about his morning routine.

A certain Susheel was the ultimate fan of the tasty food prepared by Harjeet's mother, and happened to be his best friend as well. Day after day, he would lick his tongue over his lips in delight at the sight of his lunch and eventually grab the lion's share of his lunch which had many ardent admirers in the class. He would make up for Harjeet's appetite by offering him his hostel mess' not-good-at-all food which he would have missed anyway. Why Harjeet would gleefully accept this trade policy, was way beyond Susheel's understanding. But he wouldn't push for knowing this too, apprehensive that Harjeet's realisation of common-sense would imply his starvation. Perhaps Susheel needed the sensitivity of understanding what bestfriendship was, apart from the common sense - something he thought he was so rich in, maybe rightly so.

Its summer vacations in the college and these two guys have been out of touch. Surprising it seems considering the two are best of friends, but not so much considering the distance between their residences and Susheel's reluctance towards telephonic conversations. Infact 'out of sight, out of mind' is what he had always been like. Yesterday when Susheel came somewhere near Harjeet's house in connection with some child welfare event he was associated with, he rang Harjeet up. Well frankly, Susheel's primary motivation behind calling and meeting him was bragging about the kind of gracious stuff he was associated with.

"Hello! hey, Harjeet I am here at district centre, how far is it from your house" he roared loudly, the screeching sound of buses and cars in the backdrop making for difficult hearing.

"Just five minutes", Harjeet replied.

"Great, then just come over, I am here at district centre"

"Okay, I'll see if I find time", Harjeet said.

Susheel cut the phonecall abruptly, annoyed by Harjeet's reluctant attitude towards meeting up, that too when he had already travelled some twenty-five kilometres in the scorching sun while Harjeet just had to stroll for five minutes outside his house in order to meet him.

"Who the hell wants to meet him anyway"

"I wont even pass a smile at his sight, he deserves a royal ignore"

These were the thoughts swinging in his mind after the phonecall, an egoist's ego had just been hurt.

The day went on, and Susheel did all sort of work this day. Secretly he was ecstatic about the kind of good deeds he's been doing these days - child welfare and all. And when the day's work was over started leaving for his home, chin up, head held high, shoulders broadened - all signifying his new found pride in his very existence. Standing at the bus stop, he was thinking how bogus some friendships can be ,thinking about Harjeet; and had just begun musing about how he'd narrate on gtalk the day's events and his heroics to a new friend after reaching home, when his mobile phone rang.

"I am outside McDonalds, where are you", Harjeet it was.

"Well I was just about to leave in fact. Anyway, since you've come, ok I am coming, McDonalds right ?", said Susheel, giving himself airs.

"Okay, I am waiting."

Susheel sauntered slowly back to the district centre, his intention being to keep Harjeet waiting for a longer time.

He was a little put off with Harjeet's reluctance in the afternoon but at the very sight of his friend a smile beamed over Susheel's face as if all of that anger vanished instantly into the hot air around, and he started humming in parody spontaneously "Happyian di Happiyan di gal ban gayi" [Mr. Happy grabs a bounty, oh yeah!] as he'd usually tease this Sikh friend of his by calling him Mr.Happy Singh and blending in this nickname in some weird punjabi song he'd little comprehend himself. And he was surprised himself that his anger had disappeared automatically.

Susheel was back to normal, to sum up. And kept cracking jokes and passing funny comments on ambling lovebirds around and every other thing. Harjeet would usually appreciate his knack of making everything look funny and laughed heartily at his jokes, but was unusually silent today. As if he understood no context, he understood no laughter.

Quick to gauge this, Susheel remarked ," aaj tere totey kyun udey hue hain bhai" [Why are you out of your wits, dude?]

"kuch nahi yaar" [Nothing, mate.]

"abe tere chehre pe to baara baje hue hain, bhai bata de kuch hai to", Susheel stuck on. [Then why's your face a stuffed astray today .. don't make a fuss .. just bring it up]

"aise kyun bol raha hai, tujhe pata to hoga". [Why do you act oblivious, you must be knowing everything.]

This was enough to sense something really undesirable had occurred, Susheel hastened to ask, " please tell me yaar,I don’t know".

