Rajajism

மனம் ஆடும் விளையாட்டு

2012-02-15T00:03:00.000+05:30

கரணம் கூட பொருத்திராது உடன்
கடலில் சேரும் அலை கரையை நீங்கி,
நிகழ்வு சிறிதே ஆயினும் அதனழகு பெரிது,
இவ்விளையாட்டு தொடரும் காலம் கடந்து.

மனமும் தோன்றும் அலையை போலே,உனை
மீண்டும் மீண்டும் சேர்ந்தும் நீங்கியும் , இனி
உன் நினைவுகளை அடக்க ஏதும் வழியிலாது,
அடங்கி போனேன் இந்த ஜட வாழ்க்கையிலே
---

Favorite Movie Dialogue #1

2012-02-14T23:33:00.000+05:30

This tops the list.

Dear Red,

If you're reading this, you've gotten out. And if you've come this far, maybe you're willing to come a little further. You remember the name of the town, don't you? I could use a good man to help me get my project on wheels. I'll keep an eye out for you, and the chessboard ready. Remember, Red, hope is a good thing...maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies. I'll be hoping that this letter finds you, and finds you well.

Your friend,
Andy.

Movie: The Shawshank Redemption
Cast: Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman
Director: Frank Darabont.

Favorite Movie Dialogues

2012-02-14T23:29:00.000+05:30

I'm starting this series to capture my favorite dialogues from the movies. As I start to watch more and more meaningful and worthwhile movies, the list is getting bigger which I'm not able to store on my dumb brain!

In one way or the other, these dialogues and the movies have left a profound impact on me, the effects of which I'll live and re-live all over again, every dawn. Some of these have even been dramatic in terms of changing my outlook towards life, permanently.

Watch the label for future posts on this.

May I be excused for the predominance of English movies and dialogues in this series!

Enjoy them.

Rajaji.

Those still days

2012-02-02T12:03:00.000+05:30

Yes, it's a 'looking back' post. I can never get enough of it. Particularly when it's a heaven I have moved out of and look back on it sitting in a call-it-whatever-you-want world!

There's always a longing to step into those gates which somehow magically seem to transport me from wherever I am to that heaven. It would be one place where I'd say 'it's not so much about the people as it is about the place' because of the equal effects of being in constant touch with the people from the place, but physically missing the place which has been the next best thing to home. Re-living two years in four days wasn't a big thing when all I needed to do was to lie down on any spot on that heaven and take a few deep breaths with eyes closed.The memories always came rushing in.

Anyway, now that I've officially departed from the heaven, it makes things all the more reasonable to hold on to it, only with more freedom.

As I once commented on one of the most revered 'things' in that heaven, The Untouchables' stonebench, 'You can take the thing out of the place, but never the men out of it', there's truth in every bit of it!

This post is simply an intention to keep the memories flowing, for I'm sure I'll be back here at some point in time, reading this and feel that those days would never pass!

On being straightforward

2012-01-07T18:33:00.000+05:30

Happy New Year to everyone. Hope the year has started off on a good note. May all your dreams come true.

When I was penning down the 2011 wrap-up post and was running up things-to-do for this year, I saw that I had spent significantly less time on things I had wanted to write about, most of them being still in the draft stages. Sometimes I felt I'm going overboard for myself or at other times I lost some of those thoughts on the way. Some of the posts make me wonder where I picked up those crazy thoughts from, and make me consider the prospect of writing less number of posts on confusing and fleeting ideas, lest I should drive away the few merciful souls who take the time to read all that I write and comment religiously. But ironically, you're all the people who are there to bear the craziness I bring forth in all my thoughts! In that way, you're all my inspirations! Thus I welcome you to this year with the first thought-post!

I'm no fan of adages, and I find myself in no need or abundance to quote anything to others on how to live life, how to learn lessons etc. Anything I experience I'm sensible enough to keep it to myself. That applies to judging people in life too, and learning from them. That said, I do have opinions of people and their character, generally, but no one in particular. One such case of opinion is on being straightforward. I do not have any personal experience or lesson for me in life from being simply straightforward. But I think, the quality of straightforwardness is not being given its due recognition; as that of the base for two other qualities, namely integrity, which is a virtue, and honesty, which apparently is a virtue. (but who decides what is a virtue and what is not?). Though both are used interchangeably, I still hold my opinion that there is a world of difference between honesty and integrity. Here again is a conflict on two different and widely held opinions; one, that honesty is the best policy (Anon), and the other, that One should never be too honest, straight trees are always cut first (Chanakya). So, I leave it to the discretion of the reader to choose what suits him/her best. I only intend to opine on straightforwardness, which according to me is neither a virtue nor a vice, but simply a characteristic, unique and distinct in degree, in each individual.

By and large, there does not seem to be a majority for straightforwardness being perceived as a virtue or as a vice. The case for straightforwardness is one of 'brought up' from childhood, and may be of 'human instinct' too. The former I can talk a little about, but not the latter, since that requires a psychologist's opinion. I personally think there is quite a lot of social conditioning and conditioning through education on a child's mind about being straightforward. But beyond education, society conditions a child in numerous other ways also, which put together are weighed against education. Ultimately, what the child believes in and eventually wants to be, depends on which of the two has the most influence on him/her. I, for one, was influenced by the society, and still continue to be done so. And I wasn't spared of the troubles of the mind and the heart in choosing one way over the other. The question is not on the universal agreement that it is primarily a matter of perception, but it is one of 'perception in whose eyes'? It is essentially asking oneself 'Am I characteristically, and by nature, straightforward in my own eyes, or am I wanting to be perceived by others as straightforward or not?' And consequentially, 'Am I holding my integrity, or am I just wanting to be honest?'. This is the typical situation most siblings find themselves in, when it comes to protecting their little one from their parents for some misdeed or the other, and the situation extends itself into friendship during the growing years of adolescence and eventually in all relationships into adulthood. While protecting them or not is a matter of self-righteousness (Why should I feel bad for saving/not saving him/her this way?!), the trigger for that is the effect of moral education and social conditioning on the upbringing of that child.

From another prominent angle, I think most often straightforwardness is perceived as rudeness. I'm not sure whether being straightforward is characteristic of the heart or the mind, but it is generally not considered a good thing to speak openly what one feels/thinks. Some flavoring is always desired irrespective of the audience.This again is driven from the early years of conditioning in the name of social manners. This takes the most common form of gossiping or backbiting about someone to someone else, but pretending to be good to him/her in person. Thus, from the point of view of society, there is no definite answer to 'what does being straightforward lead one to?'. It's largely a matter of individual preference towards a society of either active, spirited, like-minded people, or a society of dead-men-walking.

Secondly, on a smaller scope: beyond a point in life, once the trust radius of people is definitively set, it doesn't really change things in any way by being blunt and straightforward to both the trust radius and the outsiders, i.e. those outside of the trust radius. In such an environment, being straightforward does maintain the vitality of the individual in terms of active agreement/disagreement with the insiders and outsiders alike, and thus toward a spirited defiance of one's freedom of choice. Simply put, as some say, "Be yourself. For those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind".

Having considered the society at large, and then the smaller trust radius, it is apt to talk about the individual and the ego. We are all egoists. We are all selfish. We are all simply human, after all! Uniqueness, being the universally unique character of each person, grants everyone unique and distinct ways of protecting the ego! One such is being straightforward, where the individual is 'as-is' and shuns any degree of relatedness and connectivity with others' thoughts, feelings and actions. In that way, I believe it is rightly helpful to be straightforward, for in straightforwardness there is a degree of opacity for an ego to protect itself, rather than being a mirror to others' thoughts, feelings and actions, by aping and imitating others, particularly their ways of social behavior. But does being a mirror help in any way to maintaining the independence and freedom of one's own conscience?

I agree this is sounding more like a principle of individualism. But, whatever be the case, being straightforward does boost the self-esteem in one's own eyes. If one cannot be straightforward within, one can never be straightforward without! And if that isn't the virtue of integrity, what is?

Goodbye 2011

2011-12-27T22:47:00.004+05:30

Since the yearning, things have changed quite a lot in the 365 days. The student is long gone, and there is an uncomfortable phase of dependence on things and people outside myself in the professional circles. Thankfully, the social circles (not the social networks!) continue to hold me tight and good.

Incongruence continues to grow stronger by the day, yet I somehow find the strength to cling to my fellow day-dreamers and continue to live in an imaginative beautiful world. I'm sure it will turn real soon. There is a lot more clarity on the way I want to live and I'm almost done with the wishes and wants of a materially rich life. I'm sure some of those will never occur again in life, for good. And I consider myself lucky to have realized this early in life. One of the probable reasons why I felt a bit disturbed by a brewing materialistic attitude in myself during the second half of the year is that I'm now around with a lot of salaried, yet indebted employees, settled with families, building up their dream houses and buying their dream cars, sitting on mountains of loans, betting on irrational markets, losing them all and then crying foul; and after such a considerably tensed life for decades, wanting to retire rich! I do not know who I was surprised at, them or myself, though I'm sure that I am the anachronism, misplaced in time. I'm not saying anything against such a life of theirs, only that I can't imagine to be one of them. Resolutely respecting the freedom of 'every man for himself', I'm just saying they have their own ways, and I have mine. Anyway, I hope 2012 brings in a lot more strength and stability to put off that attitude in me, and throws open the door for a fulfilling, quality life. There are many, many ways of living a simple beautiful life, some of which I'm already discovering. They should provide the perfect supplements for my vision of that kind of life.

I'm a little upset with myself that I have not been able to concentrate and develop more on some of my thoughts on the lines of education and inspiration. I hope the second inflection point and the thought-provoking reality from The elusive big idea provide the foundation for a worthwhile thought process in 2012.

Overall, this year has been eye-opening in quite many ways. I've come across inspiring and life-changing works of people in literature/poetry, art (especially music), way of life, etc.. As usual, now for the picks of the year in each category: The below works have left a strong impression and a tremendous inspiration in me to live life the easy, simple, and thus, the happy way.

1. Literature/Poetry: Stream of Life (from the Gitanjali, by Rabindranath Tagore) - This was already quoted in an earlier post, in May. I have never, and probably never will, come across a work as brilliant and spiritually invigorating as this. If it could bring such a great feeling from the translation itself, one could imagine how it should sound in its original, in Bengali. I bow to thee, oh dear Revered Mother Nature! Your inspiration will always guide me in the right way.

2. Music: Praan (Adaptation of the Stream of Life). Kudos to Garry Schyman and Palbasha Siddique for an inspiring rendition.

3. Book: 'Small is Beautiful', the slap-in-the-face view of modern way of uncivilized living, and a guide to simple effective economics! And this was written in 1973! Wonder how many disturbing numbers in that book regarding the depletion of resources has to change if it were edited now! Hats off to E.F.Schumacher. You will always be an inspiration to me to live life simple.

4. Video: Life is easy. Why do we make it so hard? This brilliantly simple truth came in late, at the end of the year, but nevertheless beats anything and everything hands down. Hats off to this great man!

Finally, I would wish to wrap the round-up of 2011 with two inspiring and true quotes, one from Buddha, and one from the Cree Indian Prophecy, from the Cree, one of the largest groups of Native Americans. I'm sure these will remain an eternal inspiration, and an eye-opener, to appreciate the beauty of the journey of life as I see it, and to use as a guide to a life free of cruelty to Mother Nature and full of vigor and passion to live simply and beautifully.

Only when the last tree has been cut, the last river has been poisoned, and the last fish has been caught, will we realize that we cannot eat money - Cree Indian Prophecy (The exact saying is not known, but most of it is true!)
It is better to travel well than to arrive - Buddha

Here's wishing everyone a simple, beautiful and peaceful year ahead. Happy New Year.

Rajaji.

For the love of clicks

2011-12-19T20:22:00.001+05:30

Science invents very few things which produce an experienced and felt impact in our lives, long enough to last our lifetimes. It is but the metaphysical value from some of these inventions that make them a little more than the normal material inventions which are predominantly useless and which add hardly, if at all any, value to life.

In that sense, one of the most worthwhile inventions of all times, in my opinion, is the camera. The quintessential element of metaphysical value from a camera is the ability to capture and freeze moments in life which the ordinary eye and even the extraordinary brain cannot keep in their racks forever. Such is the eternal value I derive and enjoy from photographs. [I'm in a tremendous way humbled by the extraordinary brains, the prime-movers (to quote Ayn Rand), that create these marvels in the first place. Yet we are largely susceptible to the inabilities of that same mind to retain things forever, unless the thing is of a life-changing nature, or at least, profoundly impacting the fundamental beliefs or altering the basic foundations of life]

And thus I started clicking shots, much to my emotional and mental congruence with the value of a photograph and the inspiration I derive mostly from Mother Nature and the natural life surrounding me; from the sunrise, from the early morning dew, from the blooming flower, from the drizzle to the pouring rains, from the waves and tides, from the sky, the clouds and the stars, from the beautiful flora and fauna all around me. There are, of course, many man-made marvels which are a photographer's paradise. But they are nothing but for the grace of Mother Nature allowing those to be created by men in the first place. Thus, the source of any beautiful thing, in my opinion, is Mother Nature. I love capturing such moments and things, small or big, and like playing them in my mind over and over again, sometimes voluntarily but primarily involuntarily when those moments pop up suddenly out of the secret lockers of the mind.

Thus was born my little effort to capture the brilliance of Mother Nature in all Her creations. I guess there should be something more compelling than what I describe here for this feeling to be born in photographers (I'm not one!).

With a firm belief that it is my duty to show the world all the wonders that Mother Nature has to offer and a commitment to make myself good at this so that I could share the wonders untainted, I venture into this marvelous field of photography.

Enjoy my clicks in this photolog: Through Rajaji's eyes (Read the 'ABOUT THIS PHOTOLOG' Section without fail).

P.S: I feel there is an unmistakable beauty in presenting a photograph as it is, as offered by Mother Nature. All my photos are RAW and completely free of any form of post-processing. If you're one who is looking for touch-ups and artificially added beauty, like the ephemeral cosmetic effects our faces have, my photolog is not the place for you! No offense meant, but feel free to scout elsewhere for post-processed, autographed, photo-shopped photographs!

Long live Mother Nature and Her Creations. Long live the Camera! Sincere salutations to the prime movers who created this marvel.

Rajaji.

Happy birthday, Spirit

2011-11-30T20:09:00.001+05:30

Dearest Spirit,

It's yet another year we have crossed, half of it with tremendous activity, adventure, excitement and what not.. and the other half.. well, let's just ignore it! Battered and bruised you were, on the outside, when you made way to this city. I'm sorry I haven't tended to you yet. But I hope you won't mind it knowing well that I'm as battered and bruised as you are, only that it's on the inside for me!

Not far away, Spirit.. Not far away.. The time is nearing. For us to be back on those heavenly roads, chasing the sun burning down the vast ocean of waters, for us to be back on those lovely sands, leaving hard footprints that the caressing waters will have a tough time erasing, for us to be back where we can simply be riding on and on and on!

Till we get back to those heavenly roads, hang on.

Here's wishing you another year full of adventure and excitement and great great times ahead!

Love you always, Spirit. Till death do us part!

Rajaji.

That day of the year

2011-11-03T08:04:00.000+05:30

I'm on the day before the one important day in every man's life, the birth day, a day that reminds a person of the significance of what life is, what it took to live it up the whole year before and what it'd take to do so the year ahead. It is today that brings to light the worthiness of a life lived over the last 365 days before it started the same way an year back as it does today too. It is one of the few days in life when time does knock on my brains and reminds me it is there, watching.

Over the course of the last year, there were moments that I wished would stay forever and time would stand still, and there were moments that I wished would pass too. It is but the realization of the truth that life is a passage of good and not-so-good things that brings me peace at the end of the day, that keeps me in check to appreciate the ups and downs. For, it is after the blocked view from behind the mountains or the ocean horizon that I see the true magnificence of the sunrise and understand the mountains and the ocean are there for their reason. And they are going to be there forever and the sun would still rise. Someday soon, I'll start liking the blocked views too, for the beauty of the sunrise is unimaginable but for them.

It is today that the bits and pieces of music, good and bad, that have gone through my mind and heart over the last year, come together in a flash to weave out a magical symphony. And this is when it strikes that whoever said life is a bittersweet symphony could not have been more right. Life makes perfect sense being bittersweet. It is understandable what one should have gone through for realizing this.

I have viewed, and will view, life always as a journey. I'm not that typical traveller who knows his destination, and hits the bed the moment he's on board only to wake up where the journey ends. I look forward to the things that form the journey.

With this, I get ready to enter another year, another part of life where the journey is on new routes (I've already been on the new route for some time now), where I'm eager to feel both the pleasant highway drives and the bumps in the cramped roads. I'm game!

Happy birthday to myself.

Rajaji.

Inspiration

2011-10-26T00:32:00.002+05:30

I had an unsolved mystery about inspirations for a long time. ‘Are inspirations ephemeral?’ I used to ask myself time and again. I can hardly recall any experience then, where my inspiration lasted beyond two days at a stretch! I had tried developing and instilling a thought or two on the lines of the inspiration which triggered them in the first place. I failed all the time. It was long before I experienced and felt, finally, that all inspirations are ephemeral but those driven from within. I don’t see a reason why an inspiration should not be the source of internal motivation. After all, what inspiration essentially does is that it triggers the hidden inertial energy to motion. The cause is internal and the effect is driven from within too.

That inspirations are primarily non-material is the biggest discovery of my life, though they may drive downstream material goals. An inspiration is no more than a spark in that it fires the inner fuel at the right time. What follows as a result is that the concentrated and channeled thoughts are given shape by the spark and become visible to us through its tremendous energy and action. If inspirations were to emanate from a source, then that source has to be infinite and transcendental, for it is impossible for something by itself to generate different motives in each one of us. That each of us gives a different angle to our actions is because of the fundamental difference in perception, and that perceptions differ across each individual is the ultimate evidence that each of us is as unique as the rest of us. So, essentially, the source of inspiration is unlimited by space, time or any other infinite measure in comparison to our short life. And that is precisely the reason my inspiration most often comes from nature and the natural life surrounding me; from the sunrise, from the early morning dew, from the blooming flower, from the drizzle to the pouring rains, from the waves and tides, from the sky, the clouds and the stars. I also feel it in music, in the wisdom of the philosophers, and much more. All these, needless to say, are unlimited by space and time, and are infinite in comparison to our short lives. These trigger some internal thought process in me that takes a cue from the natural design of things, develops a thought and puts it into action. And thus they become the true source of inspiration to me. This is from my experience with the quest for the metaphysical.

Coming to the physical and more haphazard, I have a problem with the self-help books. That one can derive continuous streams of inspiration from someone else’s experiences and discovery in life is simply unacceptable to me. As I mentioned before, a true source of inspiration can never be from a thing that is limited by time, space or any other measure of finiteness. What we truly mean when we say a person or a thing is an inspiration to us is that there is a characteristic or a quality in that individual or thing which is infinite, transcendental and unlimited. That Albert Einstein is my inspirational figure essentially means there is a certain quality of his which was unlimited in scope, his creativity and thought. That Abraham Lincoln is my inspirational figure truly means there were more than one quality, perseverance, integrity etc. that stood the test of time and resulted in historical glory for himself and a source of inspiration for millions like me. To reiterate, these are qualities that we all have but which are dormant all the while. A thing, an individual or an action that is not part of us triggers this from within us. Personally, I think it is but futile and silly to ascribe a permanency to an inspiration from a source outside of one's self.

Finally, if one goes by the universal adage that ‘God helps those who help themselves’, the self-help books are a waste of time and against the devotion to their self, and ultimately to their God. (That I’m an atheist is a different matter, but even if I were to construe a God, it would be my own ‘self’! And this I take as substantial evidence from the words of the second best God, next only to myself, Krishna, who I could see as nothing more than a man with profound wisdom and common sense to say 'Your self is your God; and that is me!) Self-help is not to be found anywhere but in the self. If there was someone to lend a hand, literally and metaphorically, all the time for all problems one faced in life, I guess the receiver is nothing more than a machine which is driven by the thoughts and actions of someone else. If you feel a tinge of objectivism in this, I’m glad you’ve got my point.

If I feel like writing a ‘Part II’ to this, I sure will update.

P.S: This post is originally written for Akila's blog as my contribution to her column on 'Inspiration'. So, as such this in itself is an inspiration. I've tried my best not to generalize the concept and to stick to my personal thoughts and opinions on it.

Incongruence

2011-10-15T12:38:00.001+05:30

There are times when, in the depths of my heart, I encounter a flashing life that makes me feel like I have been living in an altogether different world. I'm awakened by chills from my sleep and find that I'm glued to the bed whereas, just microseconds ago, I had been on that different world doing different things. I do not think they are dreams--for my dreams often get knocked off when the reality of the morning and the mundane life ticks my biological clock away--and they aren’t random either, as most dreams are! I guess they are the manifestations of my infinite daydreams which I deliberately undertake to live a life out of this world; a world I’ve created on my own terms, no conditions!

Sometimes I have spiritually, emotionally and intellectually challenging conversations with my larger circle of friends and find that I do not fit anywhere even on the border of the circle that they are the center of in this world, in terms of defining the quantities and qualities of a successful life. But it is nothing to trouble me, for the definition of success is altogether subjective and I have my own measures for it. But I can't help feeling that I'm a misfit in their world, the world largely populated, and more often than not, polluted, with things that have the least bit of value in my judgment, and that I have the least respect and most scorn for! Truth be told and accepted, predominantly it’s a materialistic and capitalistic world. I hate both.

Still, against all these imbalances of a seemingly normal life that I have developed within me, I continue to live a life out of this world, a daydreamer's world, with my own projections and imaginations of people, systems and ecosystems. It was hard there at first, but it is harder here. The only saving grace here is the few connections I have with a few, very very few, like-minded people who are on the same boat! And I know I'm not alone. As time grows, I'm more and more aware of who are the kind of people I want in life and the type of connections I build. For one thing, I know suckers (interpretation left to the reader!) when I look at them and I keep off. For another, their dreams, wish lists, ambitions and ‘wanna-have-realizations’ screw my mind and I get insane!

