Not a Morning Person

There are mornings when you feel old. When you feel like you've understood the secrets of the world--some of them, at least--and you just want to walk up to your mother and ask her what she was thinking, bringing you into this mess. When you feel like you've lost yourself, but also found yourself after years, maybe for the first time. And it all only makes as much sense to you as it does to anybody else who isn't privy to your every thought.

On mornings like this one, when you've chosen to stay up all night, pretending to give meaning to your existence and worn yourself out; and further pushed yourself to get back into your exercise regime; and then tried to round off the health routine by having that rare breakfast, your first in two weeks... on such mornings, you feel worn thin, stretched out, left with little idea of who you are and what the hell you're doing on this little planet, because even sleep won't come (and every damn person chooses to knock on your door to ask irrelevant questions and present you with bills that are not yours and you are too broke to pay anyway). Thoughts crowd in, too heavily, and you want to drill a hole into your temples just to relieve the pressure--if only that wouldn't be so fatal.

Why are there mornings when your present seems to define your whole past and future and everything about you gets washed in the same greyness until you feel like there has never been and will never be anything, anyone other than this moment and the you in it--so dull, so drab, so washed-out and lacking in any kind of interest, a ghost who pretends she is living but knows, always knows somewhere that this is not what living is? When did that realization dawn, that you cannot take your cues of living from others, that you must make this frightening journey into the abyss of yourself if you want to find any kind of lasting meaning?

The abyss yawns
beckoning
seducing
come-to-me-you=know-me-you-are-me;
and I swim
into it (though I
don't know how)
without torch,
oxygen, map.

So clearly is god beckoning, from the other end, telling you that you needn't look in there, forget it, the looking has been done for you and the answers have been piled up, compiled neatly and placed in a way that would inspire and please the Virgo in you. And there's more... there are paths already trodden a million times by a million travellers, tried and tested... Yet they all seem to fit badly, entirely lack in imagination, are uninspiring and just plain not for you. A morning like this can drive you up the wall with confusion; if you weren't stuck in this rut, you'd probably jump up and do something really crazy just to prove you can.

And then just like that, you lose interest in mornings like these.

Just a moment

I came across a photograph of you today. It wasn't in anything nearly as romantic as a shoebox or an old diary, no; I was rummaging through my external hard-drive, took and wrong turn, and found you standing there, outlined against a blue sky and a grey ocean, apparently caught in a rare candid moment, with that quizzical look in your eye and your hand fanned out against your pocket. You are just breaking into a smile and all the charm of your sunsign--all that almost childish charm that lets you get away with many, many slips--is all frozen there in that moment, leaping out, as if competing with the wave caught mid-climb behind you. I smiled back at you and remembered the day, the time, those seemingly perfect moments. Though so many things have changed, so much has gone, water under the bridge and passing clouds bringing rain, there was still just you there, as you were to me then and as I imagine you now. And I didn't want to walk into that moment and speak to you, ask you how you felt at that moment, tell you what followed and how, I didn't even want to hear your voice. I just wanted to sit down at the shore, beside you, let the waves continue their journey, taste the salt on my lips... For a few short seconds, I just wanted to be... in that moment, with you.

*

I sometimes wonder if it's true that we've lost our appreciation for photos what with the unlimited bombardment of our eyes with images that range from barely recognizable to brilliant, from the truly remarkable to the banal and random. Maybe when there were fewer photographs to be seen and when they had to necessarily have a physical impact, printed and touched in glossies and mattes, we appreciated them more. But that photo of you reminded me that we'll probably never lose our sense of the poetic, the sense of the beauty of anything our senses can perceive. That photos will always freeze those moments and force us to imagine the rest, force us to imagine the rest of the story in 3D, in time, in love, in the gaps our memories have, in nostalgia.

Friends

That night, it hailed on you and me, unexpectedly. We were quite vulnerable to the rocks of ice that the sky was hurling with inexplicable wrath on us--you, completely unprotected, and I, carrying only a notebook and a folder, with not a tree nor a building anywhere in sight. Not that we could see much anyway: it was late in the night, in a little mountain town with its early sunsets and no streetlights. I pulled out my notebook and folder when the raining rocks got big enough for us to start discussing concussions, and when I offered it to you as protection for your head, you exclaimed, (quite ridiculously, considering the situation): "But your notes! They'll be drenched!"

