Bland...

Singularly(pun intended!) uneventful life and yet I find it fascinating!

• Cooked up this amazing joke yesterday and have been cracking up on it ever since:

Why did Anakin Skywalker fail?
Because Master Yoda had told him: "The Force with you, Maybe!" :P

• Also baked a pretty cake in the oven, nicely singed my hand in the grill too. It came out well, soft on the inside with a crunchy crust in top! Hope the blemish on my hand goes away though!

• Assembled an awesome workstation today, Intel, Duo 2 Quad Core, 2.40GHz, 8 GB RAM, 160 GB Hard disk, 80 GB retrievable, a huge woofer and speakers too- though not to much use in office :P !

• About to write my first recommendation letter for a UG student!

• And yeah Aamir Khan blogs too! Found that out yesterday. I know it'll be more of plugging his own movies, still :) Chk: http://www.aamirkhan.com/blog.htm
  

"I am, therefore I'll think"...Ayn Rand.

• "Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another. " ---Ayn Rand

• "In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it's yours." -- Ayn Rand
  

But I don't see that world. I don't see the strength and the righteousness, the character and sheer courage.

It makes me sick, people creeping and crawling, apologizing for being alive, living through with bent backs and grumbling faces. No dignity and no self-respect. Only a borrowed stick for support and stolen shoes to keep them warm. And then having to mother them around, listen to their whines and shoulder their burdens!


Why is it so difficult to just stand on one's own two feet and use the backbone God gave?!!
Why can't people just take responsibility for their actions?
Why are they so afraid?
What are they afraid of? Of themselves, or society, or their parents? Or of their own thoughts or feelings? Of reality?

• "I want to see, real, living, and in the hour of my own days, that glory which I create as an illusion. I want it real. I want to know that there is someone, somewhere, who wants it, too. Or else what is the use of seeing it, and working and burning oneself for an impossible vision? A spirit, too, needs fuel. It can run dry."-- Ayn Rand
  

I need a lead, an inspiration. To see someone create something I can follow. I want to learn. I want to listen, not even argue, just listen to someone who says something I have no reply to, only applaud. I don't want to be extolled, enshrined, or respected or followed around. I would much rather welcome contempt. I need to see a creator. That first. The one who begins an idea which then the entire community blindly usurps. I don't want anyone to do what I am doing, rather I want see someone whose deeds would make me stop and think.

• "Why is it so important--what others have done? Why does it become sacred by the mere fact of not being your own? Why is anyone and everyone right--so long as it's not yourself? Why does the number of those others take the place of truth? Why is truth made a mere matter or arithmetic--and only of addition at that? Why is everything twisted out of all sense to fit everything else? There must be some reason. I don't know. I've never known it. I'd like to understand."--Howard Roark
  

Or am I just being cynical, like all self proclaimed intellectuals? But there is just too much creation around for their to be no primes. Are they too humble to claim what is theirs? Or is it just the norm of our society to copy and then copy the copy and promptly forget the original and its originator?

Not that I deserve it myself. All this whining makes me yet another person looking for someone to follow. But I don't want a shoulder to cry on, I just want to see a fire that gives me reassurance that such people do exist. Or maybe I'll just pick up a Rand again, and live in that make-believe world for a few days.

• "Haven't I? -- he thought. Haven't I thought of it since the first time I saw you? Haven't I thought of nothing else for two years?... He sat motionless, looking at her. He heard the words he never allowed himself to form, the words he had felt, known, yet had not faced, had hoped to destroy by never letting them be within his own mind, Now it was as sudden and shocking as if he were saying it to her…Since the first time I saw you.... Nothing but your body, that mouth of yours, and the way your eyes would look at me, if... Through every sentence I ever said to you, through every conference you thought were so safe, through the importance of all the issues we discussed... You trusted me, didn't you? To recognize greatness? To think of you as you deserved -- as if you were a man?"

• ". . there's nothing of any importance in life - except how well you do your work. Nothing. Only that. Whatever else you are, will come from that. It's the only measure of human value. All the codes of ethics they'll try to ram down your throat are just so much paper money put out by swindlers to fleece people of their virtues. The code of competence is the only system of morality that's on a gold standard"---Ayn Rand.

• "It's not that I don't suffer, it's that I know the unimportance of suffering, I know that pain is to be fought and thrown aside, not to be accepted as part of one's soul and as a permanent scar across one's view of existence. Don't feel sorry for me. It was gone right then."--Howard Roark

I truly am rambling now :P. Should shut up!

Kimi

I miss her! I really do....

The antics she'd put on. The way she'd go jumping all over the place, merry, excited. Every night that she spent by my study table, refusing to go to sleep till I did, which was never before 12, and getting up when my mom did, sharp at 5 am. The way she'd keep quiet all the while I was busy mugging and the moment I took a break, would come rushing to me! The way she'd follow me to the roof whenever I went, jumping two steps at a time and then make the whole wide world know she had arrived!

