It would be our last night out together. He was leaving the next day and though the two of us would stay for another year, things wouldn't ever be the same again. In the four years that we had been together the thought of doing this had crossed our minds several times and subsequently, we had spent many night outs singing songs for hostel events as well as just for the pure pleasure it gave us. But the reality of the last night out was what it took to finally get a cheap headphone and an amazing piece of software to record some of the songs we had sung and tunes we had played, henceforth to be remembered as "aakhri nite out"
"Do you sing?" asked the Music Rep of my hostel. It was the summer of 2001 and we were being "ragged". "No, but I can play the tabla nad a bit of congo, Sir" , I said, almost too embarassed to state that I didn't play something cooler like guitar or drums. "Tabla! ok let's see what all you can play"
I still remember the day of our Fresher's Music event. It was the 17th of August 2001 and my Rep had asked me to come running to the hostel immediately after finishing the first Quiz of my college life. It was on Applied Mechanics. There were three songs lined up for the event. "Nights in Blue Satin" would take care of the Western Song, I was playing the Congo in "Chale Chalo" - the Eastern Group Song and the tabla for the solo instrumental. As Venkat and myself started on the mandolin and congo respectively to begin "Chale Chalo", I felt a strange calm descend on me. It was the first stage performance where I had a significant role and I simply loved it.
We came first and one of the most cherished moments of my college life was my hostel mates almost picking me up and dancing on the SAC floor. I felt ecstatic.
I was fortunate to be one of the very few tabla players in the campus and as a result people had to bear with whatever I dished out. So for the first three years of my stay in college, I played in almost each and every event; often pushing in the instrument even if it was not needed just to add to the classical touch. In singing events that we had, for some strange reason there were no points for the accompanying instruments. This meant that in one particular Ghazal Night in which I was the Music Rep of my hostel, I ended up playing tabla for 7 hostels out of the 9. My hostel finished 5th and two of the others for whom I played, ended up 2nd and 3rd. Not bad, ha!!
In my first year we had this fourth yearite who was the best Drummer in the institute and folks from my hostel said that he always hoped that there would be a tabla player so that we could fuse the two instruments and do a sawal jawab in the Fusion Night event (till then the most happening event in the Music Club).
It was a chilling January morning and the time was around 5 o'clock, as we stepped out of the hostel to go the the institute music room (which had the only Drum set) to have the last practice for the Fusion Night. We were almost sure of clinching it. We had a few tunes from Indian Ocean to be played on the Electric Guitar along with the drums and the tabla, a very melodious piece on the synthesizer which was to be played by one of my seniors who of all people I have met had the keenest music sense. Be it keyboard or guitar he could figure out tunes, chords, harmonies with ease. His rythym sense was fantastic and was a true asset to the hostel and the institute. All of us in the first year simply adored him, more so because of the lovable person that he was.
Anyway, the real attraction was to be the jugalbandi between the drums and the tabla.
As the judge stepped on to the stage in the Convocation Hall, all of us could feel the tension in the air. We had made a few mistakes here and there but come on, no other hostel had a drummer and a tabla player. Worst come worst we would be second, I thought.
"The drummer from Karakoram was fantastic."
Cheers!!
"The tabla player was also good."
Yipee!!
Second Runners Up ............
OK. Good. Now we are either first or second.
First Runners Up .............
Cool. We have almost made it. Just announce it quickly will you.......
And the winner for this evening is .........
I dont even remember which hostel came first. All I remember is that they had played some crap. We were crestfallen. We cursed anyone even remotely associated with the event. In hindsight though, it was to be the most important lesson as far as playing in events was concerned. Never play for the result, play for the fun. Never play for the stage, revel in the practices.
What followed was the costliest and the biggest (in terms of sheer quantity) treats that any Music Rep has ever given to his team in our only hostel cafetaria.
KL? Cafeteria? Anyway...
We mostly lost in the music events. Initially it hurt. Later on it didn't matter. At least not to me. and it was true even when I was the Cultural Secy of my hostel. I was anyway not the "play for win" kind of a guy ever in my life. I took whatever came to me in my stride.
In the meanwhile I also tried my hands at drums and though the process lasted only about a month or so, it was fun. Helped by my senior I practised everyday in the music room and given my rythym sense, I could say unabashedly that I was a fast learner. The pinnacle of my stint as a drummer was the House Day perormance where I played drums with the instrumental rendition of the MI theme and a part of Metallica's Nomad. Take my word for it, it was a hit!
Amidst all this I was spotted by a certain stud. Stud Singh for all those who have ever been to my college! So along with a Mohan Veena , Violin and Guitar player and perhaps the best classical vocalist of my college we formed a fusion group. To say I enjoyed the association would be a gross understatement. We spent time composing tunes on certain Ragas (I mostly listened though!) figuring out jugalbandi between tabla, ghatam and the pakhawaj, trying out pieces from Mrigya, playing Vande Mataram on the mohan veena accompanied by the tabla, singing bhajans and ghazals. It was probably the most enriching experience that I have ever had as far as music is concerned. There was so much to learn from each of them. We became quite popular in the campus and it was fun to be congratulated on the superb performance in the inauguration of the Tryst or Rendezvous. I think I upped my tabla playing abilities by a few notches during those days.
So while I went about trying to fulfil my craving for playing the tabla, there were performances by the stalwarts of Indian Classical Music in our campus which left me dumbstruck in awe and amazement and gasping for more. I didn't look for company to go to these concerts and remember in my first year attending a Ravi Shankar, Anoushka Shankar concert in the Siri Fort Auditorium , sitting in the steps all by myself. In the campus itself I was fortunate to see Pt. Shiv Kumar Sharma, Pt. Vishwa Mohan Bhatt, Ustad Bismillah Khan, Pt Hari Prasad Chaurasia, Dr. L Subramaniam, some of them , multiple times, accompanied by the lesser known but no less talented tabla players like Ustad Shafat Ahmed Khan. It was heavenly. At the end of the concerts as the performers stirred up a storm with their amazing speed and dexterity, it seemed almost out of the world. Throats went dry and heartbeats became faster. God I miss those days.