And in the midst of wondering at the strange twists of life that had brought me, from the hot southern city where we don't even have a proper word for snow, to this place of hailstones as big as my fist; in the midst of paranoid yet oddly calm contemplations about the irony of dying in this dark little hillside with only you for company; in the midst of cursing myself for having forgotten both umbrella and torch; in the midst of yelping at the stones that were assaulting our necks now; in the midst of all this, I could only think of your remark and barely contain an urge to burst out laughing.  And remember why we'd been friends once.

Love and live

I've decided that it's absolutely ok and in fact not at all uncool to blog about post-breakup things. Especially since said breakup is now ancient history and pretty much most of the world (and especially me) has stopped giving a damn. Therefore, a note on being alone. Somebody once told me that the hardest part of a breakup is the end of an entity you became a part of, the end of an "us". You return to the state of being "me" again, and in the meanwhile, if you've given enough time and energy to the relationship, you've completely lost track of who that is or even how to be that person. Much madness ensues--the inability to be alone, rebound relationships, etc.

Looking back, this seems like a horrifying way for relationships to work. We live in a culture (that includes a frightening percentage of humanity) that prioritizes the collective over the individual--our ideas of democracy, fashion and even society itself. And love just happily skips along into the party. The popular perception of love seems to be a noble giving up of the ego, of immersing your self in something "greater"--as if greater necessarily need be greater in number and not just scope. I'm all for the idea of building something "greater", but it does seem dangerous to give up being something you are just to be part of something else. Rather, I would imagine love to be something that lets you be exactly who you are and embrace something or someone else in all their uncomfortable, wondrous reality. 

And let's face the hard facts--we are all ultimately alone, in body and mind. I'd hardly be the first to point out profoundly that everybody dies alone. Yes, the entire history of humankind, every power struggle and work of art somehow leads back to that fact. We may ignore it or try to erase it by building elaborate fantasies such as happily ever after, true love, and so forth, but there is no getting away from it, really. You are the only one who will ever be there, the only entity, sane or insane, that you will meet all your life. It's nice to have someone along for however long in the ride, but that's all it'll ever be--a little company.

Call me a cynic, but I'd rather face that and hold on to me. And still love and live.

Undone

What if you stood before an enchanting lake on a hot summer day, a cool, enticing lake, and yet don't step in? All you have to do is strip off your clothes (there's no one looking, and you don't care anyway) and plunge yourself into the delicious water and you know you will forget the harshness of the sun, the thirst of your skin, the dust that coats you. You can imagine the water enfolding you in its embrace and you know instinctively that you can trust that you will enjoy every minute of it. Yet, you stand at the water's edge, looking in, looking around, half-longing, yet holding back.

It's not that you're afraid. You know you can probably swim the depths of this lake. Well, you're not really sure, the water has frightened you in the past--always that fear of drowning. Yet you know that you need to try before you know for sure whether you can swim or not. The only way to confirm or disprove your own fears is by facing them. Yet that's not why you hesitate. Sometimes you enjoy facing those fears, there is a certain excitement to that sense of drowning, almost running out of breath, before you break the surface and remember to kick your feet and move your arms and fill your lungs with oxygen, eyes stinging with water, yet unable to close them to the light that proves that you're alive. No, a little fear of drowning could never dissaude you from the rewards of a swim on a summer day.

But the fact is that you would rather stand here and stare at the sparkling water. There is a hint of a quiet breeze rippling the surface of the lake on the otherwise quiet afternoon, but it doesn't touch you--only stillness all around. The sun is beating down and the grass is letting out that hot humid smell of summer green. Insects dance in a huge column in areas over the grass. And the water beckons. And somehow, this moment is enough. It's enough to know that the water is there without having to throw yourself into it. It's enough to imagine the depths of that pool, imagine being deep in its belly and look up to see the sun streaming in, oddly distorted and pretend you're a fish. It's enough to imagine all the pleasures of finally escaping the dreadful, sultry day and giving in to the beauty of the water. Somehow there is enjoyment in knowing that this is all the moment will be, that it will remain unfulfilled. Yes, this is enough, just this feeling of anticipation.

Not everything must reach its logical or desirable conclusion, must it?