The racket she would create when mad. The way she'd sulk when scolded. Her high maintenance demands. Her going tiptoes on her nails, absolutely refusing to let her feet get dirty! The times she'd refuse to eat anything that wasn't quite cooked the way she liked it. When we bugged her and she'd agonize over how to respond, the way she'd finally snap at us and immediately go into pangs of remorse!

The way she sat by my grand father's bedside when he was extremely sick, all day and all night.

The way I'd make her chase her tail, in circles, round and round!

The way she'd run, leaping like a rabbit, (like Utki too! :P)

The way she'd come nuzzling her nose beneath my hand, effectively getting me to per her!

The times I ignored her for I had other work ..(shouldn't have)

The times she'd listen to me talk. The times she would not listen to me talk!

The friend that she was.

All that is long past, I am not a kid anymore and I don't have Kimi, but somehow I still think she was one of those who understood me, even if just a little :)

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt!

But people want their entertainment, so I go on......

Our first problem was that Sindhu, like me, could be well trusted to get lost and to add to it she didn’t have a cell phone so we desperately prayed for her to get late, not realizing there was a chance God just might listen to us! Meanwhile we put our heads together, charted out yet another plan so we would reach back around 9.00. We waited. Then Sindhu called and He spoke! Apparently she had reached the airport in time, figured her way around, had managed to hold onto herself and lost her luggage instead. The airlines expected it to arrive no earlier than an hour, and apologized for any inconvenience hence caused.

So we waited. The next flight came in but the luggage didn’t. Now we were to give the airport an address to deliver it to. But what address were we to give? We were leaving Stanford the next morning, for Berkeley, SF and the next day to LA! Sindhura meanwhile made it abundantly clear that she would not leave without her baggage, it contained all her skirts after all and she was going to Hollywood for God’s sake!! So her luggage, along with the skirts, was to be express delivered at Stan at 3 in the night.

While we waited again, this time for the bus to the Caltrain station to come, Shruti thought it prudent to now take a cab back and went negotiating for it. Just when we were about to stike a deal and fork out the money, the bus came. Unfortunately, I have always been quick to see trouble and immediately spotted it, left the cab driver mid sentence and ran to catch the bus. Intent on taking the next Caltrain back we all rushed aboard and were feeling very intelligent about ourselves when midway it became all too apparent that the bus was slyly trying to avoid reaching the train station.

Fuming we demanded to know why we were being taken in quite another direction, when the driver told us that we had in fact boarded a bus going the other way. So now it would go to its final stop, halt for some time, then go back to the airport and then go to Caltrain station. By the way this was the last bus for the night and any Airport shuttles or cabs were not to be seen in the God forsaken middle of nowhere that this bus stopped.

We laughed! Really there was nothing else to do. When you have been so monstrously stupid, you can either cry at your idiotism or do one smart thing after all and laugh at it! We had a good chance of missing the last train back but determined we pleaded our case and the driver agreed to go as fast as he could. Racing against time we looked only at our watches, cursed every red signal and damned every slow passenger who dared to board the bus. Finally though, we made it 5 minutes before the last Caltrain to home came, ran for our dear lives to buy the tickets and hopped onto the platform just in time to hear that the train was 20 minutes late.

Well we did finally get onto this one, and thought that was the end of it. But no! Suddenly Shruti realized, as this train was late, by the time we’d reach, the Stanford shuttles now would be closing down! Aaaarrrghhhh! Well we couldn’t argue with the driver this time, so we prayed!

The station came, we got out and we sprinted. Yet again. The last Stanford shuttle was just leaving the station when I spotted it and Shruti lurched forward, waving her arms wildly to flag it down. Really we were so desperate that I can quite imagine she would’ve leaped into the middle of the road and refused to budge if the shuttle didn’t stop. Well we didn’t quite get to see the show, as the bus did stop and dropped us home around 11.30 in the night. Tired to the bone we went off to sleep only to be rudely awoken at 4, Sindhu's skirts had arrived you see!

P.S.: Contrary to popular misconception, the author is not lukkha and frowns upon being called so!
P.P.S.: To be hopefully continued!

"The road to a friend's house is never long."

-Danish proverb

{ Moving closer to claiming Phirta hoon main London, Paris, New York, LA, San Francisco :P}

The days spent in California could be very succinctly described as cacking till the last drop of energy we had, then sleeping, hogging and back to cacking again! That’s about all we did for 15 days, only the settings of this routine changed, from the posh hills of Hollywood to sunset at the beach, from chilly night at Berkeley roads to sleepy days at Stanford. Loads of noise, crazy antics and crazier photos, laments about painful roomies, attempts at making exotic sounding dishes (some unexpectedly successful and some not quite so), repulsive IIT level fattes, howls of laughter (mine being the loudest of course :P) and heroic efforts to sing adding to the cacophony!

