The good thing about being away from home is always finding something new to whine about. That way you never get tired of whining about the same old leaky tap or the neighbour's cats. As is customary, I woke up this morning and spent three whole minutes wondering what to whine about the whole day.
The weather. Yes, the weather. I shall whine about the weather today.
The weather forecast in Chennai is quite predictable as it can only be one of three options - hot, hotter and hottest. It doesn't get more depressing than that, especially at this point of time where temperatures are well over 30°C and it hasn't even hit the peak yet. Things are about to get a lot worse and if I don't ditch my two week long summer internship and run home to safety, I might really drop dead in the middle of the Lloyd's Road junction.
The temperatures are soaring everyday, true, but what makes it even more unbearable is the humidity. Being a coastal city, Chennai during summer is akin to a ginormous sauna. The humidity makes the air so heavy that it sinks to the ground and refuses to budge. It plays dead better than a well-trained Pedigree dog. The few trees that have escaped being chopped down stand motionless and dry as wind movement and natural breeze become an urban legend. The only time you can feel the sea breeze brush against your skin is when you're standing lesser than two feet away from the seashore.
There seems to be no respite from this sultriness. With the sun beating down on your head, the only way for the body to stay cool is by sweating. Sweating profusely and copiously is anything but pleasant, especially when you can feel it trickling down your back and your clothes are ridden with sweat patches. No amount of water intake seems sufficient when you're sweating two litres of water or more every hour and given the amount I've been sweating of late, it's a small wonder that I don't have a dark rain cloud floating over my head all the time. Sometimes I feel like just peeling my weather-abused skin off like a wetsuit and jumping into a new one. If you've watched that episode of Man vs. Wild where Bear Grylls is lost in the Sahara Desert, you know what he did in an attempt to conserve water and stay cool at the same time. That's right, he took off his shirt, pissed on it and slipped right back into it. Now I don't intend to go to that extreme but I'm beginning to wonder.. what if I had to?
I just found another sub-topic to whine about... yay me! Tans. If I had to go to Africa right now, I would have to risk getting humped by a horny zebra. Why? Because that's how closely I resemble a zebra right now! A whole variety of sunscreen lotions have proved futile in preventing me from getting tanned. I could have still lived with it if the tan was even, but as luck would have it, it isn't. I can positively identify atleast 25 different skin tones out of which atleast 5-6 of them would make nice shades of lipstick (not that I would know).
If I have melted to the ground by tomorrow, I shall find something else to whine about. Until then go read up on global warming.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Invisible Ink
(Certain things you might want to know before reading this post: 1) It's very long 2) I have a Genetics test tomorrow and hence found it more worth my while to write this note rather than study 3) Expect a lot of abstractness)
Write, though your heart is aching
Write, even though it's breaking
When there are clouds in the sky
You'll get by...
If you write
With your fear and sorrow
Write and maybe tomorrow
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just... write
In case you haven't figured it out yet, I've taken a song called called Smile by Natalie Cole and tweaked it a bit. Why? Because all of a sudden I find the need to patronize people without being pejorative. I started writing long before I can remember but for many years after that writer in me just lay dormant, in a self-induced coma, until a bunch of people (the Muffins and a handful of others) dragged it out by its hair, arms flailing madly and sucker-punched it back to life.
Over the years, I'd been often told to write. Just write. It seems so simple, doesn't it? To just sit down for an uncertain span of time and watch words crawl onto what was once nothing but a blank sheet of paper. For some people, maybe it is. For most others, it's not that simple. For a long time I thought I could write only when I felt strongly about something, when I was extremely upset or unbelievably overjoyed, or just when I hated or loved something enough to write about it. I knew nothing about style and hadn't quite found my own. I thought I needed to have a fixed topic to write about. The latter changed after I started blogging in 2006. I began to write about the most random things that seemed to somehow magically fit together to create one blog post after another.
