Occasions – Page 3 – Helmet Pinched

Scribbling randomness.

I wanted to title this entry as “Proud to be mallu – II” but then I had quite a few things to scribble in and the ideas were too varied. Essence of that title being the part where Onam just went by and I felt endearingly close to my family and culture. Physically far away but still so close. The idea of going back to Pune and home thereby seems so alluring. I spent the day with my family in Bangalore which included and are limited to Ravi uncle, Radha aunty, my cousins; Ammu and Kuttapi and granny. I always knew about the fact that Radha aunty would never let me miss home. She’s an amazing cook, a very concerned mom and a very easy person to connect with. I’d always agree that I’m much closer to her than I’m to my uncle.

The day began with breakfast that included something called “Ada” this is made up of rice dough which is stuffed with jaggery, bananas, coconut and then baked. Another version of the very famous malayali rice cakes or “puttu” if you might. The only difference is that “puttu” is baked in powdered form and this here is roughed up and doughed like the dough you’d beat wheat up into to make chappatis. That and cooked up bananas (don’t try to imagine this because non-mallu’s just find this gross and distasteful, but we the mallu’s dig it!) formed the initial part of the breakfast. I then stuffed myself up with chips and some other tasty tit bits! I was so full that I could not move. We then headed to a temple nearby and I prayed my heart out. Here was when I discovered that I’m extremely pious during occasions like these. I smirked when I prayed cause god must know about how busy I am, tssk tssk.

We then got back home and I introduced Kuttapi to Ubuntu; which had already caught his attention when using it at my place. We got it installed and he needed all the programms that I had running. They use BSNL broadband at their place and I realized how much it sucks. I somehow managed to get almost all the important programms installed and asked him to do the rest. I am forgetful and thats something that came to me like an nth-fiddle. I had installed Ubuntu at my place a few months back and I had performed manual partitioning flawlessly but I forgot how to do it and had to google it out. Damn! I dunno, I feel sometimes as though there is a lot of space up in my brains. My memory is unused and its decaying up there. If small things like these don’t stick why do I even have a brain? Pfft. Lunch called and its aroma filled the air dragging me from in front of the computer right upto the table. Radha aunty’s lunch tasted amazing all spicy and full of love. Again, I stuffed myself up and headed home to watch some tv and relax. Which is precisely what I did. I’ve been watching all the mallu movies that TV could show within the last 3 days and I feel closer to who I am when I’m with my people, my language, my movies. I feel owned by malluism!

I couldn’t get much sleep on Saturday after shift since I had to attend the workshop. This time it was arranged to be at this really endearing place called “Alliance Francaise” which I assume was largely to introduce the French language and its culture to people interested. The language, its art and other things falling in its agenda. Also, plays and other forms of creative expressions seemed to be all over the place. It was a green-spot, serene and I loved it there. The ambience is still stuck to my head and I’m not sure if they charged a lot but then this was way better than being at a noisy coffee shop. We discussed play-writing this time and a play-writer called Abhishek spoke to us about his experiences with play writing. It was interesting even though play-writing isn’t one of my things. I enjoyed the whole discussion nevertheless and I’d love to see how people enact these plays when its presented next week. It’d be funny. I can’t act or talk stage for nuts and it’d be really embarassing if I have to! Connecting to people still seems to be a difficult thing for me to do and all I can do for now is try. I don’t want to push myself too hard anyway.

It was raining boredom today cause I had to work the morning shift because of Hemant the dickhead. It was his birthday today and this was why I agreed to work in place of him for today. Anyway, I watched tv throughout the day and slept some. There wasn’t much to do and it was one of those really boring days. Music, writing and tv helped me passed my time as I felt myself starve till like 4. Hunger pangs struck somewhere around this time and I ran over to Radha aunty’s and devoured everything I saw. By that time I was dying for it to be 6 and the final two hours seemed to be the slowest. Finally, I drove down to Ajay’s and we went over to Purple Haze since I was in the mood for some rock music. Chetan was reluctant but then he tries to not say a no to me. Thanks Chetan, we needed you to sing along. Purple Haze was loud but the DJ played some good music along with videos and man it pushed my adreneline level up and I enjoyed being there and head banging to some really nice rock music. I heard a couple of songs that I really liked and I’m listening to them now. Neat place overall, Purple Haze. I heard from a few acquaintances though that it wasn’t as good as it used to be and that its lost its charm. I’m not sure, I liked the place anyway. Chetan said that the repeat the music over and over again, everyday. That’d be annoying to the regulars!

