last post ............ of 2007 A.D.

Its pretty cold here .. freezing everyday.

Everyday is different in many ways, but still remains the same.

Just wanted to denote that I am still here :).

Doing some writing of the technical kind completely kills any enthusiasm to write anything more .. even informal .... like, say a blog post.

40 days .... too long a shot ... but no harm right?

Mythalez wishes every reader, a very happy new year .. lets hope this year is radically different from the rest ;)

Aaah, no .. no new year resolutions for me ... no resolutions of any kind at all .. mythalez claims he is perfect as he is :P

Au revoir!

memory fading out ...

Nostalgia may be painful. Nevertheless, it is quite agonising when you realise that many of your memories are slowly, silently fading out. When you try to recollect various time-periods of your life, your are confronted with some faces floating around and some scenes blinking in and out of sight. You focus your attention on some of these scenes only to realise that they depict some random incidents that have occurred on some arbitrary occasions and are quite inconsequential. You have no justification as to why your memory chose to register these sequences so strongly while overlooking the actual major events. You might consciously force your memory to gather those moments that you feel are important and should be treasured. It will cough out a few flickering images and you have to carry out extensive extrapolation to make them coherent. But you begin to wonder how much of it is a genuine part of the memory and how much of it has been cobbled up just now using your imagination on how it should or could have been.
And then, you sigh and give up .... after all, soon you wont even remember that you were trying to hold onto those fading memories.

teaching wordpress !!!

Wordpress users .. can you tell me whether it is so complicated to use wordpress that anyone would be interested to fork out £400 to learn how to use it, as proposed by this course?

I know I am inadvertantly advertising them .. but seriously ... how many participants would they get!

When you want to just talk ... blog

Aren't there occasions when you suddenly get this urge to talk to someone? Not someone in particular but not any-every-one either ... just that you feel a need to talk, about nothing in particular but not too inane to be ignored either. And, as it is bound to happen, you would not find anyone worthwhile to talk to. You can't call anyone reachable at the time without mildly upsetting them or making them question your sanity. You do not have the other easy option of chatting either since you strangely find no one worthwhile online. The adjective 'worthwhile' does narrow down your choices quite considerably. So, you think, what the hell, just go to sleep! But you can't! As a result, you decide to have a monologue ... via your blog.

However, the point of contention then is that since you had no particular topic in mind to carry out the much wanted conversation, what would you start blogging about? Yeah, you can just type what you are thinking. And some thoughts ramble out.

There is as much mystery outside as there is inside .... both literally and metaphorically. Isn't it much tougher to figure out what you want then to actually obtain it? Even when you think you know what you want, you cannot be completely sure, since there always exists an uncertainty (no thanks to Heisenberg though). It can get more complicated if the only way to know whether you want it or not is to try obtaining it but you cannot risk not wanting it once you obtain it leaving you are in a catch-22 situation (that reminds me, I still need to read that book)

Sometimes, you wish your mind would stop all the pondering and contemplation and give itself a break. You try to bring about the break by watching many hours of gripping drama or hilarious comedy but as soon as you stop, the mind jumps back to the same old state ... just as I am typing this, the song 'comfortably numb' comes out of the random selection of winamp ... how ironic.

The general trace of life:

zero-teens = you learn about the world.
early-teens = you intend to change the world when you grow up.
late-teens = you realise you can't change the world, ever.
early-twenties = you intend to direct your own life as you want it.
early-thirties = you realise you dont control your life, rather it controls you.
late-thirties = you vow to direct the life of your children.
early-fifties = you realise you can't control your children's life at all.
sixties and later = you give up all hope and continue living.

ofcourse, I am just guessing, but I feel its true :D.

facade

Occasion, just another
thoughtlessly, words spoken
skin pricked, by needles
the heart and the words.

scornfully, smile appears
wistfully, mind escapes
imagination, its personal
we shall survive it all.

cold wind, chilling effect
warmth inside, no reflect
frozen exterior, fire within
frown inside, show a grin.

overcome, the day, the night
and you shall be all right!

