Slumdog not millionaire

When you work for a MNC bank which was one of those guilty banks not prudent enough to know which kind of customers can pay back the money and which cannot. When you work for a MNC bank where you are working from 2pm to 11pm . When you work for a MNC which provides for you basic level of subsistence, you don’t ask question,lament ,but you work.

In the heat of the sun,I was waiting for my cab. It’s a routine . It’s more of a part of my life. Waiting !!! The usual surroundings being same . As goes the famous lines from “Donnie Darko” …”All around me are familiar faces,wornout places ,going nowhere…” . So was the face of that little neglected child. A toddler wearing a tainted frock, face smeared with mud,dirt and tears. An existence of ignorance,innocence and exuberance. And she (going by the frock she was wearing) sat there,enjoying in the scorching heat,playing with plastic bags and twigs, living in her own little devoid of any worries.At that instant came a white skinned lady, she looked at the “little angel” sitting there. She bent down caressed the toddler’s cheeks, offered her some goodies and after this show of benevolence the lady went on her usual business.I was amazed at this show of affection. I wondered how many of us (read Indians) would do so, everyone is so damn busy living the burdening life that it’s humanly impossible to even pass a smile on seeing a familiar face, let alone a stranger.Then came my cab and i went ahead to play out my day.

A week after at the same location,same time , i was living out my same routine. There was no toddler that day. Moments later the same white skinned lady came and went about her usual business.Just after that a girl carrying the same toddler came there and tried catching the attention of the lady , but she was gone. Judgmental as I usually am , I figured what was going on.It could be that the goodies offered to the toddler by the lady was cherished and savored by someone else. This girl , who carried the toddler could very well be the toddler’s sister and to get another round of goodies , this girl was using the toddler to catch the lady’s attention. Sounds far fetched ,but quite likely.

It’s the inherent human nature to exploit the kindness and love bestowed upon us. What this poor girl was doing is a reflection of the thinking of society in general.

It’s how the human psychology works. We use our helplessness to hoodwink others who piety us. We take undue advantage of kindness and sympathy and justify each wrong done to us as a matter of our destiny.

Now many of you might feel way differently and might even call into question my humanity or blame my emotional depravity and one is within his or her right to do so.Before you take your daggers out hear me out . What should I make out of Danny boyle , the coveted director who came to the rescue of the slum kids,who along with their family were thrown out of their illegal houses , while their parents are busy roping in the new found stardom of their kids. I don’t want to blame the parents. It’s human tendency or the survival instincts or rather protective instincts of the parents to dream a better future for their family .

And who doesn’t want that ? What would you do?

Fire in the belly

Me: “It’s time. Let him go.”
Me: “He is detrimental to your existence, to everything you cherish, to everything you aspire, to everything you hope for and to you future.”

And he stood there mockingly and unfazed , looking at me and looking like me.

Him: “You sure about letting me go? Am happy to go, infact ready to go , but only if you are Ready ?”

I cringed as I stood there obfuscated, “How did he know about that, how is he speaking my mind ? Was that my voice reverberating? “

Him: “So you are still living in denial, you cannot live without me ” as his voice echoed yet again.”You have lived,grown and fed on me. Everything wrong that has ever happened to you was attributed to me. I had been the scapegoat for all your failures,for all your setbacks and now you want to disown me and you want to live without me. I have been the reason that you are living . I give you hope,I give you reason to try , try again and if you fail , I provide you an excuse in my “form”. I give you your EGO.I let you to use me , like I have let you to do for the umpteenth times. I am your “Mediocrity” , you let me go and watch yourself disintegrate.I am a necessary evil for your existence ,lighting a “fire in you belly” to get rid of me.

The palpitations grew .Sweat gleamed on my forehead and it dawned “WE are in this together,in sickness and in health till death do us apart”.

