Crush crush crush

Oh man,
That smile so divine
It lights my dark world
Like a million Christmas lights
The world, full of lilacs and daisies
Would you mind
Holding my frail self
In your sure and strong arms,
In am embrace so warm,
I could forget it all.
Would you mind gracing me
With that penetrating look,
With those soulful eyes, so merry,
So bright, filled with life
Oh! I could just pee my pants
Throw me off guard, just once more,
Like you always do!
Why, oh why? Do I get all shy
Every time you look my way?
The inches between you and I
Are enough
To light my pathetic heart on fire!
Would you, Oh my love,
Lend me a small portion of your pretty heart
For keeps?
'Tis all I ask!
How do you do that?
Every time you cross my mind
How can I love you more
Than I already do?
It ain't possible!
Not ever!
But you make it happen.
My incarnation of a Greek God!
Where are you from, if I may ask,
So pure, So ethereal,
You ain't one of us mortals.
Come down to earth, from the stars
Pull me out of this mess.
Be mine.
Only mine....

Dear Mr Corrupt Politician

"Where the mind is without fear, and the head is held high..."


I watched you on the news, making those protracted, dashing and awe-inspiring speeches, sweeping the entire nation off its feet. You spoke with such conviction that, for a second I believed that nobody else but you could be our ambassador for the India of my dreams. I felt proud. I felt proud that the country is led by individuals like yourself. Leaders who would so willingly give up on food and water, walk for miles over to campaign, not for votes, but for the better cause.

Dear Mr Corrupt Politician, I thank you for the privileges you bestowed upon me. I wake up every morning, a free mind, with an identity of my own. An identity which is testimony to the fact that I live in a free country, and that I chose you as my leader. It is perfectly justified that you demand to eat up half of my salary every month, a mere Rs 10,000 on which my entire family is dependent. It is but a small price for all the selfless services you render. Your 100*100 mansion needs to be maintained, understandable. The dozen attendants, whose job is to clean the water in your swimming pools need to be paid. After all, clean water in your pools is just as essential as the water supply to the poor. To my 20*30 mansion, the government supplies water once in two days. I store it and use it as little as I can. But I pay a bill that I cannot afford on my meager pay, while you enjoy the water to your swimming pools for free. You without doubt, deserve it more than I do. 

It is completely justified that you need to travel by a BMW to meet you colleagues for a party over drinks for a victory you obtained fair and square, and in a stretch limo to a house meeting in the parliament . It is definitely a matter of prestige you see.. How demeaning wouldn't it be if you went instead, in a Mercedes Benz? After all, you presented one to you fifteen year old son who made it through his tenth boards due to the grace of his highly qualified teachers who were so overcome with respect towards your great self that your son's grades were but a minor favor towards you.

"Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken down into fragments 

By narrow domestic walls "

Mr Corrupt Politician, not the tens of kilograms of jewelry you present your wife with, not the crores of rupees that stock up abroad in unnamed bank accounts, that rightfully belong to the citizens, not the mines you so legally dig up, none of these things offends me. I in turn, am so filled with pride that you are a man of principles, a man of righteousness. So full of courage that when your mansion is raided, you very conveniently hide in your farmhouse, the land for which was, of course, obtained by unsolicited means.

It isn't right at all that you are called corrupt. You sir, are in fact my personal satan on earth. Should there be a reason in the near future that may see me hanging from the only ceiling fan at my little home, it is you. I will never stop fighting for what is rightfully mine. It burns my entrails watching your wife dressed in a pure gold embroidered saree, the worth of which may be nothing less than my annual pay. I could educate my son with that, you know.

"Where words come out from the depth of truth

where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

into the dreary desert sand of dead habit..."

With what conscience do you don the Gandhi attire so proudly? With what guts do you blame the education system when your extent of literacy are the thumb impressions in place of your signature? I am now beginning to question the very status of India as a free nation. Are we truly free in the true sense of it! You preach democracy like you are its messiah, its Jesus of goodwill. You tell me its my birth right, you tell me I am entitled to make my voice heard, while do not care to listen to it yourself. You narrow-minded wench! Do you not have any qualms over what you are doing? The crores you spend getting your posters printed and hung over bill boards and on getting votes, just so that you can make a few hundred crores more. God complex is something that exists with surgeons. But its is valid to a certain degree. What makes you feel it? The hollow power you think you wield, Mr Corrupt Politician?

