THE FINAL NAIL...

I've been trying to write this for three days now.

Two huge posts have been typed and discarded, because words somehow don't do justice to what I feel like saying.

For the final time.

So I'll be objective now.

I started this blog at a time when I had my first one up and running full throttle, as a 'diarý', where I could write things other than the poetry n prose crap I wrote there. Then, one day, my blogging identity started fighting with my real identity, and I needed to free myself of ancient baggage and words that were trapping me. It became necessary for my survival, and thus on 15th of June, I shut it down. And this one too

At the beginning of this semester, I felt like giving life another chance, and restarted this one.

It worked well, I wrote fairly regularly, and over the last 75 posts this semester, this page got more readers as well. I'm grateful to all of you.

But once again, my blog is questioning my identity, and I dont want it.

I don't want that people read this blog just because it's a girl's blog, or even because it's mý blog, because a LOT of people know who I am, in person, and this very fact takes away from me my freedom to express what I want to, without value judgements and all other kinds of opinions being formed on me. I do not give anyone the right to decide on me and about me for random reasons. This is(was) my page, I wrote it for myself. But if people in ym college start calling me Phoenix instead of who I am, if random ppl who obviously know me make shocking comments anonymously like Comment #22 here or Comment #16 here, I feel the need of drawing a line, at the end of a very eventful semester.

I refuse to be exploited like this; I refuse to be made an object of observation and comment.

WHY DO YOU, IF YOU DO, EVER READ/VISIT THIS PAGE?

Because you like reading it?

I dont think so.

Most of you dont.

Reasons range from no reason to for fun to for curiosity sake, since this is a GIRL's blog, or because maybe I left a comment on yours someday.

Do you think I left that comment so that you came here, or for some other ''sinister'' reason other than the plain fact that I most probably liked reading what you wrote!

But reverred people now tell me that I comment because I have nothing better to do, and just to attract attention. I'm sorry but I wont take so much insult. Yes, I cant stop anybody from having an opinion. I respect their right to have one.

But I also respect my own self-esteem, my right to exist the way I want to, and my right to express wat I feel like.

Go ahead, call me a new-age insensitive woman if you want to.

As if I care!

I crave for equality(now my previous post makes even more sense to me) which was the reason I first started blogging because I had thought at least here I could be what I am, and I could be judged, if at all, based on what I thought and wrote irrespective of who or what I was born as, irrespective of whether I was Asian or African, rich or poor, boy or a girl.

I see that losing, and the "public" nature of this diary being way more painful than what I ever would have liked.

And that's why, I exercise my right to shut down the diary. I have my reasons, the ones I said here, and others, but I anyway dont see a need to justify myself any further to anybody.

Do me a favour, dont ask em questions.

If I need to express myself, I have other options. But no more posts here, and no more comments from me.

If you feel offended by anything I ever said, I'm sorry.

And thanx to all those who ever supported me.

A special thanx to my most dedicated commenter THE ANONYMOUS too.

I think this completes all the formailities.

Now just don't tell me I'm acting extreme, I know I am. But I dont need your opinion.

Infact dont just tell me ANYTHING at all...it's not gonna make a difference to what I want to do.

I know a "Phoenix" cannot die.

But it can certainly hibernate.

Or confine itself somewhere where it is not seen, or heard.

BYE.

Intezaar

Has saans raah takti hai teri, ki hadd hai bekarari ki
Ye ghadi ki suiyaan bhi har ek kadam bad rahi hain sau- sau saal mein!
Dikh raha hai chehra bas ek hi har jagah, ki hadd hai meri khumari ki
Zindagi bhi ruk ruk ke rahi hai sarak, intezaar khatm hone ke intezaar mein!!

ICE ICE BABY...

One of the reasons I've disliked Delhi for is its absence of two of the most beautiful things of Nature-two things I really love...Sea and Snow.

Mumbai scores a lot of points over Delhi in my eyes because of The Arabian Sea. Infact one thing for which I fell in love with the IITB campus when I went there last year was the lakes (the other being the hilltop). Water is such a beautiful, sublime gift of Nature. (I'm now looking forward to my next week's visit to Mumbai and Goa:D)

The other thing is Snow. It's so pretty, so beautiful, so enchanting, so cool that it's actually hot!