.. this poem will remain special to me for one reason ... for its written without sobriety :).

The one about the barber and other stories

Okay, I need to confess this. Ever since I had consciousness of this world, my hair and barbers, I tended to have longish hair compared to the average (of the guys of course). I have had long hair on many occasions in the past 3 yrs. Atleast on three of those occassions it was more than 6 months long. To the outside world, I supplied many explanations, ranging from the absurd like "it just keeps growing!" to the pretentious like "yeah, I look good with long hair". The fact is that I do not look good with long hair (inspite of the fact that it atleast makes me look older and not mistaken for a high-school going kid) and I have no inclinations for fashion or hair style. Yet, I generally have my hair long because, well .. umm .. I loathe going to a barber :-s.

Yeah, I am scared and fearful of those peaceful but sly, scissors wielding, smooth talking tormentors. When you go and sit in those comfy chairs, you submit yourself to their mercy and are practically helpless. Specifically in my case, since I have to remove my spects, am practically blind also. When their scissors whizz all over your head, cutting and chomping your dear dead black cells at will, you can only close your eyes and pray that the dark storm passes over quickly. And then, when he disdainfully takes out a brand new blade or those electric shaver thingy, you gather all your will power to stop yourself from bolting out. And then, a particularly raunchy song comes up in that miniature tv set in the room and you start fearing for your life; since the barber continues as before but with both eyes fixated, not on your head, but on the tv screen. And when the ordeal finally finishes, you are proudly glad that you have survived and ecstatic that you wont have to go through it again any time soon. And therefore, I end up having long hair :(.

Yeah, I will be going to a barber (or should I be classy and say hair-dresser?) tomorrow morning ... wish me luck :D.

And now for the other stories:

* I met a British-Asian the other day (as they are called) and he said he was originally from Pakistan. I asked where exactly and he said Kashmir. I was about to utter, "oh, you mean POK?" but just checked myself in time :D. I guess not everyone in the world calls that area POK.

* There was a talk show on TV about 'what brings happiness'. The panel included lottery winners, self-made multi-millionaires, members of salvation army, devout muslims, charity workers, money-less folk etc. It was pretty interesting. What I gathered from it and the theory I later developed will be told in another post :D (pathetic attempt at building up a suspense ;) ).

* Yeh mera diwanapan hai: this song, supposedly from the movie Namesake has been haunting me! I have been listening to it continuously for almost a month now, and I continue to do so. Perhaps it's the unique blend of involving lyrics, detached singing and unobtrusive music that makes you want to listen to it again and again and again! I had force myself to listen to other songs just to liberate my mind from its clutches. It sure is addictive; stay away from it :P.

And yeah, happy children's day everyone ... go get yourself a lollipop :P

Frozen

frozen. stolen. ephemeral paradise.

retreat. quashing gently, unnoticeable. unaffected.

treasure, yet trivialise. enclosed eternally.

fake. brush-off. shrug, sigh. wonder, incompletely.

smile with a raised eyebrow.

a random post ...

° Why? because I have some work to do and I am running out of procrastinating options ... there is no one online to chat either (and that's a rarity given the huge chat-contacts list and the large number of people I chat with) as most of them must be at their homes, gorging sweets (read as gaining weight) and running around bursting firecrackers (read as damaging the nature).

° I started writing this post when, after analysing all that I was supposed to do, I heard myself say, "aah, its so simple, I don't want to do it." And let me tell you, this 'simple' thing will hopefully solve the problem that has been dogging my algorithm since the past 3 weeks :D. Finding the problem is always harder than finding it's solution ... yeah thats my quote .. feel free to reuse it, with due acknowledgments of course :P.

° Global fusion of cultures? cutting out small pani puris from the big rolled out dough using a shot-glass. Yeah, I did this last week.