As I'm writing this, I'm slumped deep in my chair, unmindful of the song that is running in loop, deeply lost in what I'm penning down here. I stare at the wall in front of me. It carries the marks of the cellophane tape stripped off the surface. There used to be three sheets stuck on the wall under the cellophane tape. They were the calendar days of the three months that lie ahead of me. I stuck them there a month ago in an attempt to live life on a 100-day time frame. But a couple of weeks down the line, I could no longer take the dread of the mundaneness I would have to undergo if each day began with a look at the white sheet. I stripped the papers off the wall and then there was peace!

In this age, if materialism is tantamount to the technological overwhelming that we find ourselves in, well, I don't deny I'm not caught in the web of the new world, for I am around and abound with technology and innovation; things that I enjoy, reading about and marvel at (and despise) the (sometimes useless) minds that create them and make a labyrinthine mess out of it! Guilty as charged, truth be told, I have a Smartphone, one my brother gifted me about a year ago. It is flashy, awesome technology and I flaunted it! The last one year with it has been colorful. I've been completely in and through it; and now out of it. It isn't exciting to me anymore (No offence meant, Bro!:-)). It’s a phone. Period. I’m not anymore hooked to social networks or online games (I hated them from the beginning!), I’ll soon be out of social networks for good for they are the perfect worrisome rocking chair, consuming an exorbitantly large amount of energy and doing essentially no good. Catching up with friends? What catching up? Once you catch up, what next? Everyday you’re hunky dory about that person spending your 23 hrs thinking about him/her and the remaining 1 hr online chatting?! Come on! Give me a break!

As I said before, the only saving grace for me in this world is that I'm, for most part, connected to people who, to a large extent, understand and correlate with me on my perceptions and principles of life. Primarily they are my immediate family and the few best friends. And they are the people who know that a social network is the last place on earth I’d get into for catching up with them! Well… sometimes I wouldn’t even have to catch up for we’re never out of touch!

To hell with materialism; to hell with capitalism; to hell with hi-tech. I know I’m incongruent with this world. So be it. This is what I am.

Rajaji.

A lesser immortal?

2011-10-14T21:21:00.000+05:30

On my way back from office, I usually have one of two companions. On most days, it's my mobile phone pouring out the same songs again and again.But, occasionally, it's the cab driver. Generally I'm not an accosting type, but on boring weekdays and exciting Fridays, I get desperate to talk, either to beat the boredom or to lighten up for the weekend. Usually it's just about a couple of minutes' talk just to break the monotony. And then I get back to my own world of imagination. And here's the story about today's driver.

Me: So, Bhaiyaa, how much do they pay you here? Kithna miltha hai har maheena? monthly salary yaa km rate?
B: Har KM ko Rs. 6.50 miltha hai saab.
Me: Ithna kam?? kithna pickup/drop har din?
B: 5 or 6 pickup/drop kartha hoon saab, har din. Lagbag 200 kms hotha hain. 22 days gaadi chalatha hoon har maheena. (launches the calculator from his Nokia C3).. That's 28,600, saab.
Me: Diesel aur maintenance?
B: Diesel har din kam-se-kam Rs.500. That's Rs. 11000. Maintenance/oil change/service ke liye 3000-5000 hotha hai. Har maheena 10,000 miltha hai saab.
Me: Achcha..

I thought I had had enough for the day and kept mum thinking of what to do over the weekend and mentally charting out a plan. But he continued on.

B: Main tho bachelor hoon, saab. Akele rahtha hoon. Abhi chaar dhin pehle hee ye gaadi kareeda, second hand mein. 2005 ka model hai.. Rs. 1.7 lakh ko milaa..
Me: achcha... congrats bhaiyaa..
B: Pehle, hamara gaav ke kirana store mein kaam kartha tha. Uske baaad ek auto kareeda aur usse cheez thoda settle huyi.. aur ek motorcyle bhi thaa... abhi dhono ko bechke ye gaadi karidha... poora mera paisa se.. (gleaming!). abhi tho kush hoon, saab. Mujhe tho har maheena 1 lac ya 2 lac kamaane ka ichcha nahi hain...
Me: (curiously) kyon nahin bhaiyya? kirana se auto, abhi car.. kyon nahi 1 lac?
B: yehi tho mujhe teek lagtha hai saab. Mera own gaadi se kuch miltha hai, usse main jee hoon aur gaav mein maa ko bhi kuch detha hoon.. mein bhi khush hoon.. woh bhi khush hai... thodi dhin ke baad woh bhi mera saath aa jayegi.. bas saab... kisi our ka Mercedes bhi chalaatha tho mujhe yeh khushi nahi milega..

Here was this mortal with a simple philosophy in life! And I thought how many such seemingly 'lesser mortals' like him I would have snapped at, gotten angry at, in my mad rush at things! And today it seemed this man was royally giving it back to me, and indirectly to my fellow men, thus vindicating all his fellow 'mortals'!

And I walked home feeling a prick at our hi-fi mad life and a smile at the simple life philosophy of a lesser immortal!

Rajaji.

That thing called...

2011-09-17T00:34:00.002+05:30

I have always been amazed by people. A thousand different faces with thousands and thousands of expressions driven by something from within. Most are fickle lies, many are forged machines, some are greedy scorns, few are blessed indifferent, but only a very few make the connect with me!

What drive them all? Is it passion? Is it motivation? Then who or what is the motivation? Is time evanescent or eternal? Is it fear? If so, of what? Is it greed? Do people really believe in things 'in the long run'? What is the life force in that life which, on one extreme, cheats the gravest of impossibilities thereby managing to snatch a decent life out of a mess of things and emerges successful (of course, based on the subjective definition of success), and on the other, a failure (as with success, so with failure)?

I'm going to capture them all in this 'That thing called..' series! Watch out the label in my future posts.

The stares

2011-09-12T20:21:00.000+05:30

It was strange. All through the day there was constant noise and light, my mind wasn't at its usual form; it was swinging wildly between all the challenges that lay before me and the visions of braving them, all at once or one at a time. And they vanished just like they had come. The day was, simply put, heavy! I felt tired. I had to pull it through somehow lest any brief stop should drag me to sleep right then and there.

And then, after all the noise and light of the day had died down, when I hit the sack thinking I'd cross the trance and slip into unconsciousness instantly, I didn't. There stood the challenges in front of me, again, staring, all armed with their heavy swords, just waiting which one I'd choose for the first feud. I wasn't prepared for the moment when all of them would throw themselves open in the silent, dark night and take me head on. But I knew at that moment that this is the way I'd henceforth be challenged by my challenges. When all the world calms down and I am with myself, dangling at the borders of an abyss and a pinnacle, they'd stare at me with their glowing, piercing eyes with a condescension that could wring the heart of the weak. Then I'd say "All right. Let's see who can stare longer and wear the other one out!".

Indifferent

2011-08-19T07:30:00.000+05:30

I think an idea or a thought is not complete until its polar opposite is analyzed too! With that in mind:

‎"If you hate a person, you hate something in them that is part of yourself. What isn't part of ourselves doesn't disturb us."
— Hermann Hesse

Well then.. This is what I make of love.

"If you love a person, you love something in them that is NOT part of yourself! Men would be too egotistical to love someone who is just like them! so, love shouldn't disturb us either, since it isn't a part of oneself!"

Does this mean, we should all, invariably, be INDIFFERENT?!

Ohh, I love the idea of indifference!

shining

2011-08-16T23:06:00.000+05:30

a million memories flickered in dark ceiling,
a world of talks echoed in dead silence,
the blaring sound of the song muted out,
music that soothe the soul, now on deaf ears,
minutes roll like hours, past frozen moments,
such stillness like the world stopped, forever.

and then the ceiling vanished, the stars shone,
all echoes muted out and the cold winds sang,
the music caught on, to nature's rhythmic dance,
in the flashes lit up brilliantly with such purity,
in that streak of light, blemishless and pristine,
stood gleaming, my pretty little angel, shining!

Happy birthday, dear

2011-07-31T01:29:00.000+05:30

My dear blog,

It's that time of the year again. For you, and me along with you, to start another year of our eventful lives. Here's to you a very happy birthday and wishing many more prosperous ones to follow.

Hope you remember when I told you last year how I'm making the best out of the life as it happens to me. I've managed to do it throughout the last year as you'd have wanted me to, despite, of cousre, some rough patches and some serious mistakes! Well, I'm learning, buddy. Most of the things I said back then continue to happen today. Of course, they would. Aren't they a part of life? A development, if it may be called that, is that I take deeper looks at all of them now than I used to. But this year I think I won't be seeing as many of them as the last year, because all those souls that drove the events of my life last year are out of the beautiful, closed world. I face a tougher world now, a world more corrupt, more drawn to power, more dependent... more 'dog-eat-dog' types, simply put!

The tunnels keep coming one after the other and I somehow manage to continue to find the light at the end of each. The crossroads are as interesting now as they were when I first experienced them.

I hope to recount more interesting experiences right about this time next year as well. Till then, let's both continue to enjoy the journey.

cheers,
rajaji.

P.S: you know what? I still walk hand in hand even when alone. Those angels... they're pretty much still around! :-)

Gamble

2011-07-22T22:54:00.000+05:30

The last month was heavy and tight with the re-transition from a student to a corporate and the two before that with the idleness and leisure of breaking off from the student part. Just when I began to feel that I was running out of interesting thoughts or events that make me take a deeper look at myself, today proved the long wait worth it! There's always a thrill when certainties are challenged, when the brief moments of waiting throw light on the (debatable) virtues of patience and hope. But sometimes things are just quite right by themselves if they are gambled on, if I may be excused for calling it a gamble! And it is in moments like these that I realize life is indeed more interesting with adventures.

Now after quite a lot of testing with chance, choice, preference, expectation etc etc., I prefer such gamble to certainty. If it pays off, I'm good. If it doesn't, I'm better off with a lesson or two more than what the certain ones can teach.

I now realize I'm slowly getting back the liveliness I used to enjoy when things in life are more a gamble than just routine and when they add adventure to the otherwise boring haphazards of a mundane life

cheers,
rajaji.

Spectacular night of the century

2011-06-16T10:11:00.000+05:30

Last night was nothing less than the spectacle of a lifetime, metaphorically and literally too. It was the longest and darkest lunar eclipse of the century, and thus of our lifetime too! And boy, what a pleasure it was to be with the moon throughout the two long hours. Only the paradox did become true, that the longest eclipse passed like minutes!

(If only, the clouds had not played spoilsport during the retreat!)

Here's to my readers, the pleasure I've had in watching it from start to finish, in watching the moon change from whole to nothing.

https://picasaweb.google.com/raja.us/LongestLunarEclipse160611

The liberating order

2011-06-10T13:29:00.000+05:30

The saying ‘Orderliness is born out of chaos’ has one more believer to it hereafter. I say this after I have experienced this pristine truth in ways quite usual, and unusual, over a considerably long period of time. As with everything else, chaos and order are matters of the heart, the mind, or the soul. I guess my realization comes about in seeing chaos and order not just in one of these but all the three concurrently. It has been my experience that a chaotic mind finds order in self-conversation, a chaotic heart in love and a chaotic soul in freedom. It is a series of interdependent, inward and outward flow of thoughts and feelings. The common thread that I see in all these three is the immortality of which they are capable. I beg to differ with the conventional lot in their logic that it is always either the mind or the heart that holds the key to bringing about any order. The order I speak of here is not to be confused with the conventional order that is of a controlling or a correctional nature, but that of a peaceful, uncontrolled and revealing one; for the former is a kind of binding force whereas the latter is of a liberating one. Though a liberating order sounds like an oxymoron, it is my experience that the initial stages of the feeling of chaos are greatly abetted by illusions of impossibility or ‘too strong to be rid of’ and make the liberating order seem unattainable. All it needed was time and patience, both of which I was fortunate enough to have aplenty, to prove to me that it is very much possible that an understanding of chaos can bring about a liberating order.

My thoughts on this subject concern the interrelationship between time and the chaotic mind, heart and soul and how the powers of each are linked. Another important thing that is of consideration in this essay is the power of solitude.

Chaotic mind: The reason I speak of mind first is that it is the easiest of the three to be understood and corrected. I consider it a fallacy that the mind should be the ultimate authority, either alone or together with the heart. There is no ultimate authority. The first thing that comes to my mind when I speak of mind is reason. To me, till some time back there was not a better and stronger advocate of the impeccable power of reason than in what Baruch Spinoza says “In so far as the mind conceives a thing according to the dictates of reason, it is equally affected whether the idea be of anything present, past or future”. The truth in this is difficult to conceal, and not profound either, when there is a personal experience to that effect. At first thought, though this may seem to be true and irrefutable when the stress is on reason, the effects of reason are significantly altered with time even if it is for the same idea. The argument that supports a view now may differ from an argument that is put forth at another time, though the support of the view is still held. This is not to say that time always alters reason but there have been quite a few experiences when the mind was not equally affected always. It is my view that it is not the situation or circumstance of the event that is subjective but that reason itself is subjective to the circumstances and occurrence of the event. This was greatly assisted by self-conversation, that unique thing but for which my mind would have just been a machine. I don’t prefer big words like contemplation, introspection etc, but I prefer to keep it simply as the mind talking to itself. This is a unique conversation in that the mind comes to terms with what it had done, is doing and is thinking of doing. And when it applies reason equally to the event irrespective of time, I think it is bound to end in chaos. This can be understood, analyzed and corrected only by and within the mind through its own conversation. Mistakes and wrong judgments arising out of reason can never be repeated (not quoting philosophically but logically) because the situation, time and the circumstance in which they are done are never the same. When this is understood and analyzed, it becomes clear to me that order is attainable, be it in bits and pieces or in full. Finally, the reason for bringing about solitude into this picture is that it assists the mind in analyzing the connections between the thoughts and feelings, which at other times is either discrete or is even absent, and thus helps attain the liberating order not just by being free of the thoughts but also free of the feelings accompanying those thoughts.

Chaotic heart: Though I have neither the experience of years nor the knowledge of hearts, I have had the multitude of relationships to understand true love. Having seen, experienced and lived through love of different forms, I say that the beauty of true love, of any kind for that matter, is not in its being mutual or reciprocal, but in its being unconditional. This would very well be the greatest revelation I have had till date. Unconditional love is liberating in nature, not by breaking down barriers, but by being all-pervasive, so much so that at one point in time all it sees is universal equality. This equality does not come by any analysis, for analysis is the work of the mind, not the heart. This comes about by a feeling of oneness with everything. Though it is agreeable that sometimes reason should work along with emotion, I see it as a bane of this generation that sometimes rationality enters a bit too much into the domains of the heart. What I believe to be matters only of the heart are most often judged by reason too. I intend to stop it here and leave it to one’s personal interpretations based on individual experiences. The role of time in love, though not quite as strong as in the matters of the mind, is nevertheless prominent. I believe it is very much possible that the feeling, accompanied by reason, towards another person or thing is not the same at all times. It is a fallacy that love needs no reason. Love needs, and has, all the reasons to be expressed, but what I have understood is that it should be unconditional, and free from expectations which turn sinister if allowed too much reasoning. Here again, solitude lets the heart see and feel the equality without any conditions, expectations or prejudice.

Chaotic soul: I do not know if I believe in soul, but what is true of the mind and the heart should be true of the soul too, for it is nothing but the outcome of the thoughts and emotions pervading through the mind and heart. In that sense, the soul is both the cause and the effect of the interactions of the mind and the heart, for it is the one which initiates the interaction of the thoughts and feelings and it is also the one where the judgments of the thoughts and feelings culminate. What the mind achieves by its self-conversation and the heart by love, the soul thus achieves by freedom; freedom from thoughts and feelings and the realization of universal equality. The culmination of the chaotic thoughts and feelings that finally understand each other and work in tandem can be nothing but an orderly soul that feels freedom. And thus is attained the liberating order.

only be you

2011-05-29T08:18:00.000+05:30

the night is different, more enigmatic
than all others, only a few stars smiling,
the sky spotted white in huge blackness
by clouds unwilling to part them stars,
here and there drawing shapes of her,
pure, angelic, twinkling and what not,
added sheen by lightning trying its best
to make her look irresistible, despite dark,
as she smiles at me, amidst dancing trees and
musical thunder, glittering rain drops and
whistling winds playing tunes to all of them,
just when it feels the dreams are far and away,
magical that these moments are, blow my head
off the unimaginable that you seemed to be, now
proven wrong in such marvel of nature, it can
never just be a dream, but can only be you.

magic of music and 'Praan'

2011-05-28T11:46:00.000+05:30

There are some novel moments, unexpectedly and surprisingly discovered, that make you feel you could anything to experience that moment in its origin and birth as it happened in its real time. To me, most of such moments occur when I feel music like I've never felt before and it makes me want that moment in its birth; the moment when that piece of music sends cool shivers down the spine and make you lose yourself momentarily. And here is one of those magical moments of music and lyrics that I discovered accidentally.

I've never read or known anything about Rabindranath Tagore, except for a few keywords, national anthem, Nobel Prize in Literature, Poet, Gitanjali etc. I never felt an urge to go beyond these and follow the strings from there. One of the main reasons is the language barrier. I can only spell Bengali in English! But Praan - Stream of Life (from Gitanjali) has indeed allayed my reasoning fear!

As universally accepted and also personally experienced and felt, music needs no language. Here is the proof that music can make life of itself irrespective of the language. And now, I have no regrets that I don't know Bengali to feel this magic of Tagore's 'Praan - Stream of Life' . Hats off to Garry Schyman and Palbasha Siddique for this amazing rendering of magical music to Praan.

Here is the original lyrics, its translation and transliteration.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stream_of_Life

Cheers.

so much for the love of music

2011-05-24T23:03:00.000+05:30

I've always felt that this space of mine is the most compelling and satisfying means of my expression, next only to music (that too only listening!). Everytime I start to pen down my thoughts on any subject, I involuntarily switch on the music. But lately it so happens often, that the music gets too much into me to let me continue penning down those fleeting and momentous thoughts. And I hate to say this, but maybe I should stop the music when the mind is on work here! Maybe I'm afraid my best thing of relief is attempting to ruin my best thing of expression (of course self-proclaimed). So much for my love of music!

P.S : The music had been on all through this post!

The struggle of the educated minds - an introduction

2011-05-16T12:16:00.000+05:30

This post is a foreword to my views and opinions on the effectiveness of formal education which I intend to bring forth in detail in the near future.

My doubts on the effectiveness of the formal education system began to convert to certainties as the years drew closer to the official completion of the two-decade battle. And I've eventually found out that the system of education has indeed affected me negatively to a great extent, if not fully. Not that I would have acquired significant knowledge of any other kind by any other means of education, if not through the formal schooling and college education system. Still, the certainties come in the form that they've been only partially and very minimally successful, if I may call it a success, in imparting the right kind of knowledge. The flaw that I've felt in this mode is that it doesn't quite clearly put forth from the early days what is the right kind of knowledge that it intends to impart and how much of it (The Zeroth Flaw). Of course, it has the indubitable and perfectly compelling excuse of saying 'what is taught in class is very little and only theoretical, the actual learning is out in the world'. Agreed. But if that is the case, has the system at least made sure that it puts forth the right foundation? I am against this view. To me, this is obvious in the many dubious methods of teaching the theoretical foundations of some of the pertinent knowledge (that which is assumed and expected to be of use to everyone in the right sense of both pertinence and knowledge and on all the spheres of life).

I find it obvious that this has affected the effectiveness of using all that information and knowledge. Facts are facts. Facts are information. Facts are knowledge. But do we not find it quite odd that most of the times, these facts aren't of much use? It is not difficult to realize that we never put to use most of what we read/study/learn/acquire as knowledge. The best it does is that it brings some realization to a troubled mind that what is available is not always needed; and sadly, what is needed is not always available either.

It is in this aspect that the brain is severely crippled in handling the whole lot of knowledge, a mixture of all sorts; useful but incomprehensible and prohibited (The First Flaw), useless and unlawful (The Second Flaw), and dubious and immoral (depending on one’s views on morality, a topic for some other time). The more concerning matter is that it impairs the capability and outcomes of an individual in the society due to the expectations thrust upon him/her based on the universal laws of the flawed system, both in terms of misleading the individual to what level of knowledge is expected and what is the source of that desired knowledge. And the outcomes are disastrous sometimes.

The prime suspect in all this, I believe, is a false motivation. For a cliche, two of the most influential yet thoroughly misleading motivations in this aspect are thrust upon the child right from its childhood; 'Knowledge is Power' and 'Information is Wealth'. These two simple adages are so subtly and subconsciously thrust upon an individual like a slow poison, that the effects don't show up clearly until it is too late. These are like drugs that consume the mind of the person pushing him/her towards an irresistible ecstatic state and at one point driving the person to a condition from which there’s no way back. These have only complicated the existing system and continue to do so. The levels of irrationality, if I may call a spade a spade, that this extensive knowledge professes are so high that someone could easily tip over to blind beliefs in that knowledge and lacking complete reasoning to justify its usefulness or adoption to one’s life.

For example, in theory, motivation may be internal/external, positive/negative. Now just these two broad classifications (there may be more) bring four quadrants into the picture and a knowing mind is already in a fix as to where it draws its motivation from and of what kind it is.

More flaws on the way. Chaos prevails!

