Of Doors & Perception

I dont know how this is relevant to anything, but it just seems too interesting to overlook. 

Though the title for me would originate from Jim Morisson, to him from Aldous Huxley, and to him from William Blake's "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" : - 

"If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern."

Other stuff from there:

• To be shaken out of the ruts of ordinary perception, to be shown for a few timeless hours the outer and inner world, not as they appear to an animal obsessed with survival or to a human being obsessed with words and notions, but as they are apprehended, directly and unconditionally, by Mind at Large— this is an experience of inestimable value to everyone and especially to the intellectual.

• "Is it agreeable?" somebody asked."Neither agreeable nor disagreeable," I answered. "it just is." Istigkeit - wasn't that the word Meister Eckhart liked to use? "Is-ness." The Being of Platonic philosophy - except that Plato seems to have made the enormous, the grotesque mistake of separating Being from becoming and identifying it with the mathematical abstraction of the Idea. He could never, poor fellow, have seen a bunch of flowers shining with their own inner light and all but quivering under the pressure of the significance with which they were charged; could never have perceived that what rose and iris and carnation so intensely signified was nothing more, and nothing less, than what they were - a transience that was yet eternal life, a perpetual perishing that was at the same time pure Being, a bundle of minute, unique particulars in which, by some unspeakable and yet self-evident paradox, was to be seen the divine source of all existence.

• I strongly suspect that most of the great knowers of Suchness paid very little attention to art.... (To a person whose transfigured and transfiguring mind can see the All in every this, the first-rateness or tenth-rateness of even a religious painting will be a matter of the most sovereign indifference.) Art, I suppose, is only for beginners, or else for those resolute dead-enders, who have made up their minds to be content with the ersatz of Suchness, with symbols rather than with what they signify, with the elegantly composed recipe in lieu of actual dinner.
  

• The man who comes back through the Door in the Wall will never be quite the same as the man who went out. He will be wiser but less sure, happier but less self-satisfied, humbler in acknowledging his ignorance yet better equipped to understand the relationship of words to things, of systematic reasoning to the unfathomable mystery which it tries, forever vainly, to comprehend.
  

Confusion - Part I

He waited in confusion,

Lost in his own thoughts.

The details were blurry,

The damn math was all wrong.

 

He waited in confusion,

Perplexed at his ignorance.

He knew not, for what he waited.

He tried not to remember.

 

The children played and shouted outside.

He marveled at their nonchalance.

He wished he were as free,

He wished he didn’t have to wait.

 

Though he continued to wait,

For something, or someone.

Was it a loss of memory,

Or did he not know at all?

 

He waited in confusion,

The truth must be out there.

It had to be found.

Or else he’d drive himself crazy.

 

The anxiety was real,

But he couldn’t fathom a reason.

He pondered for long, very long.

But the answer still eluded him.

 

He waited in confusion,

Wishing this was just a dream.

But he knew it wasn’t, and that this wouldn’t end.

He knew that the wait, was to be perpetual.

 

 

I miss being together.

(To Nupur)

I miss every moment that we shared.

The time we laughed, the time we cared.

When everything was only, happiness and glee.

The time we were joyous, as we could possibly be.

 

It didnt have to end like this.

I dont want it to be this empty abyss.

I love you now, and will continue to.

Our vows i wish, will always hold true.

 

There was a time, when we couldnt be seen apart.

A time when choices, we made from our heart.

Back when we didnt care how people judged us.

A time when we weren't unhappy, thus.

 

If only we could go back to the way we were.

If able to pardon when we both did err.

The world would seem happy, forever again.

Forgetting everything, no loss, no gain.

 

We both made mistakes, i now accept.

We knew we did it, we know we wept.

I miss being together, i miss that life.

Let's end this pain, let's end this strife.

 

We both changed, as time makes you do.

But love shouldnt change, it should hold true.

I'd die for you, i'd kill for you.

Know that, my love, take my cue.

 

Let's go back, to the way we were.

Let this agony never recur.

I know you feel my pain, i know you care.

You care too, for the love we share.

The Walker

The walker goes on his way.
The dreamer, the watcher.
Leaves shrivel and flowers wither,
Under his neverending footsteps.

The walker sees all that is to be seen.
Omnipresent he may appear.
He cares for nobody.
Inciting no joy, only a foreboding fear.

He tramples Mother Earth disdainfully,
As he searches for his destination.
Long has he explored, never to find it.
Ever will he search, all of creation.

The path to freedom is not to be found.
His will begs him to end the trauma,
His refusal is instant, the soul is still incomplete.
Endless will his quest be if it is unfound.

What is it that he hopes to find?
What is that final destination?
It is unlikely that his observers can fathom.
Doubtful still, that he knows for himself.

The walker fears no death, only welcomes it.
For it is that which shall put him out of his misery.
He requires and demands no quiescence,
The road does not end till it is found.

The walker goes on his way.
The dreamer, the watcher.
Unconcerned and perfunctory.
His quest is still incomplete.

I hear the rain again.

I hear the rain again.
Continuous, uninhibited, free.
Your thoughts flood my mind.
I feel the pangs of your memory.

The distance does me no good.
I am enveloped by the longing.
Conversations deceive me not,
I desire your presence for evermore.

I hear the rain again.
Bringing back to me recollections
Of when we were together, and happy.
Real but so unreal.