Change

While the “change” came to America , a different kind of “change” creeped into my life. A “change” which was just the natural conclusion of the consummation of life. A “change” where i was loosing company of like minded people,slowly and silently being pushed into a minority by the desertion of the “faithfuls”. These people at various stages of my life have been my companion , my mentor .From childhood , through adolescence into adulthood and now one by one they are leaving me all alone by getting married.

The year before last had isolated cases with a couple of good friends leaving the ranks of bachelorhood voluntarily or under paternal pressure to go the “family way“.But last year was unusually bad. Just like the recession and housing market debacle wiped away the equity of the major banks , similar tremors were felt across my social circle. It was eroded.

I lost a “room mate” who shared my rent. I lost a school friend (senior in college ) and haven’t heard from him since he got married. I lost a childhood school friend and then a maverick cousin and am on the verge of losing someone real close.

Not that am not happy for all these married or would be married  souls,it just that when I see people with whom i went to school or to college, with whom i played cricket all day long,with whom i exchanged comics, with whom i spent nite outs “high” on music and booze, deliberating the intriguing questions of life . People whom i would call at any point of time to tell them about my freaking frustrations,insecurities,concerns are all calling it quits.

All this takes me to a pertinent point where am forced to introspect.Is it time for me as well to cave in to the inevitable threat posed by reality or can i buy in more time to continue to live in a delusion ?

PS: Congrats to Gautam,Dharam and Dixit (IIIT Hyderabad),Sachin Seghal and kunal tiwari (Inductis), Sachin singhal and GR (you know who u are ).

Faith

Disclaimer: Anything said is writer’s personal opinion and not written to hurt anyone’s feeling or defame a holy place.

FAITH after HOPE is the second most optimistic virute of the human race.And unfortunately the most exploited sentiments of human by the fellow beings

Faith a parent has in their progenies ability.
Faith a child has about the unwavering kind nature of his/her mother.
And faith that everyone(read Theist )has that one day God would redress his sufferings.

So in good faith , I decided to skip the HOLI colours this year and went to the abode of LORD TIRUPATI.

Before I narrate about my tryst with his self appointed PR’s,his devotees and the lord himself,I will take a moment to reflect about the sacredness of the holy place.

“It is the richest and the most visited temple (of any faith) in the world” considering the FAITH and the legends associated with the temple ,its’ apt that

“The temple of Sri Venkateswara has acquired unique sanctity in Indian religious lore.The Sastras, Puranas, Sthala Mahatyams and Alwar hymns unequivocally declare that, in the Kal Yuga, one can attain mukti, only by worshipping Venkata Nayaka or Sri Venkateswara. “

So people abound the shore of Tirumala in huge numbers. This year on “Holi” day at 4 am along with hundreds of people ,we were in the queue to get the tickets for the “darshan”. There were two lines one was “free of cost” and other was worth 50 bucks.The 50 buck premimum one pays to bypass the long queues at the darshan.Well i had reservations about the commerical angle of this gimmick ,but “when money talks, let it shout” and so with pride and arrogance we distanced ourselves from the “lesser mortals” .

It was after an hour of waiting , I realised that we had not moved more than 15feet in the 400feet long queue and we were getting anxious if we might be able to get the holy “darshan”.

So our enterprising tour guide applied the ingenuity and asked the whole lot of tourist at his mercy to leave the “elitist” Rs 50 queue and mix with the “freebie -holics” because the free darshan queue was moving faster . It actually was and it made me ruminate about the validity of the adage “There is nothing called free lunch”