The Hostel Mess Cheatcode

Perhaps it’s best to start with explanations. A lot of things in life might be more pleasant if an explanation preceded them instead of us gamboling through events like happy things that gambol (?) blindly and get really confused about why water’s wet, love is just not enough (no matter how much really quite awesome songs may claim otherwise), the chicken crossed the road, etc. Life might be a little more enjoyable if it were a little more like this post is going to be and a little less like trying to learn a game of cards you don’t know by observing a bunch of Bengalis playing (i.e., completely incomprehensible, and just when you feel like you’re maybe getting the hang of it, somebody wins and you realize the goal was the opposite of what you thought, and most of the time, you don’t get what people are saying). So. Explanations are in order. Two fact about me should do, I think.

Fact 1: I am lazy. Like really. Like it pisses people off kind of lazy. But as you shall soon see, laziness is not all it’s cracked up to be. It’s quite a lot of work. So, on to…

Fact 2: I tend to over-think things. This, combined with a slight tendency to geekiness and mild OCD of the pattern-finding variety, makes things interesting.

So the explanations are done. (But I now realize that the whole explanation thing is futile because explanations make less sense than the things they explain before the things they explain unfold. Wait, I think I might have said something profound. Let’s examine that… Ah, never mind, too lazy. So, moving on.)

I live in a hostel that’s built like a pyramid. No, its construction didn’t (exactly) involve slave labour and it’s not full of dead people and fabulous wealth (snort) so the pyramid thing refers to what you first thought it referred to, before I distracted you with irrelevant details–the shape. Each floor is slightly smaller than the one below it. I have no idea what the architectural significance of this is, but since I live in the second floor, this creates many, many puzzles and challenges for me. One of the challenges revealed to me that if I were a civilization all by myself, I’d be in what Douglas Adams calls the Survival stage, for the challenge is, “How do I get to the mess to eat?” This may seem like a trivial question. But this is where I ask you to turn your attention to Facts 1 and 2.

Living in the second floor means I expend a lot of energy climbing up and down stairs. And to have to do this for every meal and water refill creates unspeakable anguish for my lazy side. To reduce the monotony and make myself feel better, I decided to over-think things. Fun. So, there are many ways in which you can reach the mess from my room. Cross the corridor, take the stairs at the end, climb down two floors, exit. Cross half the corridor, take the stairs in the middle, cross the other half at the ground floor, exit. Take the stairs in front of my room, cross the corridor at the ground floor, exit. The last option might sound good because the stairs are right in front of me, but the fact is, this is out because it would involve crossing the whole of the ground floor, which, in the pyramid structure, has the longest corridor. So, the first option? Nope. Wrong again. It IS in fact the shortest route, but there are problems. The staircase at the end of each corridor (except on the ground floor) plays host to a lovely little thing called the common dustbin. This is generally a huge plastic drum, and is often filled with… well, let’s say the cats and flies love it. It’s smelly and quite effective in killing any appetite that dares to pass it without the answer to its impossible riddles and it also has to the power to send any satisfied appetite to go commit suicide. The ancient Egyptians, had they met Mr Dustbin, would not have bothered with pressurized acid and such to keep marauders out of their tombs.

It took me just two weeks to figure it out, and the funny looks I get from other, more unadventurous, weary dinner-time travellers were answered with looks of smug superiority. I had the keen intelligence, the courage, the perseverance to figure it out! All you have to do is:  Take the middle stairs, thus cleverly avoiding the dreaded Dustbin, cross the other half of the first floor corridor (which is still shorter than the ground floor’s, ha!), take the stairs at the end of the corridor, exit and reach your destination, thus achieving high score of sheer genius.

And then, you go eat mess food.

Sigh. Maybe all we do need is love :D

Metaphor

Everything is metaphor. This fact was suggested to me in a course that was called (loosely) Post-structuralism in connection with language, but the more I think about it, the more it seems to apply to everything under the sun. Language, in whatever form, be it music, dance, or Tamil, is metaphor. But so is everything else we do. Advice is metaphor--my life was like this, so life is like this.

The past is also metaphor. It's built up of our ideas of ourselves, of sense experiences and our own memory, which is never too reliable anyway. The past is a memory of our own selves and our world-view. Everything we believe about the past is built up on our narrative, the grand story of our lives. The past is a metaphor that represents us as we perceive ourselves. When that metaphor is jarred by reality, it is a hard fact to reconcile with. But the metaphor is perhaps the most resilient creature in all of creation. It builds itself up again, till all is in order.

Some more streams of conscious nonsense

Is it truly courage if you do something difficult when you're forced to? If you have no choice in the matter, how is it courageous? I mean, what's the other alternative that you could choose that would be not courageous? I'm not being (very) judgemental of anyone here. In fact, I've been congratulated myself for my "courage" in such situations and I've always found it odd. The situation is thrust upon you and it's either do what you have to or... well, die, I guess. And that's not really an option, is it?