° Is the 'Fall' season named so because the leaves fall from the trees or because of the drastic fall in temperatures from a pleasant 15-20 °C to a frigid 1-5 °C ?? :D This is a rhetorical question, readers are not invited to answer it!

° There are so many movies that I ought to watch :-s, ranging from Pirates-3 to Bourne Ultimatum to Chak De India and a host of other movies in between.

Better get back to work and start doing that 'simple thing' (only to discover that it is not so simple after all).

home ...

Home. When you think of home, what is the first image that you get in your mind? For most people. it should be that of their mother doing something in the home. Generally, all of us associate our moms with our houses, they ought to be the most significant part of it.

So, when your mother comes to visit your house for a few days, you realise that you must have grown up after all. So, when you show her around the kitchen, tell her where the masalas are and where the utensils are, which bottle contains haldi and which one mirchi, you realise you have made a home for yourself. So, when you inform her, just as she gets ready to make your favourite dishes, that she should put more salt and chilli than usual because they are not strong enough in these parts of the world, you realise you are more a part of this kitchen than she is.

And then, when you see the ease with which she adapts and is seamlessly integrated in your house for those few days, you realise she is not a mom for no reason.

Books read in recent times

First of all, by 'recent times', I am not exactly referring to yesterday or past week but the past 12 months :D. My reading rate has been appalling over this time (due to several reasons ;) ). Though I must have read close to a 70-80 research papers (many just introduction and conclusion so that they could be discarded as irrelevant), I only managed to read a few books. Hence there are not many books that I am in a position to discuss now. The plus point, however, is that my choice of books has been pretty good and I have enjoyed most of the books that I read.

» My autobiography - Charlie Chaplin: I have only read a couple of other autobiographies, and this was by far the best of them all. Right from his poor beginnings to meteoric rise in popularity to being assailed by various people for various reasons, he narrates all events in an enthralling way with a hint of dark humour, I guess much like his movies. Statutory warning: Reading the book will make you want to watch all those movies asap, so better be prepared with the CDs etc before you start reading.

» For Esme, with love and squalor - J. D. Salinger: I picked up this book as it was the most attractive of the Salinger books in our library. No, I did not read any review about it and had no inkling of what to expect. After reading, I was slightly disappointed as perhaps I was expecting a bit more from the Salinger of Catcher in the Rye fame :D. It is a collection of short stories (took a while for me to figure that out :D, as I initially thought he was just introducing different characters in different chapters) and I wasn't able to see the point in some of them. However, the short story of the same title was pretty good along with a few others (that I dont remember now :-s).

» The Sirens of Titan - Kurt Vonnegut: Now, this was pretty awesome. The sarcasm and satire of the book just kills you with its ingenuity and humour. It is a science fiction of a different kind and the story moves from Earth to Mars and back to earth and then yeah, to Titan. It has an all powerful but subservient alien, mind-controlling and pain-inflicting devices, space shuttles, Earth attacked by soldiers exported from earth and train in Mars and so on. It has an idiotic multi-billionaire, an omniscient future knowing person, a glass-doll but later rugged woman and her illegitimate son and so on. I can't do it justice, you need to read it to appreciate it :D.

» Sweet Thursday - John Steinbeck: A pleasant story which is both funny and warm with an excellent narration style. The characters leave strong impressions even long after they cease to exist. All in all, a feel good novel and as most such novels ought to be, it is a love story, though of a different kind. It is actually a sequel to another novel, but I read this one directly and thoroughly enjoyed it.
PS- the librarian was mighty impressed when she noticed me getting this book issued ;)

» The curious incident of the dog in the night-time: Mark Haddon: This book has a very high reputation and not without reason. A must read is all I can say. I absolutely loved it, having read it on a one-day journey to London and back .. quite a coincidence that is, though. Why? you will know when you read it :P.