But we in Delhi don't even get that!:(

Winters get sufficiently chilly..but it's always like "almost there, but not quite". A near-zero temperature loses half its worth and becomes double as chilly when it doesnt't fall to sub-zero and allows the snow to fall!!

Having said all this, I'm still a huge fan of Meri Dilli(inspite of ALL else that may be good, bad or ugly) because of the ULTIMATE variety of everything-people, food, cultures and especially, weather.

We get the joys of all kinds of seasons over a year, and be it Rajasthan's heat or Shimla's chill, or cherrapunji's monsoon, we have our own miniature versions of everything!

It gives a feeling of completeness in a way. My wardrobe has clothes of all seasons and reasons. So is the kind of food I get to eat in a year, and the various types of routines my days take.

Ah! I'm definitely not complaining!:D

But there is the other side of it naa, which some people dislike(I don't, not much...I love DRAMA in life, I love things to be 'happening' and 'unpredictable' all the time, atleast a lot of the time. I dislike routines and monotony.)

There's absolutely no reliability about the weather patterns. It'll snow in Shimla and Delhi will become cooler.

Winds blow in Pakistan and monsoon gets delayed here.

Jaipur burns and transfers the heat to Delhi!!

Hadd hai...apna bhi kuch hai ki nahi?

Amongst all seasons, obviously Spring is the best- for the pleasant weather and the plethora of beauty. But winter is a close second. It's sooo beautiful, so comfortable, and one could freely do anything once u've worn lotsa clothes!:P

Infact, there's only one thing that can beat "Icecream on a chilly winter night walking on a dark road"...which is "Icecream in a drizzle walking on a deserted road alone!"

It's one of the most peaceful (and romantic) things on Earth!

Right now, it's the delightful winter dawning on Delhi. And it's unusually cool for this time of the year, so that temperature are already hitting 4.5 degrees at night(subtract atleast 2 for IITD campus, another one for MY ROOM!!!). The breeze that's flowing is oh-sooo-chilly, and nights are soo cold that I have to switch off my computer at night because I can't convince myself to bring out my fingers from my blanket and type!! But stiil, that's THE beauty. Winter legitimises ur indolence!!!D

The only thing that makes it uncomfortable, just a little bit, is these sickening exams, which label two of the most delightful things of winter-sleep and laziness- appear like a sin.

Although inspite of all this, I'm still sleepin 10-12 hours these days(majors hain, I'm amazingly weli!!!!!!) and acting sooo lazy that I dont care to get out of my bed to pick up a book 3 feet away, as a result of which I don't study and leave the curse unfinished and end up losing a grade!!

But frankly, I don't care!

Exams to aate jaate rehte hain...I'm just enjoying the icy weather!!!!

Anyway, there's just one more exam to go.

Then I'll be free to enjoy lotsa sleep, lotsa hot-drinks and hot-conversations for atleast one week(and then I'll be off on a vacation...where hopefully there'll be lotsa hot guys:P:P:P!!!)

Homogenous Inequality!

Ah!this is an unequal world...
Not that I didn't know that, but sometimes, even re-realisations HURT.
I'm not assigning any adjectives to this; it's a fact: The world is so unequal...
...though interestingly, everything is balanced so well, that eventually it all sums to ZERO. everything cancels itself out.
But is this particular knowledge solace enough?

All right I know I'm thinking too much.
Majors ka side-effect hai.

I'll get to what caused the latest re-realisation!:P

Everybody knows and complains that IITs, and engg colleges in general, have horrible sex-ratios.
That much, is a fact.
Then comes everybody's interpretations, and perceptions.
And claims-that girls get ALL their jobs/trainings/internships/grades etc etc BECAUSE they are girls. Perhaps they are right as well, I dont know for sure.
And blames.


So many people complain of gender-based partiality.
A few, including me, just worry about it.

(Infact I'm way too apprehensive to actually voice my own views on this touchy topic. I've neither commented, nor discussed much of this with anyone. Being a girl, and thus a supposed beneficiary, I know my views are not gonna be taken kindly. So before I shut up, lemme just say one thing: there are two faces of the coin; I fervently wish, for a thousand reasons, that there were more girls here.)

Anywa, cutting the crap off(this post wasnt meant to be serious), the idea is: that all is not fair, not right, not balanced in the world. The imbalance is uniformly spread in the entire world.
And we HAVE to live with it, with its pros and cons, like it or not!