I feel like a vase, hollow and empty.
I seek you vainly, even memory escapes me.
Why my love, why must it be so.
To rot in this farce of virtual togetherness.

I hear the rain again.
New wishes, new hope.
The strength to break the bonds of this uncertainty.
A new lease of life to this love.

Come back to me,
Even if for a fleeting moment.
Like the rain that falls around me and then disperses.
Permit me this one true wish.

Drifter

Sometimes i feel i just wanna drift
Into the unknown, "uncharted territory"
I am loathed to do the same - again.
That aversion to normalcy, to the ordinary.


“I see myself as a huge fiery comet, a shooting star. Everyone stops, points up and gasps "Oh look at that!" Then- whoosh, and I'm gone...and they'll never see anything like it ever again... and they won't be able to forget me- ever.”

I know what I must do now, I’m finally clear.
I’ve got a lot of people to thank for that. But there’s still a long way to go.
It’s like the feeling I always get the wheel of my car leaving home with thought of the Mumbai-Pune Expressway coming up.

“Minor” setbacks, which seem minor now that I’ve seen suffering of a much greater degree. They seem finally like a hurdle I can jump over – cuz jumping high has never been easy given that I’m slightly on the shorter side. But I can live with that, and I can now be sure that I’ll cross those hurdles/setbacks.

There’s a new feeling inside of me, an uncanny aura around me, which I cannot describe.
“Love cannot save you from your own fate.”

Now I’ve got places to go, people to see. There’s a lot more on the horizon that I can see now, that I didn’t allow myself to see before. Which is weird, considering I’m not really myopic. It all seems brighter now, I can take the setbacks, I can survive them, and slowly overcome them. Life is good again. It’s not the results that matter sometimes, it’s the emotion you have inside of you that counts.

Charles Darwin –
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”

The Fading Light

For those who've read my earlier post (the glorious light ----> HERE )
You'll probably kinda understand this one, if you haven't read it, take a look, maybe it'll help.

This is a poem i wrote quite a while ago, and it seemed appropriate to put it on the blog only after a good deal of time had passed since i had written it. Anyway, for the individual involved....... i hope your Goa trip had never happened, and i wish i hadn't said or done the things that i did/said.

For those not involved with it, just enjoy it, or try to, or atleast act as if you've enjoyed it!

The Fading Light.

To Nupur...

I long for you like I always did,
The distance never did me good.
The light is fading, that glorious light.
I wished I would see you, but I never could.

Time apart you said, would help.
I believed you then, I don’t know why.
The light is fading, that glorious light.
I desire you again, as I look to the sky.

I miss the glory, I miss the jollity.
I tried to forget you, and I failed miserably,
The light is fading, that glorious light.
I can’t live without you, I know now.

I’ts getting darker, it’s hard to think.
Your memory clouds around me, pictures of you everywhere.
I made too many mistakes, I accept.
But the pain is too much, its too much to bear.

I languish in the agony of my loss.
I want you back, I need you back.
The light is fading, that glorious light.
Take my apology, my love, before I crack.

Will you come back to me, will you be mine again.
Forgive me, Rescue me from this plight.
I promise not to err again, I cannot so dare.
The light is fading, that glorious light.

Sarkar Raj

Again, I find myself devoid of the ability to write poetry. I don’t really understand the mechanism behind this, sometimes it just flows, and sometimes it just doesn’t! I don’t really know how to tackle this, but then it’s been quite a while since I posted anything on this blog. This would probably be the next post after the “meme” (pronounced /mi: m/), [or so I’ve been led to believe]. Anyway, back to the point. Since I wasn’t able to conjure up some poetry, I decided to write about the next thing that comes to mind – POLITICS. Yeah I know it seems a little weird to relate poetry with politics, IT IS! I’m not really relating them at all. It all started after I watched SARKAR RAJ. I quite enjoyed the movie, and I spent a lot of time in Pimpri where I was closely related to the political happenings of the place. I saw how politics in India works in real-time. This might not seem like something special or something interesting to many, but take my word for it, IT IS! (I like using caps [;)] )

So when I watched this movie, it brought back a few random thoughts. I had seen the first installment of SARKAR, so I had some clue about how the movie would be. I was surprised. The first one had a lot of action and a bit of politics. This one was all politics. I don’t wish to ruin the suspense for people that haven’t watched it yet (oh but I do, I just have an evil streak – so anyway about half way through the second half, Abhishek Bacchan kicks the bucket). LMFAO. Seriously!

Back to the point, this movie gives a vague idea about how ruthless politics is in India and especially in Maharashtra. A lot of people that will watch the movie will think it’s just glorified. But believe you me, this is almost exactly what really happens. There’s this whole Peshwe vs Maharaz vs Saheb War that goes on, (Vilasrao Deshmukh vs Thakarey vs Sharad Pawar, the nicknames are used in by politically involved people in Pimpri, that’s where I picked it up). Anyway, this movie makes this kinda political intrigue very familiar. It impressed me, irrespective of what the critics might say, I loved it.

Aishwarya Rai – Bacchan (yeah that sounds vague to me too) was really hot. Which is a plus point, Abhishek Bacchan was present (I cant say much better), Amitabh Bacchan is GOD, atleast in the second part of the movie, that old geyser can give any born actor a run for his money even when he’s half asleep or high!

