MANia

They say to drive a man crazy, give him a woman to deal with. And to drive a woman crazier, give her approximately two men (one's usually an ineffective dosage).

I'm dead sure it's a doctrine God believes in firmly, but I'm not so sure if God is aware how insanely crazy I already am, without the additional input...
...sigh...so well, I am going nuts, thank you. Regulars on this space would ask, so what's new? Well, craziness pushed to the limit could be hazardous to health...not mine, but perhaps YOURS, or somebody else's, but it sure is.

And the reasons for this are MANifold. Now I won't lie...men generally are very interesting characters, and universally agreed posts for the most 'interesting' ones go to friends' brothers and brother's friends ... [;-)] And of course, if women weren't fools enough to find men interesting this world wouldn't exist, so as I say this co-existence, interest, interaction business is a necessary stupidity, from both sides. However, excess of anything is bad. :)

Therefore, while at one hand there's the regular supply of unknown Cyber Despos that's picked up on flowrate in recent times to contend with and shoo away, there's also characters in real life that you keep running into,including Boss and colleagues, and worst of all, the nice sweet men in my life have all turned wayward too.
Ab main jaoon to kahan jaaoon

Sample this:

• Best Friend has been really really angry with me for 2.5 weeks now, with no hope of a patch-up. He hates me now, for reasons that are probably 100% right, for he knows me better than most people. But it hurts, really bad, and I miss him a LOT. What's worse was we fought the night before I was planning to clear out misunderstandings with him, but now I realise some of those misunderstandings have become permanent, and I'm not going to get a hearing or a chance. Yeah I am the mean pretentious bitch, but it still hurts. Yet all I want is his peace, but nobody knows how it feels...
• Mr. BoyFriend is silly silly too (oh yes, I still have one). One day he's extra caring, and that in his mathematics suffices for a month...so now he is extra busy lazing around doing nothing in vacations, and therefore has no time, reason or sees a point in a 2minute a day phone conversation. So it's upto me to miss him, and miss him some more, and try and call never for the phone to be answered and sulk and cry, while he can't understand why it annoys me. Theek hai deal with it honey...hota hai and he's still a sweety. Tujhe kaunsa koi aur milne wala hai [:P]
• Bro has no time off from his vacationing, friends and gaming. Yet ma wants me to somehow get him to study an hour a day, and he can never make it beyond 20 minutes that also with me "teaching". Cajole him!!! Ahh.......
• Dad is as hyper as ever. And inquisitive. And doesn't even let me sleep enough. Staying at home is very very boring folks.
• All other friends(both sexes) are in short supply, and usually away and missing from action.

Hmm...so insert curse to vacations and plee to God here. :-)
And oh yes, before you jump on to your conclusion, here's my bottomline. I love BestFriend, BoyFriend, Dad, Bro and all other friends are lot, and they're sweethearts no doubt, but dude, has everybody got to behave like that with me all at once!
Phew...=((

Class Assignment: Why am I here?

"That moment had come after months of wait. Long, painful, arduous wait.

I had almost given up on hope, but eventually it came, and there it was, in my hands, in my arms. He was in my arms, and rather firmly, in my life too. I loved him, at least at that moment I totally believed that I did. And finally, I was getting married to him too. After much struggle beginning from getting him to ask the question till that moment, when families had agreed, arrangements had begun and the months could be counted, he was soon to be mine. Which means, I thought, I could allow ourselves to grow more close, more intimate. And here I had the moment, on a beautiful afternoon in a wonderful place, and even the others had gone out till late evening for a hike.

For some reason he had been romantic and super-smooth since morning, and that turned me on too. I was only too glad to stay back off the hike. And finally he was in my arms.

It felt ages since we had last been so near, and his touch felt electric. His fingers ran through my hair, and his gaze through my whole self. He drew me closer, till I embraced him tight, unwilling to let go. I felt his hand caress my back, then the butts, till the chill ran through my spine and I kissed his neck. That melted him; he felt soft, lovable, cuddle-able in my arms. I always thought he was kinda cute, but for once he looked sexy too. His eyes had a never-before passion in them; his gaze seemed to be fixed at the cleavage now. Finally we kissed, arms around the waist, lips locked and feet quivering.