And within 35mins we had our ticket for tirupati darshan,but not before we were clicked ,finger printed and profiled. You might wonder why does one need to be photographed for a darshan.It’s security.Not ours,but THEIRS (VVIP’’s like Bachchans,Chandra babu naidu) So at 11:30 am darshan we were there at footsteps of the diety,waiting for the gates to open.At about 1:00 pm the demi-gods “self appointed PR’s” opened the gates.We were allowed in,but not without another security frisking and were lead to identiy verification.Leading our tour team ,I gave my ticket and the person scanned the barcodes on it and up came on his monitor
a photograph,but it was not MINE.So i was debarred from entering.So was my accompanying friend,So was the person after him and so was the preson after him.So yet again from being a “freebie-holics” we were the persona non -grata or exaggerately “terrorist”. Actually what had happened was ,the “free ticket queue” was being awarded the tickets by an efficient person who clicket photograph of one person and gave his ticket to the next person in the queue.We tried convincing this to the incharge authority,who was demonstrating the high handedness typical to a person of authority in India. He was in no mood to listen to any explainations
or accept the mistake of the ticket issuing person.He branded us as the “potential threats”and It was only when we greased his palms with 400 bucks that we finally entered the temple.

As we were crossing an empty hall,I had the feeling that atlast the darshan is close at hands.And as we exited the hall, we entered into a portico,swarmed with thousands of people,thronged with people,abundant with people. It was like a huge wave of people ,like a water current,all you need to do is enter this current and the direction of current would throw you in the right direction.This could have been a case of a potential stampede situation,but no sir you cannot have a stampede.There was not enough space for you to fall,the person infront of you and the perosn behing you are you support system , they will keep you upright,tight.
So we ventured into this human wave at the mercy of the lord.

Since we were the “free ticket holder” ,we had people from all walks of life.People who were carrying their buckets,their baggages, people who had no money to stay in hotels and have to walk with all their belongings.So it was not only the usual elbows,kicks for the menu,but pointed edges of the steel boxes packed with the forceful punches of the “old rustic women”.This human wave of devotees was more like a race for the survival ,it seemed like we were on “Titanic” and people are trying to get onto the deck to board the boats to safety.It truly epitomised Charles darwin theory of “Survival of the fittest”.

Then we reached a point ,where the “free ticket” people came face to face with the “50 ticket” people and so as they  proudly proclaim ”In Tirumala, it is very common to find that every pilgrim, invariable of his status, stands in the queue for  hours together to get the darshan of Lord Balaji for a few seconds.”

We all wrestled to stay in hunt for the darshan,fought to not be left behind ,but the FAITH was still there which culminated with the momentarily “darshan” of the encompassing benevolence of the almighty.And the ordeal of 4 hours of standing,pushing and fighting was over or was it?

So we finally took the “prasadam” , took our two “famous tirupati ladoos” ,but not without standing in a queue.There was a provision of “free lunch” in the temple,but the travail of “free stuff” had taken it’s toll on me. I was appalled by the managment and the trustees.The lack of basic amenities and the unregulated human traffic. The commercialization of the temple to the extentthat one needs to purchase a packet for keeping the “ladoos ” for Rs 2,
a paltry amount ,but for wat ? The inherent “inequality” in the supposed “Equality” of standing in the queues of the “poor”,”the rich” and “the elite”
(Bachachan family or if you can procure a letter from some minister).If that’s not enough ,the ramapnt corruption,high handedness of the authorities and to what end.

All in the name of FAITH ?

Third time unlucky !!!

 ”To err is human,To forgive divine,
And the error of repeating the audacity is mine“

I have blogged about how one of my innocuous comment on someone’s haircut had the potential of serious
repercussions and how i had averted an embarassing situation.Close shave

count=1

“Learn from ur mistake” is one thing i have not taken very kindly to.

It actually happened that a senior person was sitting next to me discussing a project and then he got a
call on his mobile which he attended to . I overheard it was some lady talking in a US accent. So this guy
excuses himself and goes out of my “hearing range” .Impulsively, I type on my messenger window to my
colleague

“Abbey isse kisi phirang ka phone aya hai,interview de raha hai, lagta hai naukari chor dega”

and before i could press enter , a perfunctorily glance on the chat window scared the hell out of me.
I was typing all this to this very person ,who had gone to attend to his call.But thankfully,I was saved
the embarassment.

count=2

At that very moment , I decided to create a separate group of all the senior ppl in the office so that
even unconsicously I don’t give them “a piece of my mind”. So I added my VP etc. and decorated them on my
messenger under the title ‘BADE LOG’ so that they get the respect due to them.