So thats it for today. I’m not too sleepy cause I had some redbull and I feel fresh as ever. Might watch a movie or two and then get some reading done. I fiddled around a bit and found this theme. Its inspired from the devine design of deviantart and I love the way it looks. I really don’t care much about what others feel about this design. Its staying for the time being cause I like it. Might go out with Chetan tomorrow. I had tons more to write, but then I choose not to, cause its pointless. Delhi blasts, over 30 dead. Whats the point in writing about it? Terrorism seems to be something we Indians have learnt to live with! Its no biggie, I guess. “Ohh, a bomb? Cool, how many did it kill this time?” Bastards, what do you get out of this? You kill 30 and within 30 minutes India would have replaced those bodies with different souls somewhere else. You just can’t kill us, you know? We’re like a never ending plague spreading and we’re spreading fast. How many do you think you can kill with your puny bombs? I loathe your existance and your attempts at bringing about an Islamic rule (or whatever the reason be) is futile. We will prevail and one fine day your ways will seize to exist. So suck it up and leave now.

-Anup

Self conversations

I’m pretty sure that I’ve managed to keep this side of me blurry to the eyes of the very few people who can look into my life and examine the way I live it. I’ve always had long detailed discussions with myself and some of those conversations have led me to good times and some others have taken me closer to doom. Whatever the case be; what amazes me is the ease with which I discuss things with myself. Its sometimes as easy as discussing it with a close friend. I’d pretend that I’m someone else and I’m talking to Anup. I question him and review the things he has done and is doing. I expect him to answer and he feels obligated to answer those questions.

The subjects for these kinda discussions have been varied throughout the years and they’ve grown from “How am I supposed to tell mom that the teacher’s put in a red remark in my calendar?” and “Anu!! what have you done? You shouldn’t have used that word, you know that!! Bloody bastard is a very bad word *anger and fright drooping off of me* Sister is going to be mad if she gets to know” Sister here were the nuns at school who taught me. It went onto something more worldly when adolescence dawned. I’ve had times when I told myself, “What a woman!!!” *gazing and drooling at one of my first crushes who walked by in a wrap-around* and to the time when, “Dads going to kill me when he sets his eye on the marks card this time, probably I must escape off to Kerala for a month or two!!” This actually worked during my 12th standard results, hah! I then came down to the golden question, “These are all good people, I’d want to be friends with them! So, what next Anu?” And from there on, its just gotten more and more complex to finally its come to a point where I ask myself, “What the fuck is wrong with you?” and “Who are you?” Makes me sad that I do not like myself as much as I used to and somehow it seems to kill my want to meet people and extend my circle of people close to me.

I was talking to Abhi today and he said a few things which I’d agree to and some stuff thats pure genius and a few other things that were plain shit. Anyway, when it comes to Abhi, I take all that he says. Somehow, it comforts me when it comes from him cause he’s the creator of the Matrix and he must have hidden some kinda code somewhere which breaks the anamoly that I am. Snip:

Anup: Hmmm, you don’t seem to see my point 🙂
Abhi: u r wrong my frnd
Anup: What I’m saying is…
              I’m not a shy person as such and I interact with people pretty well.
             But I still don’t manage to connect, the way you would or uhm, Ajay would maybe.
              Even though he can be quite an ass.
Abhi: c i ll tell u wht
              u r a type of guy who thinks he is very polished, and y expect evry1 around u also 2 behave the same way
              whras v dont behave like tht
              u r just the normalppl
              sloppy ppl u can say
              and thts wht makes us approachable
              dunno if m ale to make u understand wht i mean
Anup: Is it written on my forehead that I’m polished and I expect you to be polished?
Abhi: well.. the way u behave
Anup: What do I do man?
              I talk normal to everyone.
Abhi: u just need 2 let go of ur inhibitions
             u try 2 judge ppl as soon as u get talking 2 thm, and thn if u dont like a person after the initial talk, u tend to ignore/avoid thm… stop judging               ppl…
              just go with the flow
Anup: Ahh, well thats correct.
Abhi: and it doesnt hurt 2 try and keep in touch with ppl evn if u r nt frnz
            1 sms/call once in a while makes u grow close 2 the ppl around
Anup: Yeah…
Abhi: and the ppl around feel good bout u