On the subject of courage, why is it that some people always, always prefer to run away from problems rather than face them while some others just can't leave problems alone?

What's really fascinating (and scary) about meeting new people is that you realize how much you don't know. A huge number of facts, to start with, and let's not even get started on life experiences--the other person might just take these for granted but you've probably never even dreamt of them. It's at times like these that you're left wondering how you could ever have believed there's one single, shiny white Truth that you can possibly reach out and grasp.

I seriously can't decide if subjectivity is a good thing or bad. I'm not denying that it's an inescapable fact of life. Even the most seemingly objective things ultimately do have a subjective basis. And subjectivity is wonderful when it comes to any kind of art or sometimes, even the sciences. But when it comes to personal choices, it's a whole different question. Most of our heads have been filled with certain ideals, I think, which depend on being "objective". And when you're forced to make difficult personal choices, do you let go of these and say "Screw objectivity: My life, my views!"? Or do you stick to "objectivity" and feel miserable? Often, it's an uneasy compromise.

The worst part about growing up is that it makes you realize how foolish innocence was... And the worst thing about the past is that you just can't change it, no matter how hard you wish.

'appy nooo earrr!

No, I'm not drunk. But have a nice one anyway.

2008, compared to the average year, may be described as humongously crappy. From Jan to December, June to... well, December. A few nice things happened of course. I became a graduate. I got into... well... a pretty cool institute for my M.A. (big grin). I've met some VERY nice people who I hope will remain in my life till--oh, ok, I won't be greedy, just till I'm 120 or so. But despite all this, I'm saying goodbye to the year with great relief and hoping I don't have to live through one like it for--again, being very restrained, 100-odd years.

I'm really tempted to write something philosophical about how life goes in unexpected ways but enough already!

Have a ball!

(Or a bat... Or even a hockey puck for that matter.)

Homecoming...

Home coming is sweet, with bittersweet tinges to add to the interesting experience that it is. When home is a whole city, your joys multiply till you are overwhelmed. You can breathe in and wallow in all that is familiar, those things that were so easy to take for granted but are now so precious. The curl of your mother's hair, your sister's silent creeping-out-of-bed early in the morning so as not to wake you. The silence of the night, comfortable and unchanged since when you were thirteen. The feel of the floor, hard and reassuring, beneath your back. The sofas that echo with the assurance of a hundred memories. The tiny bathroom that remembers the yowls that you called singing, your conversations with the taps, your tears that the shower couldn't drown, your secret phone calls.

Of course, the little bittersweet tinges are there to make sure the sweetness doesn't become nauseating. Those people you miss, whom some part of your illogically expects to find, just aren't there. The little changes that you hardly notice in the beginning make you realise that home is not the static place in your head but is changing, has move on beyond the day you left. That roll-top desk has moved into your room. Your childhood dolls smile down at you from the shelf where they're newly on display. That particular road has a few extra ruts and a whole flyover looms in that familiar horizon.  And you must relearn home, rediscover it so that it's exactly what it was to you: completely familiar.

And then you must leave again.

Things That Were Created Exclusively to Drive Me, yes, ME Absolutely NUTS!

--Cooling off in the middle of a darn good temper tantrum!

Come on, we all love a good temper tantrum once in a way. Ok, why the blank look and raised eyebrow? You don't?! Well, I do! And let me tell you, there is nothing worse that working yourself up to a good sulk or outright tantrum and then realizing you've stopped being angry with whatever or whoever it is that gifted you with just that mood. You just feel so... betrayed and let down by yourself, but not enough to inspire another sulk. It's like being offered a whole bar of chocolate all to yourself and then, when you're halfway through it, being told that's all you can have. Oh, the cruelty of it!

Sulk Rating: 8 FF*

-- Morning People!

Ye gods! These creatures actually believe in such concepts as "Early to bed and early to rise", "Humans are not nocturnal creatures", "Breakfast at 7 am" and even "11 o'clock is nearly afternoon", for crying out loud! I mean, come on! I go to bed early and rise early too--in the morning and evening respectively! Breakfast at 7? Brunch all the way. And 11 a.m. is the time you crack one eye open and decide to set an alarm to wake you in an hour! And humans, NOT nocturnal? Then how exactly would you explain the reason for the stars and the moon to exist other than to light up our nights?! Hello? Go read up your science. Sheesh.