I dream of an India where my children will be educated to take the country forward, and not hinder its progress.Where corruption is removed from the very roots. Where there are no ulterior motives behind good deeds. I dream of a fearless India, with no illusions about itself. I dream of an India truly by the people, of the people and for the people. I dream of that India that the likes of Rabindranath Tagore dreamed of.

"Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake...."

You know you're an engineering student when:

• You have no life - and you can PROVE it mathematically.
• You enjoy pain.
• You know vector calculus but you can't remember how to do long division.
• You chuckle whenever anyone says "centrifugal force".
• You've actually used every single function on your graphing calculator.
• It is sunny and 70 degrees outside, and you are working on a computer.
• You frequently whistle the theme song to "MacGyver".
• You know how to integrate a chicken and can take the derivative of water.
• You think in "math".
• You've calculated that the World Series actually diverges.
• You hesitate to look at something because you don't want to break down its wave function.
• You have a pet named after a scientist.
• You laugh at jokes about mathematicians.
• The Humane society has you arrested because you actually performed the Schrodinger's Cat experiment.
• You can translate English into Binary.
• You can't remember what's behind the door in the engineering building which says "Exit".
• You have to bring a jacket with you, in the middle of summer, because there's a wind-chill factor in the lab.
• You are completely addicted to caffeine.
• You avoid doing anything because you don't want to contribute to the eventual heat-death of the universe.
• You consider ANY non-engineering course "easy".
• The "fun" center of your brain has deteriorated from lack of use.
• When your professor asks you where your homework is, you claim to have accidentally determined its momentum so precisely, that according to Heisenberg it could be anywhere in the universe.
• You'll assume that a "horse" is a "sphere" in order to make the math easier.
• The blinking 12:00 on someone's VCR draws you in like a tractor beam to fix it.
• You bring a computer manual / technical journal as vacation reading.
• The salesperson at Circuit City can't answer any of your questions.
• You can't help eavesdropping in computer stores... and correcting the salesperson.
• You're in line for the guillotine... it stops working properly... and you offer to fix it.
• You go on the rides at Disneyland and sit backwards to see how they do the special effects.
• You have any "Dilbert" comics displayed in your work area.
• You have a habit of destroying things in order to see how they work.
• You have never backed up your hard drive.
• You haven't bought any new underwear or socks for yourself since you got married.
• You spent more on your calculator than on your wedding ring.
• You think that when people around you yawn, it's because they didn't get enough sleep.
• You would rather get more dots per inch than miles per gallon
• You've ever calculated how much you make per second.
• Your favorite James Bond character is "Q," the guy who makes the gadgets.
• You understood more than five of these jokes.
• You make a copy of this list, and post it on your door (or your home page !)

The Undead

I see the faceless figures, or do I?
The demons of the dark as they pass by
Circling over my head high
Showing the promise of death, a mere lie.

The sound of the reaper's scythe
Bearing down on my kin and kith,
The chill on my spine dancing down, so lithe!
The fog clouding my vision like a dark myth.

Unable to move, unable to stay,
The eternal horror, under death's sway,
Looking for a way out as my senses fray,
Out of the unending nightmare, from the dark foray.

Away from the corpses' stare of dismay,
Out of the land of the undead, where dreams they slay.
"you will find none, none at all!," they say,
"for your sins, this price you pay".

The chant of the undead, like the wail of a child
Abandoned by its loveless mother with shameless guile
Hit me like the night chill, coming from a mile,
So gripping, so heart wrenching, yet so mild!

I tried to run towards, and away from it.
I tried to scream as the spirits, so mirthless, closed in,
I tried to pray, to purge my soul from within,
I tried in vain, for a redemption I wasn't meant to win.

I began to feel it. The eerie emptiness inside,
The hollow numbness, without emotions contrite,
When death's weapon finally bore down on me, with a promise of respite.
And thus began the setting in of an eternal night.

They welcomed me with open arms, the spirits of the dark,
As if I were one of their own, as if it were all a mere lark,
To the land of the bedevilled, of anguish so black,
To the land of the Undead, of evil so stark.

I watched on helplessly, as the darkness engulfed me whole...

First Semester: A Reminiscence

"Sugar, Spice, and most things nice...."

