The End


See the coins in the back denoting the conventional material world, wealth, success. And the ash tray, the cigarette denoting succumbing to the gray. The gray overrides the conventional. It is closer to you, more prominent in the frame.
You give up the laughter (the joy of the conventional game) and the lies (the rules of the conventional game), and transition from the material mattering so much to where it just does not matter anymore. It hurts at first to end that game you played with your sweat and your blood. But you know it does not have any more for you. It will not follow you. It’s not your fascination anymore. The old rules are gone. The old game is over. You are no longer trying to die. Perhaps, in some ways you are dead already. The passing over to the new world. The End.
(Words by Sumit Mudgal, a friend)
(Image: taken by Sumit’s cam by me, June 2005. Edited by Sumit)

Time to write a long post

It’s been a long time since I had time enough to write something worthwhile. I think god has given me the chance today. I’m not feeling well and the doctor has asked me to take some rest. By the way, I could not understand why he took the decision to advice me that. He himself doesn’t seem to be sure about what’s wrong with me. He told me after a long diagnosis session that the problem is either in my stomach or in my forehead. Now THAT really is puzzling. Anyways, irrespective of whatever he concludes, one thing is sure, its time to change the way I live my life. I’ve not been sleeping at nights, I haven’t been eating things which “people” categorize under food for a while now, and I haven’t taken a haircut for some13 months now. Well this reminds me of Three Men in a Boat… and another opportunity to laugh at myself. Khair… chhodo.

Okay, the above lines were written on 4th of June. But I didn’t post them… generally. So, this is what I’m writing now (That is July 5th):
After a while the doctor finalized on “amoebiasis”. It’s not dangerous. It was just the shear magnitude of it that was causing me problems. Anyways, it helped a lot to have it. I feel much more human now. You want a proof, take this – I’ve taken a hair cut.

Anyways, for the previous post which I wrote some time back – for which a few friends demanded an explanation, I have this to say – forget it.

It was an important day. For sure. And THAT truth alone is earth-shattering. My expression may actually fail to explain why it was important. And I guess that was also the day, when I realized WHY some things are better unsaid.

An important day

Today is an important day of my life. I just want to remember the date. That’s why this post. There is nothing else to say.

Ya I know there is a risk that I may not be able to remember the fact that I need to remember something, but anyways if that happens then the thing I want to remember must have lost its importance. So its fair. 🙂

I feel like zaphod beebelbrox. Hell!! now I feel like Sandy. Read this.

Another amazing song

तुम पुकार लो
तुम्हारा इंतजार है
तुम पुकार लो

दिल बहल तो जाएगा
इस खयाल से
हाल मिल गया तुम्हारा
अपने हाल से

मुख्तसर सी बात है तुमसे प्यार है।

I’ll really exploit unicode to the fullest.

Garden State

Its Sunday morning 6:00 am. Yes I’m awake… No, I’m not on a night out… Obviously, a reason to blog. It’s the first time that I’m blogging in a day even before I washed my teeth. I’m feeling great. It’s an amazing morning. I can here the birds chirp and the wind blow, along with a Bob Dylan song playing on 92.5 FM somewhere nearby.

Anyways, I watched a movie yesterday – Garden State. Truly marvelous. Zach Braff, Natalie Portman, and Peter Sarsgaard. A movie which I could term as a cute dope movie. Yes I know it sounds weird. The movies is about the events of four days in a guy’s life (Zach Braff), who is living his life on anti-depressants prescribed by his own father (a psychologist). In those four days, one of his old friends (Peter Sarsgaard) and a girl (Natalie) somehow succeed in changing his entire life and making him discover the joys of life. Natalie acts great as a full-of-life, free-spirited, talkative (dumb) girl. Okay that was redundant anyways it helps to specify “dumb” sometimes. Cinematography, abrupt sequence of shots and great editing has resulted in an amazing portrayal of change of emotions. The movie has a lot of out of the blue events, unrelated to the main theme. Such as a bunch of nursery kids making a chain holding hands and crossing the road on an overcast morning. These events are placed at appropriate places in the movie to bring out the thoughts in the minds of characters. All this makes it qualify for a dope movie. And the cuteness is inherent everywhere in the movie, especially whenever Natalie is around. Good to watch a well-made movie after a long time.

Bye for now, I need to have some tea.

Timir

One of the Mahadevi Verma’s greatest creations:

पंथ होने दो अपरिचित,
प्राण रहने दो अकेला।

और होंगे चरण हारे,
अन्य हैं जो लौटते दे शूल को संकल्प सारे।
दुख्ख व्रती निर्माण उन्मद,
यह अमरता नापते पद,
बांध देंगे अंक संसृति की तिमिर मे स्वर्ण वेला।

पंथ होने दो अपरिचित,
प्राण रहने दो अकेला।

Somehow nowdays I feel like posting such inspiring works.

Total Perspective Vortex

The Total Perspective Vortex derives its picture of the whole Universe on the principle of extrapolated matter analyses.

To explain – since every piece of matter in the Universe is in some way affected by every other piece of matter in the Universe, it is in theory possible to extrapolate the whole of creation – every sun, every planet, their orbits, their composition and their economic and social history from, say, one small piece of fairy cake.

For when you are put into the Vortex you are given just one momentary glimpse of the entire unimaginable infinity of creation, and somewhere in it a tiny little marker, a microscopic dot on a microscopic dot, which says “You are here.”

(By Douglas Adams, of course)
(Image: Nihal and Rohan at my ex-office in Gurgaon, 2004, image taken from a Rohan’s camera phone, and to hell with copyright)

The wowbagger

Has to title the blog this way, because its about Sandy.

Since last few days Sandy has become paranoid (affected by a psychological disorder characterized by delusions of persecution or grandeur). And the cause is not a girl (Of course… Sandy !! forget it)…. oh by the way its not the lack of girls even… he is too experienced (5 years -DD) an IITian for that. So what’s it that is making this “really amazingly together guy” (frood) go insane. Its a combination of two things….

a lot of time… and…

the ultimate hitchikers guide to the galaxy

The guide is known to affect people historically. The one thing that a person ceases to have after reading it, is the sense of proportion.

Anyways, after loosing the sense of proportion, Sandy had a lot of time (being in 5th year) and he quite happily wastes it in relating every odd thing in life (universe and everything) to The Guide…. Things like: his underwears, his glasses, his exams, his guide (the DDP guide not the hitchhiker’s for a change). Not excluding his towel of course.

I have to relate this paranoid state of Sandy to The Guide. So I coined a word – the wowbagger syndrome.

God and Shairi

An incident in Ghalib’s life that I heard recently:

A friend, who used to hate Ghalib’s sad gazals, once asks Ghalib: “do you believe in god”. He quite simply says “yes”. The friend feels victorious and quickly fires his “victorious” question: “Then, how come he doesn’t listen to your prayers. You write so many sad gazals.” To which Ghalib smiles and replies:

“Allah shairi nahi samajhatein honge”.