Catharsis

A day with yawning periods of joblessness usually devolves into a introvertive inspection. But that wasn't the case today. It may have been the small amount of hours of peaceful sleep yesterday, or the lack of caffeine, my mind dulled and wandered through the day, and sought no action. A book once started can usually captivate me. Even if the story flow rambles or follows no direction, i would want to find out just how it ends. Or it might be a hopeful hope that if this writer actually got his work published, there's got to be something of value, intellectually or rhetorically, in the pages yet to be read. This may just be a symptom of not having read any piss-poor books. Maybe i should, but that's a train of thought for another post.

Entertainment media today, as it often does, has sparked a wee bit of introspection. I watched "Noone killed Jessica", and Jon Stewart's commentary on the Arizona Shottings of 8/11. Both pieces were politically charged, seeking to inform/catharsize/dramatize/remark its audience. And i found myself standing on no base to even have an opinion. I've numbed to events in the news, and facepalmed it as "just more bad news". I fear i may falling into the stereotype of the news not really reaching me,unless its dramatic, sexual, or something that's easy to have an opinion on, or wordplay material. It is imperative to not view news as isolated events, and they seldom are isolated. With few exceptions, every event is a lot like something before it, that should've had some learnings, and so should this event. There should be progress. That being one point of concern, the other being, is it a good thing if i collect tidbits of world happenings, as capsules of information, so that i may not scoffed at an intellectual conversation. Trivia for the trivial. It may be that i don't care. Empathy is definitely an integral part of an event mattering to people. Or may even be a symptom of laziness, since i started out late discovering reality.

A car-bomb in Jeddah is a tablet of news. No connection to me. But it is a result rhetoric/actions. It will spawn consequences. Without context, it is a haze that is easily forgotten.

I mostly boils down to reading more to inform myself, and form my own trail of breadcrumbs for every issue, and a mark that train of thought for later evaluation. That sounds like a lot of work.

I need to get a lot more sleep.

And maybe start a coffee regiment.

Dubai, Home.

The city I grew up changes every passing second.

There is always this electricity in city.

For me, because of the way my family was, there was always a cultural atmosphere around life. The tamil community never stagnated, socially. I guess my parents were young then. Young in a vibrant town, you do things right? Culture here had much more meaning than in India. I mean, no huge intricately sculpted temples, or 18 century palaces. But tamilians would get together and sing bhajans. They would have trips around the Emirates, and laugh and sing songs they heard on AIR. The Indian community will never die of boredom. Too much to celebrate.

My memories of youthful exuberance was in the backyard of the building i lived in. Vast expanses of nothing but sand. Grounds that called to be played in. There was a rock there that we found. Big rock. It had no earthly reason to be there. It stood out, like a piece of hair in your food. We called it pride rock. Us kids used to hold daily meetings there. Our own little parliament.

What a world. A dreamscape of memories, that building.

When you think back to happy childhood memories, it always feels like an eternity of time. There were so many things, that you fail to remember now, that gives it the fabric of stretching for ages.

As I grew, the city grew with me. Well, I like to think so.

Skyscrapers popped up like pimples on a teenagers cheek. I mean, if you slept for a week, and then wandered out, you wouldn't recognize your surroundings.

When I went to college and came back in my first year, I was in awe. It felt like the city had jet-propelled itself in a direction it didn't really understand. 7 star hotels in the middle of the ocean. Malls that stretched until the horizon. Metro-trains moving along with the clouds. Roads that followed curvature of the earth, that greeted the sun in the morning and bid him good night in the evening.

It's so easy to get lost here, just from the sheer exhaustive lavishness. This is, of course, the city of opulence. The City of lakshmi.

After coming here after the peak recession, it felt like the city had the wind knocked out of it. Like the electricity that used to surge through here is now trickling into a fading lightbulb.

Friends here who used to spend like sheikhs, now curtailed themselves. Only the cheap whiskey for me, please.

The city hasn't changed since I was here 6 months ago. It seems like an outrageous expectation, but really, it's not. I half-expected it to become an aquatic city, or people moving in suction tubes, or anti-gravity hotels that float in the sky. But, nothing has changed. Like a bright, questioning, creative kid who got sent to engineering college. In Trichy. Not really maturity. Just, lack of ideas.

I'm not even sure this city will be here for much longer. I'm not sure how much the world needs fancy address for their head office anymore. It's a disappointment.But I'm sure the city wont go down without a fight. I expect that much. I hope it does. For the sake of my memories.

Cue,Thomas Newman-Any Other name.

And now,

The pund jokes.

For the uninitiated, the pund is more than just a word. It not only rolls out of the edge of your tongue like mellifluous nightingale music, its meaning and purports defy any human effort in cataloging the gamut of emotions than accompany the mere utterance of the word "pund".

Pund can be standalone.

Pund goes well with cheese. And other words.

Pund gives other words new meaning. These words can be found in the Bible of those who follow The Word-the Compundium.

Here are excerpts from the Good Book.

--Pundes-1.People of the pund; generalization.