The sugarcane juice shop

2011-04-30T12:26:00.000+05:30

It's summer. Mid summer, peak summer, extreme summer or whatever summer you call it, but it's summer. And in Trichy, it's everyone's dread to go out during the day for any work. Nevertheless we go. We are Trichy-locals and have tumbled and toiled with love in this beautiful city for the last 20 years or so. Personally more so for me because am a native also. And so we went, myself and Bharath, yesterday for some personal works in and around Thillai Nagar. Thirsty as we grew after an hour of roaming, we thought we'd have some drink. Unconsciously or subconsciously, the first place that came to our mind was the Sugarcane juice shop in Fifth cross, opposite K A P School. And so we went hoping that the shop would be there, hoping to see the same old faces of the man and wife who ran it then.

2001: Those were the days of ERHSS, one of the ought-to-be-there schools for Trichy guys in the higher secondary. Myself, Bharath and Ananth Hariharan (wonder where this guy is now. A long lost friend!) used to cycle all the way to school, starting the day by 5.30 AM and wrapping it up at 8 PM (part of the effects of this kind of an education can still be seen in me). On our way back from ERHSS, this shop was the best retreat of our daily lives for those two years. We three used to gulp down at least 10 glasses of juices in all, everyday; on some days each one going up to 6 or 8! A juice then costed Rs.3.50. Our pocket money was enough to be done away with here itself. Those were the golden days of schooling (at least for the cycle rides with friends and the juices and snacks on the way back).

Now, myself and Bharath were pleasantly surprised that the anna still runs the shop, and felt happy that he still remembers us. The same place, the same setting, the same new-looking motor-fitted crushing machine that he bought in 2001 (yeah we were the first customers of his upgraded shop then). Not a thing was out of place, the place of the glasses, the ice box, the crusher, even the waste. Only that the man looked a lot older for his age now. Selling the same, fresh, high quality juice in the same quantity, but for 10 bucks now, it could be clearly seen that he's still having a tough time with life! (or maybe just content, which I strongly doubt!)

Back in 2001, on our way back home after the halt at the shop, we used to talk about how nice and sweet the juice was, who gulped down the maximum glasses, who took the longest gulp, the fastest gulp etc etc. It was fun all through. And yesterday, all the same way till home, we talked about how tough things look like for anna, the man, who is still puffing and panting and toiling his way to life through more than 10 years of standing with a single machine for about 10 hrs a day.

Somethings that brought much happiness at the sheer thought of them early in life, now leave a lot to be desired for economic and social betterment!

We just hope we don't see him in the same condition when we walk those streets again with our kids some years down the line.

C'est la vie!

rajaji.

Doctor-Counselor-Josiyar

2011-04-28T19:58:00.000+05:30

'Hello Mama, Namaskaram.. I'm so and so from Chennai. I had given my son's jaadhagam to Maami. My son has just completed higher secondary schooling and waiting for college admission. Please advise me how I should take him forward'

'Yes, I saw the Jaadhagam. Its very good. The grahas are all moving in good synergy. Nothing to worry.'

This is how the conversation started when I just entered the house of that josiyar mama. Nice English for a man in his seventies, complete with the thirunamam in his forehead, pattu veshti and the 9-strand sacred thread. A typical brahmanaa household complete with all the idols and images of Gods and Goddesses, probably between twenty to thirty, and three or four madi veshtis drying up under the fan in the hall.

I chuckled and listened to the conversation with interest since I'd never heard a josiyar predict/prophesize/recite(!) the future of an unknown person. I knew it was going to be fun. Continuing with the grahaas being in the right place and moving at the right pace, he went on for a while with the regular flow! With time, his answers began to change in tone and style and I was sure of the tense feeling with which the caller on the other side was asking questions, or rather, shooting questions at the mama. At one instance, the poor old man raised his voice as in a loud chant of a mantra and said

Maami. Sittha irungo. Naan elathayum ozhunga thiruppi solren; nanna kaetukongo. Kuruka kelvi kekadhael!

Payyan jaadhagathuku avan Mechanical Engg thavira endha branch venumnalum edhuthu padikalam

(Sutham! I'm sure the boy would've told his mom he wanted to do Mech and mom would've asked the mama 'Mechanical edukalamo?!').

Raathiri 9.30 ku mela padikka vendam.. mandela eradhu. Kaarthala 5.30 to 6 padika arambikaatum, nanna mandela yerum!

(Great!)

Pazhangal vaazhai, atthipazham, saathukudi, orange idhellam kudungo; daily ovvoru pazham maathi maathi kudungo.

And thus went on the list. At the end of a grueling 5 minute, mama sported a flashing smile (which I guess the maami would've seen through the telephone!) and concluded in style

Ipodhaikku idhellam pannungo. Konja naal kazhichu paayan epdi irukannu solungo. Apparam paapom.

Kavalaye padadheengo maami, payyan kshemamaa iruppan.

What the hell! I, for one, am pretty sure that the payyan, once he hears all this being told to him with a stern voice of caution and tension by his mom, is sure to lose all hopes of whatever little kshemam he'd wish for in college! I just couldn't help wondering whether the mama was a doctor or a counselor or a josiyar indeed! He spoke all these with such panache that anyone who happened to hear any part of the speech midway would definitely be in for another Frank Abagnale performance as spoken in style by Leonardo!

Great going, mama! :-)

cheers,
rajaji.

and much more

2011-04-14T22:49:00.000+05:30

how could the clouded sun seem to burn so hot now,
was it 'cos there weren't warriors who braved its heat?
who mindless of the strokes, barefooted on ground?
who cared a damn if it was warm or hot or burning!

how did the silent wind blow too strong today?
where were the glorious gladiators braving him?
who with strong strides humbled the great wind?
letting it blow just enough to feel the breaths of life?!

had the trees ever howled so loud like they did today?
did the voice of the bravehearts vanish in the wind?
who screamed all times, in love, joy, laughter and valor?
their voices reverberating in hot days and cold nights!

were these roads ever this leaf-strewn and deserted?
the racers blazing in their bikes aren't gone, are they?
will the screeching stops ever leave the tyre marks again?
sweeping the road clean of dirt and leave it sparkle in sun?

where are the wake up bells of the morning tea rounds?
will the sleeping angels and lions be gone, forever?
never to wake up another morning in that heaven?
Ohh, how badly I'd miss all of this, and much more?

the two days of March 2011

2011-03-30T15:00:00.000+05:30

This post has a lot of specialty attached to it. I'm going to talk about the last two days that had everything in them to be remembered as two of the most quintessential days of a student life. Days characterized by many events that bring to light in a flash many things of the past and of the future.

The first of the events was an act of 'make do' for a mistake that would haunt me for life. 'missing the two most important and interesting finance courses (of course, applicable to my job now) handled by one of the best visiting faculty and an authority in Finance that BIM has ever had'. And the 'make do' came in the form of a workshop on behavioral finance. A good thing to learn in a good way. Now, this is not the only catch. The significance of this is a peep into the puzzling world of investments and securities that rings a bell in me that it's time to switch the hats forever. That of a carefree student to one of a responsible bread-winner. Of course, I accept the fact that this is what is intended in the process and I don't deny that this was not an agenda. It was the primary one since the beginning. But I no longer have the luxury of maintaining an easy 'student account' but to foresee a complicated web of financial decisions that is going to make me think of and plan all my investments henceforth.. financial decisions right upto the retirement plans. That's quite a plan considering that I'm 25 now! Well... sometimes we need things like this to wake us up from a wishful dream world of being a freebird to a reality of a circus bird.

Next was the 'Offer Letter Ceremony'. Again a reinforcement, an official and legal one, to get out of this beautiful, wishfully institutionalizing cage called BIM and get on with life outside in the free world?! Need I say more?

And then the 'Faculty Felicitation Ceremony'... felicitating the members of both the teaching faculty and non-teaching staff. An event painted with bright and dark colours of memories, with ambivalence of missing some great members of the faculty and glad not to have to an obligation to some of them anymore (two sides of a coin!). The next time I meet them for a light chat, shake hands with them, seek advice or suggest changes, all of these will signal my 'detached attachment' as I'd have donned the hat of an alumnus, definitely a proud one.

Then a very special one.. something that all of us love to do. Advise. In stylish college slang, the gyan sessions to juniors. There's not quite a feeling like this, is there? :-) But, jokes apart, this is seriously one of the very few special moments one can have with a junior friend. Let me just say it is a subjective feeling of a person and depends on the willingness to share good things about college, courses, opportunities etc etc with willing or unwilling juniros. All of this makes sense only when the audience is genuinely interested in what you say. Fortunately for me, I got a very good set of junior friends who bear with me on this! thanks to them for making me feel good about myself and realize the responsibilities as a senior! Lol.. :-)

Last but definitely not the least, some of the most quality time spent with great friends and discovering new and more friends in the process. These will be memories etched forever in the mind and heart. And when I look back in life, which I most definitely would do, all of this would reinforce my right decision of doing an MBA. I lived the two years like never before.

Life is beautiful.

cheers,
rajaji.

the living hope

2011-03-26T16:25:00.001+05:30

This post is an inspiration from Kaks, one of my longtime best friends.

Here's the inspiring post from him : http://watsnstoreforu.wordpress.com/2011/03/26/hope/

These images should serve as a reminder of the hope that lights lives across the world and brings purpose in the millions of lives to overcome the suffering and get ahead with life.

"Hope is a good thing.. maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies" (from 'The Shawshank Redemption')

the longest journey

2011-03-26T15:45:00.000+05:30

The only journey I talk about all the time comes with a twist now, or a realization I'd say. One that I didn't consciously know or think about but has always been there. And it took a series of events to lead me to that. Events which primarily shape an individual, events which bring to light undisputable proofs of personality and character, events which strengthen the foundations of personal development, growth & transformation and provide the training grounds to attempt a change if required. (It is always required!)

Thanks to the 'Personal Growth Lab', the most useful experiment of my MBA stint, finally I have access to the right set of tools that would help me in the personal transformation I'm about to undertake. In this sense, I feel grateful and glad for the one series of events that have shed light on some of the dark parts of the path that I'd been taking till now and a hopefully bright path that is on from here.

And the journey is all set to begin with a new commitment and a purpose. As my professor quoted during the first and the last sessions of the course: "The longest journey is the journey inwards". And I'm all excited to take the journey head on!

cheers,

rajaji.

...of your love

2011-03-12T22:22:00.001+05:30

these lonely nights bring along with them
heavy thoughts of that last few moments,
ever fresh and pure, as stuck in my heart.
love inexplicable, the kind I have for you,
inexpressible too, against all wishes to show,
together for the time that our lives went along,
though brief albeit in every way momentous,
life'd just go on this way forever, thought I,
eternally, oh that wishful way I yearned for!
silently it comes though, the time to move on,
inertness that I wish for being moved by truth,
short life that it is, I only wish it be worthy...

aeterna veritas

2011-02-22T00:05:00.000+05:30

not a day goes by, in these times,
that I don't look up the sky, for you.
When sometimes there's too much to take,
with you, things could've been easier.
I feel you pretty much, but sans touch,
feel the warmth and life, sans gentle hands.
Alas, not much remain, but thoughts,
of how nice things would've been, together.
Not much remain, but strong memories,
how momentous, yet fleeting, some are.
Somewhere beyond clouds, in the azure,
I know you're there, silently watching.
but the clouds stick too long, sometimes,
stealing the view, of the grandeur in you.
Still, every dawn when the sun rises up,
I see you, feel you, know you're there,
more strongly than ever, bright in the lit sky,
but, sometimes, you're just too far away
that I wonder a second, if you're there at all,.
I know I got to live with the truth, all my life,
that you are within and without, both, always,
the boon and the bane, the aeterna veritas!

the year in sports

2011-02-09T19:47:00.000+05:30

I just did the most wonderful year in sports in my life so far. Something I thought was near-impossible an year ago. Not because it was anywhere near-impossible or even difficult, but because I wanted to stay away from it. I play usually, but to the point of only satiating the momentary thirsts for some hard, taxing play... like badminton or TT... or worse, sometimes just to kill time! But the latter feeling of playing to kill time did come to pass over time as I was slowly dropping the good habit of a routine physical exercise regimen I used to have (don't judge me by my appearance! :-)) and sports seemed good to fill the gaps. Only that I viewed it as an alternative to exercise and not as 'sport'! So, looking back, I always had a leak in my sports since there never was a 100% play any time.

But somehow, at some point in our life, there comes a better-late-than-never realization that some things are too good to be left untasted... to be viewed from the sidelines. Getting on to the field and playing a sport, any sport, with passion, the kind that makes any other thing in the surrounding insignificant, is a gift for the lucky few who dare to venture into it, either without expectation or with the most dedication. After all, in life, we either do some things for the sake of doing, without any expectation.. or we do it as if life ended there!

Well... this past year, I almost did the latter. I played like I played never before. I played as if the world stood still outside the ground. I played as if I was on a battlefield saving the last few bursts of energy to go for the kill. Yes. A surprising 'me' to myself!! And thus they happened. The three tournaments at BIM. The most coveted events. Football, Volleyball and Cricket.

The football tournament -- FREEKICK '10 -- was probably the most unexpected package. The last thing I would've dreamt of in football was kicking the ball properly, let alone stylishly! And thanks to my captain who exactly figured where I'd fit in, The GOALPOST! Whoa. And I did a pretty good job in the initial league matches, good enough to gauge myself that I DID fit in there, what with my 6' 1" tall structure and 43 cm broad shoulder frame! I did cover the post pretty decently giving away only 6 goals in all of the 6 matches played, including the final. And boy, the CATALANS, as we called ourselves, did lift the trophy in a stunning, nail-biting 'penalty shootout' final where I saved 3 goals out of the 5 and our star players already sealing 4 goals 'for' us. A proud novice!

Then came the volleyball tournament -- SPIKES & SMASHES '10 --. Well, I didn't do much here, except that I was part of the team, the same Catalans but only that we called ourselves 'SHAOLIN SPIKES' this time. We did pretty good job to book a 3rd place. Hard luck. But that was ok for a team which was totally new to Volleyball.

Last but dare-not-be-called-the least, Cricket. The tournament, called WICKETS '11, was the biggest of them all, obviously. Running for 10 days, or rather nights, the game in many ways changed many or our lives when it came to sports. It would be the last time we would all play cricket in an official tournament while being students. (Same with football and volleyball too, but somehow cricket always gets a sentimental edge even when placed on the same platform as other sports). Why would it be a religion if not given at least this much significance?! We, the 'MARINES' this time, had always been dreaming of this, what with the success of Gold in football and Bronze in Volleyball. But be it Gold or Silver or Bronze, it was definitely something bigger than the same G/S/B in any other game. Every win in every league match would be a near-yet-far fight for the Gold. The Finals was always in sight waiting to have us play it. We did make it through to the final, although with one loss in 4 league matches. But considering that it was the VELOCIRAPTORS, the most respected and feared team in BIM (they define Cricket in BIM), I did feel proud to have played with them, loss or win. But whoa, the finals. It is by far the best game of cricket I have ever played in my life. A thriller, more frightening than the football finals, coming down to a 1-ball-1-run finish. And from the non-striker end, the hell I ran like I was on fire, hoping that my striker would just touch the ball. And he did! The rest is history.

What a wonderful year in sports. Thanks to all my wonderful friends at BIM for giving a life-time experience of sports in my last year as a student.

Life is beautiful.

cheers,

rajaji.

My first step against corruption

2011-01-31T21:07:00.000+05:30

I've been a victim of corruption, more often than not, over the last many years. And I'm sick of it! I choose to say a strict 'NO' to it hereafter. And here's the first step towards it. On the day of Mahatma Gandhi's martyrdom, the 30th of January, my friends and myself represented our college in organizing the 'India against Corruption' march in TRICHY city.

Here's an important link to join hands with the anti-corruption forces.
http://indiaagainstcorruption.org/

Here's the link to the photos during our march.
http://indiaagainstcorruption.org/blog/?p=16

Here's the link to the news item.
http://www.hindu.com/2011/01/31/stories/2011013161200300.htm

My 'NO' to corruption counts. How about yours?

cheers,
rajaji.

storage of thoughts

2011-01-14T18:56:00.000+05:30

We often realize the value of a life well-lived through the thoughts that pop up out of nowhere after being hidden somewhere in the corner of the mind or deep inside the heart. But are the mind and the heart always adept at funneling and bringing out desired thoughts of a certain time period that we crossed in life? Do we get to recollect all as we want them? Well.. there's, of course, amnesia of the brain and the move on phases of heart that may warrant voluntary subjugation of these thoughts.. those heavy and light ones alike which either dragged our lives or made us fly like the feather in the wind! Nevertheless, they are always there... somewhere.

And what of all the places to find these thoughts when the mind and the heart either genuinely fail or concur to conspire in a rarity of events?? Almost certainly, I'm to find them in the drawer of my computer table or some other furniture most often! Well... the coolest part is that these thoughts pop up inconsequentially, unfolding a series of events, when I just happen to look at one item in the drawer. Today was one of those days to bring some of the pleasant thoughts as a result of my cleaning up the table drawer.

It so happens that most of my UG alma mater items, stuff that I wouldn't even have thought of, are still with me! I don't remember when or how I brought them to this table. But now that they're certainly in the right place, the when or how is immaterial! And boy, I just covered 9 years in 30 mins!

Guess what some of the unexpected and interesting items are: B.Tech's seven semesters hall-tickets (sad that I lost the 8th one somewhere!), all UG fee receipts, some of the pencil sketches I made years ago (well, I now remember I used to do pencil sketching and water-coloring a lonnng time back! Some of those were in the days of Emerald Hostel @ NITT), a pretty good number of birthday & festival greeting cards from some UG friends (thank a lot for remembering, guys!), friendship bands, Raakhis, key chains as birthday gifts, a couple of books that came my way, again as birthday gifts (I still haven't opened them. The fresh scent of a new book is still in them. I like them that way! anyway I had or have read those books elsewhere), a couple of photo albums with friends from alma mater (a surprise package. Some of the best memorabilia!), two boxes of business cards and three unused bank cheque booklets all from my previous employers. And here comes the picturesque part... 4 sets of my PP size photos shot in a span of 10 years (lol!!).

Is there a better way to travel back in time?!

Life is beautiful.
cheers,
rajaji.

a 'year'ning

2011-01-12T10:37:00.000+05:30

For many people, the start of a new year in blog has obviously to be with a recap of the previous one. I, for one, don't want to be an exception here. So, putting aside the 'what' part of the ride, here I am to share the 'how' of 2010. Yet there may be some 'what's too which I feel are worthy enough to share here, for those are some moments that made 2010 worth the while.

2010 would undoubtedly be the best year of my life as a full-time student. And the last too! And to the best of my abilities, I tried to live it up and most certainly did. It was one year that made life worth calling a bittersweet symphony. It was simply beautiful.

In retro, I feel I comprehensively captured some of the moments in saying

so many good seen, worth a life everyday..
so many bad seen, worth a lesson for life..
so much more to see still, good and bad..
'tis a perfect thing in itself, this draft of life.

in the draft of life .

And of course

I’m glad that this time this experience has not all been out of contemplation or retrospection...I've opened up to the world around and getting along with all the like-minded and different people around me. I’ve been loved... I’ve been hated... I’ve been remembered... I’ve been forgotten... I’ve been praised... I’ve been pissed off... I’ve felt honoured... I’ve felt embarrassed... I’ve felt proud... I’ve felt humbled... I’ve felt angels walk with me... I’ve felt heaven in the hot sun and the cold rains... I’ve felt hell in packed AC rooms with all the luxury... I’ve felt walking alone even in a group and felt walking hand in hand even when walking alone... with the angels...I’ve wanted to be seen and unseen... I’ve played crazily in the rains and found that lost kid once again, for a moment forgetting that I’m grown up...

in dear blog .

My two bests of the year if I may say so! I wish 2011 gets atleast as interesting as 2010, if not more!

'Event'ful of 2010.

Ambivalence of seeing my brother off to a foreign land and missing him here a lot! Love you, bro.
Dearest nephew, Raghav, turned 2.
Dear Blog turned 5.
My beloved Spirit turned 5.
Had some of the best times, in terms of tours, outings, talks, post-dinner walks, movies, sports etc., with good old school buddies and The Untouchables of BIM. Thanks a lot guys.
Our team won GOLD in my first ever football tournament of the entire student life.. that too on a nail-biting 'Penalty Shootout' in the final. What a series that was! And me, 'Goalkeeper of the tournament' and 'Man of the match' in the final! Something to show I'm a sportsperson! ;-)
Numerous Online quizzes representing college; teaming with Sathish Pandiyan often and other Untouchables too occassionally.
My best birthday celebration in BIM. and some of the most valuable gifts. :-)
Momentous moments with Bharath, Senthil and Gokul, three of my best pals, now-NRI's who paid a visit to India in 2010. Special thanks. Miss you a lot, guys.
Numerous early morning walks in College Road, BHEL Road, BIM Street, Marine Drive and East end gardens; with Abhinav Apte, one of my best buddies from BIM.
Felt some of the best music ever. There was hardly a day that one or the other did not run in loop, or at least once. What more could I ask for. Check out my top 3 picks at the end of this post.

Many more 'event'fuls which I may have missed now, would follow. Keep checking this post often.. The list is sure to get bigger! :-)

Here's wishing everyone a happy and a prosperous year ahead.

Life is beautiful.
Cheers,
rajaji.

Dearest Spirit...

2010-11-26T18:36:00.000+05:30

People say we’ve got something that can run faster than you... time! Looks like that's the best that they can come up with! And pardon me, for I thought so too for a moment! Otherwise I wouldn’t be wondering how I’m back so soon, after a whole year, talking to you the same way we did a year ago! But don’t worry. Time’s got nothing to do with us. It never was and is our world! Our spirits are not to be racing with all the rats in the world! We are born to transcend all the trivialities of the world and ride like no one ever did!

Bear with the damn roads for
they haven’t seen spirits riding,
Spirits like you and me that
are stuff of a different world,
a world like no other world,
where we don’t race for life!