While topics weren't an issue once I started writing, inspiration still was. Nothing could inspire me to write more than two or three posts a year, and that's when dA (deviantart.com) happened. Ajooni, Aditi, Dipti and Akanksha were hooked on to it and they forced me to go join as well. dA is a wonderful place where creativity thrives. It felt like home the minute I signed up. With that much original art, literature, photography and what not, all around me, it was impossible to resist writing and drawing and expressing myself in any other creative form I could manage. dA was in a way a path to self-discovery. I now realized that I could write very dark pieces, which strayed from the usual slapstick style I followed, and I also discovered that poetry really wasn't my thing. It was creative bliss. However, as all things go with us, we got bored of dA. Too many of our favourite artists/writers/friends/whoever were leaving and we were left with no reason to stay. While I occasionally signed in (with the bleak hope that Elbethius a.k.a. Mark Kozina has returned), I needed another creative outlet. Enter Facebook.
Facebook, Facebook... what can I say? It gave me the perfect platform for harrassing unsuspecting friends who happened to stumble upon my notes (the ability to tag people in them made it that much easier). Before I knew it, I was writing frequently again and with a lot of inspiration drawn from Nazia and others like her who frequently wrote and published notes on Facebook. I was a serial writer who derived sadistic pleasure from subjecting people to the agony of reading my endless rants. As if I needed any more egging on, Ajooni lent me a book - Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury - which sealed my fate. I was back!
Honestly, I never tire of talking about myself, but mayhaps this is a good time to move on to what I originally wanted to talk about - writing. Or rather, not writing. Do you know what happens to thoroughly bored students in a Chemistry class (by all means you're free to choose any other class)? They doodle. They stare vacantly into space. They sleep. They feign attention, which does wonders for all those with bright acting careers ahead of them. But more importantly, they ideate. More often than not they don't know that they're ideating. An idea just creeps up on them slowly from the shadows of their numbed minds. These ideas are meaningless at first... they seem like shapeless blobs of goo that the disgruntled canteen lady slaps on to your plate. However, if you look closely, if you pay them a little attention, they begin to take shape. These shapeless blobs metamorph into something beautiful yet indescribable. Let us consider, for the sake of visualization, that one of the blobs has metamorphed into an exotic rainbow coloured bird. Now this breathtaking bird is lying flat on the dusty floor of your mind, motionless. Feed and nurture it with some attention and love. Pamper it. Kiss it. Watch it slowly lift itself off the floor, shake the dust off, spread its wings and fly off into the depths of your subconscious.
Now it's purely upto you to chase after the idea-bird. Run like the wind, jump over obstacles, and put every ounce of your being into the chase. If you find it, which I'm sure you will if you've followed my instructions so far, don't lose sight of it. What you're looking at is your muse, your brainchild, your living imagination, a part of yourself alien to you. Without startling the bird, grab a pen or a pencil and any material that can be written on(tissues count). Here comes the most important part - close your eyes, exhale slowly, open your eyes again and WRITE (or type if you prefer a laptop/computer).
Did you hear about that boy, Jimmy, who refused to write? Rumour has it that he never bothered looking for the birds. When he woke up one day, he found that all the birds he had ever created with his imagination had flocked together. They had decided that they shan't be ignored any longer and decided to go to him instead. When these birds came down on him it was not pleasant. They pecked at him furiously and flapped their wings violently and did what angry idea-birds do. Finally, he was left with no choice but to drag himself to his desk and write. He wrote on endlessly for days, they say. In his maniacal condition, he couldn't bring himself to stop. The birds wouldn't have it. So he wrote and wrote, page after page, book after book, hand flying off the page at the end of every line, until one day he was driven to madness.
Even if you hadn't heard about Jimmy, I'm sure you must've heard about that girl whose birds disappeared one night while she lay fast asleep on the couch? She thought she was dreaming when her mind's eye saw them fly out through her ear. Sadly, she wasn't. The birds had had enough. They flew off to go find a place where they could flourish and the heartbroken girl was left wishing she'd just paid them the slightest attention.
Inhibitions are many and they come in layers and stacks - Exams, work, lack of leisure, fear of what others think, they are countless. All I can say is let your imagination run free. Let it do cartwheels and crazy jigs and Joey dances. Embrace it. I do realize that I'm talking with the air of an accomplished writer. I can assure you that that is anything but true. I am a nobody with something to say and I will sure as hell put it out there for hapless victims to see.
P.S. To all the people who inspired me and those who read and appreciate what I write alike, thank you! :)
Write, though your heart is aching
Write, even though it's breaking
When there are clouds in the sky
You'll get by...