Almost as an accident we tripped - I'm not sure it was me or him who slipped first but nevertheless we took each other down - and fell on the couch nearby. We laughed immediately, in unison, but stopped as abruptly too. Our bodies pressed together were reacting inwardly in a violent fashion and something in his eyes gave me the urge to make love with him then and there. I was shocked at my own desire and hesitated, but his lips on me soon took me out of control. I did not know if he shared the same feeling as me, though I hoped, but I believed I should wait for him to make a move. I was ecstatic nevertheless, then suddenly he broke apart and turned to come on top, and said in my ears in a tired, breathless tone..."Honey, would you like to sleep with me?"

I was disappointed, infact I was shocked.

I pushed him away almost by reflex.

My mind raced, "Here I was fervently hoping for making love with this guy, and all he wants to do is go to sleep! He goddamn loves his siesta more than me. Yeah sure he wants me to give him company, and asks his innocous, normally likable "Honey, would you like to eat/come for a walk/watch a movie with me?" again, but can't he see this wasn't the moment. He's ruined it again. And I thought he loved me!"

"Sleep!!" I shrieked aloud.

There must have been something scary on my face, for he looked baffled. But I went on, pushing him aside and getting off the couch.

"Well, go sleep alone. I think I'd go for a walk..."

"Hey, I'm sorry....I didn't" He began.

"Sorry? I thought you loved me. We're getting married soon. And you?" I went on ignoring his mumbles.

"See I dont know what your problem is, but your sexual quotient surprises me...God..what kind of a man I've fallen for..."

At this he got totally enraged and walked off the room with a disgusted look. I went out too. Few hours later he messaged saying he was breaking off with me, that the marriage was off and that he was leaving back for home and I could come with the rest of the group.I was happy in a way, but I still cried. I'd loved him, but this wasn't going to work......

******

Four years later I told about this to my best friend.

I hadn't still married; I never fell in love again and the matches my parents tried to fix up routinely found me too undereducated, too out of city-lifestyle loop.

All she did was brought me to this class, saying the most important thing I need in my life was this spoken English and personality development class.

And thus here I am. "

More Equal

I was writing a comment on this blog, but it blew up and I realised it was one of those topics I always had too much to rant on if I got in the mood, and thus I thought if I had to mumble about the crap about feminism, I should at least spare Ady's space from the corruption.
So, coming to the point, what I was getting worked up about is this whole feminism crap. Women have been ill-treated in this society forever, YES. It needs to be ended, DOUBLE YES. It needs to be ended as soon as possible and our society should treat men and women as equals, TRIPLE YES. But that equal word is where the catch is. Men and women are different, by nature, and it's not essential men can do everything women can with the same ease, or vice versa. The problem of our society, however, lies in the belief, in the value-assignment, that some things are more important and better than the others, and unfortunately in our chauvinist mindsets, all these perceived superior activities are titled men's domains. Real equality would be equality of respect and importance, when women don't insist on physically fighting and doing 'men's jobs' just to prove women can, but instead everyone recognises that the jobs women naturally do better, including emotional fighting, are just as important in the society as the ones that men do.All this noisy show of feminism is in fact anti-feminism, and indeed all of feminism, anti-feminism, pseudo-feminism et al is all the same. In simpler words, fierce feminism subtly accepts the 'difference', the 'inferiority' in shouting for we-can-do-it-too. You actually concede an intrinsic disability, an inferiority while asking for active 'help', in a way. Don;t get me wrong. I'm not saying affirmative action, women's empowerment, education for girls and all those schemes are not required. They definitely are, and much more effectively than they exist so that it makes a difference where it matters, and FAST. But at the same time, the solution doesn't lie in drastic things like women's reservation. And again, you need to remember that while 95% of women may have been wronged, there are 5% cases where the victim needn't be the woman and things need to be dealt objectively. That is what equality is about, to treat men and women as individuals above anything, with their own special traits and respecting them for it. Gender-based decisions, discrimination and generalisations are stupidity. You see where the problem is...problem is that in trying to restore the balance in this hugely biased society, the women (and some men) at the forefronts ask for superiority of women instead, by going gaga about their achievements, multitasking etc etc. what are you trying to do? In the long run, create a world as biased to the women as it is to the men at the moment, and then run men empowerment schemes. (I know it sounds funny, and one may not be able to empower men later because women are cleverer just as men are more ruthless, but that's not the point)People crib, if women ask for 'equality', why reserve seats for them in the bus? Well, the reason is not that they are women, the reason is that there exist wild, disgusting creatures who push, touch, rub and try to do all kinds of stuff with women standing in a crowded bus (or even sitting, if the creep is standing next to you and you are a half-decent woman, you'd know what I mean). Women are physically weaker than men, so it makes more sense to offer them a seat in lieu of a healthy man, but at the same time if an elderly man is standing, the girl should offer her seat to him. Nothing great about it either. That's humanity, not feminism.I can go on and on, a dozen posts maybe, but lemme stop n go home noe.end of week!