I never wanted to be stereotyped as someone who listened to a particular type of music or played only a particular type of instrument and so always wanted to learn playing the guitar. You see, tabla was great, it's one of the most difficult and beautiful instruments. There's nothing like hearing to a tabla player in full flow. But as a college goer there was only one thing which was cool. Singing songs with friends and playing the guitar alongside. I knew I could sing at a certain level which would hopefully prevent my listeners from throwing footwear at me. So the fact that one of the nicest guys around and a very good guitar player was one of my closest buddies coupled with the realisation of the approach of a two month long summer vacation of nothingness, prompted me to finally take the plunge and get the first few lessons from him to be honed at home.
My first and until recently, only guitar was a Hobner Jumbo and boy, I remember the first chord I played on it . It was wonderful. It was the summer of 2003 and spirits were high. G C D & Em formed my life. I was sure of why I wanted to play the guitar and so it made things easy. I never wanted to be a Joe Satriani ( I didnt even know his name back then) and so I concentrated on learning to play the easiest chords. My mother bore the brunt of it all. From morning till night I would keep playing (rather try playing) chords at random The thrill of learning was mine again and it was awesome. It was painstaking and boring at times but I somehow kept my interest levels up with the vision of singing "Take It Easy" and "Every Rose has its Thorn" firmly embedded in my eyes.
As third year started I began playing the guitar more freely. My guru would teach me all the songs he knew which meant that we ended up knowing the same songs and no more. There was also the thrill of taking the guitar along on visits to my home. Yeah there was the rare occasion of a few girls (ya you heard me right , Girls!) saying to me the lines I always dream to hear whenever I carry my guitar along with me .."So you play the Guitar.....Kuch bajao na..."
Soon I was the dependable rythym guitarist of my hostel, doing all the easy chord playing while others played the leads. I loved it all the way. My first appearance with the guitar was the most beautiful song I have heard called "Dust In The Wind".. (that's where the title of my blog comes from) and do I even need to say it, we came first.
Then there was that incident where about five or six of us sat on the road in front of the hostel through the entire night, waiting for the keys to the music room to arrive. There was some dirty politics involved in it and I dont wish to reproduce the details here. But it was the most amazing of nights as we sat in the middle of the road waiting for the keys to come, frustrated, angry and amused at the same time. Somebody brought maggi for all of us and we sang a few songs. It was dreamlike.
Meanwhile many events went by. We won some. We lost more. I managed to see some fabulous performances. "More than Words" by Francis and Baijal, "Comfortably Numb" by Mohit, Amitabh Basu on his keyboard (it didnt matter what he played), Jwala on the second year Eastern Night with Basu on keyboards, Jeet on the Mohan Veena and Aravind on the Violin... there are too many to name. Through all of this I came close to so many people, mostly from my hostel. So there was our synth player who graduated from figuring out and playing chords (which he was by the way very good at) to playing Fur Elise and Moonlight Sonata , who became the epitome of determination for many of us, the level headed, wierd at times, genius, the boy house wardens want parents to meet when their kids come to the hostel. Then there was our lead guitarist whose antics generally started after midnight as he plugged in his guitar and distortion, the bundle of energy and enthusiasm, whose rendering of "Toxicity" in the first Distortionaire is something I would never forget. And there was my guitar guru. When he sang "Baby can I hold you tonight" at 3 in the morning, it brought goosebumps.
In the last year in college I had all but stopped playing anything. I didn't learn anything new, the thrill, it seemed, was gone. Coming here though I have realised that I cant live without music. And I don't mean listening to it, I mean playing something, singing to myself. So as I sit in my room with my new Yamaha acoustic guitar trying out "More than words" a sense of pleasure fills me. The joy of doing something to your hearts content.
People who know me say and I myself like to believe that I have a sense of music . If you ask me I won't be able to describe to you in words exactly what it means. The point is as long as I have this sense I would like to keep playing something and it doesnt matter to me whether it's the cool guitar or the classical tabla (or maybe some other instrument someday!)
By the way, if you have managed to reached this far, firstly thanks a ton, and if you still remember the mention of the Applied Mechanics Quiz in the beginning, I scored -1.5. No that's not a typo!
Thank you for the Music.
Friday, October 27, 2006
Monday, October 09, 2006
Change Revisited....
It's a subject that has begun to fascinate me more and more since the time I pondered on the change that was about to happen, as I entered the last days of my college life. Till then though I somehow only thought of it at a very individual level: change in environment, change in the people living around you, different routines. different hang out places. My visit to home this time (the first one as an employed son !) opened for me a new perspective.
There are certain things in life which you take for granted. Or at least I did. Things which to you are eternal. For me it was my hometown. No I am not talking about the physical appearance of the city of my childhood. I am talking about its feels. Its sounds and flavours so as to speak. As kids, Durga Puja was one of the most eagerly awaited events of the whole year and although the attractions changed from getting gas balloons and riding the merry-go-round as a 5 year old to checking out the prettiest girls in town all dressed up as 10th graders and roaming around the city in one's father's scooters (sadly the dad's in my hometown prefer a scooter over a bike), yet the charm stayed the same, unaffected by the growing years.
This time around, as I stood in the pandal with one of my friends, I realised (and this was something which had hit me a few years back also) that we no longer enjoyed it as we used to. The thrill was gone, we were too old for the merry-go-rounds and too young for enjoying the spiritual/religious aspect of it. There were almost no known faces and we were only going through the motions trying to recapitulate what thrilled us as schoolboys. I guess it's but natural that you outgrow your childhood joys and start enjoying newer more mature things but even then it sort of hit me hard.