It’s all political intrigue, a well woven plot, its like a goddamn spider-web. Brilliant, but seriously confusing at times. There’s a whole lot of conspiracy, a thrilling mystery movie. But believe me, if you aren’t into Indian politics, or haven’t ever experienced anything remotely close to Maharashtra politics, stay away from this movie, its difficult to relate to! I know I have, so I’ll go ahead and rate this movie 4 outta 5.

The Brand MEME

I was glancing through Mo's blog, and i came across an entry where he'd done this brand meme. At the bottom of that post, i realised he'd tagged me to do a meme myself. From his post
[ HERE ]; it wasn't very difficult to understand what it was. Though there exists a challenge here. Anyway, before i get to that, let me explain briefly what a meme really is. Well the idea behind this, as Mo would put it is "Take any day in your life and chart out all the brands you have used"

I did this, firstly i listed out all the stuff that i use on a normal day, then listed out the brand-names of all those things. Then i set about trying to put this on a blog. This is where the problem happened. If you've taken a look at Mo's blog entry, you'll notice that after the stuff that's written, there's a whole lot of brand images stacked up rather nicely. THIS was particularly hard for me, cuz i dont know how to put images on the blog. There's one solitary image on this blog, i guess you've noticed that. So this was the hard part. Well, anyway i googled a search to find out how to put images on the blog. It listed out the basic method, which i figured would be functional, but wouldn't make my entry as presentable as his. I kept searching for other methods, and it turns out there's various blog websites & all of these have different methods of uploading pictures/images. I finally got rather pissed off and decided to go the old way and just upload them and not worry about how the blog looks after i've published the entry.

So, i dont quite know how this is going to turn out. But, i'm hoping for the best. Alright. Here's the list of brands that i use on a normal day.

Confessions

There's so much to tell, it's difficult to bear,

But i must not say, I cannot so dare.

So many secrets, so much is hidden,

With an urge to speak, my mind is ridden.

It's all a facade, nothing can i reveal,

Why still do my thoughts, so pained feel?

I tried to conceal and tried again.

Still do i feel an aching strain.

To everyone, there are things i hide,

In none can i truthfully confide.

My agony is true, the mask is not.

In silent anguish does my memory rot.

How do i restore, rid myself of the distress.

Is there no way out, other than to confess?

I'm tired, can't take it anymore

Too many secrets, my mind is sore.

The world before me seems anarchic, uncouth.

I cannot sustain this, but I speak not the truth.

I have become like the living dead,

Bear this burden someone, in my stead.

The veracity will be out soon, my wait will end.

I held on this long, soon I will transcend.

I will myself to endure, to ignore the prick.

I’m almost there now, and its happening quick!

Finally my wait is over. It’s all done.

I am victorious, I actually won!

No more secrets, no more confessions.

No more pain, no more questions!

The free mind - and Pimpri!

Sometimes, the mind speaks freely.

A barrage of unrelated thoughts. Complete confusion. But it makes sense. There’s no need to contemplate, there’s no compulsion to decipher, no exigency to analyze. It just makes sense. All I have to do is sit idle and let my mind speak to me.

Different thoughts, different emotions – all at the same time. I don’t letch for enlightenment, I don’t desire intellectual freedom, I just want time to think! Jubilation, joviality, rage, despair, frustration, love, hate etc. all these emotions come freely. I feel like I’m confounded, but, I’m not! I’m thinking more clearly than I’ve done for a long time! It’s never easy to think like that, there’s always something more important, urgent playing on the mind. Always something that solicits more impetus than idleness. So, its rather difficult to bring myself to behave like this, or to think like this! I wish for the license to think freely – which RTO officer to do I have to pay and how much to get that license? [;)]

Pimpri’s done me good. I understand India a lot better than I used to. It’s not what we read about, its not what we think about, its not what we imagine. On the ground, reality struck me hard, struck me across the side of my head. Two things I realized are of utmost importance here, one is money, the other is “contacts”. This side of the world, your intellectual capabilities count as much as your ability to ride a unicycle on a crowded Vallabh Nagar street. Let me not make it sound like Pimpri’s hell on earth, its not, but its close!

Back to the main point – money and contacts. If you have either of the two, you can live comfortably, if you’ve got both, you’re the king! If you have neither, you might as well pack up and take your ass back home cuz you aint surviving here! Let me narrate a story, there was this chick from Mumbai who came to live in Pimpri, she used to prance around the area leaving the hormone-infested jocks with their mouths wide open (sorry for being oh so crude, but it gets the point across). There exist some politically connected guys (ugly, frustrated but moneyed 20 something’s) who’s claim to fame is that they bring their cars and stand around the college in a large group heckling everybody that walks by, getting into fights for no reason at all, smoking, making loud conversations etc (you get the point, you’ve seem them too sometime, somewhere). Well these guys, seem to have their eyes on every new PYT that crosses paths with Pimpri. To this day, not one of them has ever got any attention, but that’s aside from the point. Well as the story goes, this chick used to keep garnering a lot of their attention. One of these cronies decided that she was to be his wife! (ah yes, wife). He attempted to approach her a few times, but nothing ever came of it, still, he was madly in “love”. Time passed, the chick continued to ignore these rowdy behemoths. Now is where the story gets interesting. There comes along this guy from Delhi, nice guy – decent, intelligent etc. The chick’s caught his attention too (like anyone doubted that), but then the difference is, she’s interested too. They meet, they talk, they go out a couple of times. Love is blooming. Until, the ogre finds out. One day there’s a scuffle somewhere around Pimpri, and upon inquiry, I realize that a set of behemoths entered Delhi’s house (hostel room) and beat the living shit out of him, tell him to stay away from ogre’s future wife. And walk away. Nothing more is heard of this, except that Delhi’s got a disfigured face, a broken hand, and several other bruises, apart from the bruised ego!