If you write
With your fear and sorrow
Write and maybe tomorrow
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just... write
In case you haven't figured it out yet, I've taken a song called called Smile by Natalie Cole and tweaked it a bit. Why? Because all of a sudden I find the need to patronize people without being pejorative. I started writing long before I can remember but for many years after that writer in me just lay dormant, in a self-induced coma, until a bunch of people (the Muffins and a handful of others) dragged it out by its hair, arms flailing madly and sucker-punched it back to life.
Over the years, I'd been often told to write. Just write. It seems so simple, doesn't it? To just sit down for an uncertain span of time and watch words crawl onto what was once nothing but a blank sheet of paper. For some people, maybe it is. For most others, it's not that simple. For a long time I thought I could write only when I felt strongly about something, when I was extremely upset or unbelievably overjoyed, or just when I hated or loved something enough to write about it. I knew nothing about style and hadn't quite found my own. I thought I needed to have a fixed topic to write about. The latter changed after I started blogging in 2006. I began to write about the most random things that seemed to somehow magically fit together to create one blog post after another.
While topics weren't an issue once I started writing, inspiration still was. Nothing could inspire me to write more than two or three posts a year, and that's when dA (deviantart.com) happened. Ajooni, Aditi, Dipti and Akanksha were hooked on to it and they forced me to go join as well. dA is a wonderful place where creativity thrives. It felt like home the minute I signed up. With that much original art, literature, photography and what not, all around me, it was impossible to resist writing and drawing and expressing myself in any other creative form I could manage. dA was in a way a path to self-discovery. I now realized that I could write very dark pieces, which strayed from the usual slapstick style I followed, and I also discovered that poetry really wasn't my thing. It was creative bliss. However, as all things go with us, we got bored of dA. Too many of our favourite artists/writers/friends/whoever were leaving and we were left with no reason to stay. While I occasionally signed in (with the bleak hope that Elbethius a.k.a. Mark Kozina has returned), I needed another creative outlet. Enter Facebook.
Facebook, Facebook... what can I say? It gave me the perfect platform for harrassing unsuspecting friends who happened to stumble upon my notes (the ability to tag people in them made it that much easier). Before I knew it, I was writing frequently again and with a lot of inspiration drawn from Nazia and others like her who frequently wrote and published notes on Facebook. I was a serial writer who derived sadistic pleasure from subjecting people to the agony of reading my endless rants. As if I needed any more egging on, Ajooni lent me a book - Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury - which sealed my fate. I was back!
Honestly, I never tire of talking about myself, but mayhaps this is a good time to move on to what I originally wanted to talk about - writing. Or rather, not writing. Do you know what happens to thoroughly bored students in a Chemistry class (by all means you're free to choose any other class)? They doodle. They stare vacantly into space. They sleep. They feign attention, which does wonders for all those with bright acting careers ahead of them. But more importantly, they ideate. More often than not they don't know that they're ideating. An idea just creeps up on them slowly from the shadows of their numbed minds. These ideas are meaningless at first... they seem like shapeless blobs of goo that the disgruntled canteen lady slaps on to your plate. However, if you look closely, if you pay them a little attention, they begin to take shape. These shapeless blobs metamorph into something beautiful yet indescribable. Let us consider, for the sake of visualization, that one of the blobs has metamorphed into an exotic rainbow coloured bird. Now this breathtaking bird is lying flat on the dusty floor of your mind, motionless. Feed and nurture it with some attention and love. Pamper it. Kiss it. Watch it slowly lift itself off the floor, shake the dust off, spread its wings and fly off into the depths of your subconscious.
Now it's purely upto you to chase after the idea-bird. Run like the wind, jump over obstacles, and put every ounce of your being into the chase. If you find it, which I'm sure you will if you've followed my instructions so far, don't lose sight of it. What you're looking at is your muse, your brainchild, your living imagination, a part of yourself alien to you. Without startling the bird, grab a pen or a pencil and any material that can be written on(tissues count). Here comes the most important part - close your eyes, exhale slowly, open your eyes again and WRITE (or type if you prefer a laptop/computer).