At home as my father came to me to ask about the nittie-gritties of the latest Digi-Cam that I had brought for him, my mind went back to the days when the roles were reversed and my father would be unravelling for me the mysteries of the newest remote control car that he had brought from Calcutta. I met my grandmother after 6 years. For her mine was a transition straight from school to that of an employed youth. She was delighted and nostalgic at the same time and we spent a lot of moments reminiscing about the days when grandmothers and grandfathers were the most caring and the best humans on earth. As for me I could see that she had grown old. There were the usual joint pains and the daily dose of medicine. A far cry from the Nani who would make me stand on her feet while she sat down and then swing me for as long as I wanted.
When you go home on a vacation, it's mainly for the two things that matter a lot in your life: your family and your friends from the school days. And like family you always expect your friends to be there or at least their families to be there. This time around as I parted with one of my closest buddies I realised that I didnt know when I would meet him next. His father would be retiring on March next year and so his family is moving out. It was as if a defining principle of your existence was being challenged. I always expected home to be this way. Meet family , hang out with old friends, go to their houses irrespective of their being there or not at that moment to feast on the various dishes that their mothers would prepare once intimidated of my arrival! All that was slowly changing. And then I realised that my father would also be retiring in a few years and leaving for Kolkata where he has built a house.
I guess all the while the world around us is changing in its various forms. Sometimes the changes are shattering and sometimes too subtle to catch our imagination. It's only when we sit back and retrospect that we find the way things have changed: relations, perspectives, roles, everything. On a slightly different note, ever since I started maintaining a blog, I think I have become more aware of everything around me. Someone once said to me "The more you write, the more you will have things to write about..." . Now I can fully understand what he meant.
There are certain things in life which you take for granted. Or at least I did. Things which to you are eternal. For me it was my hometown. No I am not talking about the physical appearance of the city of my childhood. I am talking about its feels. Its sounds and flavours so as to speak. As kids, Durga Puja was one of the most eagerly awaited events of the whole year and although the attractions changed from getting gas balloons and riding the merry-go-round as a 5 year old to checking out the prettiest girls in town all dressed up as 10th graders and roaming around the city in one's father's scooters (sadly the dad's in my hometown prefer a scooter over a bike), yet the charm stayed the same, unaffected by the growing years.
This time around, as I stood in the pandal with one of my friends, I realised (and this was something which had hit me a few years back also) that we no longer enjoyed it as we used to. The thrill was gone, we were too old for the merry-go-rounds and too young for enjoying the spiritual/religious aspect of it. There were almost no known faces and we were only going through the motions trying to recapitulate what thrilled us as schoolboys. I guess it's but natural that you outgrow your childhood joys and start enjoying newer more mature things but even then it sort of hit me hard.
At home as my father came to me to ask about the nittie-gritties of the latest Digi-Cam that I had brought for him, my mind went back to the days when the roles were reversed and my father would be unravelling for me the mysteries of the newest remote control car that he had brought from Calcutta. I met my grandmother after 6 years. For her mine was a transition straight from school to that of an employed youth. She was delighted and nostalgic at the same time and we spent a lot of moments reminiscing about the days when grandmothers and grandfathers were the most caring and the best humans on earth. As for me I could see that she had grown old. There were the usual joint pains and the daily dose of medicine. A far cry from the Nani who would make me stand on her feet while she sat down and then swing me for as long as I wanted.
When you go home on a vacation, it's mainly for the two things that matter a lot in your life: your family and your friends from the school days. And like family you always expect your friends to be there or at least their families to be there. This time around as I parted with one of my closest buddies I realised that I didnt know when I would meet him next. His father would be retiring on March next year and so his family is moving out. It was as if a defining principle of your existence was being challenged. I always expected home to be this way. Meet family , hang out with old friends, go to their houses irrespective of their being there or not at that moment to feast on the various dishes that their mothers would prepare once intimidated of my arrival! All that was slowly changing. And then I realised that my father would also be retiring in a few years and leaving for Kolkata where he has built a house.
I guess all the while the world around us is changing in its various forms. Sometimes the changes are shattering and sometimes too subtle to catch our imagination. It's only when we sit back and retrospect that we find the way things have changed: relations, perspectives, roles, everything. On a slightly different note, ever since I started maintaining a blog, I think I have become more aware of everything around me. Someone once said to me "The more you write, the more you will have things to write about..." . Now I can fully understand what he meant.
Monday, September 25, 2006
"Family Matters"
There are some books you don't like but still read through because they are supposed to be very famous, very good. There are others which you love and recommend to friends. And there are still others which move you to tears and for a long time after you have finished reading it, sitting on the bed alone in your room, you dont want anybody to look into your eyes for fear of ridicule. It's not that you cant hold back your tears, it's just that you want to give in, you want to cry. And you know the beauty of the story that I am talking about, it's not a tragedy, in fact its far from what you would call a tragedy or even a sad story per se. It's very commonplace , almost mundane in its spirit, yet seen through the eyes of one Rohinton Mistry even everyday occurences take the hue of magical appearences.
If Such a Fine Balance swept you of your feet due to its attention to details and the vast scope at the same time and the imbalance between hope and despair in the lives of its characters, Family Matters brings out perhaps all the emotions you can ever feel: love, hate, anger, compassion, hope, greed, pride, pity, despair, scorn..... I can't even name them. It's the story of a family, an old man, Nariman Vakeel, afflicted with Parkinson's, his two step children Jal and Coomy, both unmarried living in a big house with him, his daughter Roxanna living in a cramped house with her husband Yezad and two schoolgoing boys Jehangir and Murad. When a turn of events forces Nariman to stay with his daughter Roxanna in her little flat, it not only puts to test their financial and material resources but most importantly their spirit. What follows is as intricate and magical (I can't stop using this word!) a description of "family matters" as ever could be. From Murad's coming home on foot for days to save the bus fare for his little brother's Christmas gift, to Jehangir holding his grandfather's hand in the middle of the night while the old man is tormented in his sleep with memories of the death of his beloved Lucy and his wife Yasmin, from Yezad's realisation that in the end a little compassion is all we need to live in this mad world to Roxanna's ever ageing envelopes marked "Bread & Butter", "Electricity" and the likes in to see through the month, from Jal's guilt having failed to stand up to his sister's verdict to Coomy's anger and frustration with life, Family Matters makes you smile and cry at the same time, makes you marvel at the beauty of life itself, of bondage and the complicacies of human relations.
