Another one bites the dust

Rushdie is old and will die in a few decades. The current hysteria about his visit will die much sooner. The government has appeased the extremists and will probably save its votebanks, or the votebanks would find some other fault and a new government would rise. Water under the bridge. But there is more to this controversy than what the passage of time can sweep under the rug.

There is no doubt that Rushdie is a fucking awesome writer. I have not read Satanic Verses seeing as it is banned. I think that it is the case with most of the extremists opposed to Rushdie. We are ready to lynch and crucify a man for his work that nobody has read. I wonder how people arrive at such conclusions. Was there a meeting where Rushdie’s book was read and defiled and burned and it was decided to martyr him? Or even an attempt by the extremists to see that how much Rushdie is in the wrong? No. It is a simple witch hunt and makes about the same amount of sense.

I don’t blog about current events and the like, seeing as it is all so temporal and hardly matters, but this current event is not like the others. What would happen if Rushdie were to physically manifest in the space-time we call India?

More than that, I find it personally embarrassing, that persons like Rushdie and the late M F Husain who  have brought such laurels for the nation are debarred from visiting India. Grow the fuck up, I want to say.

 

 

Testing

Just checking out wordpress for android.

Update

It has been a long time since I last blogged. I had forgotten the calming feeling of writing things out. But then I don’t really get frustrated these days so it is not very surprising that I don’t feel like writing.

My future is very stochastic atm. There are a couple of things that I want to do, but I would probably end up taking a PhD somewhere, at least that is what I am telling myself these days. We will see what happens when it happens.

Words

After a point words become somewhat meaningles

Homeward Bound

So I spent my obligatory week in the Health Center. And I reconnected with most friends and found some of the answers about how and why I am an Indian Muslim from Bihar.

Now my parents are of the opinion that I should stay with them for a while. Ideally till convocation. But I have never really been very good at following orders. We shall see what we might see.

There are a couple of things more, but for now, I am leaving iitk today, and this is the first real vacation that I have taken in a long time. So lets see, Fingers crossed. I intend to relax as much as I can.

 

Take care.

On Crying

The first time I cried, it was out of sheer confusion.

My father’s father had died.

I saw my father cry for the first time.

What is he feeling, I wondered?

We came back to our house from the hospital.

There was a crowd.

All the womenfolk were competing with tears.

 

Hasn’t he gone to a better place?

Isn’t the goal of life, to die?

 

Nobody seemed to have shed my father’s tears.

It was the first time I felt really proud to be his son.

 

Why am I not crying? I thought and I thought.

Isn’t a man supposed to be stoic?

I want to shed the pure tears of my father.

I want to share his burden.

 

I didn’t tell this to my parents.

I didn’t want them to lose heart in me.

 

I did tell someone dear.

And cried in her arms,

my purest tears.

A Self Portrait. Iter_1

 

Fig: The dead pixel over yonder serves as a signature.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. That there is a 1016.

On words

My words always surprise me. Perhaps they surprise others even more. I don’t like surprises. Thus it stands to reason that other people would disapprove of them. But then, that somehow doesn’t seem right. A surprise is something unexpected that happens and now you have to deal with it the best way you can. There are people who I have seen go around claiming that “I love surprises”. I however entirely disapprove of surprises. I find comfort in sameness. Or maybe all my words are lies. I don’t really know.

I have had these grand plans forever and I wasn’t actually going to go do anything about them, because well, who ever achieves his dreams? But I guess the idea was to dream recursively and I am I don’t know, not very good at recursing?

In schools there are always these teachers you know, that do not actually look at what you have written but just grade based on how long your answer is. And there were kids who would always find something interesting to write, some would write class gossip, others who would just write the lyrics to songs. And they got marks. And I had always thought that it was because the teacher didn’t pay attention, but then I wondered about the doing the same myself, but I thought there is no way I won’t get caught. Nobody is blind, they would see a word at least when they are marking.

So I never really did all that, I just decided I was going to write longer than anybody else. And there are all these tricks that I didn’t do, like answering the same question twice(what if my total went over 100? I think that is what happens to Hermione’s papers p; ) or repeating phrases to make it look like the answers are longer or something.