But as luck would have it.I saw my colleague coming out of my VP’s cabin. To get a first hand account of the
office rumour ,impatiently i wrote

“kya baat kar aaye XXXXXXXX se “

and the unaware “subject” of the conversation became the unintended recipient of the message. Before I could have
realised the “bullet had been fired”.The chill through my spine, the trepidation forced me to write .

“sorry wrong window”

With the holi season coming around i thought , i should write

“burra na mano holi hai“

But i held on my horses to prevent further damage.

count=3

I knew i had screwed big time and so removed all those ppl whom i can unknowingly offend and so my messenger
friend’s list is left with no one but me …

PS: An interesting incident.

One of my friend got a missed call from his manager,so he saved his number under the title “GANJU”
but instead of saving his number he actually sent him a message “GANJU” and while he sat there totally
unaware of all this ,his manager came to him and showed him the message and this person actually laughed
on his face ,but he was not that fortuitous and his manager had the last laugh on his appraisal.

Drinking

It started with pati’s bday in Nov 05 with smirnoff shots going down my throat,leaving behind a burning sensation.
But the aftermath was controlled . It reached it’s climax in the holi season . After getting placed not once but twice and
nothing to do save for the fyp (who cared but ?) so the four years of subdued feelings were outpoured in a single night.

Thinking abt replicating that nite’s fervor is a distant dream ,but even as i gulp the LIT sip by sip moshing to the
LP’s and Pink Floyd’s there ’s a twitch of guilt. Guilt…That’s astounding considering that one drinks to forget all the
strings that makes one mortal. Mortal in literal sense . Mortal that you don’t rmbr even you remotest miseries,your faintest
failures or anything that makes you unhappy . In short , you get high . You go with the flow .

But as i sit with ppl ,smoking and swaying to the musinc,saying “cheers” at every new drink, I feel alientaed . Alienated from my family and most importantly from myself. This is not who I am ?This is not the real ME or is it ? This is not how i started or i thought i would become.

Life outside your comfort zone compels you to view things differently.And you are left with two option either face it or brace it.

And am still deliberating what  have I done ?

I feel betrayed. Betrayed not by life ,but by this so called ALOCHOL,which has failed on me. I get high ,but not enough.
I can still distinctly remember wat troubles me , what i desire and what i am not ? What i have to do and the futility of what I have done ?
And so all i can say rite now is “I am not trying enough” . Not trying enough to get inebriated enuff….and perhaps i should try more..

so all i can say is “One WHISKY ON THE ROCKS” ….

CHEEERS ….

Tears

“Shaam se aankh main naami si hai” …..

As a part of our growing up ,I had been time and again reminded that “Boys don’t cry!!!”. I won’t delve into the chauvinism of this pedagogy ,but a part of me had always disagreed.

It’s hard to sound not like a cynic,but the hardships of life with it’s various facets of failures,disasters and failed aspirations eventually brings down your ebullience . It drains the happiest moments of life and this  ubiquitous shadow of grief canopies life and forces you to harp on your sordid miseries. One feels like going down and drowning in a chilly freezing ocean ,where the weight of sorrow , expectations,failings are taking you down.It’s at this point the overwhelming feelings,thoughts,fears,uncertainities and introspection chokes the breath and you wait for the inevitable.

Only the purgatory powers of the lachrymal glands can revive the soul subjected to the trial and tribulations of life.Those drops from heaven,which have the magical powers to convey the innermost and hidden pains .Outflux to the feelings in the form of those precious pearls “tears” can alone reinvigorate me and i seem to have lost my Elixir of life and here i am lying in my bed ,in the darkness of my room,with a heavy,bruised and swollen heart,waiting for my revival.