It reminded me of my grandfather and his death. It was sudden. The doctors called it a bolt from the blue. Through Nariman, I could almost hear my Nana speak. The way Jehangir became terrified and saddened by Yezad and Roxanna's fights reminded me of the ones which my parents had during my childhood which shook the world around me.
Family Matters is a beautiful novel, one to be treasured forever, one which I would recommend everyone to read. Don't expect anything dramatic. The novel progresses predictably except for the end where a few coincidences change its shape distinctively. Read it for the simple joy of reading, read it to know all the emotions that exist, emotions we could forget feeling if not reminded.
If Such a Fine Balance swept you of your feet due to its attention to details and the vast scope at the same time and the imbalance between hope and despair in the lives of its characters, Family Matters brings out perhaps all the emotions you can ever feel: love, hate, anger, compassion, hope, greed, pride, pity, despair, scorn..... I can't even name them. It's the story of a family, an old man, Nariman Vakeel, afflicted with Parkinson's, his two step children Jal and Coomy, both unmarried living in a big house with him, his daughter Roxanna living in a cramped house with her husband Yezad and two schoolgoing boys Jehangir and Murad. When a turn of events forces Nariman to stay with his daughter Roxanna in her little flat, it not only puts to test their financial and material resources but most importantly their spirit. What follows is as intricate and magical (I can't stop using this word!) a description of "family matters" as ever could be. From Murad's coming home on foot for days to save the bus fare for his little brother's Christmas gift, to Jehangir holding his grandfather's hand in the middle of the night while the old man is tormented in his sleep with memories of the death of his beloved Lucy and his wife Yasmin, from Yezad's realisation that in the end a little compassion is all we need to live in this mad world to Roxanna's ever ageing envelopes marked "Bread & Butter", "Electricity" and the likes in to see through the month, from Jal's guilt having failed to stand up to his sister's verdict to Coomy's anger and frustration with life, Family Matters makes you smile and cry at the same time, makes you marvel at the beauty of life itself, of bondage and the complicacies of human relations.
It reminded me of my grandfather and his death. It was sudden. The doctors called it a bolt from the blue. Through Nariman, I could almost hear my Nana speak. The way Jehangir became terrified and saddened by Yezad and Roxanna's fights reminded me of the ones which my parents had during my childhood which shook the world around me.
Family Matters is a beautiful novel, one to be treasured forever, one which I would recommend everyone to read. Don't expect anything dramatic. The novel progresses predictably except for the end where a few coincidences change its shape distinctively. Read it for the simple joy of reading, read it to know all the emotions that exist, emotions we could forget feeling if not reminded.
Monday, September 04, 2006
The Crocodile Man, Steve Irwin, is dead.
I absolutely loved his shows on Nat Geo and Animal Planet. The fact that he died doing the thing he loved the most struck me to be ironic and poetic at the same time.
It is understood he was killed by a sting-ray barb that went through his chest. He was swimming off the Low Isles at Port Douglas filming an underwater documentary and that's when it occurred.
read more | digg story
It is understood he was killed by a sting-ray barb that went through his chest. He was swimming off the Low Isles at Port Douglas filming an underwater documentary and that's when it occurred.
read more | digg story
Thursday, August 31, 2006
A Life Less Ordinary
Think of the world "traveller" or better still, "explorer" and let your stage be the entire globe. What are the names that come to your mind ? Amundsen, Peary, Marco Polo, Columbus, Vasco Da gama, Ibn Batuta, Fa-Hien.......
Ever heard of a certain James Holman? Chances are that you have not. Yet, clocking about a quarter million miles and coming to contact with about 200 different cultures, he was and remains history's greatest traveller in the truest sense of the word. Add to this the fact that he was completely blind and you have before you the most daring, astonishing lives ever lived.
Priced at close to a thousand Rupees, it would be the most expensive book that I bought. Yet going by my book buying instinct for the last three years or so, which is to buy completely random books without any pre-conception solely based on the book cover, title and blurb, I thought I would take the plunge. I can't and I won't even attempt to write a book review here. That's way out of my league and instead of making a complete fool of myself I would rather refer you to http://www.jasonroberts.net/ the website of the author, Jason Roberts who, through his marvellously researched book has tried to accord Holman his due as history's greatest ever traveller.
Poet, doctor, lieutenant, traveller; few men before or since must have lead such a charmed life.
"I see things better with my feet." said James Holman and so he did, embarking on a journey of the globe and experiencing it in a way the sighted could only dream of. For him, his blindness was not a handicap to be pitied upon, it merely meant finding a different way to sense the world. He rode horses, studied medicine in the University of Edinburgh, climbed up Mt. Vesuvius to witness its famous eruption circa 1821, climbed the masts of ships, travelled across Siberia right upto the Kamchatka Peninsula, made friends with natives and in the process visited every inhabited continent on the planet.
He knew no foreign languages, had almost no money, and carried little more than a primitive writing machine--yet he also had a prodigious memory, hyper-acute remaining senses and vast amounts of
personal charm. (From http://www.jasonroberts.net/introholman.html)
As the author found out, there is very little information available on James Holman anywhere in the world. Comparison of the Wiki entries of Holman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Holman) with that of Marco Polo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_Polo) is just an example.
There's a famous quote saying "Life should be big, not long" . To me the life of James Holman epitomises this. I won't try to dish out what the book taught me or meant to me personally. Just getting to know about such a life was prize enough for me. Read this excerpt from the book and who knows you might also be prompted to go ahead and read the entire story, one of a life lived to the fullest.
Ever heard of a certain James Holman? Chances are that you have not. Yet, clocking about a quarter million miles and coming to contact with about 200 different cultures, he was and remains history's greatest traveller in the truest sense of the word. Add to this the fact that he was completely blind and you have before you the most daring, astonishing lives ever lived.