I just wrote. And I developed a taste for writing. And I don’t know. Yesterday I sat in mt and read this notebook that I used to write in every once in a while. It covers the periods of 2006 to 2009 mostly. And I can’t really say I have improved over the years. Though there was sometimes a spark of creativity and then there would be an appropriately honest response that I would give to myself of how surprised I was at how good I am. But I don’t know. I try very hard to, but I don’t even trust myself.

The problem with writing is thusly this, all I write seems to be a narrative of some sort. All I think even, is a narrative. So yeah I sometimes try to live the most interesting story. And I do sort of remember thinking that it would be fun to be a five pointer but have more fun than the guys in that book.

But I don’t know how much of reality is real and how much is an illusion. I need a basis. I need a basis to fix truth, at least in my mind. I cannot do it by myself, because I have read too much and all their lies collide destructively. I really really need a harmony.

On fighting

I have observed this phenomena in me. No matter how sad or angry I might be on a given day, when I wake up, I am actually quite happy. And I cannot understand that, why am I happy? what right do I have to claim such a magnificent gift all to myself? So I desperately walked around, willing myself to be angry. Happiness I would tell myself is the bliss of ignorance. A happy man knows nothing. And without knowledge, one cannot comprehend perfection. So I desired for sadness.

I have always been scared of my anger. The first instance was when I was in second class. I never studied in the first class, I found it too easy and skipped to the second. And the second was also very easy, but I got scared, what if I could just skip directly to graduation? I didn’t want that.

My father had been transferred to this tiny little subtown called Kishanganj(meaning the town(?) of Krishna) because apparently Krishna passed through here. And I cannot begin to fathom how you could justify that, people scarcely are aware of where their parents have been and claiming to know for sure that Krishna was here crores of years ago, that is just a way too mighty supposition. So anyways, I was in the second grade in this school called Bal Mandir that was run by some Jain missionaries. We used to sit in this huge hall at lunch and everybody would eat there. Before coming to Bal Mandir I was in a Jesuit Convent when I was a preschooler. And I am somewhat proud of it too. And my high school was also Jesuit, so there is that symmetry in time. And I like things like these.

Anyways I once got into a fight with some guy who was a couple of years my elder and much taller than me. I had seen flicks of Akshay Kumar and Suenil Shetty, so I guess I was aching to give it a try. So I don’t remember what the fight had been about, put he pushed me or something. So I backed and took a running jump aiming for his nose, but see I was tiny and the most lift that I could get was upto his nethers. And I guess that is way more effective than kicking somebody in the face. He collapsed to the ground. It was already time to leave for home, so I dusted my clothes and was figuring what lie I would make to explain my torn shirt. I found a razor blade and made the tear on my pocket larger. And then I had an ink pen I dropped some ink on my shirt. I don’t know what I was trying to accomplish. Maybe I was trying to make it appear to my mother that I had desperately tried and succeeded in taming the beast known as education.  Nothing much happened at the house I think, because I don’t really have a very clear memory of it. What happened the next day, I remember very vividly. My mother and grandfather were in the school and I was called out by the principal and I was explained that the boy I had kicked had not just collapsed but also fainted. I was dismayed. I didn’t intend to hurt him that badly. I was of the opinion that since I was tiny I had not really hurt him much. Never again I swore never again would I hurt people and least of all physically.

My solemn oaths never really amount to much I have noticed. I was in my second year and I got into a fight with this guy called Kshitij, whom we called Bumbay because he wanted to go to IIT bombay but had somehow landed up in IITK. He was also called State-Level because he apparently had played all games at state level competitions when he was in school. He was one of those guys that never really fit in. But now he is married and teaches at this IIT prepschool rather exorbiantly named Resonance, So I guess the jokes on me. And I am only from FIIT-JEE and I don’t quite remember what the F was for. At that time, he was about my size, but somewhat bulkier, I think. Though there were times when I was significantly fatter than him. But anyways, there really wasn’t a reason. We were being goaded by friends who wanted to see if we fought who would win. Guys are always sizing each other up, I don’t get it, I have never won at those arm wrestling games. I once defeated my mother and there was this time when I had to struggle to defeat my brother, so that for me is pretty sufficient information about my strength and I don’t need more. Now normally I don’t pick fights, because well there isn’t a reason really. So anyways I pushed him and he sort of flew into the wall. In my mind I went wow, I am strong. That is all there was to it, I think.