Did you hear about that boy, Jimmy, who refused to write? Rumour has it that he never bothered looking for the birds. When he woke up one day, he found that all the birds he had ever created with his imagination had flocked together. They had decided that they shan't be ignored any longer and decided to go to him instead. When these birds came down on him it was not pleasant. They pecked at him furiously and flapped their wings violently and did what angry idea-birds do. Finally, he was left with no choice but to drag himself to his desk and write. He wrote on endlessly for days, they say. In his maniacal condition, he couldn't bring himself to stop. The birds wouldn't have it. So he wrote and wrote, page after page, book after book, hand flying off the page at the end of every line, until one day he was driven to madness.
Even if you hadn't heard about Jimmy, I'm sure you must've heard about that girl whose birds disappeared one night while she lay fast asleep on the couch? She thought she was dreaming when her mind's eye saw them fly out through her ear. Sadly, she wasn't. The birds had had enough. They flew off to go find a place where they could flourish and the heartbroken girl was left wishing she'd just paid them the slightest attention.
Inhibitions are many and they come in layers and stacks - Exams, work, lack of leisure, fear of what others think, they are countless. All I can say is let your imagination run free. Let it do cartwheels and crazy jigs and Joey dances. Embrace it. I do realize that I'm talking with the air of an accomplished writer. I can assure you that that is anything but true. I am a nobody with something to say and I will sure as hell put it out there for hapless victims to see.
P.S. To all the people who inspired me and those who read and appreciate what I write alike, thank you! :)
Monday, March 15, 2010
Weekend Woes
What you're going to read about in this note is a perfect example of why you should always listen to your moms (with many exceptions, of course). They know you better than you think you know yourself. When I first decided to sign up for the second level of French at Alliance Française the only batch available was the 7am-10am weekend one. This basically meant that I had to drag myself out of bed early every weekend, go all the way to College Road and sit through three hours of French. It didn't seem like an impossible task at the time and with a lot of misplaced determination, I signed up for it. As soon as Mom heard, she stated plainly that I wouldn't ever go to class. Turned out that 'ever' wasn't such an overstatement after all. My mother had foreseen it all. What was I thinking?!
Here's what a typical Saturday morning is like for me when I actually bother going to class:
6.00 a.m. *alarm goes off*
"Oh feck" - The morning mantra
*hit the snooze button*
*alarm goes off again*
Groan.. *snooze*
6.45 a.m. I jump out of bed and look at the time!
"Uh-oh"
To shower or not to shower? That is the question.
"No time for that but atleast brush your teeth," says that annoyingly evil voice in my head. It's laughing at me! Grrr.
*mad rush to get out of my night wear and into some remotely presentable clothes*
7.00 a.m. *jump into sneakers and make a dash for the door*
*leave the building and then realize I've forgotten my books*
*run back up two flights of stairs*
*pant heavily and fumble for the keys outside the front door*
*swear profusely and be grateful that Mom can't hear me because she lives in a different state*
7.10 a.m. *grab books after spending seven whole minutes of trying to locate them under a towering pile of clothes*
*run back down and out on to the street*
*hail an auto*
The following conversation takes place in Tamil (or how much ever broken Tamil I can muster)
"College road," I manage to say in between sharp breaths
"100 rupees"
"WHAT?!"
"It's a one way, it's very far"
"No shitting me. 50 bucks." I yell
"80"
I turn on my heels and walk away huffily
7.20 a.m. After much wasted time, I finally manage to get a fair deal
*space out*
I end up going all the way to college, which is also on College Road, before realizing that I'm supposed to have gotten off at Alliance
*pay the guy and jump out of the auto*
*walk and half-run all the way back*
7.35 a.m. I finally get to my blessed destination and bound up yet another flight of stairs to get to my class, looking just as disheveled as I did when I woke up
*barge into class like one of those Tamil actors who barge into wedding halls and yell "Stopppp!!" right before the bride and groom tie the knot*
*get curious looks from everybody and grin sheepishly after excusing myself for coming late to class yet again*
I take a seat and look around, trying to figure out what page we're on
8.29 a.m. Just one more minute till the ten minute break. I'm as desperate as a terminal cancer patient praying for a miraculous cure.