» 5 People you meet in heaven - Mitch Albom: I don't know, how I end up reading such books sometimes. They sound interesting because of their titles and their reviews, but once you read, you are left with that feeling of promises not being fulfilled. This is on the lines of the 'Alchemist' with an influence of 'The Christmas Carol' as some important people from the life of a dead man show him how his life was not so useless after all. I guess, the book attempts to provide some hope to people who find their lives quite insignificant :P. Did not impress me though.

» The Thought Gang - Tibor Fischer: I went to the library to pick up some other book but picked up this one instead. Why? The back page review was captivating! The context of the story is also so novel- a philosophy professor at Cambridge University turns into a uncatchable peaceful bank robber in France! He also has a one-hand-one-leg but very powerful associate who is a veteran criminal and falls for his philosophy. Together they form the 'thought gang' and rob banks while showering the bystanders with philosophical musings. Yeah, the book is continually peppered with references to Ionian philosophy and those ancient philosophers about whom I have no clue. But, the form of writing is so different and the story so humourous that together it turns out to be a terrific combination.

» The monk who sold his Ferrari - Robin Sharma: Aah, I had no clue about the contents of this book. But, having seen it in the favourite books lists of lots and lots of people, I assumed it should be good. However, it turned out to be a preachy self-help, improve your life dramatically by following these hazy but obvious steps that everyone knows but no one implements kind of book. The most impressive part of the book is the title :P. The book got so tiresome that I skipped a lot of pages jumping ahead to see if the next chapter had any awesome revelation hidden among its folds, only to repeat the steps and reaching the end :P. Well, what to say, I am sorry I don't like self-help books :D.

» Saturday - Ian McEwan: Set in the modern day scenario of terror threats and anti-war protests, the story is about a not-so-usual saturday in the life of a well-to-do, decent, generally happy neurosurgeon based in London. Told from the point of view of this doctor, the story conveys his various emotions, fears, love, confusion etc pretty well. Well, you get to read all this in any review :P. What particularly captured my attention was the way author easily keeps you captivated even when there might not be much happening in terms of the story. The doctor's thoughts keep going back to his memories and thats how we get to know the background of the characters. I guess this book is a nice example of how to tell a good story in an excellent manner. Now, I want to read his other works particularly Atonement and Amsterdam.

» An Equal Music - Vikram Seth: I love his poems but never read any novel, so when I found this book in a second-hand book sale, I immediately grabbed it. That was back in February. Yet, I have just finished half the book. It wasn't easy reading for a musically-ignorant person like me who didn't even know that there existed other western string instruments than guitar and violin, like say viola and cello. Yeah, the story is about a musician and his sorry life :P. Narrated in first person, the protagonist is a depressed loser and reading the book manages to depress you too :D. Hence I stopped. Also, there is a lot of music jargon that I had to read through without understanding a bit. Anyway, some day I hope to complete it :).

Book that I will soon start reading- Cakes and Ale by Somerset Maugham. No, its not a cookery or a brewery book :P. It about authors ... yeah authors who write literature.
Other books on my shelf in wait for a reading are: Catch-22, The Inheritance of loss and the Golden Gate.

Extem'poured'

¬ After a long time I feel like writing without the idea of what to write. There is nothing concrete that I want to say, nothing I want to narrate. But I feel I have to write (type rather) and so I do. By the way that reminds me, when was the last time that you have written a letter i.e literally written a letter to some one using pen/pencil and paper and posted it using snail mail? Yeah, small memo/todo/message notes are not what I am asking about. A proper letter like we all used to write sometimes in that bygone era :P.

¬ I realised that more often my weekends are more hectic than my weekdays. Hecticity being measured by the number of hours I spend at home (not doing any work). By this I dont mean that I work on weekends or anything.

¬ I find that sometimes, some one comments on an old post. And since I do not have any kind of comment notification enabled, I do not get to read it unless I go through the archives. And no, I dont do that normally.