Delhi decides to fight but then is talked out of it cuz face it, once more, and they’ll just leave ashes! Delhi is distraught. Delhi is from Delhi, knows nobody here, doesn’t have the money to pay the police and get the ogre into trouble, doesn’t know enough people who’ve got the balls to take on the ogre one-to-one. (Oh, the ogre, however large he may be, never fights alone). That’s where the story ends for Delhi.

So, just to test his theory, this guy from Mumbai (all evidence points here) decides to play this trick. He knows this chick is interested in him (time’s passed since Delhi, and Mumbai’s a skirt-chaser), but he’s never really taken an active interest, cuz well, Mumbai’s in love with someone else, but that someone doesn’t live in Pimpri, and wouldn’t know about this trick. Anyway, Mumbai decides to play a game. He, takes the chick out, and just to spite the ogre, Mumbai walks around with the chick, right in front of the ogre and his friends. Now, ogre is fuming. Mumbai’s walked around with her hand-in-hand a few times in front of the ogre. He’s about to burst. Mumbai’s waiting, and waiting. But nothing’s happening. No confrontation, no fight, no beating up, nothing. Mumbai realizes why, his theory’s perfect. Mumbai has for a long time, known a very important person from the Nationalist Congress Party. Mumbai’s well known in the political circuit of Pimpri, Big Don NCP treats Mumbai like a son. Technically, Mumbai has no money, isn’t originally from Pimpri, but suddenly, people are afraid of him. He does as he pleases, and nobody has the guts to do anything about it.

But then, one day, the ogre approaches Mumbai. Suddenly Mumbai becomes aware that if this guy gets physical, Mumbai (who’s rather small build-wise), will perish even before his protectors can come and burn the ogre alive! The ogre approaches, and timidly tells Mumbai “you like this chick don’t you? If you’ve liked her all the time, you should’ve told me, even I liked her, but now that I know you do, I’ll let her go”

Mumbai sniggers. His theory is proven. He’s understood how this place works. Poor Delhi. Mumbai’s no more interested in the chick. He leaves her and goes back to his girl. Everyone’s bewildered, the ogre, the chick, Delhi, everyone. Except Mumbai. He’s just been enlightened!

college sodun jaatana

Yeah, i know that a blog usually has stuff that you write yourself, but this one's by a friend of mine. He's been attempting poetry for a while now, he tried and failed......and finally decided to write in 'marathi' because he believed that would help him write something decent.

It did. He's written this one! It's basically a retrospective poem about college life. I notice that he's as bitter about pimpri as I am. 4 years here has been more than enough. Kept hoping it would end soon, but now that it's ending, im getting reminiscent about the "good old times". Wonder why this happens everytime. Anyway take a look at the poem. Oh BTW, you wont get it unless you understand marathi!



COLLEGE SODUN JAATANA

घरापासून दूरवर आलो मी ह्या पुण्यनगरीत
उत्साह, भिती, थ्रिल, ... भावनांचे मनात झाले भरित

चार वर्षे एकट्याने राहायचे
शिक्षण घेऊन स्वतंत्र व्हायचे
असे ते दिवस फ़ुलायाचे
आयुष्याचे स्वप्न सजवायचे

आई वडीलांचे लक्ष नसणार
केव्हाही झोपणार, उठणार, कसाही वागणार
दिवसभर टवाळ्क्या, मस्ती करणार
वेळ उरलाचं तर लेक्चर attend करणार

चारही वर्षांचा दिनक्रम ठरलेला
प्रत्येक दिवस timepass ने खच्चुन भरलेला
खाणं, पिणं, मौज-मजा
प्रत्येक दिवसाचा मीच राजा

खुप वाट पाहीली परंतु प्रेमप्रकरण झालेच नाही
एखादी जरी आवडली तरी कधी तिला विचारलंच नाही
एखादी सुंदर मुलगी यायची माझ्या स्वप्नी
पण माझा नंबर लागलाच नाही ती व्हायची माझी वहिनी

अधुनमधून परिक्षेचा राहु पत्रिकेत करायचा भ्रमण
अभ्यास करताना वाटायचे कधी सुटणार हे ग्रहण
दिवसभर लेक्चर, प्राक्टिकल, आणि जरनल submission
syllabus पाहून चक्कर येते आणि मास्तर देतो tension
xerox, नोट्स याशिवाय topper चा ठेवायचा मान
एवढं सगळं करुनसुद्धा मार्क मिळाले नाहीत छान
चा दिवस जवळ येतो तसं सुचतं मला अध्यात्म
'यह सब मोह-माया है' म्हणुन येतं मला वैराग्यं

college life चे धुंद दिवस लळा लावून गेले निघुन
पण जाता जाता देऊन गेले सुख दु:ख दोन्ही भरभरुन

सुख त्यांच्या आठवणीचे, दु:ख त्यांच्या जाण्याचे
आता फ़क्त कापत राहायचे अंतर जन्म आणि मरणाचे