"My Dad expired a week ago", Harjeet said, the strong boy's lips and nostrils vibrating with agony, with painful memories. Just the other day he was telling Susheel that the only reason he wants to strech the limits, work hard and crack the CAT and enter the IIMs was because he wanted to make his dad proud of him, because he wanted to give his Dad every happiness in the world.

And the world moved full circle for Susheel in these last two seconds. Gasping for breath, struggling to take in this hell of a fact, his throat dried as if it had never tasted water. Speechless, out-of-wits, out-of-words, didn’t know what to say, how to console, and if all that is even meaningful now in the first place. Ashamed of the things he'd been thinking about his friend's reluctance. Ashamed that he didn’t even know about it when almost every little known, hi-hello acquaintance from the class had already paid him an assuaging visit in his difficult time. Ashamed that he wasn’t there for Harjeet when it mattered most. Ashamed that half an hour ago he was mulling over why Harjeet wasn’t there for him.

In five-ten minutes, Susheel came to terms with what had initially been a horrible shock. Gathered courage to console, extend help and enquire about the how? and now? of things. The sun set, the days events far forgotten and they left the place to Harjeet's home. Susheel sat on a stool, in two minutes Harjeet's sister came in with a glass of water, and then Harjeet's mother with a glass of lassi. Spellbound with their hospitality at this hour of hardship, he asked, "Aunty, what's the need, you need not take the burden, just sit down, please"

Harjeet's mother, who had maintained her calm could hold her tears no more and broke down, " Had his father been here he'd have left no stone unturned to make you feel special, whenever any of Harjeet's friend came home he'd just pace here and there just trying to offer whatever nice thing he could, we've got to carry that forward. But we can't be like him" and a tear just dropped and ran across that serene, motherly face.

Susheel tried his best to calm things up, his own heartbeat at its all time high with the surge of emotions. And Harjeet all this while, remained quiet as anything. Almost non-living. Then he brought himself up, calmed his mom, and some twenty minutes of memory-living coloured the conversation that ensued, in which the boy and his mom strived to live those happy moments again, trying to make sure they don't let these moments slip this time. Susheel was overwhelmed by the simultaneous utility and futility, the simultaneous everlasting and shortlived traits of this exercise.

Some half an hour had passed and Susheel's mother was getting worked up since she didn’t expect him to be this late. She had called him up meanwhile a couple of times and told him rather firmly to get back soon, since they had to leave for a cousin's birthday party. Susheel was far from interested in attending the party, but also wanted to avoid the conflicts at home that could arise from his absence, he had the task of not letting his mother get too worked up; she is a hypertension patient.

"Aunty, I guess I'll take your leave" he said.

" abhi nahi , kuch kha ke jaana, dal roti hi hai kuch aur thodi banana hai, koi nahi khaa ke jaana, koi ghar pe rehta hai to phir aasaan rehta hai, akele to bahot kamzor ho jaate hain", she said in a soft tone dressed in affection. [Not so early, at least have your dinner first. You know, when there's someone here, we're still okay. Alone, it gets unbearable, really.]

" please aunty abhi nahi phir kabhi", he mumbled. [Please, Aunt, some other time.]

" achha, hamare yahan nahi kha ke jaoge" [Oh I see, you won't eat at our condemned place!]

Susheel uttered, '' nahi nahi , aaoonga main phir , aapke haath kaa hi to khaata raha hoon do saal se roz, itne chaav se" [No, no! It's the food lovingly prepared by you that I have been nourishing on full steam, for the last two years. I'll be back.. ] and rushed his way quickly out of the house before he would too give in to the emotions, and his characteristic loud weeping took over their deeper, prolonged tears.
.

Apni Marzi Se Kahan Apne Safar Ke Ham Hain
rukh havaon ka jidhar ka hai udhar ke ham hain

pahale har chiz thi apni magar ab lagta hai
apne hi ghar mein kisi doosre ghar ke ham hain

waqt ke saath hai mitti ka safar sadiyon tak
kis ko maloom kahan ke hain kidhar ke ham hain

chalte rahte hain ke chalna hai musafir ka naseeb
sochte rahte hain ke kis raahguzar ke ham hain

gintiyon mein hi gine jate hain har daur mein ham
har qalamkar ke benam khabar ke ham hain

- Nida Fazli

friendship harvest

Wrote this when I was 14, for a little competition at school:

If in whom you invest,

Your time and passion,

To harbour a bond.

