Where are you goin'?

Where are you goin'?
Where you gonna stay,
when you don't know your way?

Where are you goin'?
At the end of the day,
when you don't know,
where your head will lay?

Where are you goin'?
Who are you fightin'?
Where are you layin'?
Where no one will know your name.

Ship of past joy

I want to sail on a ship of past joy.

Somewhere on to a far away island
so deep in my nested dreams,
etching on the dim white sand,
where joy bursts from the seams.

I sailed on a ship of past joy.

Amidst seas, flowers and their hives of bees.
kneeling against the tides of time.
I carefully dotted the i's and crossed the t's.
a penny for my thoughts, an idea for your dime.

As I run aground my ship of past joy.

A flash of light, a treacherous noise.
Torn from want, to need, I bleed
a decade ahead to reality.
no thoughts, hopes, for posterity.

Telugu blockbuster

I have decided to make a Telugu movie. I am sitting on choosing the category for the opening of the two halves.

Category one - Movie starts with the protaganist as a 9 year old. In a chaddi and a chequered half sleeves shirt. Then something bad happens. Cuts to actor's introductory scene.

I didn't chose the tapori life.

 or

Category two - Movie starts with the introductory scene where nobody can make out why the protaganist is a dick head who beats rowdy looking guys to pulp. But don't worry flashback scene after interval will explain how something bad happened to him when he was just a kid, a 9 year old. In a chaddi and a chequered half sleeves shirt. And something bad happened.

Let's now abandon all reason and logic till I can be vindicated 20 fucking years later

Intro scene: Mahesh Sai Ram Charan Dharam Ravi Teja Nagendra Babooooooo, walks in and stands there for 12 minutes like a PR obsessed politician waiting for the camera to pan onto his face from 178 different angles, as the wind chooses to selectively blow onto only his hair and nothing else. He then slaps his thigh and the objects lying nearby settle into geosynchronous orbit.

FU ISRO

Throw in a female actor somewhere thereabouts. Who, with her sense of dressing, oozes extremely high standards of maan, maryada and sushiltha. But don't be disappointed horn dogs, come a song sequence, we will spare her a few ounces of thread to cover censor board rules herself, as she prances around in nigh-zero locations, to tunes that don't matter, because skin.
 



The first half clearly has no connection to the beginning of the second half. In fact, the audience might leave the cinema hall if there are any. So keep the hauns coming.

However, there is a saving grace. Bramhanandam. Not his role, of course, just his acting prowess. Sadly you have to put up with seeing him humiliated through most of the movie by the protaganist or the villain.

Single handedly saving your asses

Last integral part - The larger-than-life-but-only-till-the-movie-climax villain. He smirks all through the movie like he just soiled his underwear and liked it.

I have greyed symmetrically and it reminds me of my skid marks.

But hold on you highly opinionated, forever pissed, sex deprived, schadenfreudian, open letter writing people with internet connections. I have already sensed the vibes of the audience and they are gonna buy none of your bat shit outrage.

Now leave me alone for a while, I will go try to fit a script in there somewhere.

The egg factory

I think I am turning into something. Not something dangerous. Not something dark - no that would have been cool. I am turning into something very weird. Something that I don't understand.

So this morning, I was at this restaurant called The egg factory where, well they make eggs. I like eggs. The thought of a nice sunny side up creeping up on me when I am super hungry is not something I can ignore.

Anyway, after the tiny-sized over-priced brunch, the waiter came back with my change after I had paid my bill. I was busy staring at twitter on my phone while actually contemplating the sophisticated realities of adult life that have befallen me, when he muttered something like

Waiter *nervously*: "Five rupees change you have to give"

Or something like that, which I did not hear correctly, but know now.

Me: " ' beg your pardon?"

Waiter *now almost shaking because his interaction with customer has gone for over 7 seconds*: "Five rupees...something something"

And then

Me: "I do not comprehend the nature of your predicament."
*adjusts monocle*

Waiter *blankly stares at me for 5 seconds while we both process what just happened*: "Sir we don't have five rupees. You please give."