कॉलेजमधले मित्र-मैत्रिणी, शिक्षक आणि इतर सोबती
आता यापुढे एकटयानेच चालायचंय, कोणीच नसणार अवतीभवती

चार वर्षांचं हे माझं जग कालचक्रात विरघळून गेलं
काहीच शिल्लक ठेवलं नाही सारं काही हिरावून नेलं

मित्रांची टिंगल, मुलींची छेड, मुक्त जीवन आणि दुनियादारी
आता ह्यातलं काहीच नाही आता फ़क्त - जबाबदारी

कॉलेजमधली चार वर्षं गेली हवेत विरुन
college life ची शेवटची रात्र गेली ह्र्दय चिरुन

माझ्या या कवितेत कदाचित वाटणार नाही तुम्हाला तथ्य
पण जेव्हा कॉलेज सोडुन जाल ना; तेव्हा जाणवेल ह्यातलं सत्य

By Nikhil (YEDA) Nazirkar.

Meatloaf

For quite a while, i've been a really big fan of the rock&roll group - MEATLOAF. I like quite a few of their songs. Apart from the music, which is obviously their USP, the lyrics are really something. Its not a very well known group, they've had quite a following, but kinda faded out of the groove a few years back. The music never looses its touch though. The band itself consists of their lead singer - Marvin Lee Aday (a.k.a. Meatloaf). The music has always had that 80's groove to it. The rock and roll feel. Though, Meatloaf prefers to call it "wagnerian rock" or "progressive rock", its not far from good old vintage rock.

The noteworthy thing is the lyrics like i said before. The lyrics are actually written by a 'Jim Steinman'. Why i speak of this guy is, the lyrics are original and quite impressive. They have that whole "sex, drugs, rock&roll" thing going for them. But what differentiates their music from their other contemporary groups is their affinity towards Harleys for one, and the whole inclination towards dark and gothic lyrics. Quite a few of their songs discuss themes like these. Meat Loaf or the songwriter Steinman seem to be totally taken with bats - which is why all their albums are name Bat out of Hell! Every song has something about Harleys, the sound of a revving Hog especially. Harleys are mentioned in almost every song. Another important thing about their songs is the whole REBELLIOUS streak. Its one of the reasons their songs have always appealed to me. A lot of rebellion and a lot of gothic defeatism is evident in the songs.

I personally suggest everyone reading this blog try out a few of their songs. They should be available on P2P, but considering its not that famous a group, you might have to search around a bit. The older albums - Bat out of Hell I and II have some of my favorite songs, though the latest album isnt bad either. I'll go ahead and list a few of my favorite Meat Loaf songs so as to make it a little easier:

1) Bat out of Hell - rocking, dark!
2) Objects in the rear view mirror - just unbelievable
3) Rock & Roll dreams
4) I would do anything for love
5) Paradise by the dashboard light

& my personal favorite
6) wasted youth (a.k.a - everything louder than everything else)



This blog entry is a whole lot different than the others i've been posting all this while, but i felt it worth to mention Meat Loaf. If there's any other fans that are reading this....Cheers! and if i'm able to create some more meatloaf fans thanks to this...Cheers!

Just try to understand the lyrics of the songs...especially wasted youth. Then you'll know what i've been talking about. Songs like those make me a little happier cuz it helps me understand that other people think the way I do. Steinman is awesome - HAIL! As is Meat Loaf himself - HAIL you too!

An excerpt from the lyrics of wasted youth!

They got a file on me and it's a mile long and they say that they got all of the proof,
that I'm just another case of arrested development and just another wasted youth
They say that I'm in need of some radical discipline, they say I gotta face the truth,
that I'm just another case of arrested development and just another wasted youth

They say I'm wild and I'm reckless
I should be acting my age
I'm an impressionable child in a tumultuous world,
and they say I'm at a difficult stage

But it seems to me to the contrary, of all the crap they're going to put on the page,
that a wasted youth is better by far than a wise and productive old age!
A wasted youth is better by far than a wise and productive old age!


ROCK ON!

http://www.meatloaf.net/

Death in Teheran

Once a rich & mighty Persian walked in his garden with one of his servants. The servant cried that he had just encountered Death, who had threatened him. He begged his master to give him the fastest horse so that he could make haste and flee to Teheran the same evening. The master consented & the servant galloped off on the horse. On returning home, the master himself encountered Death & questioned him "Why did you terrify and threaten my servant?". Death replied "I did not threaten him, I only showed surprise in still finding him here when I planned to meet him tonight in Teheran".

Intense Thoughtlessness

The Explorer or wannabe explorer of the unknown.
The soul of a searcher. The spirit of a non-believer.
Dreams of grandeur, a pursuance of epiphany.
Oh by epiphany i mean (a sudden, intuitive
perception of or insight into the reality or
essential meaning of something).

Through an unfriendly world, i drift;
through the sands of time, i sift.

Explorer, discoverer, inventor, protector,
destroyer, lover, hater. What am I?

A hole in my soul, the empty place;
Dark and revolting, see it on my face.

Existentialism:- To live is to suffer, to
survive is to find meaning in the suffering. If there
is a purpose to life at all, there must be a purpose
in suffering and dying.

Nietzsche:- "He who has a WHY to live,
can bear with almost any HOW".

Learn to bow to your master!
I don't respect authority, false authority.
Never have, never will.
Attitude? Yes I have plenty.
Ego? Uh uh got enough of that too.