Then there was the rather cs incident. Everyone of my friends know about it. And it is one of those acts I really regret. I was playing counter strike on lan. Earlier we shared the same lan. Not the one like these days where every hostel is its own sublan or something. I don’t really know much about networking. So anyways, I only played cs for one I reason. There is this sniper in the game called awp and there is this gun called the desert eagle. So I liked to do two things. Quick scope with the sniper and then if in trouble swat around with the eagle. Now there is a very pro way of playing the game, where you basically outwit others and listen to their footsteps, you don’t get a crosshair with the awp so some people go on so far as to draw a dot on their screen and shoot automatically. But I am not one for such finesse I think. I would run around oblivious of others most of the time. Pressing q changes to the previous weapon, pressing t would draw a graffiti of your liking. And people witnessing me would laugh I guess. I mean all I ever did was spawn graffiti run while quick switching weapons, draw another grafiti and suddenly bullet in the head. Respawn and repeat. But there were these moments, see when I would be a bit more careful and instinctively snipe. At that point of time, I was pretty sure that there is no greater pleasure in the world than quickscoping somebody from across the map. But it is a very instinctive thing. You right click to aim through the sights and while the sights are appearing you move your mouse across and shoot, and if done right, it is a one hit kill and really enrages people d: 

So anyways I was getting killed and muski and meesum were standing behind me. Making fun of my terrible attempts. And I was actually, I found my sheer incompetence funny myself too. So but I thought I should act a bit strict or something. And I suddenly found myself getting actually frustrated. Now muski senses these things better than meesum, because he generally has a tendency to play with fire and enrage people. If somebody is a communist he would be like yeah fuck communism, soviet union collapsed. And basically variations of these. So when he realized that I am actually getting a temper, he sort of backed off. Meesum on the other hand, either didn’t get it or maybe he wanted to see how far I would go. And I sort of hit him in the face and his glasses fell, and I could see he was disappointed more than anything. And I have been apologizing to him about this forever. And today I think, maybe, just maybe he is sort of enjoying making me squirm. So ha, there, I have seen your game, I am not gonna apologize about this again. But I am pretty sure he would find something else, if only because I apologize at the drop of a hat.

Oh since we are talking about fighting it reminds me of something only tangentially related. I just remembered that I have a yellow belt in the noble korean art of taekwondo. I say taekwondo, but it was mostly about punching the air, as far as I could figure out. I had always wanted to learn a martial art, to which end I wasn’t sure. Now when I was in Kishanganj there was this training school next to mine that taught karate. And there was another when we moved to patna. Maybe they moved with us? I had seen the karate kid, so I was like, yeah you only need to learn how to paint a house and you could be a master of karate. So I was like, meh I could pick this up at anytime. Then we got to IITK and there was this fuck awesome presentation on taekwondo. Nothing is as good in reality as it is in a presentation. There were vids of people practicing it, a teacher talking about how it is the most awesome of all martial arts. So since we had to for since the daily torture of courses and lectures isn’t punishment enough do a compulsory physical activity. And I was incensed, getting to lectures IS the compulsore physical activity that I have to indulge. Standing in a line with 400 other students just so I could eat a couple of rotis that the mess workers throw at us is a cpa. Getting out of bed is a cpa, you know. And why and to what end? I mean I don’t really want to go into body building, my body is pretty fine for the kind of tasks I subject it to. I can walk, I can walk forever. I was in class 5th and I missed my bus and I walked from my school to my home, that is like 10-15 kms and I didn’t even get tired. I didn’t break a sweat, as the phrase goes. And part of the reason is that I walk lost in my thoughts. The more I am struggle, the more I need to strain, the more I think. And it works pretty fine for me. I don’t mind walking at all. I walk at this quasi equilibrium pace, where I recover as much stamina as much as I lose while walking. I don’t mind walking at all. It is anyways the most fun activity that you could do outside the library alone in IITK. Or with friends. In my fourth year, most of my friends who were btech were leaving and we would walk, we would get out of Hall 1 and fucking walk all over the place. I don’t think there is a corner of IITK that I have not seen. I have walked all over the place and I have thought everything. Then the same thing repeats every year. In my fifth year, all my dual degree friends left. And in the period since, almost everybody has left. And come summer I would leave this place. I had never really felt myself really worthy of my degrees. I mean there are mountains of books that I have not read. there is so much that I don’t know. How can I go on to my Doctorate, if I don’t even know what I have laerned? I would lament. And I mean it is all pretty fucking meaningless, if you ask my honest opinion. All that science or philosophy or poetry really is a structure that you build, but there is no guarantee. What ascertains my nobility? I never really found the answer. I was looking in the wrong places.