Oh God ! empower me . Give me back my precious tears …..

“Hui aankh nam aur yeh dil muskaraya “

Random Thts

Random thts….

As i sit listening to “Taare zameen par” title track in the darkness of my room with the glare of the monitor being the only source of illumination,it dawns upon me that i have a blog and i have deserted IT. So i go to my blog,but instantly my fingers type cricinfo.com .Why ? What’s the score ? This reminds me how much did ganguly score ? Poor chap .He is like a tiger tamed and put in a cage.They(selectors) ask him to save their asses and he delivers by being the highest run getter in a calendar yr and now they annoint a captain called MSD who cannot withstand the presence of so many former captains and so uses the pretext of their age and tired legs to give fresh blood a chance ..Admirable…

Okay point taken !!! Agreed ganguly and dravid are not among the quickest and cannot throw 4m the boundaries.I guess we should then have javelin throwers and 100 metre athletes in the outfield.Coz we do not care abt the runs we score ,we are more bothered abt the fielding … But yeah where was I? yeah my blog…..

It’s 25th jan oh it’s ptee’s bday . yeah i wished him yesterday…There was some1 else’s bday …yes subhash chandra bose …(oh nobody cares … he is indeed the forgotten hero)…

but no somebody else’s bday… Oh yeah got that … it’s amazing na how much importance u give to some1 and they treat u like shit and then with time being the saviour takes u away 4m those nightmares and u forget abt those miseries and to top that all even that person’s bday … gr8 goin. Yr before last i wished bday. Last yr i rmbrd the bday ,but didn’t do so.This year i actually 4got the date…cool Time and Tides Wait 4 none.

Oh yeah time is running out… According to my plans, I was supposed to be doing my mba by now,but look where fate has me now…hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Introspecting ………….

(To be continued)

Long time

It’s been a long time since i blogged  last .That long that b4 writing this one i actually had to go and see what i had posted last.

Things have changed since i last posted.

The person abt whom i wrote in the previous post left the company (not because of me ).
I went for a week holiday to Lucknow and after 6 years ….God dammit long 6 years celebrated my bday in Lucknow ….. phew …. it was long…

And wow india defeated pakistan not once but twice …… (wat a treat) .
Actually ever since india won the “bowl-out” against pakistan , i wanted to say this

 ”Pakistani’s ,to defeat india in a world cup ,you don’t need 5 balls … only 2 real ones should do “.

Close Shave

I don’t know wat is wid us that we get a hair cut only on Sundays.
Ppl come normally on a friday and when you see them on mondays either the long locks are gone or a shiny bald appears.

This monday when i reached my office , this girl in my team came with an “Arundhati Roy” hairdo.Though it my be stylish all i can say was it looked ridiculous .

Well when smthing funny comes to me how can i stay withoug spreading the joy and i used my company’s messenger to communicate this to the guy next to me ,who himself had got a bad haircut the previous weekend .
 ”Bal kahan se kataye , jahan se apne katyae the kya “

I waited for a few minutes when i would get the acknowledgement from him…
But no acknowledgement !!! Wasn’t it funny ….so i tried to ping this guy….

Wat i saw on my screen was Catastrophic !!!

God knows wat had happened ,but was so occupied to “Spread the fun” that i had
actually pinged that girl itself.

And my comment “Bal kahan se kataye , jahan se apne katyae the kya ” was now transformed to a Question !!! It took me moments to realise the gravity of the situation.
Anticipating a seething face, I craned my neck over the partitions to see if my keystrokes had detonated the explosives.

But thankfully there was no one on the seat. So i got from the seat said a few “hi’s” and “hello’s” went to that girl’s seat,ACCIDENTALLY dropped my batch, bent down to pick it up and innocently pulled the plugs of her computer.

With all the imprints of my chicanery removed ,
i mused “That was a CLOSE shave . No !!! she had a CLOSE shave . I just missed one”.