Vagabond? More like gypsy or nomad.
Rock and Roll Dreams, we know what those are made of.
Is this gibberish? Then quit reading.

Touche my dear
Love struck? Maybe? Hell no.
Bandit, dacoit, thief? No.
Quit wondering, do you even care?

Love struck? Maybe? Hell no.
Skirt chaser? Yeah, always.
But I always go back to HER.
Who's HER? I don't think you care.

Discount the bling,
I ain't into hip-hop.
I'm not old-fashioned, I just think hip-hop is crap.
Pure vintage rocker, now that, I am!
Elvis impersonator? More like Elvis invoker.

Sports fanatic? Soccer, cricket etc.
Yeah, I'm one of them.
Die-hard Gunner, This time we will win!

Intelligent? Maybe.
Deranged? Maybe not.
Derailed but profound. Hell yeah.

A perquisition for inner freedom, personal value.
Independence, personal and social. I live for that.
Learn to bow to your master! F**k off!
Avaricious? a little, yeah!

Poet? Writer? More like wannabe.
I attempt. Try, Try again;
till someone smacks you in the side of the head!
Businessman? too rapacious for my own good.
Predatory? Hope to be.

Enough about me, lets talk about you.
Hell i don't give a shit.
Lets end it like that!

Glorious Light

To Nupur....

The moon, it shines bright
brighter than all else; tonight.
Everyone looks up, looks around.
The glorious light, is everywhere.

Not I, for I look elsewhere.
I look to you, only, my love.
Your face, brighter than full moon.
The stars twinkling, in the midst of your eyes.
The glorious light, is everywhere.

My desert spring, my oasis;
bring warmth in the cold ice, of my life
make bright, my dark eternity.
I blink, to see you through closed eyes.
The glorious light, is everywhere.

Soar above that which is wrong,
your innocence must not be broken.
To sing, I want, to you;
you make me want to feel, want to belong.

Your spirit completes me; my cloud of happiness,
I lose myself to the light, the light of your soul.
You become a part of me, integral, vital.
Might i see the world through your starry eyes.

Your touch, the mist of winter morning;
your voice, intoxicating but pure.
The taste of your lips, is nectar.
Turn my night into day.
The glorious light, is everywhere.

The Pune Misal pav tour.....by motocycle

The Pune Misal pav tour.....by motocycle

This one's courtesy a friend of mine who goes by the name "kadakpav". Before you wonder why anyone would be called that, id like to take your attention away from that cuz its a story you just wouldnt be able to relate to. The matter of interest being Misal. Personally i've always been a fan of misal. Though i've been living in mumbai most of my life and face it, people from mumbai know little about ancient marathi culinary traditions, i had a few trysts with misal during my time there. Now pune, thats a place which i believe can be heralded as the global misal capital.

Now, if you don't know what misal is, dont bother to read further, cuz i aint gonna be able to explain. A gourmet delight if i may say so myself. I wouldnt call myself a perfect gourmet or gastronome, but lets just say i have a colossal appetite. Ah, i drift into obscurity again. I must pay attention to relevance. Alright, the misal tour. Well, ever since my first few days in Pune, i noticed that every restaurant served misal here. Everywhere i ate it, it was different. I was intrigued. So after a few months of misal hunting, i finally opted to take professional help. Kadakpav, (its awkward, but lets just call him that) is what we call an "assal puneri". What that means, is that he really doesn't know that a world exists outside Pune, but then he does for that matter know everything there is to know about Pune. So, i went to him and said, "kadak, mereko pune ka best misal khaneka hai". At first, he was shocked that i hadn't eaten it yet, but then i told him i was from mumbai. After cursing the ignorance of "us city boys", ( i always believed pune was a city in its own right); he nevertheless agreed to take me to eat good misal. The best misal he said, was decided from person to person, apparently there were several kinds of misal, and different people had affinities to different kinds of misal. I was rather abashed at this point in time but i decided to humor him. He said he would take me to a few misal outlets ( i was later to find out that all these were to be visited on the same day); and that i would later decide for myself what the best misal was.

So it began, Kadak and I, on the greatest journey i had ever undertaken (im not kidding, i really dont get out much). We were to traverse the length and breadth of Pune, and visit the oldest and most famous misal outlets around. This was just after i had read Che Guevara's Motorcycle Diaries, so i felt like drawing parallels. Except that Che and his friend drove a 500cc la pederosa where we drove a rickitty old Bajaj Electric in which the back-seat didnt have a cushion, meaning only that I would end up unable to sit for nearly 4 hours after getting home. Also Che and his friend traversed the entire continent of South America where we were just travelling through tiny, crowded and smelly roads of interior Pune.

Anyhow, it started early. We left in the morning, travelling through roads i never knew vehicles could go through and reached a small dirty shack run by an ill-tempered "kaka" (interesting how all such shacks in Pune are run by ill-tempered kakas). Kadak told me this was the premier misal outlet in Pune and that the owner (kaka) started out as a refugee out of Kolhapur. What i was fed there was nothing short of what old wives would call pickle. 20 minutes and a liter of icy cold water later, i still felt like my mouth had been lit on fire (oh i know what that feels like literally also). We then began our journey towards another shack named Bedekar somewhere on an intersection of a certain Laxmi road. Each road thinner than the next, each intersection about half the width of the road itself. Bedekar apparently was typically puneri, and therefore made sweet misal. Also importantly, it served its misal with "slice" bread. When i inquired, it turned out that original misal always comes with "slice", and that the misal pav that we know of, is just a hybrid. That i believe most of us didnt know. Anyway Bedekar Misal kendra was also run by an ill-tempered kaka who was out buying provisions and hence had left "kaku" in charge. It wasnt a respite, "kaku" had a shorter fuse than the earlier kaka i had encountered and almost slashed at me when i asked for the customary "sample" which is supposed to come free. Well, Bedekar misal was rather sweet, and i ended up feeling like i would end up with diabetes before i finished what was on my plate. We left soon thankfully.