He was known simply as The Blind Traveler--a solitary, sightless adventurer who, astonishingly, fought the slave trade in Africa, survived a frozen captivity in Siberia, hunted rogue elephants in Ceylon and helped chart the Australian outback. James Holman triumphed not only over blindness but crippling pain, poverty and the interference of well-meaning authorities (his greatest feat, a circumnavigation of the world, had to be launched in secret).
Once a celebrity, a bestselling author and an inspiration to Charles Darwin and Sir Richard Francis Burton, the charismatic, witty Holman outlived his fame, dying in an obscurity that has endured--until now. (from A SENSE OF THE WORLD.)
Priced at close to a thousand Rupees, it would be the most expensive book that I bought. Yet going by my book buying instinct for the last three years or so, which is to buy completely random books without any pre-conception solely based on the book cover, title and blurb, I thought I would take the plunge. I can't and I won't even attempt to write a book review here. That's way out of my league and instead of making a complete fool of myself I would rather refer you to http://www.jasonroberts.net/ the website of the author, Jason Roberts who, through his marvellously researched book has tried to accord Holman his due as history's greatest ever traveller.
Poet, doctor, lieutenant, traveller; few men before or since must have lead such a charmed life.
"I see things better with my feet." said James Holman and so he did, embarking on a journey of the globe and experiencing it in a way the sighted could only dream of. For him, his blindness was not a handicap to be pitied upon, it merely meant finding a different way to sense the world. He rode horses, studied medicine in the University of Edinburgh, climbed up Mt. Vesuvius to witness its famous eruption circa 1821, climbed the masts of ships, travelled across Siberia right upto the Kamchatka Peninsula, made friends with natives and in the process visited every inhabited continent on the planet.
He knew no foreign languages, had almost no money, and carried little more than a primitive writing machine--yet he also had a prodigious memory, hyper-acute remaining senses and vast amounts of
personal charm. (From http://www.jasonroberts.net/introholman.html)
As the author found out, there is very little information available on James Holman anywhere in the world. Comparison of the Wiki entries of Holman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Holman) with that of Marco Polo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_Polo) is just an example.
There's a famous quote saying "Life should be big, not long" . To me the life of James Holman epitomises this. I won't try to dish out what the book taught me or meant to me personally. Just getting to know about such a life was prize enough for me. Read this excerpt from the book and who knows you might also be prompted to go ahead and read the entire story, one of a life lived to the fullest.
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
In Good Company
The mercury was soaring and so were our spirits. It's not everyday that you get an engineering degree (2 in fact !), it's not everyday that you get to wear a rather gaudy orange gown and roam around crazily clicking pictures of yourself and your friends as if the world were coming to an end, it's not everyday you come to the place you spent five years of your life and for some unfathomable reason it feels different to the point of emptiness.
It's as if life has changed gears. "Kitne baje ki Train hai ..." has been replaced by "Kis Flight se jaa raha hai...... Jet?". Card has replaced cash, 3 bedroom apartments have taken the place of hostel rooms, people you used to live your life with were scattered, found and scattered again. But in between all these, it's the time spent together, time spent gossiping and giggling, time spent over a bottle of beer or vodka, time spent over sumptous meals ranging from Chicken Lasagne to Kukkad Kebab to Railway Mutton Curry that linger in memory.
The Convocation was a fantastic weekend. Late nights at a dear friend's house, spent with the best buddies you will ever have, the awesomely boring dress rehersal and the final convocation ceremony highlighted by a very relevant speech by Azim Premji (who also happened to quote from Thomas Friedman's "The World Is Flat"), the mayhem that followed afterwards under the scorching sun with the photo sessions, the beer sessions at Masala Junction and Scorpion Moon so typically spent discussing "life ke funde", the weary eyes, the throbbing headache; the two days were eventful to say the least. To add to all the excitement was the realisation on landing at the New Delhi airport that you have forgotten to bring your return tickets, the solitary auto rickshaw to be seen at 2:00 A.M charging Rs 600 to go to NOIDA, the Airtel roaming facility ditching you at the moment you needed it the most and the sweltering heat and humidity which made sure that my love for Bangalore went up by quite a few notches.
Nevertheless, things got sorted out, I got my degree(s), met friends, went to my hostel where again the feeling of emptiness was the most dominant one where I had expected nostalgia/sadness/belongingness and finally was back on the Jet Airways flight to Bangalore.
At the airport there was more good company as another dear friend and fellow Bangalorean was found arriving from Chennai having extended his working days in a week from 6.75 to 7.00. The Bada Saheb that he is meant we got to go to his home where we had Britannia GoodDay biscuits (the Brand being important for the fact that he works in ITC!) and then had the company ki gaadi drop us at our house.
The fun and frolic of the weekend spilled over to the 15th of August also. Sure it was the Independance Day but to admit candidly, it was no more than a holiday for me. So I got up at around 9:00 and then helped my friend prepare sandwitches for breakfast which was fun, what with boiling potatoes and all. The rest of the day didnt seem to promise much and was about to be spent lazing around alone perhaps reading a book. Then suddenly the Bada Saheb called up informing of the expected arrival of another and his unexpected availability for the entire day. Soon they were near Maharaja Hotel, the landmark near our house where I went to pick them up on my now famous bike which has become the laughing stock in some circles and at the same time has elicited mixed responses of "Cool.. but thoda aarbit nahi hai ..." from others.
After that it was time for lunch which we had at one of the best restaurants I have been here in my short stay at Bangalore. Sahib, Sind, Sultan, modelled as a old time luxury railway coach proved to be the perfect blend of ambience, great food and a bill that won't empty your wallet. I have always wondered at the effect a good lunch or a dinner with good company has on an individual. For me it's the best part of any day and the gourmet that I am, the potent combination of food to tickle your taste buds and friends to spend entire lives with, was and still remains, one of the few moments to savour and relish for ever. Add to that I had my inspiration as far as the quantity of eating and the choice of non-vegetarian items goes, eating alongside me.