Wish the souls who rode with us,
whose lives have our indelible mark,
whose days we made a tad better,
and whom we’ve crossed in life!
Remember them for their good deeds,
and their differences in our lives!

Ride on, my Spirit, like never before,
not on any destiny but on freedom,
which only a few lucky discover with us,
and whose souls ride with us in our world,
the souls of the few untainted, untamed,
free souls which will transcend time with us!

Here’s wishing you a very happy birthday, my dearest Spirit! May we ride on forever!

ever together,
rajaji

days

2010-10-12T16:35:00.000+05:30

insomnia took strong hold and ruled,
not night nor day, did eyes ever sleep,
many ages had come and gone like this,
but vicious time, did roll on so, forever
and'd still come and go, more ages,
annihilating all the farthest of hopes
razing the day and bringing dark, but
the sun would still rise, more hopeful days!

barefoot

2010-10-12T16:22:00.000+05:30

that was once when they didn't feel heavy,
the footwear, which'd be so all other times,
it was time for the freedom, that they knew,
when they'd be real free, not under any order.
all dirt would be washed, time to get clean,
by the silver waters lit by the golden sun.

calm by their side, sat their wearer for whose,
sole they were made, not tight nor loose.
so did it look to the others, trivial who'd never
know it was his soul that they were made for.
for some time, on the sands, the wearer and they,
would feel freedom, and in the waters, under the sun.

bound all the while by the bonds of the world,
they'd to wait for the time to come; it's now.
on the way the world opened up clear and bright,
the wide silent free world of the ocean and the sun.
the sands and the water awaited them, barefoot,
for joy seeming ephemeral, but to them eternal!

a bookfair and 15 years later

2010-10-03T19:56:00.001+05:30

It was the 1995 'Annual day celebrations' of our school and I stood glued right next to the stage eagerly awaiting my turn to get on it and beam proudly to my mom, sis and bro. For a 5th grade kid, it was indeed a proud moment. Yes, I was also to be awarded a prize for 'General Proficiency'. Oh, to this day I just can't understand how it happened! I didn't even know what it was for! I probably just got luckier than the others. Period.

Anyway, for the interesting part of the whole ceremony.. that was the first time I was ever awarded books as a prize! Well.. that was my first ever prize! And it was 'Alistair', the comic hero. It was a fairly big book (not by number of pages, but by the dimensions. I guess it would've been A4!) I totally forgot whatever Alistair's heroics were. It turned out that the book and many others for the other winners were all bought in the book fair in Thillai Nagar. Now, it'd be too much to say 'I dragged my mom to the book fair to get me more books to quench my thirst for reading'! :-P . But it somehow happened and we did go eventually! That was my first visit to a book fair and the first impression, for a 5th grade kid, was definitely awe-inspiring. I could hardly believe that there would be so many books in the world! Anyway, my mom ended up buying me a couple of them.

Now.. 15 years later..

The book fair is organized by the same club, in the same place. (It is done every year and I hope it will be done every year henceforth too!) After missing 10 or so years, I happened to visit it yesterday. While coming home, the flashback of the 5th grade kid came rushing.. and of course, the books that mom bought me. Guess what? 'Jataka tales' and 'Tales of Hithopadesha'. A sudden fear of having lost them gripped me and as soon as I was home, I razed our bookstand in desperate hope that they'd still be there. And lo, they were! My first ever books! The dusty, brown, worn-out look gave them the authentic 'old book' feel! I took them out, dusted one and opened it slowly, page by page. Just to see what were the first things I read in my childhood..

Lo and behold! The book had these!

It pays to be cautious
Pride goes before the fall
Never be afraid to tell the truth
Speak only when it is necessary
Never let a friend down, for nothing is impossible
A kind word or a deed can change a whole life
It is better to rely on yourself than on foolish friends
Be humble
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush
You will never succeed if you cheat people
Unity is strength

and many more! 'MORAL OF THE STORY'.

Goodness me! I just can't hold the books for long, for they weigh so much now! The kid who just as casually read through them with vivacity is long gone! And here I am, 15 years later (roughly 6 of them, so damn boring and worthless!) hopelessly wishing I stayed the same age! :-)

But I think I've actually learnt some of the things in life the right way they need to be learnt rather than from a book full of talking animals! :-) I firmly believe the 15 years have been worth the while! The difference had actually been between seeing things and doing things. Confucius had rightly said 'I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand'.

After 15 years of doing, I say, C'est la vie!
And of course, "Life is always beautiful".

cheers,
rajaji.

random thoughts

2010-10-01T17:30:00.000+05:30

months rolled by, seemingly busy as ever,
but never did those thoughts stop hittin me.
those random thoughts, as they come and go.
only that I couldn't stop to jot 'em down.
all this amidst a world of everythingness.
not a moment of pause that they'd give me,
they always beat me, those lovely thoughts!
lots said, lots done, lots of what-not,
would take a lifetime to pen 'em all down
amazing, the pace at which it all struck,
just like a flash or a streak of lightning,
etched in memory for an eternity, that beauty
but never easy to hold, it always flies off.
leaving behind a world of nothingness,
to cherish that moment's aura forever.
who ever said nothingness is nothing?
It's everything, so long as they are there too.
those lovely, striking, random thoughts!
stunning my world as they pass by,
leaving behind a new world of silence,
for me to get lost, once and forever!

Dear blog...

2010-08-29T08:14:00.001+05:30

At this very moment, you should be fuming inside for me having completely forgotten your birthday. I hope at the end of this, you should be sufficiently convinced to forgive me for that! And knowing that you’re one of the best things that have ever happened to me, I fondly hope that you’d! You sure do know, I can’t live without you...

So.. first of all, wishing you a very belated happy birthday... we’re made for each other and we’ll live upto that..

For one good understanding soul, you’d appreciate that I’ve been making the best out of the life that’s been happening to me. And as we’ve known together, growing up and getting better never stops. And that’s to say the least. Read on...

Boy.. I don’t know how to feel for time’s running so fast! This cliché, for one, is sure driving me with passion to live life beautifully. And to think of the times when we talked about perfections in people we hated and imperfections in people we loved.. boy! What an enlightenment has it been to see it the other way round! I've learnt that the only way to live life the way I want is to let others around me live the way they want! And that, sure as heaven, means learning to live with these (im)perfections... I’ve found friends in people I thought I’d never be able to come to terms with... And most importantly, I’ve experienced the truth that best friends are never ‘out of touch’.

I’m glad that this time this experience has not all been out of contemplation or retrospection...I've opened up to the world around and getting along with all the like-minded and different people around me. I’ve been loved... I’ve been hated... I’ve been remembered... I’ve been forgotten... I’ve been praised... I’ve been pissed off... I’ve felt honoured... I’ve felt embarrassed... I’ve felt proud... I’ve felt humbled... I’ve felt angels walk with me... I’ve felt heaven in the hot sun and the cold rains... I’ve felt hell in packed AC rooms with all the luxury... I’ve felt walking alone even in a group and felt walking hand in hand even when walking alone... with the angels...I’ve wanted to be seen and unseen... I’ve played crazily in the rains and found that lost kid once again, for a moment forgetting that I’m grown up...

All this is to say that the long wait I’ve been having for the 'light at the end of the tunnel' is because I’d been staying still inside the tunnel now and then... stuck... lost... and I’ve somehow managed to gather up the steam and the spirit to move forward... and I’m seeing the light... I've walked aimlessly with an open mind and free of any thoughts and found out that they turn out to be the best walks I could ever have... The crossroads which earlier seemed baffling now look beautiful, for the road in every direction now seems to hold some surprise or the other... calling out to me to come and experience the undisclosed beauty it preserves.

And I firmly believe it’s all been worth the while...

Trust me, my dear, when I say I’m living like I’ve never lived before... :-)

selfless greats!

2010-07-19T07:32:00.002+05:30

For the selfless greats who take that road...

Who am I writing this for and about? Well... definitely not anyone and everyone. There would’ve been and will be some people, now and then, in our lives who touch us in some way or the other, who are an inspiration to us... and whom we would sometimes like to emulate despite our highly inflammable ego and identity!

Almost everyday we would want some tough things to move on fast and then tell ourselves and others that ‘This too shall pass”... the infinitely comfortable way of self-deception that “that thing is never going to be ok...”

For some, this journey of life is as ephemeral as passing someone on the road and then forgetting about it. After all, ‘out of sight is out of mind’. Isn’t it? I’m just going to talk about that category of people (me included!), for their journeys are accidental... not transcendental... and thus easier to know what not to do!!! It's also because of the fact that it's infinitely difficult, if not impossible, to talk about the lives of the greats as they are living it! That's why only those invariably titled books "The History and Life of ..." sell well!!

Even then, I would just want to touch upon the lives of the greats, as I see it. This is for those souls... not just immortal, but divine too... for whom the arduous journey through those tough passages of life will never be adequately compensated for. For what they have spent in order for it not to pass out of their heart and soul is something intangible, priceless and selfless. And it’s this beauty of the selflessness of their lives that makes it all the more immeasurable.

About the rest.. It’s not fate but the self-inflicted imperfection of a majority of the people of our generation to measure everything only by tangibility and price. The equations of life are simple to us... never complex... and thus never interesting. The logic of our measure of life is found in paper-work and so happens to be the precision of our work... clockwork! Our lives are void of the inspiration that drives those of the greats! Our lives are deprived of the symphony with nature that is overwhelming in those of the greats! Our paths are so redundant that there isn’t space for a new footprint for us to show we went that way. Our lives are not intertwined with the music of the soul which makes any of those arduous journeys a pleasure to undertake!

Ohh.. How I wish I could be different!!

rajaji.

touched...

2010-06-20T08:26:00.000+05:30

this post is a collection of songs that I've come to love recently and each've touched me in various aspects. wanted to share with you all..

1) For those who know only of the 'Wavin' Flag (The Celebration), the song that's rocking the world now as a promo for FIFA WC 2010.. well.. time to take a look at the original.. 'Hope for Haiti - Wavin Flag'... the struggle that's part of everyday life of those poor souls.. and the proof that our life is really beautiful and theirs not so, at least for now!! Hope they get their due...

Of course, there are other variations too.. check out YT...

2) This was an accidental watch when switching channels on the tv aimlessly.. and lo, wat a wonderful melody!!

3)This is really a cool one.. You just have to sit back and enjoy.. :-)

will be back with more,
cheers,
rajaji.

My first experience with Blue Cross

2010-06-06T00:58:00.001+05:30

I’d never set foot before on a Blue Cross.. though I’d been wanting to do, I somehow did not, all these years! Thanks to Google, I had the opportunity to be a part of one of their CSR activities, ‘Service at Blue Cross’, in Hyderabad.. and I should admit the experience was quite a stunner.. I just couldn’t help coming out with ambivalent feelings.

On the one hand, it’s a great feeling to care for those animals, mostly puppies and kittens... particularly feeding 10-day old and 20-day old kittens or the cute puppies which had just opened their eyes! But I should also say, man, it was quite difficult to see the living conditions of those poor animals... ‘blame it on the recession, we’re very short of funds’.. said the lady who’s heading the Blue Cross here. And that clearly reflects in the state of most of the animals... many underfed and some sick! And not to mention the many abandoned, deformed dogs and cats... what worse.. I had to bear witness to the death of 2 kittens which had recently been handed over by the owner for want of time/whatever to take care of them! Man... I had enough! Poor lives... unused... unloved... dead!!!

It turned to be one occasion which I had been looking forward to very much with great enthusiasm and anticipation but one I ended up feeling why I should have been there in the first place!!

Maybe I was destined to... I’d say it was worth all the while going there and doing the little bit of service I could for all those poor souls... more importantly, there are lessons to be learnt from the people there... and lots of gratitude I’d sure want to feel for all the efforts of my near n dear ones and also whatever luck(!!) I’ve come through in leading a comfortable life...

And I sure do appreciate the fact that my life is indeed beautiful! And this experience was one that has made me appreciate this beauty and strive to make something worthwhile out of it... to give something back to the society... to make a difference... I hope to do that.

will be back,

cheers,

rajaji.

the draft of life...

2010-05-19T18:47:00.000+05:30

this ain't usual, nothin's being done...
days swiftly go by, albeit all mundane,
thunderous waves.. have they calmed down?
for the sea hasn't been this silent before!

many flashing dreams, but not all lived!
is it already that time of life's season?
mind and heart both shut down, at once!
simply away from the world, at peace...

all thoughts frozen.. for time quite long...
all dreams inanimate.. that too for long!
for what seems a long lifetime ahead...
'tis too early.. for the story complete...

so many good seen, worth a life everyday..
so many bad seen, worth a lesson for life...
so much more to see still.. good and bad...
'tis a perfect thing in itself.. this draft of life.

Walk - 1

2010-05-13T12:23:00.002+05:30

A: wats up?

E: nothing...

A: well.. not the usual way u say ‘nothing’.. tell me wats wrong?

E: as if i can correct it now... doesn’t matter.

A: let’s give it a try. Wat happened?

E: u don’t stop when i ask you to, do you?? well... nothing happens... tats the problem... no damn thing happens the way i want. I’ve been waiting for long for some good to happen to me. Too long in fact!

A: good things do happen to you, rite?

E: what.. this looks good to you? Cut the crap! You know how long i’ve waited for this. Now see where I am. Damn all the waiting i did!!

A: looks like you’d been giving too much shit to that ‘good-things-happen-to-those-who-wait’ stuff huh??

E: wat u came here all the way to pour more crap into me? D’ya mind talking something else?

A: Yes I do mind. And I won’t talk anything else now. Upto you whether or not to give an ear to this ‘crap’ that i’m gonna give you. But tell you what? the longer you let your psycho listen to it, the worse it’s gonna become for you!! Wat the hell is the matter with you? Haven’t you had enough of this? Wat.. since schooldays we’ve been through this thing?? how many times ‘ve you waited ‘long enough’ and how many times have those good things happened to you?

E: But patience is a virtue.. isn’t it? Is that not what they taught us at school?

A: there you go. You didn’t believe me when i said your education ruins your life’s learnings. Now you see you lead us in this... BY EXAMPLE!!

E: You better mind your words, mate!

A: ah, don’t try to cut me out. You can’t. You know tat. So just listen. First, you’ve any idea wat patience means? Who the hell told you it’s ‘waiting’??

E: u here to teach me that? well. Wat else is it if not ’waiting’??

A: come out of this someone-teaching-you-something, will you? Why the hell don't you get out and know it urself firsthand! experience it..

E: ah.. experience?? you're never tired of talking abt experiences huh? Even for these little things?? now wat r u gonna tell me about ‘patience’ from your experience?? it means 'enduring’? it means 'waiting after you’ve tried’? don't give me this crap.

A: there!! I didn’t say it. You said. You know what it means. You’ve experienced it, yet you fool urself that it’s not what you think it is! Where did you learn this art of fooling urself of the truths you know??! Look inside urself. You are more than wat you make urself to be from ur damned education!! You are made of your experiences!! And these ‘little things’ are what make your life.

E: aha.. so education is damning for you and experiences make you who you are? Wat r u then? A philosopher?

A: Wat do u think you’ve just found out about patience and its so-called virtuosity?? and you think you are not a philosopher??

E: I’ll never want to be one!

A: Wat’s wrong with you? Wat’ve you got against philosophy? Wat’s the greatness abt ur education that’s not abt philosophy? I’d rather be wrong by my philosophy than be right by someone spoon-feeding me education!! You have a nice meal of your education!

E: enough of your damn sarcasms.. they fire like a bloody shotgun at close range!! :-)

A: well.. you could get further with a kind word and a gun than with just a kind word!!

E: Al Capone stuff huh? I know there r better things you could get from ‘The Untouchables’!!!

A: You don’t mean that ‘Never stop fighting till the fight is done’ stuff, do you?? ;-)

E: You said it!! :-)

A: let’s go.... let’s fight the world. ‘So much to be done but so few to do it’!!!

E: shut that crackpot in you! Not a word more! Let’s go... :-)

cool... and bored!!

2010-05-09T11:53:00.001+05:30

H : What are you doing?

C : Being cool.

H : You look more like you're being bored.

C : The world bores you when you're cool.

good one, Calvin.. :-)

rajaji.

The best policy?

2010-05-04T23:20:00.001+05:30

I am kind of beginning to like playing around a little with whatever words I know... :-) It looks funny and interesting when some subtle distinctions in these are experienced personally. And more interesting is the realization that there is more to the word than just what the dictionary says..that sometimes we are able to go beyond definitions!! That way, let me get started with the first of these kinds of 'mind-teasers' based on my personal experiences.. I'm dedicating a section named 'wordtricks' for this..

here it goes..

does the title ring any bell? 'Honesty is the best policy'?? we knew this without even knowing what 'policy' meant, let alone what 'honesty' meant!! learning to discern things a little now, myself and my friend were talking abt this with the intent of taking this to a different level..so we chose a word very closely associated, and often used interchangeably, with honesty, 'integrity', and thought abt how to distinguish these based on whatever we have learnt/experienced.. after quite a serious contemplation I told 'I think integrity is the best policy'!

why? because i feel while honesty means being true, sincere and moral when others are watching you, intergrity means being these even when no one's watching you!!

wat say??

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

strange!!

2010-05-03T13:36:00.002+05:30

"Strange is our situation here on earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose. From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that man is here for the sake of other men – above all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness depends"
- Albert Einstein

I start this post with the above not-so-known quote from Einstein; though it shouldn’t be a surprise coming from one of the greatest scientists of all times, many of them having dedicated their lives for the above said ‘well-being’ of others.

But what about this ‘well-being’ from the point of view of evolution? My recent love for evolutionary biology and history of evolution has been leading me to an amazing world; a peek into the minds of the greatest scientists, philosophers, historians and who not... but there are a lot of questions in my mind which I hope to subsequently answer for myself (!!!) or get it from anybody out there.

My concern here is the next stage of evolution keeping in mind the way we have developed over the last thousands and thousands of years. It is now widely accepted that natural selection has paved and been paving the way for this hugely successful evolution of everything in nature; man, flora, fauna and what not. Natural selection in simplest terms is the ‘survival and passing on’ of the best gene to create the next generation. As confusing as it can get for newbies, like myself, to this field of study, it is the exact opposite of ‘chance’ as the creator of life everywhere. This theory necessitates ‘Selfishness’ as the basis of evolution. Every gene of every ‘thing’ strives for the best of every resource to be available to itself to survive and create the next generation.

The first question:

In such a situation, how is it that human (and even animal) capabilities have risen to such great and unthought-of levels of ‘life’ (not survival!) where we care for others, where we aim for peace in the midst of a ‘crisis of life’, where we collaborate to make a better place for the next generations to come, where some rise to be ‘selfless’ leaders against the fundamental concept of selfishness of the gene? From where does the unimaginable ‘altruism’ picture at all in this? How can a gene/organism/species ever grow to be altruistic??! What is the theory behind this?

The second question:

While we evolved from beasts and grew to be humans, when we had civilization coming up, the prominent player in our development was ‘war’ (no... it wasn’t just colonization! In fact, it was extermination!). Everybody waged war on everybody else mainly for control of the resources to ensure the survival of their kind only! And nobody bothered ‘exterminating’ communities and civilizations for their own survival and well-being. This being the case, how was it that ‘coalitions’ came out of nowhere? What necessitated this? Why the communities and civilizations were not better off with their own ‘independent’ levels of growth and development?

The third question:

If all of the above emerged through the realization of a few people who believed that there needed to be some superior power drawing the lines for everything and everyone; and who gave a set of rules/practices, in the name of ‘religion’, for everyone to follow, then how is it that ‘it’ became the ‘controller’ instead of being the ‘controlled’? What caused/causes this change in the behaviour of humans to let something that they created to control them? How is it that ‘religion’ which is the exact opposite to ‘the theory of evolution’ has come to overwhelm us? Which is older and more powerful– religion or evolution??!

The fourth question:

From here, where are we headed to? Will evolutionary theories throw up more surprises and give more solid evidences supporting its role as the creator of the past and future generations of life (will we have mutants of the ‘X-men’ type as the next generation of super-humans??!!) or will religion dominate, making us believe it’s all the work of the invisible hand??!! Or will science make the best of both –evolution and religion – and emerge as an even more powerful force (this is not to say Science is against religion or evolution!)

Strange, indeed, is our situation on earth!!!

will be back..
cheers,
rajaji

soul's flight...

2010-05-02T23:59:00.001+05:30

move on, it had to.. can’t quit,
o’er the horizon, was its stop.
this ain’t a movie nor fiction,
for it to be as ephemeral as those
it never ends easy, the struggle,
very smooth as it does in those.
another chance? it won’t know
’tis now or never, that was it.
there was in it, the eternal hope
only of the brave and relentless..
and not just immortal but divine too.
in crossroads, which is the way??
none but what i make, thought it.
steps too slow, it must be flyin,
pull it back, who can or dare??
in it not the spirit, but ‘with’ it.
reverberatin’, not in the least tired!
all the way, lightin the darkness,
this path’d praise its name, for
it wasn’t there until now, it made it.
oh i’m there already.. is that it??
next stop? here i come.. off it flew!!
and there it was, the new path…
the blazing trail of the soul’s flight!!!

war of thoughts..

2010-05-02T23:56:00.002+05:30

that’s the way things were…
never obvious, never subtle,
that’s the way he was…
never closed, never open.

but then, things had to change…
to either this or that..
more so, he had to change too…
to either be or not to be…

again, that ain’t quite smooth…
things changin from this to that.
yet again, that ain’t quite him..
to be ‘this-him’ and not ‘that-him’…

knew all this, and yet he feigned…
that things will never change.
and so was he, cheating himself,
that he would never change!

and so did it happen, that things changed.
but then, things aren’t quite human..
and there he stood struggling…
would the change consume him?

transform him; engulf him?
or leave him torn to pieces, and dead..
the human too frail to stand it all…
killed by the war of his thoughts?!!!

vagabonds!