Ok, having to put up with these creatures' quaint ideas is bad enough. But to endure their cheerfulness when you're forced to rise before noon and rummaging about the room (if you share one with them) when you can sleep in, it's just tooooo much I say!

Sulk Rating: 8.5 FF

--The bus starting just before you get off!

This happens more and more to me these days. I, of course, am always the LAST person to get down at any given stop and the drivers take perverse pleasure in starting the bus when I'm one foot on and one foot off. As a result of which, I step down and have to do an ungainly little dance to the amusement of everyone (including the people in the bus, people on the streets, the snoozing street dog and the lamp-posts.) Foooh! (The sound of steam coming out of my ears)

Sulk Rating: 6.5 FF

(And while on the topic...)

--Having to travel half an hour to get to a place that's ten minutes away.

Yes, you read that right. Bizarre, right? Well, apparently the Delhi Transport Corporation and its sister private concerns have managed to bend the laws of time and space. Remember the straight-line-shortest-distance-between-two-points rule? Apparently, there is another law of the universe that overrules this--There can be no direct bus from the abode of this blogger to her university. Therefore, to get to the university, I am obliged to hop two buses--which are timed in just such way that if one arrives on time, I'm sure to have to wait at least 15 minutes for the other and if the first arrives late, I JUST miss the other. Sigh. The relatively low Sulk Rating for this is owing to the fact that I actually enjoy bus travel. Go figure.

Sulk Rating: 4.67 FF

--Finding that thing you were looking for for so long! [For for? :D ]

Ok, you might be puzzled by that. But what your forgetting is that, according to the Holy Murphy's Laws (which sometimes seem more verifiable and relevant than Newton's), this can only mean that you'd given up looking for that thing only a few days/minutes ago and bought (or married!) something else... Ah, the look on one's face then in priceless.

Rating: 8 FF

--ZITS!

Zits are not as innocent as they seem. They have a secret cult for they are all from the invisible 9th planet, Elp-mip. (Pluto, apparently, is not a planet but actually just a huge, infected acne.) This cult has its sinister rules and rituals. Rule No. 1 is... (No, it's not "Never talk about the Zit Cult") Always appear when least expected, i.e., when the Host is heaving a sigh of relief at their clear skin and laughing at "those pimply, awkward adoloscent days". Rule No. 2: Appear in an area most likely to be accidentally scratched or most tempting to scratch. Rule No. 3: Itch. Itch more. Itch like crazy. Then refuse to leave.

Rating: 8.9 FF

--Poor punctuation

Enough said. (And no, learning all about descriptive-not-prescriptive grammar has not changed this is me!)

Rating: 9.98 FF

____________________

*All values in the standard Frowney Face (Metric) Scale of Ten. For conversion, (these calculations must be done on paper only!) to Grumpy Face scale, add 5968, multiply by 4.943608, divide the result by 94, strike the whole thing out and write the original FF value, this time replacing 'FF' with 'GF'. (Calculations suggested by the Gunther & Ames' Moody Society of Cranks)

A Glitch in the Brain

I always get a strange, surreal feeling when I think that the whole of my past is just memory. Every moment of pain, wonder, joy, confusion, every crush, every unforgettable feeling of knee-knocking fear, every betterfly in my stomach, every stubbed toe is now not even real or verifiable. Those moments are just grooves in a soft, easily squishable brain, folds in my cerebrum. That friend who betrayed me and who I haven't spoken to in more than a year may as well be a ghost. She exists as I saw her only in my memory. My uncle, grandmother, aunt, grandfather... even my father... are all just memories now. From a child's impressions of popcorn and poppins to a young woman's helplessness at pain suffered, these people, once easily hugged and spoken to, are just memories now.

My life so far could've been a wasteland--I'd never know if all that I've felt is real or the drug-induced hallucinations of a crazed mind. And tomorrow, my life so far could just be wiped out by a careless blow to the head and then where would I be? Where would you be?

Does this sound like pseudo-Matrix-existentialist crap? Well, once I hit the "Publish" button, how can I even be sure I wrote it?

Random Experiences...

Moving to a new city, starting a whole new kind of life, etc., often causes the profoundest, most moving thoughts and experiences. You look back your old life, amazed at the new experiences open to you... you look with wonder at the suddenly wide horizon even as your heart swells with...