WHY WOULD I SAY "I do not comprehend the nature of your predicament."



WHERE DID THAT COME FROM?

I am pretty sure normal people don't suddenly regurgitate things like that out of nowhere.

I was half wishing that he responded with

"Why sir art thou speaking like a humungous piece of self-glorified turd ball that you obviously are?"

Then I would have had some semblance of an atonement. But he didn't.

This and many other untold turd ball stories...

And it's a girl

India: Twitter and Facebook users from the darkest, dingiest corners of an enchanted Kalispalya, Bangalore to Mandya's Achappan Kopplu were ringing with celebratory cheers

"   And it's a gurllllllll   ^_^   " 

because somewhere in Europe, a lady and a clean-shaven under-sized gorilla man, made a baby. Again.

Sensed a disturbance in the force? It was probably the sound of incoming Whatsapp messages like "Girl Roxxxxzzz Boy Shoxxxxzz", (prepared well in advance to suit either scenario).

TDH, wondering why the hue and cry over a seemingly mediocre news from a for-the-lulz-monarchy, headed over to the UK to find out, and we ran up against the father. He explained, that he is second in line and could be first in line (if the succession is leap-frogged), to be the "monarch" of the United Kindoms and the Commonwealth realms. India is among commonwealth realms.

However, he also explained, the baby was actually a big deal, because a normal man couldn't seduce a nun doing squats in a cucumber field, while looking like this-

Take a good look India. This could be your 'King'

While we agree that those teeth could be used to put the Kola Superdeep Borehole to shame, we still got in touch with the town crier Tony Appleton for some extra sound bites. And he proved to be a joyous and loyal servant.

Hear ye hear ye

Having fully understood Kalispalya's over-the-top obsession with the Royal baby, we headed back to India chanting 'Long live the queen'.

Humans

I think all humans were all in a previous life some beasts that had some sort of sentience enough to know cruelty and indulged in the worst form of it capable. And then we were born as humans to suffer a higher form of sentience.

Being human

P's relentless march towards becoming a human and full blown denial of being a dog continues. He now uses a pillow.

Don't come to the dark side P. It's a trap.

Man over tiger

I remember way back around 1998, there was a hut near my house. A guy who lived there worked as a grass cutter at the Mysore zoo.

One unfortunate day, the gates to a tiger enclosure were accidentally left open when he was cutting grass on the open area meant for tiger. The tiger ventured out into the open and saw an unfamiliar scene of two numbnuts cutting grass in it's space. Predictably, it attacked this guy while his colleague climbed up a tree safely.

 A Garuda jeep passing through the area was alerted and immediately, the officers rushed in and opened fire on the tiger, killed it, thus saving the man. He would recover from his injures soon, so that he could return to being a wife-beating drunk.

Less than a year later, one night, while returning home drunk, he fell into a drain, smashed his head and died out of excessive bleeding. His wife Manjula, a 10th standard drop out, was given a job, her first, at the zoo as a clerk. She would go on to write SSLC which made her eligible to earn various promotions.

I couldn't help but feel that Manjula's financial stability, independence and a more peaceful existence was denied for an extra year by heroics of some Garuda officers who just like most of us, valued the life of just one of the billions of humans on earth, over that of the tiger, a species that barely number in thousands.  Waste of an innocent life of a magnificient animal, the tiger, that acted on natural instinct and also perhaps of a few government bullets.

Pulchritude

How beautiful you are as you sit in the yonder
I marvel at the resplendence and wonder
how many eons did the almighty take
how many lifetimes, to such beauty make

How many hours have I peered into that bewitching face,
to find a shadow of his mistake, amidst that grace
Where do the curves on your eyebrows, begin and end?
from where did such a musical perfection descend?