In whom you confide,

Of whom you're so fond.

He turns a blind eye,

As if your woes are just a lie.

And turns a deaf ear,

When you most want him to bear.

Bear with your boring qualms,

Bear with your sorrow.

And he yawns, bored,

And wryly says "tomorrow"

You pass it all okay, but alone,

And good times do come back.

With good times back he comes again,

To say 'we're still jill & jack'.

How can he be so cool again,

How do you hide the remorse,

When your heart isn't a fine jelly,

But has doubts, thick and coarse.

If it was just all about,

Having a good time and some fun,

Wouldn't you rather open the fridge

And bite into harvest-gold-ka-bun.

p.s. : Its so yummy tasty, the bun.

And yes, this one is a poem.

WB Yeats ka naaati.

Errrr…

Hmmm, the net was taken out the other day, and today it is back, again for reasons beyond the scope of this blog. It feels a little shameless writing this but has to be written anyway. So all the pains I took and some of the things I wrote in the previous post, as it happens usually, turn out to be meaningless, inconsequential, unadulterated bullshit.

Apart from that, spending a lot of time outside the confines of your home, in this deadly heat can be real bad for your physical health and your mood. And dermicool will always be in business. In all summers I mean, it works.

And I have been feeling a little bored of late, in case someone has the time and intent , you can please tell me about the good shows on TV because I didn’t seem to find any whenever I’ve tried it in recent days. And I already watch laughter challenge. Anything better than that will do. No challenging yardsticks, you see.

useless updates

Hell, i am writing this from a cyber cafe and slowly realising the pains associated with blogging in a cyber cafe. with such a meagre space to move my hands and my elbow constantly pressing against my stomach as i type this, this is already a physical discomfort sufficient to keep my mind away from delving into the other discomforts i thought about grumbling today. this cyber cafe just won't allow you to. just as you strain your senses a little bit to bring out your lachrymose self, the next guy shoots up the volume of his 'pak chik pak raja babu' on his winamp or real player whatever, and you are suddenly reminded of the days when heroes could have oscillating tummies, and heroines found every little irritating prank of this tummy taqatwar cho cuute. and hopes replace angst, even though for a short time.

and the reason i am here is because i no longer have the net at home. for whatever reasons that are beyond the scope of this blog, as they said after all difficult axioms in class X mathematics refresher by RD Sharma. and i havent had the energy to turn up here in this suffocating little cafe regularly, so the posting thing is almost nil from now on. so it'll be in your time saving benefit to not check this space for updates. i hope to keep it alive with post a month routine, lets see.

as for now, i am slowly turning serious for cat. its still seventeen months so i can afford to turn serious 'slowly'. infact all i am doing at this stage is mentally preparing myself that yes! it is cat that i should do next. i think i'll start actual preparations by november or december. and i'll be going to some ngo in jungpura delhi, an environmental one, i hope to learn driving in the next 15 days, and mummy keeps pinning me to join a gym, so i think i shall oblige her too, and its getting hotter by the day here in delhi, unbearably hot. and now all my core group of friends have managed girlfriends, other than me. the last one to have hit the jackpot is adi, and he was as happy as mayawati yesterday. and i was as happy for him as mulayam is for mayawati. that means, hardly. selfisshh.

pardon me for the spelling mistakes, i usually type in msword at home and it tells me about the mistakes and corrections, the msword here is in a state of paralysis and hence the spelling blunders that must have been.

surrender !

Here at home, each day passes like three days. I thought about writing a decade, but then, why exaggerate for nothing. But its true that after hopping all day and night without any rhyme or reason during my stay at the hostel, it is a little tough to behave like ultra civilized human beings who keep vigil of everything, from when to wake up, when to take a bath, when to go to play, when not to, when to have the meals, when to go to bed, just about everything except of course, when to go to the loo.