Never fall in love with a GEEK! :P

In the interim...

It's a bewildering feeling, being torn between powerful emotions leading you to different directions, each emotion hesitant still to express itself in totality. It's one of the most bewildering feelings on earth, not knowing what you feel or how are you supposed to feel that. I can see both truth and illusion existing together, and I believe in both of them. Perhaps. I wonder if this illusion of time and space I'm warped inside is actually a truth, or yet another trick. I don't want to get out of it though, even despite the confusion, even if I'm physically torn by all these opposing forces till mere shreds of me float dispersed in the homogenisation of illusion and reality, each feeling the pangs of unparalleled joy and pain simultaneously.
Topping the list of my weird desires, I thereby seek permanence in the transition.

Birthdays.

It's the birthday of two of my friends...both different, independent, rather opposite of each other. And I've just come back from the birthday celebration of one of them. A group of friends, lots of noise, cake and bumps and the kind of hooliganism only Indian college students can do. I remember narrating these typical birthday celebration stories when in Sweden to all the firangs. So proud, so excited I always sounded, and of course we demonstrated it all too at Ayush's birthday, that even the wild Italians and Spanish folks bowed to our wildness and celebratory spirits. Dirty, filthy, wild. total fun.
Even now I'm returning from an equally wild celebration, smeared in cake and curd and iced tea. There's something energetic about the smiles, the affection, the masti that's not worth missing. Yet of late I find myself nostalgic, silent, sidelined even on the birthdays of people I'm close to. I just like observing it all from a distance, sometimes smiling, mostly wondering. We celebrate growing older - more rustic, less innocent, more cynical, less flexible. That's remarkable.
I am thinking about my own birthdays. All 20 of them, as much as I remember. I'm trying to remember one I was happy on, feeling content and loved, and can't. They haven't been bad per se, except the last one which was AWFUL, but I don't love them. No I don't.
When I was three or four, I remember having a small birthday celebration at home, with a few of my colony friends and a lot of relatives, but more or less birthdays have always meant chachu and cousins coming over for dinner at my place, and that being it. My bday comes in the christmas vacations, ans thus there never has been a school celebration. When I was in 8th, my twelfth birthday, that one was pretty bad. It was a Sunday. I was at a cousins' place since Saturday night, and both mom and dad were busy with something that week where they had to go morning through evening. Bro was home too. The whole day I waited for my parents to visit me, to come and take me where they were, to call me, to wish me...it's not the same with a couple of relatives and cousins, and I had to wait till 10 pm that night till they finally came where I was. Of course I got no present, I have never got many of them on my birthdays.
Then there was the next one, the thirteenth. A particularly cold winter that year meant not much of the routine 'celebration' at home happened, but I do remember giving a small treat alongwith a couple of friends at McD's a week later. These friends were supposedly close, also primarily the only ones, and they also have bdays near mine. I remember carefully choosing their birthday gifts and spending all my saved pocket money on them plus the treat which mainly accomodated their friends. I also remember the present I collectively got from them, or rather was left for at the security guard's, which was a couple of ugly cheap negro dolls.
The fourteenth never happened, almost, for hardly any of my 'friends' remembered it. the fifteenth was almost exactly the same as the thirteenth and the sixteenth, when I was in class 12, was slightly better when one of my friends showed up at my place in the evening and we had a good time. Also this time, some friends had cared to call, at least within +/- 3 days of the bday itself. I was delighted. The only presents I got was a sweet birthday poem, and a pen stand. I still have them.
I've always been better-than-average with dates, especially birthdays, and by the time I was 17, I had a large circle of acquaintances and people I knew, spent time with and had wished all year on their bdays. As a percentage thus, the number of people who actually called me that day was touchingly high. Most of them have even forgotten my today, but that's a different matter. The calls were the only good thing about that day, but it was good enough.
And then the last three, each of which was outside home, outside Delhi. I've never had a birthday with friends, never had a birthday in IIT, never had birthday bumps and smeared cakes.
My 18th has been by far the best, though some associated incidents happened that made me curse it for a lot of time. Still I got a few calls while in Mumbai, I got a couple of presents, and I got a wonderful dinner with a friend too. Blessed. The 19th wasn't any special, even in Mumbai with a few friends, and the last one in Sweden was so terrible, so lonely I wished I never turned 20 at all. I had nobody to even talk to all day; not a single person even wished me in person. Three phone calls and 200 orkut scraps+10 chats don't make up for it. I had nothing to do, no mood to even eat alone anymore and terribly missed a lot of people who weren't even available online at the time. I roamed about the streets of Stockholm alone in the dark, sitting by the lakeside and capturing the last memories of the landscape. A lot of my friends forgot, but that's pardonable. My parents wished me at 2 PM IST when I called them to wish me, but that's also understandable. Everything is, except the fact that I was really sad that day. I came back, parents made up for it, and the only present I got was from my roomy. But being back home and at IIT was a present in itself.