I always feel better after having spoken to him. He’s straight, to the point and doesn’t beat around the bush. He does exaggerate a bit, but thats ok; thats a part of him we all love! Confuses me a bit. I thought friends happened, but thats not something that seems to be coming my way and like Abhi said, these days, you have to “make” friends, approach people and keep in touch. Sitting in a room and expecting people to come to you just won’t work. Later, cribbing about how lonely, boring and pointless your life has become would just make you look like a fool. Alright, so here’s the deal – Anu, you’ve gotten over some really bad times and getting stuck with yourself now isn’t something you’d want to do. You really need to go on and explore what lies beyond your room. Considering HP to be a very professional workplace and assuming that making friends isn’t all that easy there, its time you pulled up your socks and interacted a bit more with people. Socializing is very important. Haven’t you learnt nothing from Barney?!

Chetan and Ajay come as my saviours and though there are very little grounds on which me and Ajay connect; the lucky thing is, we don’t argue a lot. Just enough to keep things alive and not more than whats required. He loves music and so do I. Plus a lot of other things which makes him the only person I can talk to and feel good about! He’s a very much “me” kinda person where he’d mostly prefer talking about himself and himself only. Now, I wouldn’t say thats much of a problem if you look at it from the brighter side of things, but well, sometimes I feel he needs to give others a chance! Ghek. Chetan and me have no areas of commanality. Our choices, when it comes to music, cloathes and everything else seems to go to opposite ends but we still find a lot to talk about and I totally enjoy his company. He’s one of the most funniest people I’ve met and times flies when he’s around. Ratheesh my earlier commorade has been lost ever since he fell in love and I feel for him! *sigh* you were a brave soldier mate.

Its Onam, on the 12th of September and I think I’m going to enjoy a wonderful treat at Radha aunty’s place. We got Kuttaps a new computer. We here implies that his dad payed and I decided the config. Man, that was fun. Ravi uncle’s face was flooding with dismay when I kept on adding things to the list on which he’d be billed. Come to think of it now, we got an awesome config for approximately 23 grands. Common, talk about awesome – AMD Athlon X2 2.4 Ghz, Asus Nvidia chipset MB, 2 GB RAM, 320 GB HDD, LD DVD combo and an awesome 19″ flatscreen LCD, Viewsonic. Seriously, it was an awesome deal and I’m totally happy about getting it for that price. Kuttapi is on cloud number 9, but he’s lame with security settings and hit himself on his toe as soon as he got the box cause he decided to make some security changes to a game he installed so that his sister wouldn’t access it and that resulted in he locking himself out instead, funny kid. Ahh, its late and I’m hoping to meet Chetan tomorrow cause its my weekly off and he’s working nights. I hope we get to catch up. The workshop is going good and I love being there. The only part that bothered me recently is that my fellow writers were completely oblivious to the power of blogging and public writing. Some were confused about copyrights and the others were worried about their work being stolen. Common guys?! Do you’ll really care? *sigh*

-Anup

61 years of freedom, really?

I don’t want to sound cynical here but come to think of it are we are really free from the so called “Gora raaj”? The white mans rule on us coloured people, is it really over? Well it never has and it never will. We have always been under the western rule. Earlier it was forced upon us and they captured our land and stole our wealth. But now, its sad that we are slowly moving towards their culture trying more and more to westernize or if thats not what you’d refer to it, lets call it globalization. The world turning into one? Bullshit. We have always been a gullible little pup to their pomp and glory and have always tried to adopt their ways of life. I’m probably just speculating all this and what I feel can be ignored, but then for how long? Lets continue living in the shadows of our ancestors – they were brave.