And yesterday I went to the college again, not because I was missing it, but I had a room to be surrendered. Yeah, that’s right. This is what we call it when we formally close the pot of evil and shift its keys in the hostel attendant's butt. When I did reach there for a supposedly 5 minutes affair, the attendant put on his James Bond cap to have a sharp look at my room, and take the prizes for catching the 'wanted'. He poked into every little portion of every little drawer while I wrote the required application he is supposed to collect and forward to the warden. 'Shrewd me!', he must have patted his own back.

''Cigarette!'' , he shouted as if he saw an anaconda, one Godzilla and a dinosaur all fighting each other for a chance to kill this attendant.

"kya", I exclaimed rather tensed since a cousin was around this time.

" cigarette! cigarette! cigarette!", side effects of watching too much of Ekta Kapoor stuff in the TV room were already showing on his face and his language.

Now, I do not smoke. Yes, even after a good two years at hostel. But I am not Ramdev-ish enough to stop each and every guy who comes around, in my presence or absence, to this room to stop doing things he loves to do. Besides, quite often the guy with a cigarette in one hand he has a can of beer in the other, with which I have nothing to do either. Oh no, not all people who don't drink beer are dumb. Its just their choice. Choice, you know. The thing which those who drink it have. Similarly these guys who don’t have it too. Infact its this choice that they are exercising. And they don't need to visit paida-kyu-hua.com. Not really. But equally often he has a fountain pepsi with him , and I never said I never sip into other folks' pepsi. Yeh dil maange more.

"arre bhaiya kisi aur ki hogi, mujhe nahi pata".

To make matters worse, I have no official roomie. The one who stayed with me was another hostel's inmate, whom I called to live with me since I was alone in my double-room.

"arre tumhare room par padi hai ye, aur koi saath bhi nahi rehta yahan to ladka, to ham kya pagal hain , ya tum zyada hoshiyaar ho.", he retorted.

"kisi ne fenk di hogi yaar, main kya karoon"

"yaar kisi aur ko bolna, tumhe hostel se nikaalne ki taakat rakhte hain hum", he said. At first it seemed he was trying to pump himself with an ego-boost, but then I realised it was nothing but just another ekta-kapoor-effect taking its toll on him.

But suddenly, something got to his head. He said, 'ye saara samaan jo akhbaar, photosatat vagehra hai, ye le ke jaoge?'

"nahin"

"achha main le ja raha hoon phir"

"le jao, aur kya", I said.

" chalo, theek hai, ye saara samaan mere room pe rakh do, baaki main dekh loonga, kuch nahi hoga , apni tubelight bhi chhod dena lekin mere room pe", he said.

"achha ( hoshiyaar you are - I thought) ", I was losing interest in the unnecessary delay.

Then I forwarded my application on a desk he was standing next to, and started packing my bag as he pretended to read the contents of the application. Just when I was done, he hit back. " ye tumhara lock hai na, mere paas chhod dena, le jaa ke kya karoge ab kya lock karna hai, main dekh loonga baaki to, kuch nahi hoga ".

"Kuch to vaise bhi nahi hota." but I left my lock with him anyways, too pissed off with his unending blabber.

Shrewd he was. No doubt. What chance would James Bond stand before him ?.

Guys with beard aren't necessarily weird.

People are very apprehensive of other people's intentions. I don't know why but they are. I know that. There is this very disturbing lack of trust syndrome the people of delhi carry when they leave their homes out for work or play, anything. Parents clutching their kids' hands more firmly as someone approaches, is commonplace now. Here if you ask someone what the time is, the She thinks you are not asking the time but trying to ask her out, the He gives away the facial expression that he thinks you're asking the time just because the girl with him is a good looker. Interesting. And two out every 5 boys, without anyone with them, you happen to ask something in the middle of the road, or just talk some pointless point, would wonder why is he being told this, as if thinking - why is he being beaten up. Ok I look a bit thief-like with my grown up beard which might just mislead people into imagining my lack of finances to throw at the barber bar bar, but I certainly don't look like an eve teaser. I don’t think so. Atleast. I don't know why grown up beards only remind people of osama bin laden and never Vir Sanghvi.