It would be punishing to see you wear a frown
or a hint of last night's sorrow drowned
in even a single tear down the skin flown
yet hidden today behind a cheerful tone

I need no more answers, I've witnessed the most beautiful dawn
I've no more dreams, I've seen your charm
I wish for the gift of soothing music, to pour
and immortally describe, with justice, your allure

New Firefox add-on auto-comments on anti-Modi articles, calls author paid media

Helsinki. Finnish software start-up Crowd Tech just released a new Mozilla Firefox add-on that enables users to detect any articles with an opinion against Mr.Narendra Modi and automatically generates and posts a comment against the author after calling them "paid media", while offering other customizable abuses.



The announcement took the social media circles by storm. Most people hailed the effort as timely and supportive towards the "Indian youth", but there were a few people who found it appalling. On the company's Facebook page, which got 800,000 likes within a span of an hour, a certain Ritu Roy commented "A Finnish company making something like this? C'mon guys is this what we have become?". However, within 3 minutes, her comment was bombarded with replies calling her a 'Kangressi', 'Congi' and 'educated illiterate' among other things. We tried to contact her but she has now deleted her Facebook profile.



We later got in touch with the company asking why they chose to release an add-on like this, targeted at Indian consumers when the company calls itself a Mobile Apps developer, Mr Juhani Katainen, CEO of Crowd Tech, replied "Start-ups have a tough time cutting into the market, you need investors, you need to build an image and for that you have to grab attention, we just can't waste our time having a conscience. We studied Google search trends for a while, we realised that the Indian audience was huuge. I mean Justin Beiber and Lady Gaga might have some following, but we needed some real numbers."

Click to enlarge: This development model is a success

"Once we realised we are looking at India, our only problem was choosing between supporters of Shah Rukh Khan, Salmaan Khan and Narendra Modi. Some group called 'Akkians' also showed up, but we never understood what they were talking about."



We decided to seek help of an ardent NaMo supporter who goes by his Internet alias "I hate sickiluars" , a techie in a reputed software company, to put to test this add-on which has since gained over 847k users, at the time of writing this article and has in a matter of hours climbed to the top of "Most popular" and "Top rated" sections of the Mozilla add-ons page.














"This is a work of art. It has so many features. It can detect any opinion article on any media and tt has such a huge list of abuses starting from ones like 'congi', 'sickular' etc to serious ones like 'Italian b**ch', 'Go back to f***istan you f***ing ISI spy' all vetted with asterix symbol to avoid profanity filters." says our friend with a twinkle in his eye. "It also seems to have a bit of AI as it suggests '1984' if the article contains '2002' anywhere, 'pappu' in reply to any comment that says 'feku', 'CoalGate/corruption/scam' etc if the article contains 'malnutrition'".



"I think the crowning feature is the auto-comment, where the user doesn't even have to be involved. It leaves a short and crisp 'Paid media' in the comment section of all articles. Sometimes, it leaves this comment on pro-modi articles also,but  I'm sure its a bug that will they fix soon.". Crowd Tech did confirm that they are working on this as a priority.



When asked if he wished for any additional features he was very quick to point out a few "To begin with, it should be 'kangressi' and not 'congressi', the later sounds too polite IMHO. Secondly, it should allow multiple usernames because sometimes we have to leave contradicting comments, like blaming the west, saying they don't understand India, when they call NaMo communal or violent, but embracing articles where they support him by saying things like 'SEE SEE EVEN AMREEKA LIKES HIM'", but he sums up with "A lot of people are losing their jobs everyday because they are spending too many office hours searching and commenting on anti-Namo articles, Crowd Tech is doing a really noble job by reducing that time, saves a lot of jobs, I would like to see more add-ons like this".

"Vikas Purush"

Meanwhile, a source from inside Crowd Tech tells us that they are making a mobile app that helps users to write open letters to Pappu, every time he opens his mouth. The last we heard, Chethan Bhagat was very keen on its development. Let's just say that Mr.Modi is 'Vikas Purush' indeed, inspiring such brave new (software) development and not just within India.

Coming home from work

Damn.

It's been 3 and half years or so since college got over and I started working. I must say its not all that attractive.