People are richer and poorer than they ought to be.
Opinions are more biased than they ought to be.
Chance+perception is way more important than it ought to be.
I'm way more careless than anybody before a difficult exam ought to be.

But the catch is, is "ought" really important? (You might remember, I hate the word "should")
Kaam chal raha hai na, ye theek nahi hai kya?

Isn't mine a luxury problem?

Meanwhile, notice this:





Even the authorities realise not all is right in IITs.:))

P.S. I realise I havent mentioned the incident of today at all. But now I feel I don't need it. I don't want controversies in this space.
P.P.S. In case any one of u is wondering about the follow up to the last post, wait a bit. And keep ur fingers crossed!;) Keep watching this space!

Ek Chhoti Si Love Story

I guess everyone has their own love story, or atleast a story about love, even if it's one about a-love-that-never-was, or why-there's-no-love-in-my-life!!!:P

But the story is always there...

Arey nahi, I'm not gonna narrate my own tale of tragedy or happiness here...I hardly have time to speak that much..:P
Just kiddin...

I was actually thinking a bit(what's new? :P) and just looking around myself I found more love stories per person than the number of people around;)

Teenache, did u say? Perhaps....
Despo-panti too. Accepted.
Attempts. From subtle to silent to outrageously desperate
Heartbreaks too, as well as loads of confusion.
Everyone has a muse, an inspiration, a dream, a desire, a him or a her. Visible or invisible.

And then there are the luckier ones...who have found their partners, atleast think they have.
The beautiful couples.

But this post is about this unique twosome, both of whom are my friends, and both share a lovely love story, though they are unaware about it themselves. And I can't decide what to do.:P
Because both Ms. A and Mr. B are pretty good friends of mine, and treat me as a confidante. So I know that both of them have very strong feelings for each other, developed absolutely seperately, and without ANY knowledge about the other's feelings.
No, absolutely no clue. DESPITE me being a crucial common link.
(See I'm good at this. I never leak things. You can always trust me with your deepest secrets. Seriously!!:D)

It all developed independently, and the simultaneity of it as well as matching intensities are only two aspects that make this story different! Even I got to know seperately, and almost by chance. Considering that in B's case, I'm the ONLY one who knows.
Now I'm stuck in a unique difficulty, because I am bound by promise I'd nvr utter a word, especially especially to the crucial other half of the couple, to BOTH of them. And I can''t break that. Besides, any suggestions to "Why don't you tell him/her?" are always rejected, and I get a scolding.:(
They're both too scared.
Even an occassional indirect hint as to "He/she likes you too" is not treated seriously at all, is included in my "consoling" and is actually dismissed.
What makes the problem worse are two factors:

• They are both EQUALLY good friends of mine. So cant take sides with one.
• They both love each other soooooo intensely(I know this) that it pains me to just watch everything silently and leave it on time/destiny. It even sounds stupid. But because nobody else even knows, it makes it difficult for me.
  

I had never realised being introvertish could be so problematic at times.
I'm in a dilemma. What should I do?

Moral Of the story

I learnt two things today:

• One doesn't HAVE to be politically correct to succeed. But failure is guaranteed if you're perceived to be too politically incorrect. Perception is belief!
• We all derive security from the insecurities of others, especially shared insecurities.
  

Ah! Human nature is so not-infallible, yet so difficult to completely fathom...
The art of listening is crucial to deciphering human nature, yet so incomplete. Is thinking such a bad thing then?

Ah! Should I even care?
And again, I HATE the word 'should'.

I realise you can find friends and allies in the unlikeliest of places, especially when life disillusions you from the established pillars of strength.
I also know that friends leave me as soon as they get to know me well enough.
Should I keep wandering from pillar to pillar, then, or is there an end?


There's just one truth in life: It never ends, until it does.


I know this post sounds arbit, but cmon, it;s 3:30 in the morning, and I've an exam tomorrow. I'm not expected to be sane, am I?

INSPITE OF...

...the foolishness...............do fall in love!
...the inevitability of defeat...do fight!
...the exams.....................don't be tense!
...the odds......................do play the game!
...the invincibility of death....do live!
...this..........................do remember THE ZEROTH COMMANDMENT!!

Smile. Come what may.


Somebody teach me how to smile, again...........

I'm an addict.