And of course, an entire can of chemical 'X'!
Everybody has their expectations of a perfect first day in college. I did too, way back when I was still in school. But the vacations in between had treated me badly, so by the time my first day in college did turn up, I was all exhausted of emotions, and a kind of numbness had crept over me. The fact that I was starting ten days late didn't help me much either. But who knew that luck had finally decided to smile over me? And that I would actually have a memorable first day! My first trip to the canteen, a bunch of scary looking final year guys ragging me, turning up late to chem lab, then feeling like a know it all while doing titrations, judging people at first right and later regretting it, my very first bus ride back home: wishing more than anything else to be a part of the conversation... Ahh!

Over a week went by without my talking to anyone in class. I sat next to my one friend, feeling utterly miserable, so full of self pity at what I wanted out of life and what I made out of it. It is no secret is that on my list of careers, Engineering didn't figure. I did not want to make friends. Did not want to relate to the place, did not want to belong. I just wanted to get through with these four years without much ado. But lady luck had already decided to show me her pretty face. I made some great friends!

Then came Parichay, the college fest. It is without doubt one of the best things that has happened in my college life so far! For more than ten reasons! Even now, after all this time, when I listen to the song 'hai junoon', it makes me smile, and the feeling rushes back, making me weak with nostalgia. We won you see... All those practice sessions, the frenzy, the bunking classes(which felt so scandalous at that time!)... God I miss them so! And the icing on the cake was the unforgettable bus ride back home!

VTU fest wasn't any less eventful! The journey more so. Getting to know our seniors better, the going prepared to stay overnight part, TITANIC! =D

My priorities were so different when the semester started, I was so set on making it through the year without much of a scene. But nothing really turns out the way you want it, does it? Exams came and went, pimples sprouted on my face like onion bulbs, and I found myself amazed at how quickly time passes when you're having a good time! When I say my college life started with a bang, know that I'm not exaggerating.

I had deemed myself incapable of romantic feelings, but ended up proving myself wrong. So very wrong!! Suddenly I found myself in the midst of these incarnations of Adonises, one could say there were a lot of fish in the pond to put it delicately. It is very safe to say those romantic feelings I had deemed myself incapable, of had defined my semester.

Second semester is whole different story! But more on that later...=D

First Day at Mechanical Workshop

Well, actually my second, but the first one doesn't really count. And don't expect some impressive or impeccable English out of this post because first, this post is long overdue, and second, I'm kinda high right now. So forgive me if you thought this will be a thought provoking read. Its no where there!

An ex-workshop student warned me against 'that thatha guy', aka the foreman, who yells at you and makes you wet your pants for no apparent reason. I remembered I had had a not-so-pleasant encounter with him in the past, when I had visited the workshop to buy data sheets. I had loudly wondered to what use those sheets of almost plain paper would come for, and why they were making us pay for them. No, it wasn't a pleasant encounter. So you could say i wasn't particularly looking forward to workshop.

I reached workshop, an underground, intimidating and dingy place, on time, with an incomplete record, sans hacksaw blades, cellotape and steel scale. I tried not to panic and focused on the way the foreman's white, lopsided mustache danced when he spoke. After a few minutes of *something about tools*, he asked us to submit our records and sign in his register according to reg. numbers. One by one, he called us by names. Mine was still a little far off, when suddenly from the other end of the room, "WHY DIDN'T YOU BRING YOUR PEN YOU IDIOT?!!" I bet even those ominous looking tools got a fright! Then onwards, all of us carried our pens around everywhere we went. Then our metal pieces were handed over to us and tables were allotted. More like our corners of the tables. Mine was at the farthest and darkest end of the room, and I was to share it with three others.

They kept repeating over and over that mechanical workshop is nothing like any of the previous labs we had endured in the past. This involved real manual labor. The kind you see greasy handed construction workers doing. The kind you never imagined you would do.

We were asked to pick up a flat file from the array of different, similar looking instruments, which did not weigh a hundred tons like I expected it to. The lab assistant demonstrated the filing technique to us innocents- fix the metal piece on the bench vice, grip the handle of the file firm in your right hand, support it with the left on the other end and go cross over the metal. Just like how you file your nails, only on a larger scale. "There is one side which is the piled side. The other is the manupactured side. Pile the manupactured side next too the piled side. use the *some tool which is used to check for perpendicularity* and chech ip ferfendicular. Ip nat, pile gaf side till ferfendicular. Undrshtood?". I did. But he repeated it a lot of times till we were capable of filing with using just our thoughts. And he succeeded in getting me all excited about it!