By now i was rather full, but kadak had only gained in enthusiasm. He seemed willing to take me all the way to "karad" where he said one could obtain the best misal in the world (like i said, the world to kadakpav didnt surpass pimpri-chinchwad). But we finally decided that he would take me to a place which served the best hybrid misal. Oh there's 2 types of misal. One would be home-made misal, which these 2 places served, and the other would be hybrid misal, which was changed to suit a range of tastes. Kadak seemed decidedly adamant that anyone who likes hybrid misal isnt really a misal lover. I said i didnt care, so he took me to a place on the famed JM road, which he believed served the best hybrid misal. By this point, I wasnt really able to tell the subtle differences but i was actually starting to enjoy myself. The hybrid misal wasnt much to talk about and i decided that he was actually correct in noting that hybrid misal isnt as good as home-made misal.

Kadak now offered to take me to his favorite misal joint, which he said was in a place called kothrud where the crux of the population is "assal puneri". This, believe me, was a long way off from where we'd started. Anyway we head off into the direction of kothrud. The bike we drove on was caught by a neighborhood “mama” (its funny how everyone around seems to be in some way related to you) or police officer atleast 3 times in the process of getting there. This was basically because, in puneri style, kadakpav believes following traffic rules is stupid. Also, kadak didn’t have the necessary papers for our bike or rather relic. When we finally got there, there was a line in front of the place, a line that extended almost till the end of the road. I was intrigued that people would really be willing to wait in line for a misal outlet. After waiting for nearly 30 minutes, we entered a shack that could fit about 10 people including the cook, manager and waiter (all these roles were played solely by kaka), the misal was pretty much the same thing I’d eaten 3 times already, but kadak seemed to relish every morsel. He ate 3 plates after which kaka said he’d run out and just couldn’t make more. The reaction of the people who’d been waiting in the line behind us was almost comical.

After all this, and a 60 minute bike ride in the chilly pune winter, I was duly dropped home. Kadakpav left me saying “Have a good twilight”. It took me nearly 2 days to decipher what he meant, only to realize that he’d been reading the GRE wordlist and found that twilight was a time just before sun-down (he’d dropped me off at 6 p.m.). In retrospect, I felt a lot better for the journey. An experience that would change my life forever (like I said I don’t get out much). I had just traveled through unknown lands eating unknown food, or rather the same food at different places. I had realized that any bystander on the street can be referred to as one’s relative, that one who follows traffic rules in pune is a retard, and that going on misal tours can leave you bedridden with gastric infections for almost a week.

Am I an atheist or am I agnostic?

Take a look at this.

http://www.realtruth.org/articles/070601-006-teog.html?cid=g1193&s_kwcid=ContentNetwork|1167384521&gclid=CNLJieKr-5ACFRU3egod3BtgsQ

What does revolution mean to contemporary India!

Ill try to make this as short as I possibly can. The subject I’m trying to discuss here is Revolution. To a lot of the readers, this might seem a particularly vague topic to discuss; this is mainly because when we think of revolutions, we think of history, basically what we learnt from our history books. So naturally, we would tend to dismiss this thinking it’s just a matter of past. Is this necessarily true? Did the people that revolutionized the common world as we know it today dismiss it at the time thinking the same thing?

If you’ve finally agreed to grasp the idea, you’d tend to ask why I’m bring this up right now in the first place. There’s a solid reason behind this. I’m an Indian, for a long time I was really proud to be, that’s not to say that I’m not now, but when I look around me today, my mind tends to raise a lot of questions about freedom. The dictionary defines the word ‘revolution’ as an overthrow or repudiation and the thorough replacement of an established government or political system by the people governed. Is this the point I’m trying to construct? In some form atleast.

India is changing. It’s been changing for a long time now. Sometimes for the better, sometimes not so much. One of the major changes has been the change in the Indian government over the years since independence. At the time of independence, wise leaders put forth a constitution that would in coming years form a perspective, based on which future India would command itself. They were bright, knowledgeable men who risked their lives to give us freedom. To give us the right to live by our own rules. Is this the way they wanted it to turn out? They wanted their descendants to live with freedom. Yes, freedom. Freedom to express our feelings, freedom against discrimination. I look around myself and see that is not really happened. Has it? Social, economic and religious discrimination has become commonplace in our country today.

Several brave men gave their lives for our freedom. We should be proud in reminiscence. A great revolutionary once said, “how can I feel nostalgia for a world I never knew?”. This applies to me as it seems to be. How can I feel proud of their accomplishments, considering I haven’t really been able to experience the fruits of their labor? They wanted me to live in a free India, a place where freedom meant something; where freedom meant you never had to live in fear. Fear, that brings us to another topic altogether. As common men in a country over-run by swashbuckling, power-wielding politicians, do we not feel a sense of uncontrollable fear? An administration that runs itself on whims and fancies of unaccountable leaders who continue to cause distress among the already burdened bourgeoisie, so that they can experience comforts that we can’t even dream of? A judiciary that tries as much as it can to keep the control going, but at some time will crumble at our feet to yield a state of anarchy.