Agar Internet na hota to kya hota?


It's the 15th official anniversary of Internet...(the work on the project for the first website http://info.cern.ch/ launched on Aug 6,1991 began on November 13.) 15 years since arguably one of the biggest technological revolutions to touch our lives..

Maybe only phones ( esp mobile phones) have had a stronger impact...
We blog, chat, surf, mail, read, write, watch sports, listen to music, get news, trade, do almost everything on the net.
Especially people like me and u.

No, I'm not going to give a lecture or write an essay on the pros and cons of internet.
Sabko pata hai yaar....
The impact is undeniably very very strong..not all of it is god, but it's not much bad either.
Technology, and information, empowers.
It's comfortable living WITH it.
But are we net addicts?
Can we live without it?
Do we feel handicapped without it?

For a lot of people, I suspect the answer is yes...Just look around and know the difference net has made to us.
I have sooooooooooooo many friends only BECAUSE of the net. Be it orkut, blog, chat or simply the fact that I've been able to maintain and strengthen friendships only because of this powerful means of communication.
(I'm using the word friendship here in a very loose sense...koi kisi ka dost nahi hota. Never ever trust anyone.
If u want, dont even trust me when I say this.
But one day, u'll know too.)
Of course, it's another thing that I want to get on a people de-adddiction programme now.
I dont want anyone.
But I'm digressing.

Cyber cafes have grown into places where love mushrooms, sometimes culminating in marriages
(Of course, a looooooooooooooot else mushrooms in cyber cafes as well..)

There are infact more cyber cafes in India than post offices.
Woh din ab bhi yaad hai mujhe when I didnt have a computer at home, and actually paid 60-80 bucks an hour at a cyber cafe for reading my emails!

I don't know if this one will shock u a bit, but still, this is a fact: A 30+ housewife in Kolkata sold her own nude pics to a porn website through a cyber cafe!
Terrorists use this medium, so do fanatics, and so do the biggest entrepreneurs.
Wonder how many gruesome secrets(and Osama bin Ladens) are hidden in tis vast world without a government(Of crse, ignoring the fight between US & the rest for control over Internet also ignoring Google v/s Yahoo v/s Microsoft!)
They say u find EVERYTHING over the net, if u have the eye to look for it!

Do we find love?Maybe yes, I dunno.
But do we lose anything? Yes, lots too...but we dont think that way.
At a very micro level, we lose sleep, grades, concentration, morality, innocence and LIVES

But do we mind it?
Pata nahi.....
Because at the end of the day, even I'm writing this in my BLOG- a place I love, and thats so inextricably linked with the net.


I love the power this place gives me, and the ability to connect and to communicate.
I love it when I can copy assignments from the net.
Yes, it's addictive.
I CAN live without it, but I prefer not to.
I just want to live without people, i mean without depending on anyone, without trusting anyone, at step one.
Deaddiction drive!

Tab tak let the net corrupt me.
Tab tak...

Internet Zindabad........

NEVER TRUST ANYONE

I'm IRRESPONSIBLE; Everybody is responsible for me...

Somebody tell me..tell me tell me please, that what afterall do they want of me?
Aakhir chahte kya ho logon...ichha kya hai aapki? Maksad kya hai aapka?
Ho kaun aap?

Exactly the question...who are you?
Truly speaking, nobody..because nobody owns up, but everybody does...When 'everybody' is responsible, then actually 'nobody' is responsible, because it could be anybody, but everybody assumes it's somebody else.
No, I'm not being cryptic.
This is a fact.
Everybody is asking themselves, and their respective solitudes the same question these days...because we are all feeling lost at some level in a world that has EVERYTHING, yet increasingly, NOTHING.
Cheezein kitni asani se pointless ho jati hain?
For the last three days, this link has been doing the rounds, and everybody seems to be surprised/shocked/angry/hurt/scared/outraged by this, and quite rightly so. Except the media perhaps, which is shamefully enjoying the controversy, and encashing the scoop. Sure enough, TOI sucks, but worse, the attitude, their and ours, SUCKS.

We feed the media, and media feeds us...We all eat crap. The only difference is that they get paid for this!