I eagerly picked up my flat 'pile', fixed one of two metal pieces we were supposed to work on on the bench vice, and began filing. We were doing a 'V' joint today. And I must say, It felt good. Like REALLY good! I put all my frustrations, anger, pain on that poor metal piece. It was like a knot in my back was released. I was in a terribly good mood for three days after that! The entire workshop was filled with the pandemonium of metal screeching against metal. After a few minutes, I checked the metal piece for like the hundredth time, and realized I was done. First to finish!! Just then the lab assistant 'sir' lost patience and asked us to assemble around the table nearest to him, which just happened to be my table, and picked up a metal piece, which just happened to be mine. And then he started to colour it yellow with a dirty piece of chalk! Ouch! Now i was gonna have to do it all over again! All that hard work, down the drain! Then he proceeded to maim it a bit more. Making markings, punching holes... He fixed the metal piece on the bench vice and began cutting it along a mark, explaining god-knows-what all the while. Three millimeters and what seemed like three hundred minutes later, he asked "yaardhu idhu metal pieceu?" I managed to squeak "sir, nandu". "nimdu bari cutting maadi saaku". Was there a happier person than me at that point? I think not.=D

Metal cutting is a tedious job I tell you! And I figured out quite early that I wasn't particularly good at it. It may have been one of the funnest thing i've done till now. But if you don't have a problem with getting your hands dirty, you're doing just fine. And by dirty I mean the colour of coal tar. I'll just go ahead and say it, I broke six hacksaw blades! Corollary: I blew 28 bucks, at 7 bucks apiece. The other two were borrowed. And all it took was a puppy dog face to not get yelled at by 'that thatha guy'. It somehow works on all grown men. Guess it awakens the fatherly instinct in them. The best part was watching everyone else slog it out slowly, going one by one to do the marking and the punching while I cut with a gleeful smirk on my face. I wasn't the first to finish though, even with my big headstart. Blame the blades! And when the first piece of cut metal fell off, I was so happy, all I could do was hunt for another blade. Finally!

The sixth blade turned out to be lucky for me. I did majority of the cutting with it. When I was almost done, the lab assistant took one look at the hacksaw in my hands, snatched it and enlightened me to the fact that I had fixed it the blunt side front!! I barely started cutting with the right side front, when SNAP! The blade broke. But I did finish cutting and most of the final bit of the filing before they started to shoo us out of the place.

Sweat on my forehead, hands that looked like they had never breathed in clean air, hair looking like i had grown deadlocks, pain along my arms, legs, back, neck, abdomen, I'd still say I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it. And should I mention how we all washed our hands with a piece of detergent soap that was blacker that our hands? I should, because I'm something of a hygiene freak, and it was a big deal for me, washing my hands with that!

At the end of those three hours, I was exhausted, hurting all over, happy and had a story to tell, of my First Day at Mechanical Workshop!

HOW TO TICK PEOPLE OFF

Leave the copy machine set to reduce 200%, extra dark, 17 inch paper, 99 copies. In the memo field of all your checks, write "for sexual favors." Specify that your drive-through order is "TO-GO." If you have a glass eye, tap on it occasionally with your pen while talking to others. Stomp on little plastic ketchup packets. Insist on keeping your car windshield wipers running in all weather conditions "to keep them tuned up." Reply to everything someone says with "that's what you think." Practice making fax and modem noises. Highlight irrelevant information in scientific papers and "cc" them to your boss. Make beeping noises when a large person backs up. Finish all your sentences with the words "in accordance with prophesy." Signal that a conversation is over by clamping your hands over your ears and grimacing. Disassemble your pen and "accidentally" flip the ink cartridge across the room. Holler random numbers while someone is counting. Adjust the tint on your TV so that all the people are green, and insist to others that you "like it that way." Staple pages in the middle of the page. Publicly investigate just how slowly you can make a croaking noise. Honk and wave to strangers. Decline to be seated at a restaurant, and simply eat their complimentary mints at the cash register. TYPE IN UPPERCASE. type only in lowercase. dont use any punctuation either Buy a large quantity of orange traffic cones and reroute whole streets. Repeat the following conversation a dozen times. "DO YOU HEAR THAT?" "What?" "Never mind, it's gone now." As much as possible, skip rather than walk. Try playing the William Tell Overture by tapping on the bottom of your chin. When nearly done, announce "No, wait, I messed it up," and repeat. Ask people what gender they are. While making presentations, occasionally bob your head like a parakeet. Sit in your front yard pointing a hair dryer at passing cars to see if they slow down. Sing along at the opera. Go to a poetry recital and ask why each poem doesn't rhyme. Ask your co-workers mysterious questions and then scribble their answers in a notebook. Mutter something about "psychological profiles."