Anyway, I did not intend on writing a cliched post but then I felt the urge and when I feel like typing, I’d better get it out cause else it sits on my head, grows so heavy on me that I lose sleep and I have to be ready for work tomorrow. I’ve been feeling so very lazy. I don’t like this part of me. The part of me who’d just want to sit at home, enjoy the drizzle, get a cuppa tea and relax. Makes me feel bogged down and bored of life. I don’t want that feeling to sink it cause then it just makes me sad! And I decided to write to get over the Nostalgia. Yes, 15th August always reminds me of my school days.

I’m proud of being a K.B convent product and that I’ve studied there without interruptions for 12 years. I’ve known from my peers, classmates and people I know that most of them tend to skip schools. But in my case, I’ve been very lucky and I was a part of the most awesome school ever. Independance day celebrations used to bring out a lot of colourful things in our school. Sports, concerts and others amongst the charade of things that were done during that week. Practise sessions used to be the most fun part where we’d get to miss classes if we were part of one of the plays, skits or songs being enacted. Ohh and the others who don’t take part in stuff like this get to wear colourful clothes and hold flags and run around school corridors the whole day without having to keep our hands folded behind our backs and thats like the one day where we don’t need to form a file when we walk. Its happiness all around. Teachers look prettier on that day and they seem to be extra nice to us too. We sing songs, get sweets and then we have the friends hangout time which used to be awesome too! Ghosh… I miss school. Mostly because I used to have loads of friends there and I was a comic so I’d get quite a lot of attention. Thats when I realize how drab my life has become. I miss my school mates and I miss them all the time. They were going to meet up today, dunno what happened of that.

I’ve got to get onto a 12 hr shift from 6 AM in the morning tomorrow and I’m not at all thrilled about it. So I’m just going to finish this off and here’s wishing all my fellow Indians a happy Independance day and lets just try harder to reach where we intended to go rather than following someone else’s culture blindly. Enjoy their ways, but stick to our own is what I’d say. Bharat mata ki jai!!!

-Anup

Friendships day.

So need I say more? I’m sure the pictures talk for themselves. The very essence of this post is in these pictures. I’m sure that people who know me might know who the people in those pictures are. I don’t want to demarcate those people into categories not am I going to prioritize them here. I’m just going to randomly type in names of people who make it to my list of friends and people I consider as friends. Some of these names do not appear in the pictures above but thats just because I couldn’t find a good picture. And yes, I’ve made a pyramid of my friends as well since thats how the world does it, you know? Top two, then the next 3 and then friends to follow. Some shit like that. I used to never recognize this before but recent events have forced me to categorize people and it hurts me. Coming back to names: Sneha, Shagufta, Abhi, Muiz, Smikh, Ajay, Chetan, Nikhil, Ratheesh, Hemant, Nids, Annie, Mank, Sanket, Sonu, Vishu, Vivek, Pramod, Prab, Unni. Uhm, good enough? Yeah.

Friendships day just went by and thats what inspired me to work on this collage and type in some eblish about my friends. These are all important people, you know? Some gentle and kind, some shrewd and wicked, some more hidden and deep, the others loving and caring and those very few plain ruthless ones too! I have them all in my list and I feel super cool about it. Friendship has always been a conundrum for me. I’ve never been able to make friends as quickly as Abhi would or Sneha would maybe; mostly if she could. She’s pretty tied up and the poor thing can’t move a lot. Luckily, she now has a job and I’m happy that she’d get to move around and meet some people. I couldn’t stand her cage anymore and I was praying hard. I did find most of my friends at Convergys and I’d be ever thankful to that place for almost everything in my life right now. I’ve already conveyed this across to all my friends, but I repeat; Guys, thanks a lot for being there and sharing your smiles and listening to what I had to say. I’m sorry for being boring whenever I was, but I’m a nice guy, you know? I’m sure you know and thats the reason I still continue to exist in your glorious world. Thank you once again for every step that you’ve taken with me. Love you’ll!