I can't help it, getting so unnecessarily nostalgic. About un-memorable things.
I just have too much time in my hands. Duh!

Off the top of my head

The sem is nearly over, just four more exams to go. For many reasons I don't want it to be over, even I have to give majors everyday for that to happen. I know though, that time moves at it's own pace and what's inevitable is inevitable. This sem also marks the end of a very important , rather nice phase in my life...and it's never gonna be the same living in IIT after this. But then, every phase is different, and every phase ends. And despite phasal beginnings and ends, the continuity of life is maintained. Beautiful. :)

However that is not to say that everything that's happened in the last four months have been good. But woh to life hai! Still, poltu is one thing that has always irked me in IITD, and even three years on, it manages to hurt at times. Things random people say and 'close' friends do or don't. It's all dirty, and it sort of gives me satisfaction to keep out of the rat-race of the poltu posts, GSecs et al. Yet it pains to see totally useless people put incharge of good things, and the kind of people we'd have to bear and work with all of next year. Secys who can't get the basics straight and destroy the spirit of a loved club. GSecs who can't lead. And a token of last years' legacy was visisble at the various awards given away at the end of the year. Most of it was so frustrating I don't even want to talk of it. But some things are terribly logic defying. Why does the G.Sec of a board get an "Outstanding Contribution" to his/her board just for doing his/her job and sometimes not even that? Why do most people getting the awards are either PrizeCommittee members or simply the previous Secy or something of the club? Why does holding a post, gotten by merit-defying poltu in the first place, ensure all these awards through the year denying people outside the ranks what they deserve for working without vested interest or duty? And on top of it some awards even going to people 'applying' for them, purely poltu considerations again? Why make a farce of it all...each time?
And what actually pinches is things like getting shortlisted on merit for something and then beging remove out for poltu reasons. Or you getting awarded something after years of toil while someone else with little or no work in comparison getting the same thing too. Just takes your faith out of the System.

Anyway enough frustaps...there's still more to life. The last month saw a lot of parties/farewell treats with the senior batch all set to go. Hasn't really hit me yet, but yes these people would be terribly missed. And then my own batch would go the next year...as I said, continuity...
I was doing a course at the start of the semester that I withdrew in March because I had too many credits and feared the excessive workload would hamper all my courses. Touch decision that was, and today had another discussion with the Prof for that course, who still missed me in class saying I got like the second highest in class in the first minor. Eeks..the kind of options life gives sometimes...