2010-02-03T23:42:00.003+05:30

it's so damn easy to get carried away when we are in a group, roam around as a gang, hold the head high when a praise or two is showered upon us!

but there isn't a harsher and a more bitter way to realize the true vagabond in each of us than to look deep within ourselves when we are alone and when there isn't a soul around! we hardly attempt to face this truth, for guarding this truth is the fear of that brutal truth itself!!

life goes on!!!

the other half of 2009

2010-01-10T19:05:00.003+05:30

after half-life a long time ago, i see one thing hasn't changed in me.. the kind of guy i was then and i still am.. guess that'll never change... but then the last 6 months would've been a race against time for anytime in my position to even think about a change... (as if i'd been chasing something indispensable to life or even chasing life itself!!!)

though u would agree that i do chase some dreams! well.. everybody does! so there's no big deal abt me either... except that my perceptions of dreams are quite different frm urs.. most of the times my dreams would've been ur realities and urs mine!! ;-) (provided u know the kind of guy i am!!)

but in a way, i kind of feel some of the recent happenings knocked some good sense in to me... now that would be too personal to share!! so lets have it this way simply "every day is a new life.. every thing is a new lesson.. every person u meet and relate to is a new challenge(!!).. and every next day is a new hope of something better"

("Remember Red.. hope is a good thing.. maybe the best of things.. and no good thing ever dies" - The Shawshank Redemption)

and then some other interesting things... one is the 'mental-hybernation' stuff during half-life... makes me feel how i got so much to think abt then and yet landed nowhere, but there's a new life to be lived everyday now!!

another very interesting thing that needs to be mentioned is the 'institutionalization' phase i'm in now.. (watch "The Shawshank Redemption".. but don't get carried away trying to exact what is meant in the movie! it's just kinda similar in some ways!!)

let's see what 2010 holds in store..
better late than never... here's wishing everyone a very happy and a prosperous new year.. :-)

"Walkin' like a one man army,
fighting with the shadows in your head,
livin' up the same old moment,
knowin' you'd be better off instead..
if you could only....
say what you need to say" (John Mayers - Say what you need to say)

btw, watch "The Bucket List" in case you haven't already!

cheers,
rajaji.

Growing up!!!

2009-12-09T19:25:00.003+05:30

I'm writing this to sincerely thank all the souls out there who have been through with me in handling this unstable space, sparing their precious time in going thru some of the highly illogical, whacky posts!!!... sometimes totally irrational posts on sensitive issues... gosh!! lookin back at those, where did i draw the courage to write them... cos see it takes a lot of courage even to write nonsense!!! and even more so for ppl to stand all that!!! :-P

Jokes apart... looking at all those posts, i draw a lot of lessons... and more so from the comments...from some of the dearest, most sensible and inspiring ppl i've ever come across in life ... i feel lucky and honored to be in the company of such people...

I'd not be doing justice if i fail to say this space has happened and will happen to be the cradle of my nostalgia!! (wat a term!!).. I could never have enjoyed my life as much as I do now but for this space with which I relive those good old days... and not to forget the lessons from those memories...

I'm growing up!!

will be back..
cheers...

Long live Spirit!!!

2009-11-29T19:33:00.008+05:30

Well... there had been times when i almost broke down and desperately felt like breaking free and getting the hell out of the place....like a free bird...

and for the last 3 yrs... from Nov 29 2006, to be precise.... I've had no better companion than spirit!!! my spirit!!

my innumerable rides with spirit had been and will always be adventurous...in untrodden roads!! my journey with spirit will always remain part of my legacy!!

Here's wishing my spirit a very happy b'day and a wonderful journey with me ahead for the rest of both our lives!!

Long live spirit!

Inspirations...

2009-11-24T21:26:00.006+05:30

I had decided to wait for three more days to make it a "100-day-break" from blogging!! but i can't help it now... this needs to be said...

I remember tweeting sometime back "are inspirations really ephemeral.. like a mirage?? or is it just me??!!" I lately keep discovering and rediscovering that they aren't ephemeral... it's a tough proposition to explain why they aren't ephemeral.. but let me try...

One probable reason could be that we are never short of greater people all around us... those who have climbed from even lower wrungs of life's ladder than we did... those who never fail to amaze us with their seemingly unthinkable deeds!! those who are at the dead-wrong places at the dead-wrong time and yet turn the tables to their favor in some absolutely breathtaking encounters... well.. i tell you, we need to observe a lot.. to learn to really look deep to understand how they do that... its inexplicable in words...
i can say fairly confidently that i've learnt to observe a lot these days... and been able to understand the profundities of nature and people around us... but getting better never stops... there's still a lot to learn...

talking about nature, i feel it's a totally miserable idea/perception to draw inspirations from animals as some people do... come on... don't you ever be so naive as to believe an ant, or a lion for that matter, is the king of insects/beasts... they aren't kings because they work hard or they are so powerful.. it's their nature... whatever those creatures do it's all reflexive actions and instincts... and more so, lion is just the king of the jungle.. not of humans!!!
let's stop comparing ourselves to a lion or an ant thinking we 'can be' stronger than the strongest or a harder worker than the hardest of them all... it's nonsense.... let's grow up...

i feel very sorry for those people who are so dumb into believing such crap that they 'attempt to' bring such insanities to life in the form of animation movies where a monkey crowns a lion 'king' or a tortoise crowns a panda a 'dragon warrior' all at the end of a glorious war... and such crap!
still if you insist we do draw some kind of inspiration from animals, then apart from animals, i don't think we have been that successful so far to learn from any other creations/creatures of nature to draw inspirations from them... so i think it's a waste of time to talk about inspirations from nature anymore..

so that leaves us with people...
Now this makes the most sense.. that we can only draw inspirations from people around us... and from what i have been experiencing, here too it only starts to make sense from the moment we realize we cannot draw inspirations from looking at others without looking inside ourselves!!! and it's a tough lesson we all need to learn by ourselves... to look inside ourselves...

well... i know this is all cliche'd stuff... but what we all invariably fail to see is that sometimes some of the most obscure things in life are in fact the simplest only if we know which way to look at them... and in that other direction is an untamed path full of surprises in life... the drive or the courage to take that road is within ourselves!!
unfortunately we don't see that most of life's complications and intricacies we feel are in fact only so because we see them in a way they are not supposed to be seen... that the same road is never exciting!!!

let there be light to the new road... let there be hope...
getting better never stops...
there's a lot to learn to live life large!!

will be back..
cheers,
rajaji.

one last time...

2009-08-15T00:01:00.003+05:30

He lay flat on the terrace floor... staring at the wonderful night sky... it had just rained and the remaining few clouds had passed...the breeze was awesome... a strong breeeze or two, now and then, carried along with it the finest dew drops.. some splashed on his face sending a pleasant chill down his spine.. he smiled... he was beginning to lose himself to nature.

He had been in such sensational moments before, those best moments of his life...
but that was when she was beside him... that was long back... now, he did not even seem to realize it and was totally in a different world himself..
the sounds around him... of his friends chatting... of the many walkman phones churning out one song after another... the chirping of the nocturns... nothing seemed capable of shaking his resolve now... no... not now...

John Denver's 'Annie's Song' kept running in his mind...

You fill up my senses,
like a night in the forest,
like the mountains in springtime,
like a walk in the rain,
like a storm in the desert,
like a sleepy blue ocean,
you fill up my senses,
come, fill me again.

come, let me love you,
let me give my life to you,
let me drown in your laughter,
let me die in your arms.
let me lay down beside you,
let me always be with you,
come, let me love you,
come, love me again.

let me give my life to you,
come, let me love you,
come, love me again.

you fill up my senses,
like a night in the forest,
like the mountains in spring time,
like a walk in the rain,
like a storm in the desert,
like a sleepy blue ocean,
you fill up my senses,
come, fill me again.

He closed his eyes and gathered the last things that went through his mind... the moment when they shook hands for one last time... those painful words they had to share for one last time... and many more... all for one last time...

he shed a few drops of tears...wiped them out....and he closed his eyes for one last time...

Happy B'day my dear blog!!

2009-08-01T21:27:00.006+05:30

By any measure, I could tell this is definitely one of my greatest successes in life so far... in terms of my perseverance, patience and above all, passion!! cos there are moments in life where even passions die!

But I sure am not going to relent in this... I'll just fight anything to keep this passion alive and well...

and here I wish my blog a very very happy b'day as it enters its third year!!! I just can't tell how excited I am at this success of mine! :-) Join me in celebrating this joyous occasion and a proud moment! :-)

will be back..

cheers,

rajaji.

Half-life 2009

2009-07-01T08:45:00.004+05:30

I can't help appreciating myself for having saved this space from the brink of extinction yet again.. wait wait.. its just been 75 days since the last post and I call this 'brink of extinction'?? Well... I'm the kind who feels there's so much to do (do what??) but so little time that I can say 75 days is a lifetime for me!!! and thus, this becomes an immense success for me! :-P

but I really can't tell you how busy I've been those 75 days to even 'think' of saving this space..oh come on! you must be dumb to believe me if I said I've been too busy physically or otherwise to come back to put some stuff in this space! I know you ain't dumb... none of you! :-) . So you get it that I'm not gonna say 'work kept me busy' or 'couldn't find time da'.... It was, let's say, a period of long mental hybernation(on the outside only!!) (holy &*%^.. i gotta stop inventing such insanities!!).. the month of May, in particular, being verrry testing!!!

anyway, this post is not to torture you with the course of the events of my mental hybernation.. let that shit go away with the half-life of 2009... the other half starts today!
Shd I say, the glass is now exactly half-full or half-empty?? am I an optimist or a pessimist??

will be back,
cheers,
rajaji.

P.S : This post and the events of my M-H will make clear sense to puppysmile and mood in particular... thanks for being with me thru tough times, guys!

GMRC

2009-04-18T20:33:00.005+05:30

I was going through GAAP and it enthused me a lot.. so i just thought why not devise some commandments for relationships... of course for 'fun only'... so, I've just invented 'Generally Misinterpreted Relationship Commandments'.
The names have been adopted similar to GAAP, as they seem relevant to what I'm about to say.... but should you, if at all, wish to adopt any of these commandments, it's upto you to decide to which relationship which of these commandments fit best for you!!! :-P

Commandment of regularity: You shall always be regular in your relationship, but shall not expect regularity in return!! For, should you expect regularity, you shall be sure NOT to receive it. Even then, you shall never, ever, cease to be regular!! it's the LAW!!!

Commandment of consistency: In any relationship,you shall learn to maintain consistency..in your dedication, honesty, loyalty etc... and also,in all your multi-taskings, multi-threadings, clandestine operations, and your 'lies' too!!! Should you lose the consistency, you shall pay for it dearly!! And, obviously, here too, you shall not expect any reciprocity of consistency!!!

Commandment of sincerity: No need to explain anything in detail here... should you be insincere even a moment, man, 'you are dead'!!!

Commandment of the permanence of methods: This is quite complicated!! you shall not maintain a permanence across all your methods uniformly... instead, the permanence adopted for each method shall depend on how you frame the method and, if you are caught red-handed, how to use the method to your advantage.. requires a lot of brainwork... and guts too!!!

Commandment of non-compensation: You shall always be the one to take the measures to keep the relationship moving forward... and you shall not expect any compensation/remuneration for your efforts in this! you shall be good always, do good always, mouthshut!!

Commandment of prudence: You shall always be prudent everytime everywhere cos you shall never know when the next big expenditure will stare at your face! this is not simply in materialistic terms, but in cognitive, emotional and spiritual terms too!!!

Commandment of continuity: You shall continue to remain tied in the relationship even though you shall be beaten, disgraced, humiliated.. no matter how often!! for, by being continuous you always pave the way for things to get better and keep the relationship growing!!!

Commandment of periodicity: You shall periodically invent methods of renewal and reinforcements to keep the relationship going! should you fail in this particular principle, you shall be sure to run a damaged vehicle! and be ready to lose your bones too!!!

Commandment of Full Disclosure/Materiality: Finally here!! you shall always disclose full material worth.. and, inevitably, be necessarily (note : not SUFFICIENTLY, but NECESSARILY!!) materialistic and keep yourself stuffed always!!!

phew!!!

now, would you be kind enough to suggest some good stuff for me to devise 'commandments' for?? ;-)

rajaji.

how long?

2009-04-13T20:57:00.004+05:30

of late, this is the only thought occupying this cramped dumbhead of mine all the time... "how long"!

if you ask me 'how long for what', well.. i'll have to say 'i don't know'. if i already knew it, why should i be waiting and mumbling every second 'how long'?? i tell you, it's always nice to have choices.. but it doesn't do much good to have too many of 'em... infact all it does is make you go even crazier than what you were before...

well.. this is not a rant, if that's what you think it is.. :-) i'm talking in general... let's say some philosophy of mine.. though i ain't too good at it, let me try too... ;-)

after all, there's always the opportunity, every instant, to make out how our life is gonna be... and it looks to me now is the time i gotta make mine... the time for the call... let me see how it shapes up...

the lines from 'Hero' (Nickelback)...

I'm so high, I can hear heaven.
oh but heaven, no heaven don't hear me..

and they say that a hero can save us.
i'm not gonna stand here and wait.
i'll hold onto the wings of the eagles.
watch as we all fly away.

in hopes...
rajaji.

atlast!!

2009-04-08T08:49:00.004+05:30

stood still, the breeze, and my mind!
on my eyes' tips, stopped my tears!
my soul's music, it stunned as well!
all when you came back!!! and how!!

strange!! did my heart stop too?
I know it hasn't!! how can it??
you've been living there, for long !!!
in each and every breath, in and out!!

struck sleepless, all long nights!!
roaming restless, all long days!!
thus I passed, so much of life!!
in high hopes, you'd come back!!

i thought, vicious..the circle of love!!
anyone to stop this? and how?
nowhere I could go, what next??
in all ethereal hopes! and you came back!

feel it!!!

2009-04-07T00:02:00.008+05:30

just when u think i've said all that is to be said abt 'my music', hold on!! though i say, my music is beyond language or whatever, there are some things that u can hardly refute about the language/voices when it comes to good music..and am no exception ;-)

in that way, my latest crush is a lesser known song from the recent tamil movie 'Laadam'...during the first few times, i didn't stop to look deep into the song.. it'd hardly be a moment or two before the hand automatically moves on to the next channel in the remote, because i used to have a bad opinion that songs from lesser known/stupid/bad movies will be equally bad as well! say, like.. the movie will spot a totally unfit hero (probably the son of the producer!!), a lesser known/new face director, low budget and likely, a new music director too who would hardly know what it is to create 'original music' and instead copy tracks easily from foreign languages or put on some f^&*#%^ 'dappanguthu' or totally irritating and shameless item numbers!!! again,, this movie too has a copy of an english track... so it naturally boils down that u don't waste a second on such movies/songs.. and i ditched it altogether!!!

but i was proven wrong this time with the song 'siru thodudhalile' rendered by Bombay Jayashree and Haricharan.. well.. no need to say abt BJ...there's hardly anyone who can match her in delivering romantic pieces, overpowering us with a stunning mix of both base and high pitches (the latest stark contrast being 'Anal mele panithuli' (Vaaranam Aayiram) which Sudha Ragunathan totally ditched (as far as i'm concerned!!!) BJ would've done absolute justice to it just like how she's been doing since 'Vaseegara'!!)... and Haricharan has been one of my favorite singers since he debuted in 'Kaadhal' with two wonderful songs...excellent talent!

and so, atlast, I decided to give this song one go!! just for the singers.. and lo!!! here am, after three days of non-stop 'siru thodudhalile', and writing about it here... (the first time i ever write a review) ..there had not been such an addiction for me for anything in the recent past... the song is an absolute mind-blower!! such wonderful romantic touches from both the singers... they've both 'lived' it...and to add to that, the small flute track at the start,inbetween the interludes and at the end. though a small piece,that's one stunner!!

and I won't put the lyrics here.. the beauty of the romance that the song carries just needs to be felt along with its music!!
this is sure to take its place as one of my most favorite romantic duets!!

WARNING :: Should you ever come to know that this song's music is also stolen from some original soundtrack, well... don't blame me for the hype i've created here!!! after all, a good music is good music no matter in how many minds it is replicated!! :-P

rajaji.

my music!!

2009-04-05T11:58:00.003+05:30

this has been under editing for quite a while. i think it's ready to be talked about now... for the first time, i'm writing about something which i've experienced since childhood... something which i now feel i was born with... music!!

my first teachers were my dear sisters bharathi and prashanthi.. i grew up watching them go to 'paatu class' everyday, come back home and practise the same...that was when i was in the third grade... i was too young then to really 'feel' the music... i'd just listen to them sing and repeat it... probably i had great grasping powers!! ;-) (not now though! ;-)) the music came just like how studies did!! i think i probably started growing up with it as another of the routine stuffs of everyday life!! then, i too joined them for the 'paatu class'... and this went on for roughly 12 yrs... and i represented my schools and college in competitions, winning some, losing some...

but then, in due course of time, my life started changing drastically.. slowly i grew to be the heart-ruler that i am now... giving my mind only stuff it needed for survival!! i felt i should let my heart do the 'living'... there were good lessons of that in life... and so, i began to feel my heart slowly digging its way through my music too, conquering my mind, digging real deep into the splendor and awe of my music.. and the ultimate realization dawned on me that it was my music which had been transforming my life till then and made me most of what i am today!! on the moment of truth, every little thought n feeling on music, that i had till then, began to break down into a hundred thousand pieces!!! whatever music that i had 'learned' by-heart till then (well.. almost 99% of those were not in my mother-tongue and i had absolutely no idea what i was doing with all that!! they were always some praise on some god or the other.. in some language!) did not seem to make any sense... and i couldn't help feeling that all that music i had been living with was not heartfelt.. nor truly mine even... but i'm happy if any of my 'that' music made anyone happy.... the little that i could do for others.. make a moment or two for them...

now... after the realization i've given up the idea of taking the trouble of 'learning' anything new in that... i don't mean to say i'm done with it.. but there's no point in going any further once you know how the road thereafter is gonna be!! is there? instead, if you knew there is another road, untamed yet intriguing, would it not be interesting to get onto it??

now..my music has lost all its mental/social influences and the numerous languages it had till now... it is almost dumb, still... it has a deep, profound message for each and everything in nature... it is almost deaf, still... it's always there to listen to what my heart has to say... its almost blind, still... it can dig right through the darkest secrets of mankind that i encounter... its a complex mix of both 'nothingness' and 'wholeness' in my music that makes it truly mine...

Go Calvin!!!

2009-03-27T07:45:00.003+05:30

H : How are you doing on your New Year's Resolutions?

C : I didn't make any. See.. in order to improve oneself, one must have some idea of what's 'Good'. That implies certain values. But, as we all know, values are relative. Every system of belief is equally valid and we need to tolerate Diversity. Virtue isn't 'Better' than Vice. It's just different.

H : I don't know if I can tolerate that much tolerance.

C : I refuse to be victimized by notions of virtuous behavior!

You just make my day, Calvin!! Go on! :-)

rajaji.

as you sow, so you reap!!

2009-03-24T22:04:00.003+05:30

I'm not a perfectionist in too many ways. But there are certain things which I prefer to perfect and also expect others to do so.. and these things are not too much to ask for, considering the fact that they generally help avoid mishaps in most cases, even if they don't do much good. But, doing no harm is a lot better way to make sure good things do happen automatically.

The below is one incident that infuriates me to hell and I solemnly curse the sinner when I encounter one!! particularly when I'm sure I didn't commit the mistake ever before...or atleast not the second time(c'mon.. everybody needs a first time to learn the lesson!!! don't we??)

I'm close-to-perfect when it comes to driving around in the city, particularly in the hell-breaking-loose traffic of chennai during both peak and off-peak hours. I can hardly think of a day when I've gone out without wearing a helmet(seriously, believe me!!! and of course, properly buckling it too!),
reason : not one, not two... but numerous cases of lives lost/tampered with, in the blink of an eyelid..and I've been witness to a great many number of accidents!! (not a good thing to be a witness of, rite??)

And so it happened today that while approaching a very busy signal, I suddenly felt a jerk from behind that took my breath away for a moment... I'm an unbelievably crazy pessimist who'd think something could go wrong in a perfectly well conditioned, absolutely safe and sound situation...and it gave me a lump in the throat to think of Spirit(that's my apache) being hurt.. thank heaven, Spirit was safe and sound..

it turned out that it was some dumbhead in a car just behind me who had crashed into Spirit's tail lamp quite hardly. It could well have just passed as a very minor accident due to carelessness and I'm generally forgiving/easy-going in such cases.. But the sight of a cellphone in the hands of a driver was all that was needed to rouse the uncontrollable rage in me. He seemed well enough to be an educated guy, was in a tip-top suit(IT guy??). that added fire to the rage...I parked Spirit right in the middle of the road in front of his car, called the sinner(!!) to get out of the car and terrifically lambasted him!! He looked pathetic in front of me and that gave me more chance to justify my anger... I joyfully and violently kept shouting at the top of my voice to gather a decent crowd... Finally when the rage died down after my pretty long 3 minute censure and the efforts of the numerous pacifists around me, I sighed and continued on my way to office!!

sigh!!! what a way to start the day!! :-(

I take this opportunity to plead(!!) with everyone :: PLEASE!! DO NOT USE CELLPHONE WHILE DRIVING!! take a moment to think of the terrible consequences that could follow a small slip!! and besides, you end up spoiling your mood as well as someone else's!

P.S : DO use a cellphone while driving with me, should you want to know how terrible the wrath of my anger can be!!! ;-) ;-)

cheers,
rajaji.

traces...