Haha, excuse me a minute. I'm laughing too hard to keep that up. Lemme tell you some of the things I've learned, said, thought and wondered about since moving into JNU:

--On the first day, after class, I went to the warden's house where I'd left my luggage, to move into the hostel. Oh, hi doggie. Er... didn't notice you there... Aw, you're a cutie pie, aren't you? Coochie coochie... Hmm your tail isn't wagging. Oh...kay... I'll just ring this bell here and wait for the warden to open the doo--oops! Ok, ok, calm down, no need to stand right next to me and bark at me. Er... nice doggie? Ok... not so nice doggie... Ok, STOP! HAAALP!

At the end of this internal monologue, the warden's son comes and opens the door. He's gaping at me and goes "You just came in? And the dog didn't DO anything to you?" I'm shaken, and feeling all alone, scared in the I-want-my-mommy way and all I can do is chuckle nervously and say, "Er, no... As you can see by the lack of missing chunks of flesh on my legs, he didn't, in fact, take a bite out of me, as he wanted to. And you seem shocked and even... disappointed?... that he didn't."

Ok, I'll admit I stopped at "Er, no," but I swear I wanted to say the rest. And he keeps asking the same question every few minutes. And no, in case your interested, he wasn't cute enough to make such a question more palatable. But he'd just had some kinda minor operation so I couldn't pound on him either. sigh. Moving on...

--Hmm ok... Can't I just give in my own, decent looking passport-sized photo for a buss-pass? All right, fine then. I'll just sit here on this dirty chair and smile at the weird looking web cam... Ah, it's done... Ok, I can wait, it's just a buss pass. La la la la... Hmm hmm hmm... Tralala--AAAARGH! No! That monster in the photo can't be me... Nooooooooooooooooo....

But, as in most of the difficult and life-changing experiences we go through, I had to accept that it was, indeed, me, and now I'm stuck with this wonderful little thing that's going to take me all over Delhi. And NO, I'M NOT SCANNING IT AND PUTTING IT UP HERE SO YOU CAN POINT AND LAUGH!

--Ah, lunch! I could dig into some roti-and-subzi, some dhaal-and-chaval now! Ah, bring it on... Now, what is that thing? Hmmm... Looks familiar! Why, it looks like a--COCKROACH!!

Suddenly, I wasn't so hungry any more...

--Ah, after a long and difficult day of walking about, it's good to kick back and relax alone in my lovely, dark, quiet room. Zzzzz... huh? wha--? Where's that barking coming from? Ooooh-kaaaay...

Sigh. Yes. I had, indeed, been alotted the room just above the warden's house and ole fluffy, my fuzzy, furry, furious feline friend was going to be my constant companion if not in full physical form, at least in voice. (Yes, yes, I know dogs are canine, not feline. But I had a nice "f" alliteration going there [You could even say I was "effing" hehe]. Plus, you know dogs hate cats and this was my sneaky, insulting, degrading revenge on ole Fluffy. Yes, I'm really that pathetic.) Perhaps I could hang outside the balcony on moonlit nights and go "Fluffy, fluffy, wherefore art thou so un-Fluffy?" (For the record, his name's really not Fluffy. That's just my pet-name for him, after his cheerful disposition [Haha, "pet"name, get it? He's a pet so... Ok, you get it.])

Ah, more adventures later. A whole lot to say about clothes turning moldy while waiting for me to wash them, walking about in a campus bigger than a small British colony and getting utterly lost, etc. What fun.

Fun Things (and Not-so-fun things) I've Learned In Recent Times

So yes, the summer has been upon us for a couple of months and, unfortunately, as summers tend to be, I have started LEARNING things. Sigh. An unfortunate side-effect of being utterly vetti I guess. It's most disappointing. I never went about arbitrarily LEARNING things when I was in college! Why should I now, when the days should be spent in decadent wastefulness? Sigh again. Anyway, here are these great lessons:

- Celebrity Crushes Are Fun!
Beside the garden variety everyday crush, which is often painful and almost always embarrassing, there is the Special Realm of the Celebrity Crush (hmm, what's with the capitals, you ask? No idea!) Now, the thing about the CC is the ridiculous ease of accessibility to the object of your interest/affection/desire/lust (ha!). One google search for certain strangely attractive cricketers and there are about a million pictures to go ga-ga over. One foray of television channels and there's Hrithik Roshan, bulging muscles, yummy eyes, cute extra digit et al! Now, a few heart aches could be caused by little factors such as... "Oh no, (dramatic hand-to-forehead) Christian Bale is married!" or "Damn that Deepika Padkone, trying to steal my guy!" or "Ah, if only my lowe wasn't straight..." But overall, your friends tease you and you grin along, safe in the knowledge that you'll never get caught in THAT trap, at least!

