Perfect Diagnosis

I joined boarding school in 1987. In class IV. Initial few months were as expected, not very smooth. Interesting for sure. In the dormitory, I learnt to wake up early monring, , on my own, without being pushed & pulled by a family member, or cajoled and sometimes, threatened. Well, the morning rising bell was threatening, in a way. But, it was interesting learning - to start following instructions from staff members, some simply copying the neighbour tactics and small revolting but finally giving up work outs. The most interesting learnings came from observing the other boys, though.  How they would wake up from one side of the day, everyday. How they would pick dressing gowns from the peg and wear them, most would sleep walk to the cupboard to fetch their mugs which would contain their soap dish, tongue cleaner & tooth brush. Then, sleep walking in a queue for Ramkali aayaji & Santo aayaji to press out exactly the same amount of tooth paste every day for the entire year! Finishing bowel clearances, brushing, cleaning tongues, bath & then queuing up again for one the best 1 minute of the day, when again Ramkali aayaji & Santo aayaji would apply Brahmi Amla Kesh Oil on our hair. It was one of those rare moments of getting reminded of my mother, every morning. Aayajis were god sent to eight, nine and ten year olds in junior school. Even after 30 years of passing out, their smiles first thing in the morning, their cuddles and their rough but love filled palms, remain strong over my, now balding head. Aayajis were specially wonderful to new kids. They just knew what we wanted. And as kids, every kid wanted something different. They would know exactly what, when and how much of it was needed. They were not just god sent, they were almost like godesses, pouring their unlimited love and affection, without an eight year old uttering a word. There were Bearerji also. The older ones would become our advisors & protectors, while the younger lot would become our confidantes and friends in senior school. Senior school stories will have to wait for a new title.

One time in junior school, I got into a medical situation, due to which I had to hospitalized for over 2 months. The school doctor would come for a round twice a day. The Nurse/sister on duty would take rounds at will. It was Ramkali (namesake of the dorm one) and Santosh aayaji who were my saviours again. Especially, Santosh aayaji, who would hide & bring her home food for me since I could not eat the patient’s meals and was not allowed to be fed anything else. After a month’s trials in the school hospital, I was referred to Moradabad Railway Hospital, for X-Ray. I think I was staring at it for too long since Santosh aayaji just went and bought poori-choley for me. And I was supposed to be suffering from stomach infection. I didn’t say anything to anyone. But, Santosh aayaji came back and confessed her deed to Sister Francis. I still remember, Sister Francis, while twisting my ears, telling Santosh aayaji, “her mother would do the same. So would I.  Doctor shouldn’t know of it, ever.”

Locked By A Loiness

I had started taking classes at IMS, Bhawanipore, Calcutta, in evening time slot for my MBA preparations.  I left the classes, mid way, since they had shared most of the study material and I realized, if I can take care of the fundamentals, self study will save me travel time, gossip time and the embarrassing class test time and it's even more insulting result time.  Miraculously, I got calls from three MBA institutes. I sat through the GD/interview rounds for all. The sequence of final letters had made me think I will need to go back to University to finally become Master of my fate. The first letter was from an institute thanking me to appear for the rounds and stated I was put in the “waiting list” for top 15 people. I did laugh that i am in the top 15 of some list! The letter from the  next institute was a regret letter. The fair assumption was to wait for the Top 15 to shorten to Top 1, for me to get a final call. The day the third letter had come, I was told about it coming in and kept on the fridge. I didn’t even open it the entire day, assuming, it’s a regret letter so will read it at leisure with the last smoke of the day after dinner. I had moved out of my grandmother’s place and was living with one of my school batchmates in my parents’ flat in Calcutta. I opened it, read it, mind still programmed that it’s a communication, starting as “with regret, we inform you…….” . I gave it to my friend to read. He read it out loud is when I heard, “with pleasure to inform you……. “

We were supposed to report to campus on 1^st June.  In the early hours of 1^st June 2001, Karunanidhi was woken up from his sleep, apparently dragged out of bed and arrested on grounds of corruption. I never had much interest in politics. I still don’t. But the news was “super se bhi upar wala” fun! A former CM dragged out of bed by the current CM!! And all this had happened while she could not hold office due to major chaos over criminal offenses and guilty charges of corruption etc. I had only heard of the southern part of India and its fascination with living (and dead) legends. She surely seemed one to me. That was perhaps the first time I could feel, in some odd way, what, how and how much could Ms. Jayalalitha do when she meant business. People from the northern part of India who were to join with me in my batch had already landed on campus, a day or two prior to 1^st June, fortunately, or unfortunately. Post this historic lock down, the state was closed for almost 2-3 days. Paralyzed, it took a week to get back to activity and almost a month before normalcy returned. The formal joining was delayed and happened ten days later. But that first week with only 5-7 of us in the entire campus was another great lovely, lazy and enjoyable wasting of time.