2009-03-22T10:04:00.003+05:30

hard they struck, the moment we met,
our faces, deeply in our hearts.
eternities passed, just lookin' at 'em,
now they're gone, remain only traces.

never a gap; even air couldn't sneak in,
held so veins may burst, our hands,
how we walked , those untold paths,
the footprints no more, only traces.

how they flowed, tears down ur cheeks,
I fell in love, with you...those tears too.
I didn't know till then, you too loved.
now there's no you, no tears, only traces.

till then it flew, time, as it does always,
I fought n stopped it, with you by my side,
I now walk back, all the way, same way,
alone, I'll make new paths! no more traces...

Life is...??

2009-03-07T13:41:00.003+05:30

I was planning a typical comeback, like, say, a title reading 'I'm back' or 'back with a bang' or something of that sort... :-) This came up quite unexpectedly and unprepared...yet I feel this will do for a decent read... let me know what you think...

What do you make of the title?? is it really a question answered/assessed by anyone but ourselves?? is anyone going to persecute you if your views of life contradict theirs?? or is anyone going to reward you if your views ditto theirs?? are there too many philosophies that keep re-directing our lives every day in every other direction??? is someone better off simply 'surviving' than defying something, say the foundations of society, to 'live'?? (well. before u hasten to switch off thinking I'm out with another social issue, stay!! I'm not going to discuss any social issue here!! cool... and carry on! :-) )

Here are four most prominent emotions/outlooks towards life that stem from my experience... let me know if you know more...

1) Life is 'awesome' : This is quite a rare feeling I've felt with people around me so far... only a very very few seem to feel life is awesome!! wats that 'awesomeness' in life? where does that come from?

I feel a sense of 'awesomeness' at life comes not by juxtaposing yourself with your fellow people... that could well lead you to feel life is fair/unfair... 'Awesomeness' is mostly of the paranormal type, I believe... probably this kind of a feeling comes when we cross the limits of human perception and feeling.. not always... but most of the times... the 'paranormality' (I hate the word 'abnormality'!!) need not be of the 'insane' types which it mostly, and wrongly, means (or which is what others make of you mostly!!), it could instead be anything that tilts even slightly from our regular frames of life... The first time it may be paranormal, but the impact may gradually become too strong to make you let it go and make you want for more and more and more until it becomes positively obsessive, (see...obsession need not always be negative... those who don't know what it is to be positively obsessed with something do not know the thrill and excitement that come along with it!!!), and then 'awesome'...

and the few moments/instances that create this 'awe' gradually become so overwhelming that, in the course of time, you just look to pass over every other petty thing that comes ur way, and wait in bated breath for only this moment to return.. the next day or as soon as possible, if u're that lucky to feel it even more frequently!!!

In this sense, I probably cannot better relate the awesomeness of life that I experience, to any other thing than what nature provides me with... and, of course, passionate love is another thing!! but the bell hasn't gone off for me yet!! ;-)

if u've felt anything different to arouse such an extraordinary feeling in you towards life, let me know...

2) Life is 'beautiful' : Undoubtedly... but the best part here is that most of the times, you get to realize life is beautiful only when you put yourself in someone else's shoes... and that someone else happens to be somewhat less blessed than you are, probably inferior (or so you think!!!) to you in more than one way or, unfortunately, are below you due to sheer misfortune!!

but, I also get a feeling that in such a case, we are sometimes either 'forced' to accept that our life is beautiful just because it is not so for the person next to us... or resign to the senses that this is the only possible depth of the beauty of life that we could get to... wat do u think??

or life could also be only beautiful and not awesome if the heart cannot look beyond a certain depth of the beauty of nature and the beauty and depth of the human emotions!! :-P

anything else here??

3) Life is 'not always fair' : This kind of an ambivalent attitude in life is what I observe in most people (is it only me or have u observed it too???), sometimes "fair"--due to their very proper and systematic handling of everyday things without a slip.. (lo, isn't that being a robot!!?? :-P)... sometimes "not fair"-- due to their unavoidable misfortune, or due to sheer stupidity of handling the day-to-day events and cursing life!! But unlike a beautiful life or a ruthless life, you do not have to put yourself in others' shoes...or I should say, you simply can't!!... if you do so, there's no way for you to see the two sides of the coin... fair & unfair...

This is like being a cat on the wall. there's only a thin line of separation between either sides of the neutrality, but it matters a lot which side you tilt toward... how lucky you 'really' are than most others.. or how unlucky you 'think' you are because of your silly misconceptions and lack of perception.... and sometimes because of other evils like hate,greed, addiction too!!!

4) Life is 'ruthless' : If you are of this view, then I say something's seriously wrong with you. Life can never be ruthless unless there is some incorrigible, pessimistic thing inside your head that makes u say so.. (or unless that 'God' really forbid you the right to live and just let you be an animal survivor! this I least suspect to happen!! )

the more you feel this, the worse everyday the emotions of happiness, satisfaction, contentment will grow within you... high time you corrected yourself! in such a situation, try listening to the heart! there will be a thing or two better, to beat the cry of the mind!!...

Note : There may be numerous other attitudes/possibilities of defining life.. but watever they be, I think they'll fit under one or the other of these categories... what do u think?

anything else??

will be back,

cheers,

rajaji.

50 days done...300 to go!

2008-11-11T22:30:00.005+05:30

the last hard 50 days,
before the long 'goodbye',
how fast they passed,
i still feel its day one!

came the day..and how!
time to bid adieu for now,
for another dreary 365,
oh.. already 50 done!

just six fold to go,
just three seasons,
won't be too long,
still it's a li'l heavy!

seemed far too long first,
now we know it isn't.
lots will pass in this time,
we'll catch up! no matter.

for now, the roads are parallel,
but not for long, they'd meet.
it'll be our time thereon,
to fly far away! on top of world!

Be the first...

2008-11-08T12:36:00.004+05:30

It's yet another 'one-fine-day',
begun with the sun's first ray,
the breeze quite full and strong,
not a moment when nature's wrong!!

drowned in all the same thought,
for the day, so much to be fought,
there isn't a moment to lose,
its' your only call; choose!!

who taught you wrong n right?
nothing's wrong, all right!!
you're drownin in an ocean of lies,
look inside, the ray of hope lies!!

carried on not by the tides,
they gotta be yours, the strides!
know this, more is always less!
life's always like this, ruthless!!

keep moving, the light gets brighter,
loosen up, with time all get tighter!!
hold the head high, cheer up...
catch the spark n fire up!!

none left on shore, all the tide sweeps,
left to be scavenged, in big heaps!
dont' be left to belong there, never!
it's your call,and the only one,ever!!

they don't stay forever, the footprints,
forget them all, start your sprints,
its the only way, to lead the race!!
to ultimate glory! and infinite grace!!

God or Hero???

2008-10-08T11:18:00.011+05:30

Well well... however much I try to avoid, it always comes back... this rage, anger or whatever you call it, on God!! I'm not in the idea of hurting anybody's sentiments here, but if you feel this post might hurt you, then pls dont go ahead!! For I'm definitely going to yell at God who in the name of devotion, turns every soul into a criminal.. of some sort or the other... the kinds are innumerable as is the number of Gods we have!!! Nonsense!!

I don't want a God who sits stonedead, who likes to play games with the insanity in the minds of the people, who is determined not to move a limb to destroy all the evil spread all over the world. Then why the hell should He say 'Age after age, I'll be reborn to destroy evil and uphold righteousness' if He can't keep up his words?? I don't see any God coming up anywhere to do what He said He would!! ah ah... You have no idea about the Tenth Incarnation of God supposedly for the Kaliyuga we are in... You'd be surprised if I pointed out all the 'Godliness' that the Tenth incarnation is currently into!! damn!!

Take a look at the below post on what I had to say on God sometime back.. http://foreverrajaji.blogspot.com/2008/01/what-ist-am-i-part-one.html
If that God was really inside each and every one of us, then why should the world still be cruel?? I tell you, it's a really really cruel world out there!!!

When that God said 'self is the ultimate ruler', I was a bit overwhelmed and even began considering myself a supremo, only that I can't lift mountains with a finger or dance on a snake's head or whatever... I began looking upto myself as a hero, a savior, whatever you call it... but sadly, I'm still human and not a hero, not a savior... I know there's a hero in each and every one of us, but I don't know how that hero will rise!!

All my hopes of some invisible hand sweeping the dust off the world are being shattered as each day progresses... The thin line between my being an agnostic or an atheist is slowly breaking away... I don't think I'll be falling at the foot of any statue in any place of worship hereafter!!

I don't want a God anymore to come to the rescue of the innocent and the destitute... even if He's there, He won't come, I know!! I want a hero!! I don't know how a hero is born but I'm sure that a hero is not born with a unique character, an untold determination to uphold whatever righteousness that the God said He would do. I guess a hero is born out of inspiration... but there should have been a hero before you in the first place to inspire you!! Isn't it?? Where did that first hero come from?? Could he have been drawing inspiration from God??!!! Oh man, what a maze this is?!!!

Alright alright... without infuriating you any further, I'll conclude...
God isn't coming any sooner to set things right, atleast not for me yet... and I'm not going to be expecting him hereafter with 'hopeless hopes'. All I can say is that a hero will be born soon!!! There's so much to be done but so few to do it... I think the day isn't far when one more will join the 'few' to do all that is to be done!!!

will be back,
cheers,
rajaji.

In the brink of extinction

2008-09-27T09:33:00.009+05:30

I see that the last post I did was on the 29th of June. It's hard to believe that three months have passed in a jiffy since I still vividly remember the scenes that came to my mind when I wrote that tribute to my soulmate!!! Well... before you jump into any conclusions too fast.. I have not found my soulmate!! and I don't think it will happen anytime!!!

Now, to the present...
I know this blog is in the brink of extinction... I started it on the 1st of August 2007... with so much enthusiasm and interest. Now I see that it has moved well into its second year and it doesn't look like a blog at all!!!...Its ok... what can this lifeless thing do if I forget to mind it?? Lifeless is it?? nah... it's the best living slave and I'm the Master and Commander.. Could this thing dare to defy my orders??!

It is very difficult to understand 'time'... even more so to master the art of time-management(or whatever bullshit that is!!!) well.. atleast for me... Gone are the days when I used to see 'time' as something that I have complete control on.. but not anymore... now..if I sound like a pessimistic, lazy, irresponsible blah blah blah sort of person... well.. I don't mind... Seeing all the useless nonsense and the depravity that the improper usage of time causes in the minds of many, I doubt whether it will do any good at all to seriously invest so much time to learn the art of time management in a totally abusive way and produce all nonsense!! (I truly respect the 'out-of-the-world' kind of people who ARE able to do good to others and to the world!!!) and I'm not a 'Yogi' to transcend time!! Not yet!!! I cannot understand time just like how I cannot understand God!!! (Ok Ok... I'm not going to talk about God again.. atleast not for now... be cool..)

I noticed a superb cartoon in today's newspaper depicting the current financial crisis(well.. 'money matters' is another area that is all greek and latin to me!! and this is another nonsense to me!!).. The cartoon has a bear and a tiger sitting on top of the globe, tiger representing 'terror' and the bear 'market terror'.. the bear says to the tiger "Well.. I thrive on greed.. and you??"... What a piece that cartoon is!! I seriously cannot understand (and probably never will) how 'greed' is capable of being the ultimate dictator accomplishing everything at the cost of honesty,ethics,morals and what not??!

Now, after reading this far, what do you think I cannot understand??
[a] I cannot understand 'time'.
[b] I cannot understand 'God'.
[c] I cannot understand 'money matters'.
[d] I cannot understand 'greed' (The ultimate ruler).
[e] All the above!!

Well... Is it true that 'time is life'?? If not, what is life?? Is there a life without 'God' or atleast a figment of imagination called 'God'??(I'm very curious to understand the life of an atheist; If you are one, please let me know), Or is there a life without 'Money', or without 'Greed'(oh yeah!! definitely... but in this case it's not 'your' life... it is Greed's).. Isn't it??

Ok..so.. is it only my blog that is in the brink of extinction now?? ;-) ;-)

Very soon, I'll talk about Love, happiness, freedom etc... Pray that 'very soon' isn't far away!!!!

will be back...
(not cheerful now!!)
rajaji...

Stay with me...

2008-06-29T11:39:00.002+05:30

Give me your hand, I'm so slow,
for me, unlike you, life doesn't flow,
here I am stuck in a whole mess,
nowhere close to any wholeness.

Look at me, scorched in heat,
but look at you, full of beat,
its you I hold on to tightly,
come, let's get lost, lightly..

Drowned in thoughts as I'm,
around me, everyone's a mime,
I'm in another world, lost,
please get me out of here,fast.

How come I landed up here,
where every life runs on fear,
where every life lingers badly,
its you I find truly Godly.

In a world which none fare,
with you, here I am to dare,
amidst all deaths and screams,
let's find peace in dreams.

What am I after, I don't know,
but I know it's never, if not now,
not of the infinite but only a few,
the only godsend that I see is YOU!!

Back with a tag..

2008-06-22T17:37:00.000+05:30

Back again after almost a month.. with another tag, this time too from my dear li'l sis...

3 JOYS:
Love of life,
Solitude,
Contemplation

3 FEARS:

What to fear when I'm here!!!!

3 GOALS:

There's no '3'... Someday I'll rule this world!! thats the only thing on the list..

3 RANDOM SURPRISING FACTS:
I'm still sane!!!
My usual sleep quota has suddenly gone down!!
Have been successfully avoiding chaat n masala items for a long time !! only healthy food(wowww!!)

3 CURRENT OBSSESSIONS:
Photography..(I love my Canon SD 750)
Books (currently Swami Vivekananda & Sir Bertrand Russell)
Fruit juices(man its too hot in chennai)

This is actually a very small tag, but sis added lots more and made it superb..
Sorry sis, I'm not able to do that... :D :D you know how good am at this stuff!!! ;)
so this will be it for now.. will be back soon with my usual kind of stuff soon..

bye for now...
cheers,
rajaji.

Shots by the 'sunrise maniac'

2008-05-25T19:07:00.002+05:30

Hi All,

Further to my post last week, here are a few shots of the sunrise on Elliot's beach, Besant Nagar.

http://picasaweb.google.co.in/foreverrajaji/ShotsByTheSunriseManiac

will be back,
cheers,
rajaji.

Whose fault is it??

2008-05-25T12:17:00.006+05:30

This has been bothering me for a long time but myself being the odd man out could not talk anything about it... Well.. now that it's crossed the limit, I fear I may never be able to vent my anger towards it if not now...
Since the beginning, the IPL was something which never managed to enthuse or entertain me in anyway... The previous huge mess of the politics and the 'code of conduct' of cricket were already taking a toll on my interest in the game. I gradually stopped watching any game save a few exceptional ones which, fortunately for me, didn't turn out ugly... Now, the game 'rests in peace' in my heart!!!
The first news from the media regarding IPL was about 'which cricketer was 'sold' for how much and how hotly'!! And that same news surfacing again and again in the dailies and magazines seriously made things worse for me... my instincts began developing a nonchalance which slowly turned into hatred...damn... The huge amount of money involved in the game(well.. its an awful amount!!!) had obviously cast a dark shadow, moving it to the cadre' business' from 'entertainment'. Anything considered business should satisfy both the investor and the business itself... But here it seemed the business was the only one always getting stronger... Add to this, all that damned 'bookie' and 'betting' stuffs and you know what kind of a business it becomes... What surprises me is how the investors(the general public) are so inconsiderate of all these nonsense stuff going around and spend 2 and 3 grands for a match which never is!! How could anyone miss to see the bias this will bring in the game and in the interests of those watching it... How long will it be possible to turn a blind eye to everything. Wouldn't it hurt at some point of time??? Most importantly, how many bother to consider the economic bias and the impact this creates??

And there are those humiliating moments, needless to say, which spoil the reputation and the respect the game managed to garner all this while!! How could it be that two men, who play together as a team for the country in international arena, but play opposite each other in the league 'slap and beat' each other in front of a billion viewers?? Does anyone care to think of the damage this will bring on the integrity of the country?? Such damned bullshitters should be banned for life, I say... who wants such arrogant and animal behaviors for display?? Would you tolerate if some foreigner tarnishes the huge respect you have for your motherland citing examples of just two crackpots like these?? Wouldn't you rather wish such men died for good??? Well.. I would.... GLADLY!!!! Are they any less than criminals?? Hey Mr. H. Shit and S. Shit... Just because you two are monetarily worth 2 and 3 crores, don't you dare think you can do anything in front of a million viewers and damage your country's name!! If you can't behave yourself in public, go and hang yourself man!!! you are no more than an animal..and we wouldn't weep for a dead animal!! Who cares!! But don't you try to bring down my country's name just because you can't control those animal senses of yours... You are a real pain in the ass, I say!!

Secondly, the impact this thing has on the economy is what bothers me the most!! If one is doing comfortably well in the society, there's nothing wrong in trying to do his bit for improving the conditions of the people living around you! Infact, its each and everyones' duty to do his bit for the society and the nation but for the sacrifices of which we would all be lying buried under mud..Please. If you are doing well enough, try to change things around you in a positive way!!
Here are Mr. King 'Kong' and Mr. Beverage Business Magnate(BBM) who put billions and billions of dollars in a team, buy it, advertise monstrously and cheer its players who are no damn good for the game... and now that both teams are out of the league both point fingers at the captains and the captains at them and atlast everybody feels like he's being f***** by a train!! Just imagine the change that would be the new face of the nation if Mr. Kong and Mr. BBM bothered to spend atleast a part of the money for doing some welfare to the nation!!
I feel pathetically sorry for my country whose international recognition is by the number of 'beggars' it has..(I recently watched a 12 yr old girl addressing the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development.. When it came to making the conditions of people better, she quoted something like "a dying child in Somalia, a bruised and broken kid in a war-torn MiddleEast and beggars in India"!!! )
People, people!!! Please think... is this how you want to be identified internationally?? Just see where we are in the world's perspective!! Do you need anything more than such examples to bring to light the striking reality???

On the one side, there is this country which is fighting for its everyday bread due to the soaring inflation (a record 5 year high), which is struggling to find a way to control the rising oil prices(don't forget that the Indian Govt's OMC's are selling oil for its people at a loss of 200,000 CRORES!!!).. to put it shortly, we are just shy of literally weeping blood!! And on the other side, there are people like Mr. Kong and Mr. BBM and numerous other blacksheep who create a new black and poisonous wave with this damned IPL and give no damn to where the country is headed to and are quite content stuffing the pockets and everything with billions of dollars!! I'd surprised if, till now, the IPL had made anything less than a 100 billion dollars!!

Be careful men!! you will deeply regret having wasted the opportunity to have done your bit for the country when it seriously mattered.. you'll feel this on the day when it strikes hard that you are a billion dollars rich but have no food to eat!! Let me see how you eat the money then!!

Finally, in addition to all the above social evils, this game has also personally affected me. My near and dear ones are so engrossed in it that they seldom talk anything other than cricket and I now realize I'm spending very little quality time with them on conversations...Damn!!!

water water everywhere,
but not a drop to drink!!!

signing off in a very sorry manner,
rajaji.

Interesting 10 days!!

2008-05-19T21:31:00.002+05:30

Since my last post, I can hardly believe its already been 10 days... well, this is not new to me now... I've been so accustomed to this now that it doesn't make much difference whether it's been a day or week as both seem to be moving equally fast... thus, if I wonder, I'll have to be wondering all the time about how fast time flies. So let me skip the wondering part and share various interesting moments of the past 10 days.

Firstly, I've finally found out the culprit stealing my sleep... I've been completely taken over by "sunrise-mania". Its so peculiar even to myself, you know.. all along the weekdays, be it any week, I get sufficient sleep , sometimes more than what is needed just by rolling on the mattress for that extra kick in stretching and loosening out... but no matter what , the Friday nights and Saturday nights are conspiring against me and depriving me of my sleep very badly.. so much so that I often fear that I may waste the whole of the next day sleeping... its only a couple of hours of sleep every Friday and Saturday night!!! After so much of detective/introspective stuff and action I've finally come to find that I've been terribly affected by 'sunrise-mania', the silent-thief. Having been deprived of the most stunning sceneries of nature, "the sunrise at the beach", for all these years, mother nature has been kind enough to grant me the wish every weekend nowadays!! what started as a timepass has grown monstrously and I've been overly obsessed by it...(I love Chennai simply for this one reason!! )

Mr. Sun has been so successful in getting me preoccupied with the thought the whole previous night and thus robbing me of my sleep...But, the feeling is something truly inexplicable and the sight of the sun soaring above and above lighting the waters of the ocean as he goes up, causing everything within a mile's view to sparkle brilliantly, is an ultimatum of beauty... nothing to beat it... Just a moment's sight will make every other thought fade away and the spectacle is worth giving up anything for it...even a full night's sleep.. You may think why should I lose a full night's sleep over a very trivial stuff, the sunrise...
Well... that's me for you... ;)

I'll add some photos of the same very soon (this weekend hopefully) to let you catch a feel of what t means to be the "sunrise-maniac".. ( You know, I bought a digicam particularly for this reason... it has inculcated a serious interest in nature-photography in me)....keep watching the space...

Secondly, Chennai just missed a record last week.... touching 42.3 degree celsius.... One of the hottest summers.... it was five years before that the mercury soared to 43 degree celsius... Maybe Mr.Sun has grown tired of breaking his own records and mercifully allowed us to 'cool down' in just under 43!!! And we should be the winners of the 'tolerance award' for bearing the 'every-night-power-cut' for the last one month... still to follow.... which will undoubtedly qualify us for a Noble Peace prize!!!