2. the mountain range of pund

--Punduras- where one may go holidaying

--Pundesliga- the official football league of the pundes.

--Compund-a complex mix of pund. in definite proportions.

Pundle-a lovable pund

--Pundroid-1.a mechanical pund

2. the superior pund OS

--Shizpund- a really shitty pund

--Pundwagon-the pund-mobile

--Repund-1.a pund for a pund

2.the same pund,again

--Vagapund- a pund you can find all over the place

--Pind da pund- a sikh pund

--sikh pund- a pund with a cold

--pundle doodle doo- a talking dog

--Pundonald-1.a pund who had a farm

2.where one obtains pund burgers.and pund fries.

--Hakuna Mapunda-it means no worries for the rest of your days

Chronicles of Pundia-how to make a pund your sister.

--Pound- how to beat the living pund outta someone

--iPund- gross innuendo

--pundler- a pund who starred in F.R.I.E.N.D.S

--pun-d- wordplay with the good word

--pundora-1.a box of pund

2.a place where you can listen to pund for free

--pundam-a pund in sanskrit

--repundation- how big a pund are you?

Insurgentes

Holy mother
I'm the simple one
You can smile at me
and bring me down

you betray
your thoughts
all your prayers
too low

now out of breath
you speak in tongues
and out of debt
your work is done

and your dreams
absolve
and your path
dissolve



--Steven Wilson

The Poultry Farm

If there is such a thing as work-life balance, I am yet to discover it. It is as yet unclear if that is a "me" problem, or a "system" problem. Why not explore both?
23lakh Indians are directly or indirectly employed by the great Indian IT machine. A 53.7 Billion $ machine.However the numbers do not stagger. There is an utter lack of imagination in the work that gets done. Although i'm sure its good business sense to develop a document that sets in stone exactly what is expected out of a service company, adhering to that document as pontifical instruction seems to paint a dull picture. If people are employed in a service whose model is based on repetitive, unimaginative serviceline stuff, pretty soon that quality reflects in their personality. I may be grossly generalizing, but thus far i have been proved more often right than wrong. So quite possibly a gloom and doom atmos might be to blame.

Having taken up an apartment pretty close by to work, along with people who work in the same company, i also eat there, my day is consumed by "work" life. There is no separation between work and life. A few hours of guitar a day maybe the only escape from routine. I hate routine. I hate meeting the same people day-in, day-out. It may be that i eventually don't really get close to anyone,and noone really knows me. But i can bear that albatross. There is a dull knowing when you meet people you met just a short while back. There is no impetus to be creative, imaginative, or at the very least, interesting. Of course, for me, it's impossible to be in a situation where i meet new people everyday. Maybe there are people like that. I envy them.

Beyond a certain point, everyone is the same. The only thing that differentiates people is the people we meet and the books we read. I suppose reading more books can, atleast temporarily move me to a different world. I think i crave that. Alternate reality. The stuff Indian cinema is made of.
I suppose this rant draws to a conclusion when i realise i need more cinema in my life. But the problem is surely more deep-seated. More soul-searching will ensue.

A com-pun-dium of all the bad jokes i make.
Pliss excuse.

Ajunda- a flag with goals #hindi
Chaiyya Chaiyya- what the chai-walla sings to get laid
The corner- where one goes to get chola
Orkutiya- a fraaandly bitch #hindi
Tollgate- a scandal involving JRR Tolkien
Angcraze- a British mental #hindi
Domiknows-psychic pizza
VickyLeaks- the scandal that broke when Victoria spilled her secret
Pullu-itzer- an annual award for eating grass #tamizh
Thumbi- a #tamizh thumbnail image
Jett(i)-sans: a futuristic #tamizh cartoon, starring yaana gupta.
Akkapolice- a #tamizh spoof of Apocalypse
Liquid Pro Quo- beer for words

Lakhsative- Lotion that lets you shoot bills out your behind

Moral Policing

Whaddaya mean im not allowed to copy???

An NDTV report that i caught last night,really caught my attention.
Close to 15lakh,thats 60% of students writing the UP state board exam have cupped(tamil slang:flunked). Now a result that bad always calls for a serious overview of the educational process, and an indepth analysis of the psychi of the stuent body to find the underlying root cause.
And this is what they came up with.
They believe that the students werent allowed to copy enough!!(wtf rite? i is knowing )
This year, the Mayawati govt decided to rid the state of its ''SMS the answers to me during the exams" image, deploying strict monitoring policies.
The result?Half the junta decided they had enough even before the halfway period and decided om-shanti-om was more worth their time.And half of the half that did sit throughout the exam failed anyways.
First,in 1991, the BJP employed strict no cheating measures.The pass percentage dropped by 30 to 40 per cent.Then came the Mulayam government that relaxed the rules and thus the number of students passing the class ten boards again went up to almost 75 per cent.
Now with Mayawati in power, people will have to start studying again.
My heart goes out to these students.
(ps bitcha's from UP na? the 9 pointing secrets are coming out...)