Apart from this, the weekend went by and it was neat. Coincidentally, it was Smikh’s birthday on the 3rd of August (friendships day) and somehow I find it very fascinating cause she’s been like this epitome of love and friendship for me. A symbol of companionship. There are no reasons why, its just been like that. The day passed by without a lot of fuss about it and I think I was peaceful that day. Saturday was funny though. We went shopping; Chetan and I. The monsoon sale is on throughout the malls in Bangalore and we were sweeping M.G.Road for some random cheap stuff. The only pair of jeans I liked wasn’t on sale and it was a Levis, 2,500 bucks. I liked it a lot and I wanted to buy it but did not want to spend all that money. The sales guy kept pestering me and I thought I’d buy it so I asked him to go get the measuring tape to alter its length. Thats when I told Chetan that I did not want to spend the money then and the both of us ran away from there! Man, that was really fun. Chetan is funny and his jokes (however lame they be) are cracked with a certain amount of ease and charm which is sure to make you giggle! I enjoy his company a lot. Thats just about it. Running a new month and keeping myself fit, hale and hearty. Life’s owning me right now. Peace out.

-Anup

Abhi’s engagement!

Well, here it is! The big man is finally tied up to a tree thats rooted to an eternal damnation in hell. Sometimes I think; how can someone as magnificent as him ever be tied up? Then I remember and I acknowledge the power of aphrodite! She can have anything and everything she wants. The power of WOMAN, hail for thou.

So, yeah, thats the deal. Abhijit got engaged on the 28th’s and I witnessed it along with his many many friends who were very few according to him because he could not invite them all. That would probably highlight the fact that he has tens of thousands of friends or so he likes to illustrate his popularity. We can keep it like that cause Mr. Shedge is a popular guy. His to-be-wife though, from whatever appeared of her seems like a quiet, shy maharashtrian girl who’d make awesome wife. That of course is my initial hypothesis. The story is yet to unfold.

The engagement was grand. I actually expected something different but was pleasantly surprised to see that it was pompous and very well managed. I loved some part of the food and I must say that the mung ka halwa was outstanding. I wanted to have more but then I did not want my blazer to go tight on me! Haha, funny story that! I got myself a new blazer and a pair of woodland shoes for his engagement. Feel good factor added to it. I felt awesome overall. Being there with him on an important day. Sharing those moments with his friends and family. Quite an honour O’ creator of the matrix! We now have an oracle in our midst and we must bow to her. Her name is Bhagyashree and she’s a sweet girl with an adorable smile *touch wood* Almost everyone important attended the ceremony. Namely, the Bangalore gang – Me, Ajay and Chetan and then we had close friends from CVG – Rashmi, Smikh, Anoop and then the others of his batch. So overall, the whole function was a grand success.

Nothing special apart from this happened except for my sister getting herself a laptop which is a cool thing cause now I can talk to her online once in a while and that’d surely help me, you know? I returned early the next morning with Ajay and Chetan; back to Bangalore. They cursed Bangalore throughout the way and well, I’ve made up my mind now – people would have tons of opinions and they have their own choices and likings. I am no one to change it and I should not comment when they vent out their frustration. If they hate this place, they do! Should that bother me? No. So, I must shut up when stuff like that happens again. I really shouldn’t care. So I’m back and I’m sick! What I need now is rest and I’m happy that I’m getting it.

To end this, I have something to say to my former paramour. Listen to me carefully girl! Now I’m not sure you’d read off this page cause from whatever it is that I know of you, I know you’d not return to any aspects of my life. But somehow, I felt like typing this in here, just in case you read. So, I had to tell you just one simple thing. Keep the fuck off our lives! Did you hear me or should I repeat? Ohhh, I nearly forgot, you don’t have a mother tongue. Hindi mein bolu? To fir theek hai, waise bhi bol deta hu – Mujhse aur mere dosth logon se door reh. Here, I mean, keep your mouth shut about any of us. Cause we don’t talk about you. So, here’s a fair chance for you to shut the fuck up and sit uptight. The next time I hear you bad mouthing any of my friends and trust me, things reach us… I’d bust the bubble you’ve made for yourself without thinking twice. And yes, thats a warning. The next time, I won’t save your ass! I’d let those concerned to deal with you and your ignorance. I repeat – it’d be best for you if you just forget us. Live and let live. I expect no further comments from you about someone else’s sexual orientation. Not that your opinions matter, but then you bad mouth again and I’m going to deal with it myself. So, SHUT THE FUCK UP when it comes to us, kapiche?

-Anup