Just yesterday at c.p , as I was sitting outside block b's pavement bookstall, as I usually do tired from the three-fourth college to home journey already carried out, I saw a couple going quite all over in the parking space next to it, and they were not inside their car. And just as they were gearing down the momentum and were barely done with, a tired looking must-be-collegian, emerged out from beneath the ground ( he was on the metro's escalator). At first sight he garnered my soft corner for his unkept beard. Dadiyal dadiyal bhai bhai, I affirmed to myself. And the first thing he did was ask this couple the place he'd get an auto for whichever place he intended to go to. He could be called dumb, rather unaware, but not a criminal. Well, he didn’t ask them the time but he would have figured out these were bad times going on for him. He got to hear abuse from the master and his mistress. He was made to feel as if he did something unimaginably evil. All that and more for asking a simple question. I felt like getting up, sympathise with the poor chap, and throw abuses back at the raja-rani. But better, or maybe worse, sense prevailed and I held back the desire. I usually refrain from getting into other people's woes. You usually get the wrath of both sides in most cases. Whatever. As far as the couple goes, I won't go into discomforting territory by rejecting them outright, as a majority of people I knew, and hence possibly some of the people who happen to read this text, considered 'public display of affection' as a turn-on, a fact I discovered after going through their orkut profiles. Now I completely differ, and I deem it bad manners, to put it as simply as possible. But okay that’s a personal opinion, and everyone is entitled to their own. Okay. But the way they then abused this guy was as if smooching in the open spaces , in pure public place, was their fundamental right, birthright rather. To top it, they considered that it was the fundamental duty of all other public present there to turn their eyes the other way, or still better, close them. Bahot sahi. Maybe they are promoters of the gandhian philosophy - Bura mat dekho. But if its so bura, why dikhao it in the first place.

bearded






befuddled


Bearded atleast better than befuddled. much much better. ( proudy neck swing follows )

jeetendra aur yash chopra.... aur unke bete

Reasoning is a difficult thing to do. Because some things are beyond reason. Like why tushar and uday chose to do what they are doing. And they are doing it so miraculously well, you already know which tushar and uday I am talking about, and what they do, and well, the nation knows them. They do not know the last time they massaged the inner walls of their aching nostrils, but they know tushar and uday. Such is this medium. And it is this medium that has caught my otherwise fragile attention ever since I was a little boy who would swing his neck in pride saying as meaningless a thing as " jo kehta hai wohi hota hai " whenever some smarter and wittier class fellow would taunt me with some copybook one-liner like " zindagi jhand hai, phir bhi ghamand hai!". Ofcourse this fellow would impress the giggling girls and nose-mending boys in the process, but its films I am talking about now, if you still haven't figured it out.

I had always been this really film buff sort of a kid, resolutely insisting Dad to get a cable connection at home. This was in 1992 I guess. And there was nothing even on cable TV other than Zee and Prime-Sports, that showed some things that I didn’t understand at that time. So, I would stick to the 2-films a day routine, watching the films our local cablewallah would roll for us. That’s a time I really cherish, not all actors of the time were exactly stupendous, but I think it was the childish sanguinity that I could stand the funky chunkey pandey two times a day and still say : dhaaasu. I don’t think there were many entertainment fronts those days, no internet, no computers, no dvds , no ipods nothing, and just the two second rate 1980s bollywood stuff gave me the sort of completeness you would expect to find in Shakti kapoor when a beautiful and ambitious young lass knocks his door hoping for a shot at the next yash chopra epic drama. Hopes! They are uffff.

This extremely-psychotic-craze-for-2nd-rate-hindi-films was on an alarming rise until I saw those two milestones of hindi cinema - 'neil and nikki' and the fantabulous 'jeena sirf mere liye' and so you know the root of my irritating bitterness.

God ! Get me out of it.

My Ride

I wanted trust, Which wasn't there.
I longed for it, But they just didn’t care.
Such indifference, I thought was rare.
But what I thought, They'd never care.

I wanted to show I could pull it off
And back I got a cynical laugh
I laughed back and went ahead
Only to find, a motive dead.

I look back now, Time and again
All those hopes, That died in vain
Still hurt me where it hurts most
Still makes me feel what I lost.

I stare at the ceiling thinking every night
All that's happened, was it right?
Should I be thinking about giving now?
Or for selfish desires should I fight ?

I really want now to just rise back
To get the powers that I'd once lack
To throw my flaws rather than hide
To guide my ride on a dreamy tide.