The afternoon rolled into the evening as we lazed in our house under the weight of the immensely heavy lunch reluctant to go anywhere. Two more friends joined us soon. One, my current flat and company mate and the other who was kind enough to give us a shelter when we were house hunting. It was evening and people were throwing around options regarding how to make it memorable. Movies, Pubs, Bowling everything met opposition from someone or the other until finally someone came up with the greatest idea of all time...."Yaar aish karte hain aur chill maarte hain ..." Legendary lines spoken by a person who is little less than one himself!
And so we started chilling out. The glasses were laid and the vodka came out in complete defiance of the dry-day that it was and the ball was aptly set rolling by a series of small anecdotes on the life changing power of alcohol and its wonderful affects when taken in heavy doses. There was the dim light to get the feel, photography bordering on the surrealistic :D and Marilyn Monroe in her famous pose to stare at and debate whether she was mischevious or out and out sensous. Thereafter it was a laughter riot for almost two hours at a stretch as two or three of us took centrestage to narrate the most weirdest, funniest, insane, improbable, logic defying, gross and downright mindless incidents of hostel life that you will ever hear. So much so that our jaws and stomach started aching. By the end of it all we were at our wits end. In between this there was also a walk down to the nearby Corner House for a taste of Death By Chocolate and Black Forest with Vanilla Ice Cream and Chocolate Sauce. The night was getting better and better and better.
Finally it was time to sleep and it was decided to lay all the matresses together (5 in all) to accommodate the 7 people we had. Then somebody had the idea of the night. Why not sleep on the terrace. The insanity of the numerous anecdotes had had their affect on us and so an instant decision was made and we went up the stairs on the terrace to sleep with the sky and the clouds as our roof. There was a chill in the air as we debated on the colour of the clouds and their movement. One of us who happened to be sleeping at one extreme end also had the fear of a coconut falling and hitting him to contend with due to the proximity he had with the beautiful coconut tree that stands next to our house. So after few moments of giggling we finally went to sleep.
Daybreak saw a return to sanity which lead us to scurry to the warmth of our house. Slowly the guests left and the house was quiet once again. A weekend gathering was planned at one Samarkhand which was vouched to be the best restaurant he has ever eaten in by none other than our very own Bada Saheb.
Now as I sit in my office with so much time so as to write this entire blog in one go, I eagerly await that weekend, that gathering which brings so much fun and happiness that for once I tend to forget the ends and the means which have been troubling me. I am beginnning to think that maybe life's all about these little moments, inconsequential to the world but immensley satisfying to the self, maybe no matter what you do and where you are, happiness is after all, a state of mind, it's about being in good company.
It's as if life has changed gears. "Kitne baje ki Train hai ..." has been replaced by "Kis Flight se jaa raha hai...... Jet?". Card has replaced cash, 3 bedroom apartments have taken the place of hostel rooms, people you used to live your life with were scattered, found and scattered again. But in between all these, it's the time spent together, time spent gossiping and giggling, time spent over a bottle of beer or vodka, time spent over sumptous meals ranging from Chicken Lasagne to Kukkad Kebab to Railway Mutton Curry that linger in memory.
The Convocation was a fantastic weekend. Late nights at a dear friend's house, spent with the best buddies you will ever have, the awesomely boring dress rehersal and the final convocation ceremony highlighted by a very relevant speech by Azim Premji (who also happened to quote from Thomas Friedman's "The World Is Flat"), the mayhem that followed afterwards under the scorching sun with the photo sessions, the beer sessions at Masala Junction and Scorpion Moon so typically spent discussing "life ke funde", the weary eyes, the throbbing headache; the two days were eventful to say the least. To add to all the excitement was the realisation on landing at the New Delhi airport that you have forgotten to bring your return tickets, the solitary auto rickshaw to be seen at 2:00 A.M charging Rs 600 to go to NOIDA, the Airtel roaming facility ditching you at the moment you needed it the most and the sweltering heat and humidity which made sure that my love for Bangalore went up by quite a few notches.
Nevertheless, things got sorted out, I got my degree(s), met friends, went to my hostel where again the feeling of emptiness was the most dominant one where I had expected nostalgia/sadness/belongingness and finally was back on the Jet Airways flight to Bangalore.
At the airport there was more good company as another dear friend and fellow Bangalorean was found arriving from Chennai having extended his working days in a week from 6.75 to 7.00. The Bada Saheb that he is meant we got to go to his home where we had Britannia GoodDay biscuits (the Brand being important for the fact that he works in ITC!) and then had the company ki gaadi drop us at our house.
The fun and frolic of the weekend spilled over to the 15th of August also. Sure it was the Independance Day but to admit candidly, it was no more than a holiday for me. So I got up at around 9:00 and then helped my friend prepare sandwitches for breakfast which was fun, what with boiling potatoes and all. The rest of the day didnt seem to promise much and was about to be spent lazing around alone perhaps reading a book. Then suddenly the Bada Saheb called up informing of the expected arrival of another and his unexpected availability for the entire day. Soon they were near Maharaja Hotel, the landmark near our house where I went to pick them up on my now famous bike which has become the laughing stock in some circles and at the same time has elicited mixed responses of "Cool.. but thoda aarbit nahi hai ..." from others.
After that it was time for lunch which we had at one of the best restaurants I have been here in my short stay at Bangalore. Sahib, Sind, Sultan, modelled as a old time luxury railway coach proved to be the perfect blend of ambience, great food and a bill that won't empty your wallet. I have always wondered at the effect a good lunch or a dinner with good company has on an individual. For me it's the best part of any day and the gourmet that I am, the potent combination of food to tickle your taste buds and friends to spend entire lives with, was and still remains, one of the few moments to savour and relish for ever. Add to that I had my inspiration as far as the quantity of eating and the choice of non-vegetarian items goes, eating alongside me.