- It's Possible to Do a Lot of Nothing
Now this might sound like something Garfield would make up, but it's true! You can pretend to read... while doing nothing. You can pretend to watch television... while doing nothing. You can pretend to be online, doing important things... while doing nothing. Well, you get the drift! It's a glorious feeling when you look back at a long day of doing nothing. In fact, I plan to write a book about it, Doing and Nothingness. I'm sure it'll be more popular and... "experienceable" than Sartre's similar ramblings.

- The Sad Truth about People
It's a sad truth that people have an endless capacity to deceive themselves. Some (no links here, sorry :P) would even sink into melodrama and self-pity rather than admit that they might have done something wrong or work at a compromise. Ah, well, it takes all sorts of nuts to make a fruitcake.

- The Happy Truth About People
You know there's always another side to the grass but both the less green and the greener sides can be on your own lawn! Ok, ok, I'll stop talking in metaphors before you throw something at me. It's just that the happy truth about people is that PEOPLE CAN BE WONDERFUL! Sure, we're all full of faults and no way is anybody perfect but still, there are people who will understand you and respect you for what you are and bother to stick with you even when you're being a total loser or completely lame :D That's what makes the fruitcake sweet, after all! (Ok, I promise, no more cliched metaphors!)

- Being a Girl is Fun
Yes, yes, we all know it's a hard world to be a woman in. Men constantly come up with trivial complaints about how difficult life is for men but it's obviously just men being men. It's often the case that women wish they were men but at the end of the day, I realise it's fun to be a girl! I mean, womes are so comfy in fun sleepovers where previously mentioned objects of interest/affection/desire/lust are drooled over, fashion, world affairs and everything else are discussed, clothes and weird hairstyles are tried out, crazy pictures are taken and hysterical laughter goes on for several minutes over nothing. Now, not being a man, I can't imagine what male sleepovers (sorry, is that an oxymoron? Let's call it something more MANLY... Hmm, ok BOOZE PARTY!) are like but I doubt there's any of the emotional sharing that women do. Wow, I'm being so sexist. It rocks! :D So yeah, go, girlpower!

- Coo-coo-cooking!
Ah yes, I have leanred rudimentary skills at the kitchen. Never thought the day would come when the old family joke about me having to marry a chef could be shelved. Well, I still wouldn't go THAT far but I've learned some basics. Such as how to make scrambled eggs (ahem, the broken eggs and the weird smell in the kitchen will NOT be mentioned, atomic!) and chapati and dosa and rava idli! So yes, I might survive on my own, provided there are convenient Spencer's Dailies in every corner to buy bread, idli/dosa mav and eggs from. Hehe.

Oh, there's more but all this writing really is getting in the way of my "doing nothing" campaign. So it's bye-bye for now :)

Five People You Will Meet in Hell (aka...)

Driving on Chennai roads is an interesting... experience, to say the very least. Forget the roads (which your back never really forgets) and the pollution (which your lungs never forget) or even the congestion (which your vehicle never forgets). There is a whole different aspect of driving in Singara Chennai (named so by someone with a healthy sense of irony, methinks) that is more fascinating... I am, of course, talking about the fellow travellers... Who else but humans could leave such a mark?!

Driving in Chennai, you will meet certain standard "stock" drivers whom I have neatly classified. Unless otherwise specified, these "types" extend to both genders and across all age-groups. I have used the masculine pronoun for convenience:

1. The Overtaker: We've all heard of the Undertaker, of course. This type of driver, the Overtaker, is equally lethal. And would probably fit right into the profession of the undertaker, so eager does he seem to send people on their way to the hereafter. The Overtaker's M.O. involves sneaking up on people unawares, (he has perfected this art to such... perfection that he doesn't even appear in the rear-view mirror of the Overtakee) then out of nowhere, zip past the overtakee as close as possible, preferably with a (very loud) horn honking in the ear of the poor unsuspecting victim who will promptly jump, swerve, swear or lose balance--or do all of these simultaneously. The Overtaker takes pleasure in these very actions and his helmet probably muffles a chilling, Psycho-like laugh as he zooms away.