During my stay in Tamil Nadu, there were other episodes which made me like the lady, love the scents around and get fond of Chennai. I spent four good years in Tamil Nadu. I love Chennai. After Lucknow, the only city I would love to settle & die. And I believe, Amma is one of the prime reasons to make such a statement.

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Mard, Men & Morons

Since I have aired my views on women, it is my moral responsibility to share my observations on my own self, we the men. And for this, I don’t need a drink. It is another matter that I will drink! Having been brought up in an all boys residential school, I was witness to a whole lot of different kinds of boys/men. And after almost four decades on earth, I can largely categorise us in three categories, as the title suggests. According to me, you can tell way beyond years how will a boy turn out to be as a man. There have been exceptions and those exceptions mostly become the diagonally opposite of what we would be as boys. However, majorly, we tend to create a range for ourselves to oscillate our existence.

Mard

In boys schools, we are young boys. And there are some older boys among the young boys. With physical strength to our advantage, many of us start reaping some usual benefits. You know, like better at athletics, getting to do more macho stuff in front of little girls & ‘young’ lady teachers, and of course, start bullying younger and weaker boys. We find sycophants who encourage us in order to stay in our good books. Bullying slowly becomes our habit and as time passes it only becomes worse. We not-so-young boys grow up to become ‘mard jisko dard nahi hota’ types. We want to bully our way to movie tickets queues, parking lots, traffic signal; even our own wedding procession, sometimes. We get our Tobu cycles, by hook or by crook. Bought by parents, snatched from friends, steal it just for fun & then dump it in an abandoned place. 'Ignorant abandon' is our birth right. We are the kind who have no respect for fellow beings, least of all for the ones who could never stand up to our ill behavior. You could never tame us. We live & die as wild animals. We have no limits & we fight without a reason.

Men

There are some boys, who right from the start, just know they are either at the right place at the wrong time or at the wrong place at the right time. If we were at the right place at a not so pretty time, we ensured to make the most of the time available. And god forbid, if we were at the wrong place, we would make it the best time of our lives. We flourish in chaos. We borrow Tobu cycles so cutely, that it look as if it is ours which was loaned to the actual owner. We could play without shoes, walk alone; run in groups; not study for an entire trimester and then mug lessons for 14 hrs straight without sleep to vomit all on the answer sheets & get pretty marks. We never bothered to top the class academically, though some of us could, if we made half an honest effort. We could debate with a wall, sing without a mic, laugh at our own butts; yet stand up for a genuine fight. We grew up to embrace life, the boys who possibly, learnt the art of social living. With time, there are glimpses of such a man turning into a ‘mard’, once in a while. Mostly, we were civilized beasts. We know our limits & we play to participate.

Morons

And then there are boys who are mostly in deep trouble. Or, are the reason why someone else is in deeper crap of a situation. We are the weakest, meekest, dumbest, sissiest, lousiest & perhaps the most entertaining of the lot. We are made fun of the most, bullied the most, avoided the most & rallied the most. In fact, gradually, everyone starts believing we are God’s ‘special child’. We cannot stand for our own rights because we believe we are weak and incapable. But we quickly expect someone to support us. And hence, mostly, we are the ones because of whom ‘mard’ and ‘men’ get into a fight. Naturally, men are battered. Mard mostly becomes a hero of the campus because we never had expulsions, barring very exceptional circumstances. My guess is, in all probability, he would be a moron disguising as a man, who would be rusticated.  Else, why would you do anything so idiotic or stupid, that people are forced to throw you out. Mostly they are good riddance. Being a moron is the limit. Beyond us, there is stardom.

Ofcourse, there are exceptions. I could be a ‘mard’ who somewhere down the line, became a man. Or, I could be a man who due to the need of the hour, just acted as a ‘mard’ and then, started enjoying the frivolous life to stay a ‘mard’. There are a few of us, who are actually morons but have truly found the most perfect way to fool the world by declaring ourselves, a man. And then, there is a minuscule population of morons, who flip their butt coin to suddenly become a ‘mard’. And that’s when the world comes to an end.