Once you are done with work, there is nothing to look forward to coming home. Just come, worry about things

- can I find someone to have a decent conversation with
- how I am gonna get my dinner at this hour
- will the traffic be heavy
- will people I do talk with not talk about just heartbreaks or loans that they took and can't pay off
- will I receive at least one mail where I am not in the bcc
- If I can't have any of the above, can I watch something on my laptop without being disturbed

It was fun in college, coming home. Just me, my rides, my computer games. I didn't have to please anyone self-righteous, I didn't have to be nice nor rude to make my point.

Peace was the last thing I searched for.

I'm still a kid, who liked fairy tales but didn't believe in them.

I'm the kid who has been told that he is a grown up and I can't swallow it.

Aforementioned person in beforementioned resume for your presitigious organisation

I am currently pouring through a few resumes that have been mailed to me by people for an interview at my office. I don't mind poor language, but sometimes, some just strike that crazy chord.

Here, take a look at one that made me cry, I can't make this stuff up:




"Dear sir/madan,

I am myself herewith kindly enclosed inside my resume for your good cansideration..."







*facepalm with napalm*

Are you going to kill me?

Note: The draft tells me this is a post saved from 3rd February 2011, the time I had been blogging as busily as a dam building beaver on crystal meth. I had probably saved it to publish sometime around march, but forgot about it. Considering the long awkward pause, I figured I would post it now.
I'm too lazy to go through the draft in detail and edit it for current day, so when I say last year, I probably mean 2010.


"Are you going to kill me?"

It started a few days after college was over. I had pretty much nothing to do except write and wonder when I would get a job. It was a non insomnia phase.
(So, basically, proof that my insomnia has nothing to do with any "ups/downs in life" or something 'worrying' as most people simply try to force me to agree with.)
I had been having a recurring dream, every single day. The first and the last recurring dream till date. It lasted for nearly 6 months. The dream was a bit like this.

I am standing in a dark room or garage or something and there is another guy just in front of me holding up a gun right into my face. I could see the gun and his hand and his silhouette, because there was some sunlight pouring in through a window in a wall behind him.
This guy had me check mate. If I moved a finger, it wouldn't take him much to spray my brains all over the place. So as I knew this, I just stand there with my hands up and say

"Are you going to kill me?"

...and I wake up.

The dream never lasted more than a couple of seconds from the start to the finish.


Now this dream bothered me for one and only one reason. No I didn't think I had some mental disease because the dream was so morbid. I was sure it must have been triggered by some action/thriller/heist/crime movie I saw. No, that was not it.
The thing that bothered me was my own words. Are-you-going-to-kill-me? Why on earth did I say that? It sounded like I was submitting to him. If I knew myself, if there was such a situation, I would make a quick movement, just so that I could go on my own terms and go without surrendering.


Huh..are-you-killing-me? "No, I'm just putting this gun in your face for a while to check how long it takes my arm to go to sleep."

So was my real self a meek, no-fight-left guy? Or was the line also part of whatever movie I had watched? Should I even be analysing this dream?
Why was it recurring?

As I said, this went on for about 6 months and until around this time last year when I got the call letter to my current company and I moved to my work city. It didn't take too long for my insomnia to kick back in.

The first day of insomnia, it must have been about 5 in the morning, I drifted into a light drowsy, semi-awake state. Soon enough, I was in the garage again.

Same gun, same window, same position. My hands were up in defense. But something was different. There was something in my hand too.

I had a gun. Without a hint of remorse in my mind, I turned my hand, pointed it at his head, knowing fully well he would react too and I squeezed that trigger with so much anger, hate and revenge, without batting an eyelid as I didn't want to miss a split second of my hunter's hunting. I heard the shot (Which, I'm sure would be much louder in real life) and I saw my wanna-be-killer fly backward into the darkness and slam into the wall behind him with a thud.


That was the last time I had the dream.

Rahul Dravid - Please don't retire

Dravid has a tendency to announce retirements after awesome peaks followed by a few slight lows.