Thirdly, Mr. Vladimir Putin. I happened to read an interesting article about the President... in last week's 'India Today'. The picture on the cover (with Mr. Putin's head above Mr. Medvedev's, the current head of the state) and the title 'The New Russia' were very intriguing. Myself not an avid reader of magazines, even I stopped for a moment to grab hold of a copy... the following 20 minutes made for an awesome read... It's truly 'fantastic' to know someone could rise up the ladders of bureaucracy so fast and with so much might. From a KGB agent to a Deputy Prime Minister and then on to a President and again a Prime Minister is no joke, particularly in a country like Russia and in just 8 years... It is said that 'Fortune favours the brave' . Maybe mother nature had been waiting for someone like Mr.Putin to favour... The geography of the country with all those rich oil-fields made up for someone like Putin to lay his hands on and turn everything to gold.... sort of 'the Midas touch'!! :)
A must read.... the man is no less than a real inspiration for everyone... ( though the behind-the-scenes stuff regarding the Litvinenko poisoning and his alleged affair with the gymnast are all hotly debatable and out of the scope of my post.... I dare not talk about it!!!

Well.... I'll take leave for the moment...
will be back in less than a week... Of course, WITH THE PHOTOS... :) :)
cheers,
rajaji.

What a movie to watch after sooo long!!!

2008-05-10T02:07:00.009+05:30

It's now 3:00 AM, Saturday, in the eerie silent night when I'm wide awake brimming with thoughts and activity... I have been into these kind of unusualities (particularly during the weekends!!) the cause of which I haven't been able to find out, no matter how hard I try...

Well... getting into the matter....

The first thing in the morning, something in today's dailies caught my eye... "The Lives of Others"... It was mentioned some German movie up for release today in Chennai. I've seen such ads for foreign language films, often in the dailies, and would sigh thinking who would watch these kind of movies when people are craving and crying for movies like 'kuruvi' and the damned million others of the kind... the mere names of which incense me, infuriate me to hell...I wonder where the hell people like perarasu/dharani et al get ideas from... how are they to be blamed when masses are crazily after such baseless and worthless pieces of ****.
Fine... let me not spoil the mood with my outbursts over damned tamil movies and the so-called great(!!!)directors ...

"The Lives of Others" caught my eye not just because it was a german movie or anything... the ads in the daily mentioned it was the Academy Award Winner for the Best Foreign Film Category(2007)...
Honestly I'm not the one who used to look for classics, find out how many awards the movie won or how merciful/less the critics have been etc. I'd just go, watch the movie, ponder over it for a min or two about the plot and such stuff... it would then go off my mind... Even some of the previous Academy award winning movies haven't been 'classic' enough to me.... So, of late, I see I've been very very selective about which movie to watch and which not to.... mainly because of the innumerable nonsense stuff from the 'woods' of India.. the bollywood, the kollywood etc...

But today, my instincts were pushing me to somehow make it to this movie on the first day of release...something that I hardly do... could I overpower my instinct??? nah... there I was, in the theatre at 10.25 PM sharp, anticipating the start... I sat thinking how could I blindly come up to the movie on the first day and that too a german movie and without a word of review about it in any of the newspapers... Well... I honestly began to think I'm gonna lose a hundred bucks over nothing.... Only I was to be lucky this time... "The Lives of Others" isn't an action/comedy/tragedy/thriller movie... none of these... I don't know to classify it... Furthermore, its a two and a quarter hour movie, something 'unacceptable' for an english film..(I don't know about the german movies)... this also had the english sub-titles all along...something I hate to have in an english movie... but this being a german film, there was no other help...
Slowly into the movie ,I felt myself completely enticed by it.... there were some stunning laconic dialogues which were so well 'translated' that I could hardly wait to learn german and feel the reality-bit of those dialogues!!!! also, those were not page-long 'punch' dialogues, the likes of which our '---woods' mass-heroes are so famous for!!! like hell...

But there was something more than met the eye... tying a knot to just 4 characters and pulling out a beautiful movie running for 2.25 hrs isn't a joke... particularly, nothing would've been more surprising to me than the character of the antagonist-turned-pro... well... he was the real hero... It would really take a genius-of-sorts to bring out something like this... the character would linger on forever... so will the movie...

Well, I didn't intend to write a review of the movie... So I'll stop here with a huge satisfaction of having watched a beautiful movie and letting you know of the same... infact, VERY STRONGLY RECOMMEND ( provided you like movies of such sorts and not of the 'woods' kind)
I wish I get to watch more such classics....

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

The 30 Question Tag...

2008-04-30T23:31:00.002+05:30

First time I'm doing something like this... taking part in a question and answer section... the ones i had come across earlier weren't really good.... but this one seems to be!!!! so let me try to answer the questions!!

1)LAST MOVIE U SAW IN A THEATER?

Yaaradi Nee Mohini.... one hell of a movie!!!!

2)WHAT BOOK ARE U READING?

The complete Works of Swami Vivekananda - vol 1.
The Razor's Edge - W.Somerset Maugham.

3)FAVOURITE BOARD GAME?

Scrabble... but rarely playing these days!!! :(

4)FAVOURITE MAGAZINE?

The Hindu.

5)FAVOURITE SMELLS?

the scent of the earth after the first rain drops.
the scent of the salty breeze in the beach

6)FAVOURITE SOUNDS?

anybody calling my name!!! :) :)

7)WORST FEELING IN THE WORLD?

There have been many 'worsts' in my case!! which ones can I tell???

8)WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN U WAKE?

Will today be my last day???!!!!

9)FAVOURITE FASTFOOD PLACE?

nothing.... I've greatly reduced fastfoods these days!!

10)FUTURE CHILD’S NAME?

Not yet decided!! First let me get a bride!!! :) :)

11)FINISH THIS STATEMENT—IF I HAD A LOT OF MONEY I’D…

Oh no!! I don't want to have a lot of money...
but, since the question has been posed, I'd say I'd build a school and make better lives for the future generations!!! I'd also build an orphanage...

12)DO U DRIVE FAST?

Yes.... very fast... touching 100 kmph on a 150 cc bike is simply thrilling!!! doing it over n over again is exhilarating!!! :)

13)DO U SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL?

never did that...

14)STORMS–COOL OR SCARY?

Cool... supercool, infact!!! :) :)

15)WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR?

haven't bought one till now.... not interested!!!

16)FAVOURITE DRINK?

Tender coconut, Mozambi juice, lots of milk with honey.... :)

17)FINISH THIS STATEMENT-IF I HAD THE TIME I WOULD…

read more books on time managament!!! he he he.. :D
ok.. not so funny!!
I'll spend some of the time in finding out an answer to the question of a purposeful existence and spend all the rest in living it up..

18)DO YOU EAT THE STEMS ON BROCCOLI?

No Broccoli...

19)IF YOU COULD DYE YOUR HAIR ANY OTHER COLOUR, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR CHOICE?

Don't ask me... it has already started turning grey!!!

20)NAME ALL THE DIFFERENT CITIES/TOWNS U HAVE LIVED IN.

Trichy
Chennai
Bangalore.

21)FAVOURITE SPORTS TO WATCH?

F1 and Tennis... F1 because racing is in my every heartbeat(though I don't race!!!)... Tennis because not much controversies and the game is simply amazing to watch...

22)ONE NICE THING ABOUT THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU?

Very caring and loving sister

23)WHATS UNDER YOUR BED?

I don't sleep on a bed... on floor only!! used to it since childhood....

24)WOULD U LIKE TO BE BORN AS YOURSELF AGAIN?

Ofcourse yes.. who would not want???!!!

25)MORNING PERSON OR NIGHT OWL?

Night owl.

26)OVER EASY OR SUNNY SIDE UP?

Over easy.

27)FAVOURITE PLACE TO RELAX?

Beach...

28)FAVOURITE PIE?

No Pies...

29)FAVOURITE ICECREAM FLAVOUR?

Chocolate.

30)OF ALL THE PEOPLE U HAVE TAGGED, WHO IS THE MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND FIRST?
I tag:

Abinaya

Karthik

Akila

Can't say who will respond first!!

Well.... a good game!!! for a change!!!

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

Break... and now, the chase begins!!!

2008-03-31T21:29:00.005+05:30

Alright!! I think I've been a bit too much into thoughts... of the kind I'd been pouring out in my previous posts. Looking back at my previous posts on freedom,survival,(a)theism etc etc are making me wonder where I got all those stuff from... What could've influenced me to such an extent to talk things that I had hardly felt, let alone understand, earlier...
I mean, honestly, tell me how many times do we sit in silence and think about things like freedom, theism n all that stuff. It's all behind the scenes... I'm no wonder surprised at myself at having gone so far.... But, nonetheless, there are lessons from those that I couldn't have learnt in any other way through any other means...

Fine...now let me take a break for a while.. take a different path for a while. Not that I'm running out of thoughts. There are infinite blooming within me each instant. And there are hardly any moments when I'm at absolute peace with myself!!!... But I like it too... :)
The paths will always pull me back there. And I'll have absolutely no regrets taking them... How can I when they are what I made for myself...I love them...and I'll tame them sometime..beat all the bush, burn all the weeds that grow then and there, throw a new light there. I'll do my every bit...

BUT, I'd been so obsessed with my ways that ,on the other hand, I'd been missing other actions around for a while in quite some ways...
Well..yes... I did miss some...

I've found out there are two ways to whatever your destination is... And it is to be remembered that life's not about the destination. It's all about the journey... all the toiling and tumbling around in the extremes of nature/love/success/failure/and what not!!! But its the thrill in it, each and every moment, that counts...

I believe there are two different paths to any destination... the choice is simply each and everyone's to take whichever the heart calls for... And I'd been walking one where I was the only one... :) It was lovable, peaceful, serene and of a different world!! It hardly bothered me to take a look around...see what the other path led to... This one wholly absorbed me and I was obsessed with it...
Meanwhile, the other path that everyone else took was literally a racetrack which all puffed and gasped to cross whereas a few braved it...in very heroic ways...these people are the ones who inspire others... who lead others... Of late, I've also drawn inspiration from some of these people...

well... I'll stop here for the post... I just wanted you to know that I'm joining the race too... the chase begins... After all, the thrill of the kill is in the chase!!! Isn't it??

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

Fired up....

2008-03-16T10:55:00.002+05:30

Dear all,

Thanks for the quick responses and not to mention some 'eye-openers' for my prev post "Freedom and Survival". am now fired up and all set to go for my next post...

before which i'd like to reply to all ur comments on 'F & S'...

@ Kathik....

When you talk of freedom you never think about survival. Survival comes only when something is forbidden - agreed.
If things are taken at its merit, nothing is profound. Dig deep everything takes you to dark - I'm afraid I don't clearly understand what u mean by the first statement... " things taken at merit.. not profound"... what has merit got to do with profundity... pls enlighten...

@ Gokul...

Survival is foremost, an animal instinct....Survival has a physical tone to it. The most basic instinct that is common to all living beings -- Very true.. I shd've missed it maybe because of the very fact that its part of the sub-conscious and is deep inside, and I had been looking somewhere else... ;) ;) ;)

@ Ramkum...

You might have certain physical freedoms, but are you really free? -- thats what I'm asking myself too... :)
Or is there a higher authority controlling their thoughts and actions? If so they are not free. -- You've put my whole post in a single statement... :) this is what I was getting at... I dare not deny there is no "higher authority" to control my thoughts n actions.. THERE ARE... not one not two... but many... the foremost of all, 'the society'... I know what the society wants of me. And once I've even intentionally crossed the line(not very much.. but only a little) and to my shock, realized how unnatural and critical the society was towards me!!!! the 'free-will' and 'self-determination' I had was of no help in making my point to the society...(more about this for a separate post)

If freedom is about "free-will", then the society should acknowledge everyones' right to use it. Also, by doing so, I mean exercising my 'free-will') I'm not disturbing the society's freedom in any way... am I?.. Still the society doesn't let me do it... I only find the society being 'critical' if anyone dares to take even a 'step' outside the boundaries that it has impose upon itself....

Please enlighten if I'm missing something....

Thanks for the comment anna... it means so much to me... :) :)

@ Ramya...

True freedom, I think comes at a societal level. we are not there yet, but I guess that's what were are all fighting for -- is it so? How do you say true freedom comes at a societal level??
.....survival is first step towards fighting for freedom. -- agreed... :)

Once again... thanks to you all for making it a good post...
please speak up for more comments on these comments, if any... :) :) :)

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

Freedom and Survival....

2008-03-01T00:45:00.003+05:30

All this time, I wasn't and haven't been very concerned with the way people led their lives.. No doubt, its upto each and every individual to lead his/her life his/her own way. It is each and every one's birth right... 'freedom'
I'm still baffled by the sudden interruption of 'freedom' in the course of my life...!!!! We think we are all free... but how much??? is it something we can limit or expand??? I juxtapose 'freedom' with infinity because to me it is something immeasurable...I run short of words to express the inexplicable,the immeasurable. Anyways, now that I find myself quite accustomed to and comfortable with the way things are, I feel I shall tell you what I'm going through.

FREEDOM... SURVIVAL....
Quite obviously, the two 'concepts' are interrelated... And the interrelation is easily visible in all walks of life... in each and every thing you/we do. our survival is basically because of the freedom we enjoy each and every moment...Freedom, to all of us, in as invaluable as life is... In fact, freedom is life. You wouldn't dream of living a slave any moment. Gone are the days when people lived as slaves. and I'm looking forward to the day when even the proofs and historical texts of slavery are banished forever...Any thought against the concept of freedom is a profanation of the right of existence, of the right of conscience... I would put 'right of conscience' as something that will define,first, your morality(which is a result of the dictation of conscience), next, your right to choose what you set as ideals of the heart...

Well, getting to the 'theme' of this post...
"Freedom comes only to those who no longer ask of life that it shall yield them any of those personal goods that are subject to the mutations of time" - Bertrand Russell.
When I first came across these lines, I was simply taken aback with the ease with which they had been put up but the profundity that was in them...Well, if not ease, at least the obvious truth in those words did take me by surprise...I'm not a qualified person to talk about the accomplishments of any great writer.... nor am I someone who has experienced freedom the way it is being described... The problem today is that people are not able to observe and understand the degree of differentiation of a concept in the numerous ways in which it is referenced... And unfortunately, the most often described meaning assumes the universality to such an extent that the other attributes of the concept go up like ashes...
Just to highlight one such thing put to test more often than life.... take 'Love'... the word has assumed,as I said, a universality in the sole aspect of " A feeling of intense desire and attraction toward a person with whom one is disposed to make a pair" and "an emotion of sex and romance" that the numerous and more powerful other ideals of it have been lost... [You see, this is yet another perfect example of the poor conditioning of people's minds!!!! :(]
fine... let me talk about in another post... now getting back to 'freedom'...

Freedom is not one which has been let out of this blasphemy.... Yes I call it blasphemy... if you know the definition of blasphemy as ' A contemptuous or profane act, utterance, or writing concerning God or a sacred entity', then I'm right in justifying anything against 'freedom' as blasphemy... because, to me, Freedom is more than any religion, more than any God...In fact, all Gods that we have created are a result of our exercise of the freedom to do it!! So, basically it is a perfect analogy to 'cause and effect' relationship... As the saying of Bertrand Russell goes, if at all anything that we are after is subject to the mutations of time, then our concentration and interest on that thing will be so intense that we'll be bound to it all the time... which is the direct opposite of freedom... furthermore, this bond will grow to greed... (this is content for another post.. :)) now what amazes me is how we are able to be 'concentrated'( well, greedy in fact) on something and chase it day after day and yet say we enjoy freedom in our lives???!!!!...

And now, survival... THE only thing that drives everyone in life... THE only effect of life... And survival doesn't come easy for everyone.. not even to the richest, or the most powerful or the most timid or the poorest.... whomsoever it may concern...
Immortality is not given us by Gods!!!(well, at least not MY God!!) why should the omnipresent and all-merciful deny you this when He has given you everything you did and did not ask for??? First and foremost, the architecture and design of the universe is a direct relation of time.... and hence existence and survival are limited by time, the only non-spatial continuum where irreversibility is the law... the moment gone is gone forever... no denying this... nothing lasts forever, simply to say....
and the thing that i admire about freedom is that is does not belong to this 'nonspatial continuum'... not being bound to anything... I had/have not known freedom as it matters to a 'free-man' ( now don't think a free-man is as everyone else... no one is a free-man... not me.. not you.... not anyone.... but I know what it takes to be a free-man... and we are all very far from being one...I'll talk about this in another post)...

Now... for the most interesting part...
How come we experience freedom and survival going hand in hand?? we say we enjoy freedom as a result of which we survive... Is it that we have been exposed and forced to living so with the thought that freedom provides us everything for free and drives our survival?? Or is it that 'freedom' and 'survival' are too profound for us to understand but we have given them names that do not mean what they are???

**********
Will be back...
cheers,
rajaji....

What flew?? Who flew??

2007-12-29T07:23:00.000+05:30

This may, at first, seem quite an irrelevant topic for the post. but it is by all means true that something did fly... I was wondering what... only to get an answer that,literally, everything flew in a flash the past year.

Thanks to Manu,a friend from college, but for whose message to commemorate a year of our graduation, I would've probably been carried away with the pace and not stopped to look back...
(Nostalgia is something I do enjoy always... :) quite contrary to what many believe it does to them).. well... thats me for you... :)

There had been a myriad of moments of “late-2006” and 2007, many unforgettable,some exciting, exhilarating and what not!!!

The one that would lead the list be undoubtedly the graduation day. On the 23^rd of December 2006. Though it's always clear that the day will not be far away, the electric day in every student's life, the graduation day, is something like an uncontrolled chain-reaction, the initiator of which I'm unable to find out.
I mean it's clear as crystal since the day you step into a college that the grad-day isn't an element of surprise... Still it doesn't fail to thrill you, amaze you and most importantly honor you.I had been 4 months into my previous employment. My first leave of absence for the office,which I was permitted to take without much ado, would be for the grad-day.

To talk about the grad-day would take more than just a blog. So I'll cut it short to say that was worth a treat for every day of the four years spent doing anything and everything in college.

Probably the most exhilarating moments would be of the new year's eve and 1^st Jan 2007. That was my first trip to bangalore. While new year's eve was typical of a 5-bachelors-evening, the one worth telling about was the 1^st of Jan 2007. I can say that was one of the best starts to the year I had had. Bikes would roar and raze the roads to spend the day at Wonder-La wonder-(Ful)la... :) (shots of this can be looked at in my album).

22^nd of April, 30^th of April and 15^th of December would always find a place among some of the exciting moments of 2007. I happened to reestablish contacts with some of my schoolmates after 7 long years.(Now don't ask me how the seven years flew!! As you well know, I can only say “I can't believe it happened so soon!!!)
Quite opposite to what I had expected, I was the one hearing from all that I had changed a lot, though one admittedly said I was recognizable(!!!) immediately... :)

Now, for the turning point of 2007...
10^th of August would go down my record books(!!!) in more ways than one...Though none wanted it to be that way, I did make it that way. A revolutionary of sorts I can say... :) . alright!! nothing so funny with that... Even being aware of the risks that lay at length,I know I fully consciously brought that on myself. And I will not lie I don't feel bad at it. But not like the way anyone would expect.There's no denying the fact that the “thing” did take many by surprise. But to my surprise, not many were aware, or rather willing to admit, that I did know what I was doing and that I'm not the one to be humbled by such a twist of fate( if you're the kind of person who thinks it's all the hand of fate...not me) when I'm ready to face whatever it throws at me...
Well... it seems I have answers to every act of mine... doesn't it???
Fine.. I'll put an end to the matter here.
The four months following the 10^th of August did prove many things to me, which I'll talk about in detail later.

And finally, all through the year, there had dramatic changes in my life, my views of it etc etc. I now realize I've crossed many levels of *****ISMS which I'll talking about sooner.
(people, watch out for my next post. It's already being readied. I'm trying to make it as interesting as possible. I'm looking to move to the next level of thought through this attempt of mine...)

Hope you all had a great year.. Wish you the same this time too.

HAPPY NEW YEAR.

Bye Bye 2007.
Will be back.
Cheers,
rajaji.

The past month...

2007-12-01T21:53:00.000+05:30

I don't often put down the events of the day or week or month... or any sort of diary-writing... I can say I have a strong memory and don't need to jot down events of importance or those which need or have had my attention... so, I've never had the habit I should say....
but the reason I'm doing it now is because I have certain memorable events that I feel I shall share with you...

you may or may not have guessed the most obvious reason...
well, I celebrated my birthday on the fourth day of Nov... oh yeah!!! :) a special day.. a new start to the year.. all sorts of things that we say about b'days in general....
but this time it was quite different for me...not in any way the forgettable... but one which opened new doors that I had been oblivious of... I had been thinking my path was quite smooth and I had no reason to be unhappy about.... but as the saying goes "A smooth sea never made a skilled mariner", probably it was my time to face it... and unfortunately for me, I crashed the wall even before I knew it was there... quite a heavy blow, the shocks not absorbed fully,the crash not died down but still reverberating...
I guess it never will die... and I've had some worthy lessons from it...

anyways, lets move ahead... and yeah... I wasn't the only one celebrating my day... my sister and a few of my friends also had their days... good days of November... nice feeling to remember people on their occasions,wish them well and share their joy.... :)

then,I set foot on trichy on the last weekend of nov...after more than three months... before this,the longest period of time that I had been away was not more than a fortnight...
nostalgia strikes everyone... and when it strikes me, it does strike hard... I don't know how I got this peculiar liking for the place but I'm used to it... trichy always holds me close to it...

my friend had also been there for the weekend... we two have similar interests in theology and he's probably the only one with whom I talk things like religion and God!!!
and when you speak of Gods and temples in trichy, rockfort will be the unanimous first-choice on everyone's mind( though I'm out of idolism and the concept of "temples", I love the place just for its scenary)... we made it to the temple on saturday evening itself...then a gobi-65 and a masala-poori each in our favorite chat corner followed by an hour or two's ride around the city's free roads... some good things I'll always remember trichy for... :)
Sunday went on with a matinee show of a recent tamil movie...
A typical weekend anyone would love to have with a friend in trichy...

well... I don't think I have anything more on November 2007... nonetheless, it was quite eventful...

b back...
cheers,
rajaji.