You know you're in college when:

• Its never too late in the night to call or text a friend to tell them about something as random as a song you have been listening to, and even expect a reply!
• Its really night after 2 am.
• You find yourself craving coffee at odd hours.
• You have a long and enjoyable conversation with someone, like you've known them for ages, and realize after a month that you don't know their name! And how do you ask for it? Ask for their Facebook ID! :-D
• The person you have a crush on is not your typical Tall-Dark-Handsome-Knight-In-Shining-Armour, not even close!
• You find yourself loitering in the college campus on study holidays, because you are bored at home.
• You have a wardrobe overflowing with clothes but you end up wearing those select few dresses all the time, and complain that you don't have enough.
• You start listening to Kannada songs, and even like them! A lot!
• All those manners and etiquettes that you used back in school do not take you anywhere in college, just leave them at home and come with a Kannada accent...
• You switch languages mid-sentence and don't realize it!
• Texting in class, a formerly universally accepted offence, is no longer so.
• A day before the exam is not at all late to start studying.
• You start blogging to retain you hold on your English. I tell you people, Its hard!!

From the heart...

You yelled at me, asked me to drop dead in a pit.
I laughed it off, knowing well that you couldn't mean it..
I saw the relief huge on your face 'coz i had stayed.
I hugged you and told you I'd never leave, come what may..

Because we were there for each other through thick and thin,
Our friendship would be without meaning if trivial differences had to win.
You have carved yourelf a place in my heart, my friend...
A mark you have etched, that is never to fade or bend.
You have lit a lamp of hope and life..
I bask in its warmth, knowing of nothing I'm deprived..

But its time to go.
And I cannot expect you to follow.
Fate hasn't the same things in store for us.
I will leave, happy to have had a friend I'm gonna miss...

You have your responsibilities and i have mine,
But let our friendship never cease to shine.
However large the distances may be, I'll never shiver,
'Coz you'll live on in my memory forever....

-NAMRATA

My first post...

My little cousin came to me this other day and asked me "What is the capital of Bangalore?" I sat him down on my lap and explained to him what a country is and what a state and its capital is. he listened to me, wide eyed, mouth open, and continued staring at me long after I was done. I smiled to myself with satisfaction that I had enlightened the boy with some of my 'precious' knowledge. He then looked at me again with that same wide-eyed expression I loved so much, and shot his second question "In what country does India lie?" With all the patience that I could muster, I went on to explain again. He's just a child after all! This went on for quite sometime, and at one point it began to get on my nerves. I politely told him that I had loads to study and that I'd talk to him later. He obediently left. A mere few seconds later, he came back running, and said "I'm sorry for disturbing you. I just wanted to know if America was in India because I want meet spiderman". I wasn't sure if i wanted to laugh at his innocence or cry at his ignorance. I ended up yelling at him and shooed him away...
He left me thinking about this for long. It reminded me of my own childhood, and how I was as a child. So like him! both Ariens, with an unending curiosity for the  non-existent, an undeterred search for that fantasy world, our happy place. The world where a swoop of an arm would do our bidding, a world where I could fly, a world where wearing pants isn't compulsory...

But it is dangerous to keep children in the world of make-believe, because they will have a hard time relating to the real world during their adolescence. which was just what had happened with me. I was an overly pampered child, and adults found my obsession with the make-believe adorable. They let me stay in it. More like encouraged me to remain in it. And I faced the consequences later on. During my early teens, when I began viewing people the way they are and not how I wanted them to be, I became a confused child. It was all so bewildering, I lost focus. It was my obsession with the make-believe that made me an avid reader. I found my respite in the pages of those books, and I could forever lose my self in them. In my mind, I would become the protagonist and the story would enact itself, with every detail coming to life...

But I evolved. slowly, steadily. Changing myself bit by bit, so I wouldn't feel autistic, and yet remain happy. I learnt to keep a prefect balance between reality and fantasy, and this is what I am today. I will never stop dreaming because it is the foundation of my very character. But it often creates pent up emotions so deep, I crave to express them. And so here I am, blogging away! Telling everyone just how I feel... Not exactly my style, but will suffice for now...:)