The afternoon rolled into the evening as we lazed in our house under the weight of the immensely heavy lunch reluctant to go anywhere. Two more friends joined us soon. One, my current flat and company mate and the other who was kind enough to give us a shelter when we were house hunting. It was evening and people were throwing around options regarding how to make it memorable. Movies, Pubs, Bowling everything met opposition from someone or the other until finally someone came up with the greatest idea of all time...."Yaar aish karte hain aur chill maarte hain ..." Legendary lines spoken by a person who is little less than one himself!
And so we started chilling out. The glasses were laid and the vodka came out in complete defiance of the dry-day that it was and the ball was aptly set rolling by a series of small anecdotes on the life changing power of alcohol and its wonderful affects when taken in heavy doses. There was the dim light to get the feel, photography bordering on the surrealistic :D and Marilyn Monroe in her famous pose to stare at and debate whether she was mischevious or out and out sensous. Thereafter it was a laughter riot for almost two hours at a stretch as two or three of us took centrestage to narrate the most weirdest, funniest, insane, improbable, logic defying, gross and downright mindless incidents of hostel life that you will ever hear. So much so that our jaws and stomach started aching. By the end of it all we were at our wits end. In between this there was also a walk down to the nearby Corner House for a taste of Death By Chocolate and Black Forest with Vanilla Ice Cream and Chocolate Sauce. The night was getting better and better and better.
Finally it was time to sleep and it was decided to lay all the matresses together (5 in all) to accommodate the 7 people we had. Then somebody had the idea of the night. Why not sleep on the terrace. The insanity of the numerous anecdotes had had their affect on us and so an instant decision was made and we went up the stairs on the terrace to sleep with the sky and the clouds as our roof. There was a chill in the air as we debated on the colour of the clouds and their movement. One of us who happened to be sleeping at one extreme end also had the fear of a coconut falling and hitting him to contend with due to the proximity he had with the beautiful coconut tree that stands next to our house. So after few moments of giggling we finally went to sleep.
Daybreak saw a return to sanity which lead us to scurry to the warmth of our house. Slowly the guests left and the house was quiet once again. A weekend gathering was planned at one Samarkhand which was vouched to be the best restaurant he has ever eaten in by none other than our very own Bada Saheb.
Now as I sit in my office with so much time so as to write this entire blog in one go, I eagerly await that weekend, that gathering which brings so much fun and happiness that for once I tend to forget the ends and the means which have been troubling me. I am beginnning to think that maybe life's all about these little moments, inconsequential to the world but immensley satisfying to the self, maybe no matter what you do and where you are, happiness is after all, a state of mind, it's about being in good company.
Friday, August 04, 2006
And Life Goes On.............
Remember the first time your father let go of the bicycle and you discovered one of the most amazing miracles of everyday life, your first crush in school, the first day in college, the first drink...... There's something about these firsts which persist in our memory irrespective of their actual quality. So are the lasts, but I will leave them for some other day, some other time. For now let me celebrate the new firsts that have been happening day in day out in my life.
After three weeks of intensive search finally we had our house, a first of sorts for most of us. The peculiar house renting rules in Bangalore meant that I had the priviledge of writing the first cheque (2 in fact) of my life. And what a first that was. With one swift stroke of my hand, Rs 1.5 lakh had been payed to our landlord, albeit in a postdated manner. The first salary followed soon after, soured somewhat by the hefty amount that the IT took away. Strangely I didn't feel anything particularly exciting on receiving the salary. The transition to the salaried class was very everyday to say the least.
A couple of days ago I had a chat with a very close friend and that too after quite some time. To say that it was one of the highpoints of my life after coming to Bangalore wouldn't be an overstatement. I have always seen him as one of the most level headed guys around. The clarity of thought he presents when you are talking with him tends to leave you amazed though there are some topics in which this very same clarity and in depth knowledge makes you run for cover. Anyway, if you happen to be regular reader of my blog, you would know that I have Lost Control, and though I am yet nowhere near finding the solution, yet chatting with my friend was so soothing that I felt a strange calm descend on me after that. He told me how even he is unsure in his own way of his life ahead, in a different level and context though. We chatted for quite a while on these issues, of life and finding a calling and in between he came up with his trademark straight-from-a-science-journal advices. I don't know whether it was what he said to me (which was mostly on the lines of take it easy and it happens to everyone) or simply the effect of talking to someone you like, someone you look up to in a certain way, someone who knows you, I went back home a happier man.
It's strange to think about the number of things we demand to stay happy, to feel in control of ourselves, to live. The first few days in office were without any instant messenger, GMail or Orkut and needless to say we were almost at our wits end. At home there was no TV and no computer. A month into this city and the home still looks the same though the office space has changed to only "No Orkut ". The one thing that has significantly changed though is that it doesn't affect me anymore. The hiatus from orkut hasn't stopped my life. It hasn't infact changed anything so as to say. I still talk to people who matter to me. I wouldn't mind having a TV when I come back from office, but its absence has meant that I spend more time reading Thomas Friedman's wonderful commentary of the age that we live in, titled The World Is Flat.
I think we tend to bring more and more things in our lives in an attempt to make it happier, more comfortable, more liveable and more engrossing and end up making it more complex and more dependent.
I don't know what's making me think about all these things these days. I was never the person to think about anything other than the present. I have acted on instincts in most of my decisions in my life. Maybe the lack of work is prompting me to have all these thoughts in my mind, maybe its the first job blues which has triggered off this introspection phase. Whatever it is, the one thing that is definite in all this sea of confusion and chaos is that right now I am doing what I like doing the most.......talking to me.
After three weeks of intensive search finally we had our house, a first of sorts for most of us. The peculiar house renting rules in Bangalore meant that I had the priviledge of writing the first cheque (2 in fact) of my life. And what a first that was. With one swift stroke of my hand, Rs 1.5 lakh had been payed to our landlord, albeit in a postdated manner. The first salary followed soon after, soured somewhat by the hefty amount that the IT took away. Strangely I didn't feel anything particularly exciting on receiving the salary. The transition to the salaried class was very everyday to say the least.