ODI career - Yes, India gave a poor show at the world cup, but India had won matches in rows before that, under his captaincy.

Test career - He had come off one of his best years and then a slump of few matches.

And just in case he follows trends, - Now IPL - Never seen captaincy like this. King maker. Got the best out of the rookies. But lost in the eliminator.

Rahul Dravid, sorry the script didn't come through at your first best shot, but this is where you don't retire and put the peddle to the metal and get the cup next year. Please?

You get the cup, Indian cricket gets the cup. #FuckFixing

#NammaRahul



*Update*
And thus the fears have come true. Dravid did announce his retirement :|

Miss Korea

So if you take all the contestants for Miss Korea beauty pageant and put them in one GIF...

Sorry, didn't mean to interrupt the long pause on this blog with a (seemingly) racist post (which is not, cause I didn't say anything at all). Now please carry on.

House warming and other pet peeves

It's a well known fact among my near and dear that I generally avoid the never ending pujas and the 'functions' (and methods and procedures) of even my near and dear. Though I should quickly mention, the same should not be mistaken for why I am usually absent from some wedding ceremonies - that almost always is because I have poorly timed my other errands.

But the pujas are a different story.
 * The sthothras and the mantras, the meaning of which have long been forgotten by the people who organise them, with the exception, if at all, by the people who
conduct them.
*The thronging of the sheep, most of who are sweet enough to show moral support by simply showing up, might sometimes seem charitable and narcissistic in its own sense that if they
didn't, God wouldn't rain prosperity on the organiser, or simply on the other hand, that the host would feel disappointed of their absence among the scores that they invited.
*The overwhelming crowd and the inherent attribute of everyone in one to withstand the sea of guests as they wade or back paddle in them.
*The possibly fatal (for me, or even those in my vicinity) insufficient supply of my coffee.
*The need to appease every single node of my overgrown, overly-in-touch family tree, by  acknowledging relatives whose faces (occasionally) are the only thing I remember, not how my dad's distant cousin's wife's younger son's elder daughter,
was ever introduced to me or her name or anything else for that matter, let alone the fact that I have to keep myself from even blinking, as this person who had probably only met me twice before, is asking me the intricate details of my salary and how soon I intended to tie the knot.
The list is inexhaustible.

However, all said and done, there are days when I have to relent. Simply because my mum-and-dad invoke the 'I-am-your-mum/dad-and-thou-shalt-do-as-I-say' rule. Haven't heard of that one?
Well its the second most powerful rule. The first is 'I-am-your-girlfriend' rule, which eventually will be null and void and replaced with 'I-am-your-wife' rule, but that's a discussion for another day.

So, the rule was invoked and my fate for this last Sunday was set - I was going to attend a house warming ceremony at my dad's sister's big ass shop in the neighbouring galaxy.

After 16-17 months of tirelessly searching for a house to buy for my folks, all efforts in vain, there is nothing more relaxing than riding in the sun, on an empty stomach, in Bangalore traffic, through the Mysore road, for 33 kilometers, so that I could sit inside an unventillated room, with the sunfacing side covered only by glass, among 200 other people engulfed by the smoke from the holy homa and think about how I could have been sitting in my own house warming ceremony instead.

Oh I forgot, the babies who cry like there is no tomorrow- music to the ears. They add that little zing to the entire episode.

How? How do you people do it? Do you take something to endure this? Is it ingested orally? Tell me your secret!!

Quiet

It's pretty quiet on my blog roll for the past few months. Nobody seems to have anything much to say. Honestly speaking, its been like that for almost 2 years. And anybody who does have anything to say are kids who have discovered blogs and have the most inflated opinions on the most boring topics, expressed in painfully elaborate notes. The general consensus when I was in the middle of my BE was that blogging was dead. Seems a bit like that now. Read old post (with a weird spam comment) now! Also I wonder how many of you will actually read this, since I'm not really gonna post its link anywhere.

It's been quiet from my end too. But trust me, I have only been quiet because I have been busy as a beaver on speed and a pretty happy, contented one at that.