¬ Now for the serious stuff. Aah, am kidding, there is no serious stuff, there shouldnt be any serious stuff! It's all just blah. Like the ones below:-
Sometimes you need a pain to experience the joy.
Sometimes, you need to close your eyes to see the light.
Sometimes, you need to lose the thing to comprehend its importance.
(I just came up with these .. though the last one is a common one, oft repeated in various forms)

¬ I am 23 years old. This is the 'prime' year. The previous ones were 19, 17, 13, 11 etc but the next one will only come after 6 years at 29 (and then 31). I dont know why, but it's kind of scary!

¬
Click, click and click.
left, right and still.
scroll, up and down
cause smile and frown.

with a wiry tail
send a dull email
and the reddy glow
helps the PC flow

become dirty, stick!
sudden, very sick
end up in the trash.
And then a new mouse
comes joins its new house

I guess this is one of my rare verses in which all the lines in a single stanza have the same number of syllables. Dont ask what prompted me to write this!

A walk on a bad day ...

What do you do with days that stubbornly refuse to have a single decent thing about them but are associated with an abundance of annoyance??

--- By the way,

Ever tried walking with your eyes closed? If not, try it on a silent, deserted pavement (alongside a straight deserted road) with no chance of bumping into anyone/anything other than the fences and parked cars and find out how far you are able to go before you succumb to the irrepressible urge to open your eyes.

An year .. I have been here

Somehow, searching for something, I ended up reading some of my early posts (nov-dec 2004) and wondered at how different and care-free my blogging was back then. I used to jump from topic to topic in the post, sometimes touching upon completely different topics in the same sentence!

Also, did I mention that I have completed an year, living alone in a foreign country? To be precise, as of today, it is 1 year + 1 month + 1 week + 1 day .. I think, didnt bother to be calculate exactly.

In the course of this year, I finished an year of cooking, an year of 'agent-research', an year of meeting people from all parts of the world ranging from Brazil and Australia to Europe and Ghana! It also marks completing an year of being paid regularly (the TAships in IIIT dont really count), as well as self-managing all my issues (from banks to bills).

It was an year of several trips (a lot of south England, Hyderabad+Delhi, Wales, Paris, a bit of north England and Switzerland). An year of watching several TV-series (continuing Lost and PrisonBreak and all of Battlestar Galactica, MITM, Seinfeld, Friends, HIMYM, Heroes etc), many many movies but reading very few books :(.

It was also an year spent by corresponding with your old close friends by chat /phone /orkut /facebook /batch-mails to realising you haven't known a single person in this country for more than an year (Blair, Beckham etc don't count, I mean personally knowing someone and they knowing me too)

It has also been an year of blogging in bursts and living in moments :)

this is not a PS: too many 'an year' in the post
this is still not a PS: I hope 'an year' is grammatically right? :-s

Yet another day

Looking up at the night sky, which was still bright enough to discern the clouds even as the time was galloping towards midnight, he wondered at the sorry state of his poor heart, at how mercilessly he has been suppressing his never decreasing desire. The unspoken wish has crippled his usual jolly self and made him a lost, miserable wanderer. Of course, neither his countenance nor his outward behaviour ever disclosed a tiny hint of his inner turmoil.

He wondered how long he could go along like this. While everything is seemingly fine, he no longer finds any joy in his activities, in any of his activities. He has easily dissected his condition into the minutest possible pieces and deduced that his want was just a want for love in general and not her in particular. But, since she is the only attractive one in the vicinity for a long time, the want has donned her effervescent face. Furthermore, there is no denying that it was her gorgeous presence and her gregarious interaction that had initiated this whole tasteless issue.

He looked up at the night sky again, sighed at the clouds and turned back. Today didn't feel right for the ultimate jump into eternity either. So he went back to live another day ... yet again.

Savour this piece of fiction for some time as there won't be any posts for the rest of this week :)

away ...

I want to keep away from myself today !

expression

Heard during a research talk -- "The expression is not expressive enough to express what you wish to express"
.. 'expressive' vocabulary eh? :D .. impressive ..