The police are mere puppets, or rather more like a set of rampant tyrants, who hold the law in their own hands and more often than not, twist it to their own advantage. They tend to get auctioned off to the largest bidder. Traffic is controlled by a set of incompetent, largely unhealthy officers who very often create more trouble than there already is. We’ve all experienced this sometime in our lives haven’t we? But we know enough about police misconduct for me to continue on these lines.

The lawmakers themselves tend to make laws based on their own benefit. The reservations law for example. The law was brought about among widespread public agitation against it. So much for freedom of speech. Police brutality against those who tried to speak against the law, also speaks volumes about the way this was conducted. When the reservations were initially brought forward by an insightful Ambedkar, he wished them to uplift the ailing lower castes, to bring them to a respectable social level, wherein they could stand toe-to-toe with other better endowed classes of the society. It was to be run for a short frame of time. This didn’t happen. It continues rampantly today, and we see that upper-caste individuals, no matter how economically depressed, no matter how intellectually gifted, are pushed back by less deserving candidates who just wield lower-caste certificates. Is that what we’ve been brought to? A world where people justify educational qualifications by supplying a complementary caste-certificate?

Isn’t that the total opposite of what Ambedkar would have wanted? To justify his claim for increased reservations (to reserve nearly 75% of seats in all educational institutions for the socially repressed), Arjun Singh went on to state that according to a census taken sometime in the past, nearly 80% of India’s population belonged to the OBC (other backward classes) tag. Let me calculate, so according to that, wouldn’t that make us so-called Brahmins the minority? And aren’t the minority supposed to given reservations so that they can improve economic and social standing?

A lot of questions. How can these be answered? By a revolution? Are we rebellious, mutinous, revolutionary? Che Guevara, who most of you must know, once said “What is a revolution without guns?” Is this necessarily true? To note a point from history, the erstwhile Aztec civilization of the valley of Mexico were free set of people who lived by their own rules. They lived in solitude, in peace. Their arts, crafts, agriculture flourished and they lived comfortably amongst their own. Until though the gun-wielding Spanish conquistadors turned up. Led by Hernan Cortez, these conquistadors totally decimated a race of people that did not much know of wars and battle. This may be unrelated to the topic being discussed but it holds some importance to the argument I’m trying to make.

When we think of a revolution in India, we think of the non-violent independence struggle of India, but do we tend to forget the thousands of armed rebels who played their part in bringing about independence? Or do we just remember the parts our history books told us about? Yes, changing of history books, another point I’m not really willing to discuss at the moment, but one of utmost importance in today’s argument.

What do we do to fight injustice against us in our own country? A country where we were meant to live with freedom. Is a revolution the answer? Another question I don’t know how to answer! The world is changing, will we continue to let us be left behind? A revolution? Against whom? The lot that run our country? Who are they, aren’t they really commonplace Indians just like you and me? Do we continue to live with the injustice saying “jaane de, you can’t fight the system”. Everyone’s heard that at some point in their lives, haven’t they?

The latitudes of silence. Silence speaks a thousand words say wise men, pity I can’t figure out what it’s saying!

As the wind blows.....

The leaves begin to rustle.
Like a restless old rodent,
awaiting his impending end.
The winds of change doth deliver,
thus a message across the land.

The twitching continues,
as eternity blinks,
a storm, or just a warning.
could it be a storm?

Bodies begin to scamper,
as thoughts begin to change.
To some, it brings reminiscence;
where to some, a premonition.

Consciousness wavers, tensions build.
Prayers ring the air.
Do the winds carry them to the Listener?

"Protect us, let it not happen"
Would nature stop in its tracks to save us? Why?

The winds die down,
anxiety gives way to rejoice.
Must we thank the Listener now.
"He saved us, stopped the storm."
Had the storm been stopped,
or was it just a passing breeze?

I lost my battle with reality

What? "a rational derangement of all the senses"
Why? "To achieve the unknown"
How? "Any way possible"

I do not claim that these thoughts are my own, I claim only that they reside in my mind!

"There are things that are known, and things that are unknown, in between are the doors." - JIM

"The roads of excess lead to the palace of wisdom"

To go all the way, or to die trying. Driven by an unrelenting need to test the bounds of reality, to probe the sacred, to explore the profane.
All or nothing, the ecstatic risk!

Cut to modernity.
Something inside you shifts, the unholy terror. "No one here gets out alive" -- Heard that in a song called "five to one"
Confronting the end, eternity moves ever so slightly.

Aristotle - "Mystery festivals should be unforgettable events, casting their shadow over the whole of one's future life, creating experiences that transform existence"

Nietzsche, Van Gogh, Rimbaud, Baudelaire, Poe, Blake, Artaud, Cocteau, Nijinsky, Byron, Coleridge, Dylan Thomas, Brendan Behan, Jack Derouac & finally Jim Morisson.
------ the ones who felt life too intensely to bear living it, the mad ones, the doomed ones. Writers, poets, painters, artists stubbornly resistant to authority, and insistent on being loyal to their true nature at any cost.
---- D. Sugerman.
Salutations!