2. The Tortoise: The name Tortoise, I believe, sufficiently describes the nature of this driver. As may be expected, the Tortoise is the anti-thesis of the Overtaker. The Tortoise typically drives/rides a large and ungainly vehicle, and seems to believe that it is best driven at 10 kmph and in the middle of the road. While the Undertaker hones his skill into an art, the Tortoise decides to make his skill a science. Thus, through Tortoisology, this type of driver drives in a careful, precise way that ensures that the road is blocked in just such a way that no other driver can overtake him, reducing the traffic to a speed that is similar to the Tortoise's. The Tortoise is truly brilliant for he frustrates not just fellow drivers, but pedestrian'\s too, who cannot cross the road because the Tortoise has reached that level of acceleration that is completely un-judgeable. And without a means to predict when the Tortoise will pass, the pedestrian is left stranded on one side of the road--forever!

3. The Hunk:
3. The Hunk: This, I'm afraid, in a gender-specific and age-specific type of driver. The Hunk is most often young, male and rather desperate when it comes to members of the opposite sex. The Hunk thinks himself to be more than averagely endowed in the looks and attraction department. (It is also to be noted that the Hunk is typically delusional) The motives of the Hunk are simple: Impress the Babe (more on that later) or any other female driver and show off superior driving skills of self. Due to the extremely eclectic driving style of the Hunk, it is difficult to pin down one Modus Operandi. There are, however, various styles or moves. There is, first of all, the standard Swerve-and-Swoop. To execute this, the Hunk generally speeds up, takes several complicated looking (also lame-looking, but he doesn't know it) swerves and zigzags around other vehicles, swoops down on the object of his hunkiness and calls out some witty (read: equally lame) remark and zooms off. The Hunk believes that the effect of this maneuver is dual: scare the chick, impress the chick. Unfortunately for the Hunk, this just pisses off the "chick". Another move I will discuss is the classic Fast 'n' Slow. When the Hunk spots an eligible female driver (who is driving confidently and faster than him), he speeds up and zoom pasts her. Then he slows down till she catches up and overtakes him and then zooms past again. This can go on for quite a while. Poor dumb Hunk. I myself have been at the receiving end of the ole Fast 'n' Slow and had the indescribable pleasure of seeing the Hunk being stopped in the middle of a Fast Cycle by a cop and screwed over.

4. The Babe: Another gender- and age- specific one. The Babe is the female counter-part to the Hunk. Her driving sense and skills just about equal to that of the Hunk. She has her own theories about what the various parts of the vehicle are and what the road rules mean. The rear view mirror becomes, simply, a mirror in the hands of the Babe. The stop signal is a time to touch up the make up, readjust the clothes and paint the nails (if the signal is, say, Nandanam, she'll have enough time for said nails to dry and begin chipping). The Babe, however, is mostly harmless in comparison to the Hunk. Her most lethal weapon is the long-winded preparation to driving which goes something like: Open boot of the scooter, take out bottle of sunblock. Spread generous dollops on every inch of exposed skin, take out gloves, jacket, dupatta and begin to cover the self as if a blizzard's been predicted ("Oh, I don't want to get all tan!"). The Dupatta ritual is one of the most mystical aspects of the Babe's routine--a twist, a turn, a flip, a tuck and suddenly only the eyes stare out of the face hidden by the dupatta. Then comes the last, much lamented step: Wear helmet ("Dammit, do I have to?! It ruins my freshly washed, coloured, straightened hair!") and drive away.

5. The Stickler: The Stickler, aka the Nitpicker, is a truly wondrous and indecipherable species of drivers. The Stickler actually believes in and follows the road rules. The Stickler can read various road signs. The Stickler actually passed the driving test fair and square without bribing various officials. The Stickler carries all his papers with him all the time. The Stickler makes sure his vandi is spic-and-span though it might be 20 years old. The Stickler puts up his hand when he's at the head of the signal to show that he's stopped. The Stickler stops at the stop line. The Stickler wore a helmet before it was made compulsory. The Stickler never allows his petrol indicator to touch the red line. The Stickler is often middle-aged. The Stickler is an endangered species. Save the Stickler!

Well, there you go. These are some of the chief races of drivers. There are other categories like The Spitter, Dopey, The Nervous Fumbler, The Honker, Foul Mouth etc. Certain groups like The Autodriver can have whole posts, if not books, written on them. But you would be considered a seasoned Chennai-ite and driver if you have encountered and survived these five basic groups.

Happy Bumping Along!