Break the streak, I must. Soon, I will. Until then, let the force help you live long and prosper.

How some things are born

A man in a suit walks up to a clan of female coconut climbers...

Him: "Hey you"

Her: "Yeah?"

Him: "Who is the leader of your clan?"

Her: "It's me. What do you want?"

Him: "I have a job offer for you and your clan"

Her: "We already have a job."

Him: "But we pay slightly better. Are you interested?"

Her: "I'm listening.."

Him: "It involves a little bit of dancing..."

Her: "Dancing? We hardly know anything about dancing. We pluck coconuts! Are you out of your mind?"

Him: "Na, you don't have to worry. Just pretend there is a coconut tree and make the same moves you make while climbing one. Except, there will be some music."

Her: "That it?"

Him: "Yup. That it!"

Her: "Deal. Girls, get here!!"


--

That ladies and gentlemen, how the Sri Lankan T20 World cup cheerleaders were born.

Culture politics

There is a problem with this country. A problem that has been brewing, slowly and steadily. And this problem is not gonna go away easily, because that problem has been nurtured among us. It has penetrated its slimy tentacles and imbibed itself into our so called society, if it can still be called that - society. Isn't a society a place where people live socially and behave like civilized humans?

There are elements at play. Elements that claim they are doing a religious duty, of morally policing the "misguided youth", to correct them, to teach them to dress appropriately, to never go around with a person of the opposite gender. And all this is done by harassing and mercilessly beating up helpless boys and girls. All in the name of culture.

Someone should ask these neanderthals:
Is beating up each other, even young school/college boys and girls a part of our culture? Who taught you how to behave? Did a stranger have to come and beat you up for it?

If a guy decides to put his arms around his girl, if a girl wants to dress up like a slut and walk the streets, if a bunch of kids want to have an all night booze party then its their decision. Its a decision. Its not a decision that broke a law, put you or anyone else in harm. If at all there is any harm, its for themselves and if so, they shall repent. And if they do repent, so will their parents, who obviously took a wrong step somewhere.

This country doesn't need a Taliban. It doesn't need messengers of Hindutva neither does it need the caretakers of our culture.

Culture was what evolved from millions of thinking minds over thousands of generations. If its changing, then its following its own free flowing course.


You know why this country has a problem? Because any guy who can't get laid, has a problem with a guy who can. Because any woman who wasn't allowed to peek out of the window while growing up, has a problem with a girl who can roam the streets. Because every single person, who doesn't think on their own shoulders, blindly follow these rowdies if they say it was done in the name of "saving our culture" or in the name of religion. Because any Xenophobic, forever-alone, self-hating, hypocrite can be a celebrated hero if he/she says the right things. These elements are leading us in the direction of another Afghanistan/Waziristan.

If this goes on, the day is not far away when this army of zombies are gamed into thinking that its okay to rape a girl in the name of saving our culture, because she was misbehaving. Trust me, that day is not far away at all.

I might not like it if the new generation if full of self-centered, slutty, shameless, coke-sniffing, never-sober, disease infested people. But I doesn't mean I will not tolerate them. As long as they keep to themselves, it is none of my business.

We need a revolution alright. But a revolution where we focus on correcting ourselves instead.

Are you worried that your son or daughter will be one of them? Then do us all a favour, don't be an asshole, just - BE A GOOD PARENT!


--
Sincerely yours,
A believer

Life in two cities

Two beautiful cities. Two beautiful lives.
What connects the two, is a wonderful bike ride.
One gives me my bread and butter,
while the other has my family, friends and a soulful lover.

Pretty people everywhere and not a friend to be seen,
in the city covered with smoke, but still so green.
The other is full of friends at every step,
Every time, best 48 hours that's ever been.

In one life, I earn my dreams I ever dreamed,
in the other, I dream to earn, like I ever earned.
One life built the man I am now,
while the other life was built by the man I already was,


Two beautiful cities. Two beautiful lives.
Both connected by an enchanting ride.