What next???

2007-10-25T22:06:00.000+05:30

A couple of days back, I happened to clean my cupboard and bookshelf....after a considerably long period of time... It was such a mess that even a stubborn lazy sloth like me was forced to break out of the procrastination and clean it up...

I took out all the books I had ever laid my hands on... loads and loads of mechanical engineering stuff... poor me... :( I can't really say what good are they to me now.... they have no purpose anymore... the SOURCE of the hours and hours of pondering during the cycle test eves and the nightouts are now but a shelf-load... some were damn good... [I loved automobile engineering...] and some were all greek and latin... [god!!! how I struggled with fluid mechanics...]
well.. I gotta live with it.. there are some things that, even if I wish with all my heart, I can't bring back... the feel of those big bulky volumes will be some of those...
fine... lets move on...

I also glanced thro' some fiction stuff and novels... some of my earliest and first reads were still there and I was honestly surprised to see those still ducked in the shelf...
I had never been a early starter of "reading books" (gosh!! the phrase has become more than a cliche' now...) while in school, during our english classes or during leisure we'd be asked about hobbies and other stuff... "Reading books" (and "listening to music") topped the lists of every one of us... not a single soul had a different thing... :) whether or not we read any book, all of us were clevers deceivers at that... just the names of some authors and their best-sellers and the knowledge that no one had read that before was all that it took... :) :) we'd build a whole story... sidney sheldon, jeffrey archer were some of the prominent hits on the list.... sometimes some of us even came up with better versions than the original story...
And, in a way, this was what first sowed the seeds of the craze for books in me... (and not to forget Mary Miss, the virtuoso of English language... the best teacher I've had, I can say...)

During the brief one and a half year stint at the higher secondary, I had to break it for a while(NOT a fullstop, mind you)... there was more than enough of bookloads to mug up... sometimes to the point of going mad... and not to mention the 15 km cycling everyday to and from school... what else do you need to tire someone to the point of becoming near-dead the moment he falls on the bed...

Stepping into the college brought back hopes of resurgance and thereafter it has been quite an eventful and steady journey...though not to the point of "going crazy" but I kept reading now and then... some books were too good, some too superfluous,some hilarious, some frivolous, some to the point to driving you crazy as to why you started it at all....

It was the last type that induced me to take another dimension at books...
I started to look for books that frequented the "recommended" and "must-read" lists of prominent critics and reviewers... this way, you can make sure if the book is good so that it'll interest you....Now, this dimension seldom made me care for the style of the book... it didnt matter whether the book was fiction or non-fiction,classic or fantasy, tragic or lively... I laid my hands on anything and everything....
Here I should admit it was a 'voluntary self-compulsion' on my part... to do things just because you do them... it's not in your nature but you forcibly and eventually get used to it to the point of making it a habit... thereafter you go about it smoothly... you feel good even at the touch of it...

Everytime,before I start a book, its like "well.. I'm into another book..." But once I finish it, it's the little pride I take, in recognising it the moment someone else names it, that matters...
it kind of sends a chill down your heart... to have known something that others are trying to know about... isn't it??? (well... I hope I'm not being boastful...If I am, please forgive me... I'll try to cut it out the next time)...

So... this is how I've been going through books... and I find this technique quite interesting... But the very obvious disadvantage here could be that "you may not like it just because its on the hit-list"... well, so far I've enjoyed every book I tried.. the day this fails and I start losing faith in the technique I have to think about a different way... anyways, I love books... and I'm looking for the next one... Have you got any suggestion????

Journey - Part 2.

2007-09-26T22:38:00.000+05:30

Life of 6 in a place like CORAL was indescribable... we had the world to ourselves... we had all the rules to break and all the 'forbidden' to do...I simply wouldn't care a damn about academics anytime but on the nights before the cycles and the sem.Those were just 2 out of every 30 days.As a matter of fact,to this day, I'm not able to find out what the GPA/CGPA mattered to others but to me it was no more than a number out of 10.And the only time it really bothered me was on the day the results of the third semester came out and I had managed to hold on to the 7-scale by a loose string...sooo close in a paper!!!... :) :) Of course, everybody needs a first time... ha ha.. :) :)
after that I never troubled myself to make up for the 8-scale though the final semester would take me there by luck... :)

On most nights, we'd amble to the maingate to have our dinner...then sometimes we'd take the whole night out and play cards.. whether it poured cats and dogs or a thunder or two struck, we'd hardly be shaken...

During the third year, the cellphone revolution had taken quite a toll...and some of our guys got real busy for some reason or the other...four dropped out from hostels and only two of us were left...we moved to EMERALD from CORAL. pre-final year students --> single rooms...the 6*6 space was all yours and there was nothing that you can't do there... even then, those would never come any closer to the ones in 'coral'...I missed CORAL...

EMERALD was just behind CORAL, probably a hundred mts or so, and nearly 800 metres from the main gate and the area surrounding the admin block which,with the snackie and octa,was the most crowded spot in the campus...If you were taken blindfolded and dropped in emerald, you wouldn't say you're inside a college campus...An unusual and sometimes eerie silence always prevailed there...the rear of emerald had a brilliant view of the last 2 hostels(the farthest frm anywhere in the campus) and the uninhabited plains surrounding them... you could scan roughly a km or so easily without too much strain and not a soul would be seen...Overwhelmed by nature, I developed a peculiar taste for emptiness & silence and eventually solitude...and there was no better place than the emerald balcony to while away countless hours looking at the plains and enjoying the silence...Probably that was what instilled in me an ardent passion for nature and its beauty...Thereon, whenever I could spare a minute, I habitually started taking myself to the open.. I took to the stonebench once again... Lone long walks,sometimes on usual nights and sometimes on rainy nights,gradually replaced the days of the dinner-at-gate and the night-out-cardgames...

Fourth year....we two also dropped out of hostels and were dayschi's again...but we were welcome in emerald anytime... annachi was always there for us...it was enough to attend 2-3 classes a day and the rest of the time would always be spent in emerald besides some in snackie,SC and octa...

It was the same old bus at PF1, which we had taken a liking to since our first-day-first-year, that would take us again during those last days in coll... During the journeys in our first yr,we used to talk of the awful higher-secondary days and the splendid three-month vacation which immediately follwed...now we were talking of the good ol' days of the three years that had passed in a jiffy... A quote that I read somewhere came striking back to me "We are always the same age inside"... how true!!!

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Now, after roughly 500 days since we stepped out for the last time, I've a strong urge to get back to the places which held us together stronger than ever before and which have cast awesome spells on me in particular... I hope the coral,emerald,the stonebench and the numerous other places are still as green as they've been in my memory... I hope.

will be back.
cheers,
rajaji.

Journey - Part 1.

2007-09-18T12:16:00.000+05:30

Though in a way, our 10th std board exams were the first big step in our lives, I'd say the higher secondary exams were even more exciting and demanding as those would determine our paths for the rest of the life. The deadweight and work( or was it hardwork???) of the whole year gave way to much anticipated relief on the day the results were out. I didn't have much ado about the college admission as I had long ago predetermined everything based on the cutoff that I'd score. I was totally ready for anything...luckily, the results made me heave a sigh of relief...

For the six of us,the following three months were to be the period of transition which totally obliterated the concerns of further similar hardwork...the sheer thought that none of us would need to have another year like 2001-02 simply made us fly high... thereafter, we had all the time in the world to enjoy,to hangout often, to do things undone and untold and even "forbidden" till then...

The first year was very eventful and by the end of the year, we were totally different personalities than what we had been just an year ago...we were perfectly in sync with typical college stuff...the year had not been wasted and we felt proud of ourselves on what we had achieved all through the year...the list is endless...

So, when we 6 took to hostel in the second year, we seldom bothered about the curriculum, let alone talk about it... you know, "60% attendance, proxy and best-two-of-three-cycletests" were some of the most beautiful things that happened to us in college... these would provide us unlimited fun n frolic... the snackie, canteen and the SC consumed most of our hours of a usual day... [forget the hostel food... that was better left untouched...] the comfort of the cycles inside the campus(forget walking in that campus...) also allowed each of us to have some of our personal moments at different places in the campus... if at all we needed to get together, it was just a min's task to get to the meeting point...

we had quite a few direct seniors whom we knew since childhood... we all studied in the same school from our primary days till higher secondary and now their being seniors (seniors???? i shall say "friends") in college made things easy for us... Now this is too good a piece of luck...they too shared rooms in CORAL in the first floor right wing just like us... that was more than enough for the resurgence of our religion (CRICKET!!!... what else could u expect from an indian youngster)after a break for about two years...thereafter, the evenings were eagerly awaited.. straight from the classes we'd all meet in the mess for the snack(usually bread or biscuits) and a cup or two of coffee/tea... ten min later, we'd all assemble promptly in the grounds for an hour or two of exciting cricket... ( oh!!! how badly I miss playing cricket now... I hardly got hold of a bat in the past year)...

CORAL had a tv room... luckily the hostel admin put a brand new tv that year after a brief halt for some months over a petty fight in some hostel... the ICC was merciful enough to announce tours for all nations all through the year and that kept us busy through the nights... On the nights when we didn't have day&night matches, we took to the front of the CORAL and played long hours of cricket through the night under the huge and bright sodium vapour lamp... the passion for the game was (and still is) unrelenting...

The whole of the second year went on in quite the same way...the events were more than enough to keep us all busy all through the innumerable days and nights...

ohh...how I long for some of those now...!!!

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

Genesis - Part 2.

2007-09-13T12:22:00.000+05:30

Good afternoon...

Before I started this, I looked back at "Genesis - Part 1".... I felt I missed some really fascinating things on it... One of those is about a stonebench.. ah... "The stonebench"... the first time it caught my attention, the poor thing under the shade of a tree was almost at the end of the busy road leading to the octagon(the computer center)... end of the road... I thought an apt place for such a thing... old,badly damaged... If you looked at if for a moment, you'd say "I'd rather stand than take a seat there"... The 6 ft long bench would barely let three sit on it... such was the damage... cracks all along the length... worn out edges...the winds and the rains had not been kind to it... but the tree had done its best to help the poor thing bear them all...

But,with the snackie and the octa on its way, we didn't care much to use it for the purpose it was there... we'd just enter the snackie or the octa... places lot better than itself to rest for a while...
so we were least bothered about the stonebench and left it to itself and the tree...but fate would have it otherwise...

Long before the beginning of the second year, we had planned on taking the hostel accommodation from second yr onwards... we had a mindset that college life for us will be void without some of the 4 yrs' time in the hostel...we were allotted rooms in "CORAL".. I'd say the best of the 9 hostels in the campus... it was just behind octa...we had to take the same road and then the right immediately past the stonebench... there it was... CORAL...a cool spot... full grown trees in front of both the left and the right wings... we took 2 adjacent rooms in the left wing ground floor... that provided a clear view of the rear of the octa, the archi block, 2 other hostels and particularly the lone tree and the stonebench...

then it began.. what looked like a "poor old rundown thing under a tree" was to be our full time "talkspot" thereafter... there was a never a day that we didn't halt at the stonebench during the lunchtime or the breaks (be it for 5 min or an hr).. and there was never a night that we didnt sit down under the tree....our 2 rooms would be locked for long after dinner and we were always to be found in the stonebench having countless hours of incessant talks, "secret" talks and what not... cycles parked nearby and we 5 on the bench....in the chilling winds at the still of the night and amidst the constant buzz of all sorts of insects down there, we had so much done, so often done.... you name it... the chances are that we'd have had it atleast once in the stonebench...

I wonder if we ever missed other hangout spots anywhere else in the college... but then,we didn't care about them any longer... the stonebench was always there for us...

No doubt the stonebench would've had so many chain-gangs like us... but I can't help feeling it had been there for us... just for us... I wonder if it holds some of our secrets and waits for even more... I hope to be there someday again...

[To be continued]

will be back....
cheers,
rajaji.

Genesis - Part 1.

2007-09-04T00:22:00.000+05:30

This has been running in my heart for quite a while now... this isn't one of my usual-style posts. Through this series, I intend to give you a glimpse of my past.. So,if you're ready for the trip... let's go...

4th september,2002... 7:00 AM..
the adrenalin grows to monstrous proprotions... I could hardly sleep the previous night...this dawn isn't just another of the thousands I've seen...to me, the sun seems to shine brighter than ever before...in another 15 min,hopefully, I should be on platform 1 at the bus stand... my friends will be there already and I don't want to be late. I grab my crossbag and start running...
I make it in time and they are all there already... We hug each other as though we see after so many years...(only last eve, we decided we'll all meet here)... at a distance, we see the bus headed straight to PF 1... In a few moments, we are to start on what will be one of innumerable trips that we'll be taking herefater... which will constitute some of the best trips of our lives...

we board in a haste...three at the front, the rest at the rear... I shout "Dei... the last row is just perfect for us.. come on...."
7:25 AM... the bus is on the move... another 45 minutes pass by with out regular tete-a-tete's...
8:10 AM... only we 6 are still in the bus... suddenly Sen shouts "Holdon!! its our stop"...
we get down... momentarily our legs refuse to take another step further... unaware of ourselves, we hold on to each others' hands... the "chain-gang" takes its first step into the college... the air smells of jasmine,rose and what not!!!.. are we hallucinating??? nah nah.. we all turn our heads at the same time only to find 3 bright girls following us just a couple of metres behind... [another chain-gang on the move... :)] we guys look at each other with mischievous eyes and carry on...

though we've been together since our primary-school days, the thought of the four yrs which will follow do take our breaths away for a moment or two...

further ahead, the already crowded admin block welcomes us... the notice board on display names students and the classes to which they'll belong to for the rest of the year...we know it'd be toooooo much of goodluck for all of us to be put in the same group.. so we decide to bear the weight of the separation later that day...
there won't be any classes for today... plenty of time to roam around the college and take note of vantage points where we'll be spending countless hours on sight-seeing... :)

first things first... we enter the snackie...a cool spot, at the heart of the campus... KK orders "Anna..6 samosas and 6 pepsi's"... the next 4 hrs pass simply too fast... after having thoroughly scanned the 800-odd acre campus, we settle down at the canteen[another nice spot surrounded by a shopping complex,a juice stall... an SBI counter to the side...] and finish our lunch...

afternoon... in our respective classes... a few acquaintances,a few handshakes, a few smiles... from tomorrow, there will be plenty of time to make more friends... it'll be 8:30-4:00 schedule from tom...

we 6 get back to the bus stop in the eve and another 45 min trip... as usual...
we talk a lot on the day's happenings and sight-seeings...[boys will be boys.. :)]

Today...4th september, 2007.

This is not a usual "looking-back" on the past... The memories of those days are not in a distant compartment in my mind to search for and look back... they are afresh in every beat of my heart... I still live those days everyday...

[To be continued...]

cheers,
rajaji.

Just like old times...

2007-08-26T20:26:00.000+05:30

Memorable trips have always been 'once-in-a-bluemoon-thing' for me. A wanderlust myself, I never fail to pray for a memorable trip no matter where I'm headed to. But luck has not been fair to me in this matter. I hardly enjoy my jaunts. I'm a diehard fan of train-travelling but was forced to give it up. I had to travel great distances in crushing traffic to and from the railway stations. [You can imagine how it will be to go to chennai egmore or to central from besant nagar during peak hours]. And the availability of a private bus service just some hundred mts away from my place made me switch to bus these days. But i never loved to travel by bus. And the "train-travel(lov)er" in me was slowly dying... :(

With this being the case, I got a chance to travel to my hometown by train... a train journey after a longgg time.... Damn my luck, I always get a "Side Upper" berth despite my preferences for anything other than that... "Side Upper" for a 6 ft tall person... how sweet!!!! Still I enjoyed my train journeys at large... I simply love to travel by train despite the repeated 'side-uppers'...but this time, no question of "what berth"... my ticket was 138th in the waiting list!! sounds crazy rite???... :) No....this was not going to be just-another-trip.. I wasn't going alone....this time, it would be a 10 hour journey for 6 of us...

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Just like old times...during our college days we used to abscond for days... sometimes even whole weeks... in the name of attending competitions and seminars in colleges and univs outside our city.. and more importantly, for the sheer pleasure of the night-train-journeys... Need I say how those days were...?? :) (No wonder why "friends are the best things that happen to a man") the last time we went on a similar trip was in January 2006...during our final yr in coll... the nostalgia was still at large inside me...So I was determined not to miss this one...
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So it hardly mattered to me whether I got a "side-upper" or a "waiting list no. X" this time... I was determined to take this train anyway... and I DID take it.... :) :) a memorable trip "just like old times...":) :)

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji.

23 days...

2007-08-25T14:04:00.000+05:30

yeah yeah... it took me these many days to get back here....

no matter how hard i try to turn a blind eye to things happening around me, i always end up stunned.. or i shd say overwhelmed by the sheer number of things which catch my attention...and these things only fuel my remorse for them... shall i name a few??? (Don't worry.. i'll just name them... i wont discuss the issues again and bore you all) well.... first,the subject VIP of my previous post is a free bird once again... hmm.. it was very clear since the beginning... but a bit heartening is the fact that he served atleast 23 days of the 6 yr RI(who knows??even that might've been a drama!!)...well, VIP's ARE such beings... and the next, another "law-abiding" VIP from the same stage has "surrendered" to a 5 yr term on a hunting case... oh come on men!!!! give us some break... i'll bet my head if u serve your full sentence... the weightage given to this issue, second in a month, doesn't come as a surprise to me... who does not know about the Indian media??? when will things change???? :(

well... let me get to a few interesting things...

some good news (promises???) from the PM on the 60th independence day... within a decade, India should be boasting of 6 IIM's, 8 IIT's and a handful of IIIT's...(excuse me if the numbers aren't right) an impressive speech by the PM from the ramparts of the Redfort... honestly, the first time i listened to an I'day speech... i don't know why all these years it didn't bother me to pay attention to the speeches of the politicians... but it wasn't just another politician's speech this time...

Next...back in the limelight is the issue of reservation for OBC's in educational institutions. Considering that fact that an overwhelming 52% of Indians are from the OBC's(statistical data), the apex court has rightly posed the question "why they shouldn't be given a chance?"... juxtaposing this with the new proposal for more IIT's, IIM's and IIIT's from the govt, we should ask ourselves what we are gonna lose by the reservation system... are we gonna lose anything??? i guess not... ( if i'm missing to notice something here, pls let me know what that is...)

will be back for more...

cheers,
rajaji.

Not the first time... pls learn the lesson

2007-08-03T12:23:00.001+05:30

Will the media ever stop committing the same mistake twice? I don't know if this is just the second time. But if this continues, well.. we are sure to see countless more.
Why are the media hesitant to strip the VIP's of their fame when they are no longer worthy of it? When it's time to bring to light their much portrayed innocence, it unfortunately ends up the other way. The media make a god out of the VIP. And in a country like India, the moment you say "GOD"... well... fill it up for yourself... :)

Coming to the case in hand, I confess for being a victim myself... of the hype... of the drama when it came out for the first time...

So much has been told of the VIP in our case. Damn him!! But we need to know about some real heroes. Unfortunately, they dont receive the respect that they duly deserve,considering the fact that they put their lives in stake,and eventually gave them, for us to have sound sleep. The news of the deaths of the two heroes (the first, about 3-4 months back... and the second,last week...)came out coincidentally on the same days our VIP was being tried for a crime in a court of law(twice)... and both the visual and the print media carried this news on their headlines throughout the day and observed just a minute's silence for the heroes' demises.

I apologise for not being able to remember the first hero. BUT, I learnt the lesson, unlike the media, to not commit that mistake again. So let me unfold, for those of you who dont know about it till now, the story of the second hero. His name is Vasanth Venugopal. Let me say "Colonel" Vasanth Venugopal. That way, you'll naturally feel the respect that he deserves. He was the commanding officer of 9 Maratha Light Infantry and a recipient of the Vishisht Seva Medal. He was killed on July 31, in an encounter with extremists in the Uri section of Jammu & Kashmir. The colonel, an alumnus of Bangalore University, took over as the commanding officer of his unit just about six months ago. At just 40 and no-more now, he is survived by his wife and daughters.

And people...here's the catch... this is all I could find out about him inspite of my relentless searches on the web and the print and visual media. As a matter of fact, they dont have anything more to say about him. Take our VIP on the other hand (I won't talk about his achievements). The moment we say his name, there will be scores of people to write huge volumes of biographies of him...( I wonder if they're already out for sale.... or what worse, even the VIP himself might have started his autobiograhy... another "The story of the Mahatma-behind-bars" in the making????)

Let me add to this the blatant irony of the above two cases.
The colonel died while fighting terrorists and received a day's mourning and forgotten the next day. On the other hand, the VIP has already garnered sympathy worldwide for just a 6-year RI on a proven crime. For instance,when the verdict came out, media started hunting for reactions from people all over. A girl no older than 20, probably a fan of the VIP says(in her exact words as i saw it) "He just had a weapon with him. What other crime did he commit. This sentence is too much for such a trivial crime". Howeve, the real crime... possessing an illegal weapon and being an accesory(to an underwold don) in a series of bomb blasts.!!!!

Where is the media headed to?????

Watch out media!!! yo are not gonna have too many viewere or followers if this is how you carry news worldwide..

will be back...

cheers,
rajaji.

Here I come... Once again...

2007-08-01T13:32:00.000+05:30

Greetings to all...

Once again I've started blogging.... keeping this space of mine growing hasn't been easy. [believe me, I started blogging twice before!!! and gave up]... NO..Don't even think I'll say "I couldn't find time"... :) . Simply,all this time, I didn't have much to say... or so I felt.

well... this time I hope to keep it alive and well...
So.... ppl out there... help me keep this going. Drop a comment, whatever it be. fire at me, yell at me, do whatever. All I need is your time... and ofcourse, the patience to bear with my scraps... :)

will be back...
cheers,
rajaji...