Yes, what happened with the student was unfortunate, and as BD rightly pointed out there has been too much of unfair and traumatic publicity. At one level, you cant help but call the student foolish-you cant deny both his fault as well as weakness that led to the suicide. Degree extension is not such a rare thing! Yes it hurts, but he should be strong. Worse things can happen in life, and it wasn't as if none of it was his doing. But that's not what I want to get into. No, not even the media. I'm in too caustic a mood to give them a fair hearing.

I'm fed up with THE MESSAGE that comes out of episodes like this.
Think about the common man- the layman whoknows nothing about IIT system except what he reads in the newspapers. He's now been presented a picture of aj ki bigadti hui generation yet again, with amazingly foolish soundbites from some profs, and a convincing representation of how IITians waste public money on ONLY useless surfing in the "best" institutions of the country.
(I am wondering how much time is it now gonna take for IITB admin to shut down their LAN; they already did that here some months back, so maybe now they'd remove internet access in hostels or something like that!)

Ritesh has very rightly pointed out the futility of the attendance rule.
At one level, it's not totally stupid, because there are enough lazy careless people around who would never attend a class if they didnt HAVE to, and the 'academics' would really suffer. Their argument is that someone who's intelligent enough to be in any college(inc ALL COLLEGES-it's not easy to enter anywhere these days), will, if made to sit in the class, grasp something and learn something.
But thats where the imagination stops...because be realistic, kitni classes hum sab sote hue bitate hain. We're experts at sleepin with open eyes! Mental presence is far more crucial than physical presence. So while there has to be an effort to ensure attendance, this is NO WAY fof implementing it.
I have a prof, no I have so many profs, who just can't TEACH. They know their subjects all right, but teaching is a different art...
I ask him a doubt, he'd "appreciate" my question and give a 5-minute lecture answering something totally different.
If 'he' can't understand my question, how am I expected to understand the ones that he asks in the examination!!?!?!

I think this is class-class ki kahaani now!

To ismein bachon ki kya galti agar woh class na jayein to?
Still, we tolerate, we go to classes, but it's impossible to expect us to attend ALL of them..
Tuition fee is the amount you pay for per-semester torture services!

But life ka stress level to dekho koi..
Class, oops torture jhelo....exams assignments etc crap jhelo...parents ki suno teachers ki suno, and friends ki suno.
Aur masti bhi to karni hoti hai na bhai!

Plus this age is such that distractions, anguishes, confusions, experiences, desires, love and hatred keep coming and going.

Then people say awareness and general knowledge is important for "personality building". For that it's back to "media-devtaya namaha".
Result: Itni confusion ki sab kuch swaha!!!!

Thats why I want to ask...Who's made these rules? Why is our life no more our life?
Arey hum bhi padna chahte hain, but dont make this so tough that we kill ourselves!
IT'S A FACT THAT IF THE PROF IS GOOD, HE NEVER EVEN TAKES ATTENDANCE IN THE CLAS, BECAUSE PEOPLE ATTEND HIS CLASSES ANYWAY. YES, THE SAME CARELESS IRRESPONSIBLE HACKERS. WE GO TO A CLASS WHEN WE REALISE THE TEACHER IS INTELLIGENT AND CAN FEEL OUT PULSE. WHEN HE TEACHES PROPERLY, WE WANT TO LEARN.

But the 'them' of the society wants to kill my interest in learning. They are the ones who give me alternative distractions to kill my time with. Then they tell me I'm the cream of the society which is rotting. As if they were never students themselves.
Student population is a lot of energy personified. They waste them, or they confuse them, and then they blame them.
Parents bhi daantenge, teachers bhi.
Aur friends ke funde to awesome hi hote hain.
Us par ye "chandan sa badan, chanchal chitwan...."

Koi kare to kya kare!

We can't do much about the media, except sop giving it what it wants..publicity, and TRP(& equivalents).
We can't do much about college admins except HOPE that they'll understand.
We can't do much about attendance rules because we dont want to fail, even if we like to.
We can't do much about the inter-hostel LAN that officially doesnt work.
We can't do much about the peer pressure. There's nobody to point out.
We can't do much about profs who cant teach...except pray that they take VRS.
We can't do much about our age and our parents and our disractions. These variables cannot be altered.
All we can do is perhaps crib and complain, and then be dismissed as aj kal ki useless generation!

Gosh..I never felt so powerless.

But there's one thing I'll do. In my tiny act of rebellion, I'm NOT going to class tomorrow morning.

Inquilab Zindabad!!