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Ladeej Log

Disclaimer: This write up was written over a weekend, when spirits, tempers and moods, all are at an all time high. The writer has been forced to write on the most mysterious & enigmatic species on earth, women. Kinds of Women at Work, to be more specific. Though novice at writing, the writer is not stupid and shall try to be as diplomatic & professional in presenting his views, about her. An absolute spoof on himself. Comments may be shared at dontdisturbme@gmail.com

I swear I come to office to work. And not to ogle at women. I respect women, just as I respect any fellow being, breathing next to me, below me or above me. No. No. I didn’t mean it that way. Anyhow, I really don’t know how and why am I writing this. The discussion was on the kinds of women one can hope to meet in any work space. In my experience, a working woman is the most explosive combination of a wet Diwali bomb, about to dry up and ready to explode, anytime. Why would I want to become the match stick igniting that slick chic! Anyhow, being the Alpha Male types, am always up for challenges. So, very very, very reluctantly I have agreed to bring out my observations on women at work place (not specifically my current workplace). As I see (and not stare at) women in office, some kinds that I can relate to are:

1. Girls School Vice Captain: A lady who just missed getting the most coveted Captain’ badge on her chest. She is talented, self confident, capable but always frustrated at being short on luck. Great on ability, attitude is work in progress.

2. New Bride: This is the lady who has been selected by all the elders of the family basis a short test on personality & personal ability. And now that she is in, she is over zealous, over eager and over ambitious in trying to impress the family. Great at initiative, results need better orientation.

3. Feminist Fanny:  Don’t mistake it for the name I have given. Here is a lady who has no problem with men. Her biggest problem is, problem of women. Any male related problem and she will ignore you like the one sided used A4 sheet on the printer. But let a fellow lady colleague utter “laptop issue” and she will assemble a laptop from things in her purse. Strong women, mostly caught amidst weak moments.

4. Pea-hen Behen: Rain or shine, dance floor is mine. Well, not literally. The most forthcoming, volunteering and over-enthusiastic set of women, mostly for extra-curricular activities. Great team players.

5. V for Vaastu Shastra: You will find the most exquisite sculpture of a three legged ostrich or pretty painting of a purple banana dipped in pista green yoghurt. Highly creative and structured minds.

6. Mocktail Madam: This is the kind which is a spicy mix of all the above kinds and some more thrown in. This is the kind I personally like very much. They are the ladies who show-off a certain attitude, are very positve souls and perform in extremely competitive enviroments.

All in all, there is no way you can stop a woman from shining. She will sparkle, through her superlative work, fantastic attitude or by showing off the diamond on her finger.

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Q

My views on views

I am not really a data person. I rely more on intuition & my superiority complex to decide on most things. I apply the same on my understanding of the atlas, the world map, global issues & universal problems. And I believe, everything is fine. Data suggests 40%+ world population is on internet. My sense is, if I reduce double counting of different IP being used by the same user, this should be just about 30%. 

Now, taking a family of 10 people, if 3 of them are not aware, neutral or against a certain collective view point, perception or decision I think, the majority view is the family’s final execution. Of course, in no way do I ignore the existence of these 3 people. They are absolutely legitimate, active and rightful in feeling what they believe is the truth. But, it really shouldn’t matter to the majority 70%.

In fact, I think the majority 70% does not even understand why the balance 30% tweet things as if they are on drugs, update status messages with zero grammar sense (leave alone any intellectual sense), share pictures mostly to tell others, “I am having more fun that you” & declare their true self and mentality in the garb of giving opinions. Am doing the same, by the way ☺

Anyhow, getting back to the topic. So, whoever may get to read this masterpiece of mine is basically on the internet. And just to reiterate, if it hasn’t clicked yet, we are the minority. So, let us not assume we are changing the world. We are only getting informed how the other minority minds think & are trying to influence the other minority minds, sitting easily and typing on a laptop, desktop or perhaps a mobile screen. This is not how the world will change. 

The majority still lives a very different life from you and I. They shall continue to do so. The world revolves and rotates. Population was born & will die. People will procreate & will learn to survive. It is our basic instinct. 

I really believe everything is just fine.

Roast - Raw, Rare, Medium or Well Done?

I like what the team of AIB usually does. But I really loved what they could achieve with introducing Roast, for the first time, in a society like ours. It takes passion, will to start and end, ready to take a stand and perhaps a beating, fight, convince and ofcourse balls like “roasted” nuts, to conceptualise, create & present a phenomenon like “insult comedy, more so, in a society like ours. It is a miracle on how Team-AIB could convince people like Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh & Karan Johar to get involved and that too in a magnitude that they did. But what is almost impossible to think is their outrageous imagination to assume that they could pull off something like this, in a society like ours.

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Did I say, “in a society like ours” repeatedly? Yes, I did. And I would not even get to the so called traditional, old school, closed minded-last generation society. Frankly, in my mind, they are no different from people in my generation. We are exactly the same. And I say this with surety, because, I am part of the “society” I am referring to; living & breathing it. I have had no experience living in a village which has a khap panchayat, live instances of female foeticide or domestic violence in my family (hopefully!!) under influence of substance or family J.