8.30 a.m. *do a little jig*
*go outside and take a ten minute nap on a bench*
8.40 a.m. Break's over and I'm back in class, still trying to figure out what we're doing and why I enrolled myself for this in the first place
8.41 a.m. This time the terminal cancer patient is looking at me and wondering what I'm suffering from. That's how miserable I appear while waiting for the clock to strike ten.
10.00 a.m. *breathe a sigh of relief*
What?! Class isn't over yet?? Ten minutes left? My watch is running fast? NO WAY!!
That cancer patient is feeling my pain now. He wishes me a swift death.
10.10 a.m. Finally! I'm as emotional as someone who runs to the airport to stop the love of his life from boarding the plane that's going to fly her off to a land far far away, and manages to get there just before the flight takes off
*skip out of class in a manner akin to Little Red Riding Hood*
*smell Freedom*
10.30 a.m. I'm back home and getting ready to sleep late into the afternoon
And that, boys and girls, is what a typical Saturday morning is like for me on those rare occasions when I actually bother going to class. Sundays are a whole different issue since Saturday Nights precede them.
Here's what a typical Saturday morning is like for me when I actually bother going to class:
6.00 a.m. *alarm goes off*
"Oh feck" - The morning mantra
*hit the snooze button*
*alarm goes off again*
Groan.. *snooze*
6.45 a.m. I jump out of bed and look at the time!
"Uh-oh"
To shower or not to shower? That is the question.
"No time for that but atleast brush your teeth," says that annoyingly evil voice in my head. It's laughing at me! Grrr.
*mad rush to get out of my night wear and into some remotely presentable clothes*
7.00 a.m. *jump into sneakers and make a dash for the door*
*leave the building and then realize I've forgotten my books*
*run back up two flights of stairs*
*pant heavily and fumble for the keys outside the front door*
*swear profusely and be grateful that Mom can't hear me because she lives in a different state*
7.10 a.m. *grab books after spending seven whole minutes of trying to locate them under a towering pile of clothes*
*run back down and out on to the street*
*hail an auto*
The following conversation takes place in Tamil (or how much ever broken Tamil I can muster)
"College road," I manage to say in between sharp breaths
"100 rupees"
"WHAT?!"
"It's a one way, it's very far"
"No shitting me. 50 bucks." I yell
"80"
I turn on my heels and walk away huffily
7.20 a.m. After much wasted time, I finally manage to get a fair deal
*space out*
I end up going all the way to college, which is also on College Road, before realizing that I'm supposed to have gotten off at Alliance
*pay the guy and jump out of the auto*
*walk and half-run all the way back*
7.35 a.m. I finally get to my blessed destination and bound up yet another flight of stairs to get to my class, looking just as disheveled as I did when I woke up
*barge into class like one of those Tamil actors who barge into wedding halls and yell "Stopppp!!" right before the bride and groom tie the knot*
*get curious looks from everybody and grin sheepishly after excusing myself for coming late to class yet again*
I take a seat and look around, trying to figure out what page we're on
8.29 a.m. Just one more minute till the ten minute break. I'm as desperate as a terminal cancer patient praying for a miraculous cure.
8.30 a.m. *do a little jig*
*go outside and take a ten minute nap on a bench*
8.40 a.m. Break's over and I'm back in class, still trying to figure out what we're doing and why I enrolled myself for this in the first place
8.41 a.m. This time the terminal cancer patient is looking at me and wondering what I'm suffering from. That's how miserable I appear while waiting for the clock to strike ten.
10.00 a.m. *breathe a sigh of relief*
What?! Class isn't over yet?? Ten minutes left? My watch is running fast? NO WAY!!
That cancer patient is feeling my pain now. He wishes me a swift death.
10.10 a.m. Finally! I'm as emotional as someone who runs to the airport to stop the love of his life from boarding the plane that's going to fly her off to a land far far away, and manages to get there just before the flight takes off
*skip out of class in a manner akin to Little Red Riding Hood*
*smell Freedom*
10.30 a.m. I'm back home and getting ready to sleep late into the afternoon
And that, boys and girls, is what a typical Saturday morning is like for me on those rare occasions when I actually bother going to class. Sundays are a whole different issue since Saturday Nights precede them.
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