And then one day, I was walking through the fog and I saw something that made my haert skip a beat. And I knew what I must do next.

On Poverty

Poverty is I realized tonight, a sin of the mind. It is a state of decrepit dereliction. To even dream, it seems at times is a sin. I am still allowed to dream am I not? I ask myself. Sure this is a horrid dystopia I live in, but the earth still revolves no? Yet it is hard to convince myself. That I can be so bold as to actually claim something to be of mine. I cannot yet, in me find the strength of conviction to be be brave as that.

It all begins simply enough. My big dream as a child was to own a playstation of my own. And as far as I can remember, there never really was an occasion, other than this when my parents refused me something. So it shouldn’t matter right? I mean this is no big deal. I have lately realized that it was because I played video games all day long, and they probably feared that if I got a playstation I would never look at a book again. But that has proved rather unfounded isn’t it? I wasted away my degree and for what? FUcking Oblivion. But it was righteously fun, I still dare to complain. Perhaps the person I am most scared of is myself. I don’t know why that is so. A playstation costed like 3k inr in those days and that is almost not even money. I have currently a wee bit more than that in my bank account. And I am easily fucking satisfied. Well I am lazy too, nobody on earth takes half a year to complete his no dues process and still manages to not complete it. It is the human interaction part that explains it. With myself I can behave myself. I sit exactly where I want, exactly as I want. Listen to the same album daily if I am not in an adventurous mood and even eat the same dish daily for months. But I just never really comprehended the dynamics of human behavior. And I have always always pretended to be a good listener. I pretend that so well that I actually listen to what people tell me and I think about it, I have left exam portions unrevised on my bedside and helped people if they have come and talked to me. I on most days, am proud of that too. I help people I tell myself, I am good. No god would dare, I say it out loud, no god would dare to judge me incompetent.

I never really figured out how to ask for something. Like I am a twisted perversion of Oliver Twist, but I never even dare to ask for more. I hardly dare to dream about it. Are we poor I would ask myself. And there are all these numbers and facts and figures that I don’t really remember and I would look at that and think that yes, I am not poor. But it is all in the mind really. The thing that scares me the most is a gift. I had this lighter that pronoy gave it to me. Since it was a gift of a friend, it automatically became for me more important than my life. I carried it everywhere I went. I played with it all the time. It wasn’t very costly but it was one of those lighters you know, that have a flint in them or something, there is a roller and my father used to have a lighter that had a similar mechanism and I played it with once. And at that time I was alone in the room. I must not have been more than 10 years old I think. And that is all. But a couple of days ago, probably yesterday I forgot it outside the library. I never misplace things. It is something I am proud of, that I am aware, where what thing is. And I don’t know, I was in a good mood so initially I didn’t mind it that much. But now.

There is no greater sin than poverty. One learns to love things for what they are. Can’t afford a pet, bring a mangy cur home and care for it. It grows up a bit and you can see that it is restless, rooms in halls aren’t built for the comfort of pets and they are banned too. Really all things that a guy can do that are fun are fucking band. Where is the poetry in that? Am I supposed to go around breaking rules and taking everything? I cannot live like that. I don’t want to live like that. I have never lived like that. I would much rather subsist on the non existent aether than take something that somebody might have some need for on some day. Can I not be free to live this way?

Amit today told me, that the guy who used to run the hall 7 canteen in now employed by the hall 4 canteen owner for like 5k a month. Really. All that we learnt from the west eventually was hostile takeovers. It feels like a slap on the face. The embarrassment of it all. Really, I mean greed. When does need become want become greed? Why do people need to be convinced to be good, I thought as a child. You just are good and if something bad happens you cry. That is all there is to life is there not? And to fight over a piece of number printed on a piece of fucking paper. And the absolute horror is that number is not even as tiny as a mole. And more than that, how do I justify my existence? On what basis should I justify my choices? And where do I run away to now? And can I even escape?

Yet I remember the birds that chirp on my windowsill, the soaring eagle and the laughing crow. There is still hope. Hope it might be is the greatest opiate of the emaciate.