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But I have grown up watching TV in a room full of people across ages, who would be whispering all sorts of adult stuff (much on the lines of AIB-Roast) among their peer group but looking away from the TV when a condom ad would come. I have grown up being witness to eve-teasing where 5 boys would be passing the most lewd comments (worse than AIB-Roast) towards a lonely lady with another 5 witnesses actually enjoying it (me included! L). On other occasions, if some of us did object to such a gang of boys, we would be threatened with even worse comments. Sometimes, policemen supporting “the gang”. I know of fathers cursing their wives in front of kids, abusing kids in front visitors (pretty much similar cuss words as in AIB) and in turn kids back chatting with their parents in similar fashion. Oh, and they are from so called, “well to do” families, much like who paid for a ticket to watch AIB-Roast, live.

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I live in a society, where women are being raped every day and roasted for the rest of their lives; where women, falsely accuse men of rape and violence and hold them under ransom & blackmail, roasting them for life. I live in a society which roasts “not so straight” human beings, every day at every given opportunity. I live in a society, where in the name of caste, bright and much more intellectual minds than “high castes”, are nipped in the bud. I am part of the society of the so clichéd, will hold my tool and piss in the open and be proud of it, but still cannot hold hands among friends, family or any place in public. I am part of the society which declares a human being as God, be it a cricketer or a movie star. Not to forget the many “sanyasis” who wear nothing but silk and eat only fruits, irrespective of the season. Aren’t we roasting our own self, every bloody day?

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I live in a society, where, women sympathise with women who were sexually harassed/raped but do not support the victim, saying “we only know one side of the story”. I believe, that’s even worse than all cuss words put together for the AIB-Roast show.

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Not that I have given up. Or that I am not fighting. I am doing my bit. And I have picked humour as my weapon. Which is why I support humour, blindly and unconditionally. Which is why I support AIB. Which is why I loved AIB-Roast. This is my bit.

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I strongly believe, screw whoever is in government, centre or state, or has promised “a clean & better place”; if most of us (everyone will be too much of humour!!), can do their bit right, India is perhaps, the best place to be in. We have been, unnecessarily and illogically, comparing our country with irrelevant parameters among other so called developed countries. With some effort, I too can produce enough “data” to counter most of the parameters (humour for some, I guess J). But, I would rather laugh it off – my ignorance and your intellect. Because, I don’t see a reason why should I not. I cannot convince, fully. I will not be convinced, ever. But I can laugh, fully & shamelessly. Because, I love a hearty laugh.

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Talking about love, a different kind of roast is coming up, Valentine’s Day. I pity outstation lovers, who are in a dilemma, whether to visit their valentine on 14^th Feb and if they would back in time to watch the India-Pakistan world cup cricket match. What would they do? Dekhenge, Hum Log. J J

Feel The Thought

I have always been confused between a feeling and a thought. Statements like, I was thinking of you, or, I have a feeling this is not right, never completely made me comfortable. I think, and I am thinking this, not feeling; that we can only feel for something living;  something which can test our senses.
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A thought, could be anything, for anything and about anything, living or abstract. I could have a thought about people, traffic signals, food or work. But it isn't actually our creation ever. A thought occurs to us. We don't think. A thought comes to us. We are not the source of any of our own thoughts. I think so.
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I feel for people. I feel for my pet. I feel bad for poor kids without a family and rich kids without friends. I feel because I have senses. And I can only feel something that can test our senses.
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But then what about that thing called "sixth sense"? Isn't that an abstract thing? And don't we get thoughts because of that? And hence, isn't it that thoughts have something to do with my sense? But then what I get thinking is my sixth sense actually is a feeling only. Infact, it is when I get stronger feelings. And I feel so because, I can think deep. I can think hard. I can't think strongly. But I can feel strongly. And over a period of time I have realized I need to have strong feelings to make myself do something. A deep thought can probably help me look, re-look and change or amend my perceived notions in a certain way. A thought can at best give me a direction, not a vision. I need to feel to activate my senses, and act in a certain way.
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I think I can feel. I feel this is a random thought. :)

I Will....

I tried answering

Some lingering questions

I tried to avoid new dilemmas

And failed.

I tried possessing

Some new acquisitions

I tried retaining some archives

And failed.

I tried making people smile

I wanted to help people

I asked for help

And failed.

So what?

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So what I lost. I loved fully.

I lost, to learn.

I learnt, to know.

Know myself & you better.

Better than yesterday.

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I will lose again.

I will learn again.

I will love again.

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Q

2nd January 2015

I am Alive

What I cannot share, I hide

What I cannot hide, spreads rumours

With every thought, time flies

To clouds of suspicious memories

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Words tossed up, hurled into the sky

Striking at the stars and making them fall

With wavering startles and dimness.

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This is how thoughts come to me

Flashes of memories, dry hot blows of pain

With sudden numbness in between

To let me know I am alive.