It was of course the reunion that it was supposed to be. Everything fit together beautifully and I got to pain both my set of friends ample :D

In addition to all the useless scraps of conversations, taking endless potshots at one another, misguided attempts at humour, bold trials of short dresses and subsequent portfolios, endless arguments about who'd put on/lost how much weight there also transpired a few gems, ones that make brilliant anecdotes.

Being the first one in our group to land at Stan I got to spend an absolutely lazy day with Shruti where all we did was chat continuously from 9 in the morning to 12 in the night. The high light of the day being us draining the last drop of culinary enthu we had, cooking for 4 hours! :P

The day next was a crowner of faux-pas! It began with Jyothsna suddenly realizing she had some work and a lot of mourning to do and poor Swato who came to SFO thinking she would go philandering around Stan, incredulously realizing she was being shipped off to Berk instead and Arun toiling over a dinner for which the main guest didn’t show up!

Shruti and me in the meanwhile were confidently yacking away. After all we had done 3 runs of our Master Plan to pick up Sindhura from the airport, and had a Plan B & C prepared, in case we missed a connection. Even if everything went wrong we’d be home by 9.30. Or so we thought. Midway a sentence we realized we should leave to catch the B line. Strolling outside, I turned back to Shruti (who was armed with maps btw) to confirm if there was plenty of time for the shuttle to come. Pat came the reply, “I don’t know”!!! Jolted, we decided to run, but the damned B line took off right before our eyes, leaving us panting!

But an A line showed up 3 minutes later and we ran to catch that instead. Shruti, though buried in the bus timetable, was again clueless as to where it goes or when it reaches. We boarded it anyway and hence missed our first Caltrain by no more than 5 mins.

To be continued...

Fresh feeling

That's more than a song I like, it's my current status put into 2 words.

Just finished reading "The Eleventh Commandment", an awesome book, am now looking to pick up Amitav Ghosh and will then hopefully move on to the much shelved Vikram Seth. Also looking to learn guitar some more, attend concerts, musicals, theater, movies at UT.

Funny how I am out to explore the place I had so easily shunned earlier, funny how much a slight shift in perspective can cause and how that change can only be brought about by travel to a fresh place, a new patch of land and a sunrise with different hues!

Ideally I shouldn't try to capture in words these past few days. Only a writer extraodinaire can do justice to it. Amateurs like me should let such times fly by, like silent moments of enchantement, ones you can never frame into confining vocabulary. ( Through the bars of a rhyme! :) )

But then my friends wouldn't forgive me. :P :D

Still High... :)

Ek Din Aap Yoon Humko Mil Jayenge
Phool Hi Phool Raahon Mein Khil Jayenge
Maine Socha Na Tha

Jagamagati Hui Jaagti Raat Hai
Raat Hai Ya Sitaaron Ki Baraat Hai
Ek Din Zindagi Itni Hogi Haseen
Jhoomega Aasmaan Gaayegi Ye Zameen
Maine Socha Na Tha

Not much to say..

Don't want to leave. Just that.

Ek din aap yun...

As much as I would like to write about this trip, I can't seem to find a beginning. There are too many colours and emotions involved. Maybe I'll go back and reflect, distill my thoughts and pen them down. Maybe I don't need to sift through memories and select them now, time will do that for me. There are however a few obvious emotions, some expected and others surprising.

I haven't been this pampered for ever, so many people around who bother, who wouldn't let me take any trouble or do any work. I can't even be silent for 10 minutes without rousing concerns! It's amazing to the point of being scary in that I am not used to being so spoilt!

There is of course the joy of being with people close to me and gratitude for there being such people. The excitement of meeting new junta and discovering common grounds, the silent rapture engendered by the beauty scattered all around the place.

Then, needless to say, it hits me that I have to leave.....and soon.

Sand in Shoes - again!

Two weeks away feels like the world should've changed
But I'm home now
And things still look the same
I think I'll leave it till tomorrow to unpack
Try to forget for one more night
That I'm back in my flat on the road
Where the cars never stop going through the night
To a life where I can't watch sunset
I don't have time

I don't have time....

I've still got sand in my shoes
And I can't shake the thought of you
I should get on, forget you
Why, why would I want to?
I know we said goodbye
Anything else would've been confused but I wanna see you again

Tomorrow's back to work and down to sanity
Should run a bath and then clear up the mess I made before I left here
Try to remind myself that I was happy here
Before I knew that I could get on a plane and fly away
From the road where the cars never stop going through the night
To real life where I can watch sunset
And take my time
Take all our time