A couple of days ago I had a chat with a very close friend and that too after quite some time. To say that it was one of the highpoints of my life after coming to Bangalore wouldn't be an overstatement. I have always seen him as one of the most level headed guys around. The clarity of thought he presents when you are talking with him tends to leave you amazed though there are some topics in which this very same clarity and in depth knowledge makes you run for cover. Anyway, if you happen to be regular reader of my blog, you would know that I have Lost Control, and though I am yet nowhere near finding the solution, yet chatting with my friend was so soothing that I felt a strange calm descend on me after that. He told me how even he is unsure in his own way of his life ahead, in a different level and context though. We chatted for quite a while on these issues, of life and finding a calling and in between he came up with his trademark straight-from-a-science-journal advices. I don't know whether it was what he said to me (which was mostly on the lines of take it easy and it happens to everyone) or simply the effect of talking to someone you like, someone you look up to in a certain way, someone who knows you, I went back home a happier man.
It's strange to think about the number of things we demand to stay happy, to feel in control of ourselves, to live. The first few days in office were without any instant messenger, GMail or Orkut and needless to say we were almost at our wits end. At home there was no TV and no computer. A month into this city and the home still looks the same though the office space has changed to only "No Orkut ". The one thing that has significantly changed though is that it doesn't affect me anymore. The hiatus from orkut hasn't stopped my life. It hasn't infact changed anything so as to say. I still talk to people who matter to me. I wouldn't mind having a TV when I come back from office, but its absence has meant that I spend more time reading Thomas Friedman's wonderful commentary of the age that we live in, titled The World Is Flat.
I think we tend to bring more and more things in our lives in an attempt to make it happier, more comfortable, more liveable and more engrossing and end up making it more complex and more dependent.
I don't know what's making me think about all these things these days. I was never the person to think about anything other than the present. I have acted on instincts in most of my decisions in my life. Maybe the lack of work is prompting me to have all these thoughts in my mind, maybe its the first job blues which has triggered off this introspection phase. Whatever it is, the one thing that is definite in all this sea of confusion and chaos is that right now I am doing what I like doing the most.......talking to me.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Lose Control
No, it's nothing to do with the RDB smash hit number except maybe for the fact that I can relate more to the College ke andar hum zindagi ko nachaate hain, College ke bahar zindagi hum ko nachaati hai .. quote. It's been a feeliing that has been prevalent for quite some time now. Why am I doing what I am doing.
Call it a repercussion of not getting what was my first choice as life after graduation, or the fact that throughout my life I have never been very good at anything. Nothing seems to excite me for long and it spans all realms of my known world from computer science to geography (my favourite sublect in school), from literature to music. I have never been able to master any thing, never gained supreme authority even over one small topic; not one musical instument, not one author, not one language (and this includes english, hindi and bengali). Until now it didn't matter, or maybe it did but I didn't feel it. Till yesterday my familiarity with most things was my strength. Today, viewed from a different angle I feel shallow. Suddenly I am not sure what I want to do with my life.
Do I want to be software engineer (actually I am already supposed to be one). Do I want to be an investment banker. Do I give CAT this year. What if I don't like management and fail miserably. What about a job change. Do I actually want to do a job, any job. If not then what. Why can't I do something else.
All those "Where do you see yourself 5/10 years down the line......" questions seem to make so much sense now. Here I am sitting in my office with nothing much to do, spending most of the day surfing the net, chatting and reading some documents, wondering, is this what I am meant to do, is this my life. It's not that I despise it. That would have made things easier. Worse, I am nowhere close to the solution. I have seen my batchmates and fellow bloggers follow this path of introspection throughout their professional career (which is one year) and get nowhere near the answer. Then again sometimes I let go of all this and say to myself "What the hell, just do what comes your way and try to make the most out of it. That's what you are supposed to do....". So there are these two voices in my head, much like the friend and the fiend in Launcelot Gobbo's comic Scene in The Merchant Of Venice and I can't make out whom to follow. Sometimes I think that whatever I do (for a living that is), if I consider it the means to achieve the ends (which are things that I love to do, some of which would require me to be financially independent) then all's well. On the other hand the second voice tells me it's the journey that counts and not the destination so if the means itself are not worth the pains the ends never will be.
Why am I not good at anything. I see people all around me, my friends mostly, who are very good at something and it ranges from various aspects of computer science to physics (mainly optics), from running a factory, working 6.75 days a week to being doctors. I hope I soon find my calling in life and when I do I hope to have the courage to follow it. For a third voice in me says that there are no ends and means, there's only one thing and that is Life.
Call it a repercussion of not getting what was my first choice as life after graduation, or the fact that throughout my life I have never been very good at anything. Nothing seems to excite me for long and it spans all realms of my known world from computer science to geography (my favourite sublect in school), from literature to music. I have never been able to master any thing, never gained supreme authority even over one small topic; not one musical instument, not one author, not one language (and this includes english, hindi and bengali). Until now it didn't matter, or maybe it did but I didn't feel it. Till yesterday my familiarity with most things was my strength. Today, viewed from a different angle I feel shallow. Suddenly I am not sure what I want to do with my life.
Do I want to be software engineer (actually I am already supposed to be one). Do I want to be an investment banker. Do I give CAT this year. What if I don't like management and fail miserably. What about a job change. Do I actually want to do a job, any job. If not then what. Why can't I do something else.
All those "Where do you see yourself 5/10 years down the line......" questions seem to make so much sense now. Here I am sitting in my office with nothing much to do, spending most of the day surfing the net, chatting and reading some documents, wondering, is this what I am meant to do, is this my life. It's not that I despise it. That would have made things easier. Worse, I am nowhere close to the solution. I have seen my batchmates and fellow bloggers follow this path of introspection throughout their professional career (which is one year) and get nowhere near the answer. Then again sometimes I let go of all this and say to myself "What the hell, just do what comes your way and try to make the most out of it. That's what you are supposed to do....". So there are these two voices in my head, much like the friend and the fiend in Launcelot Gobbo's comic Scene in The Merchant Of Venice and I can't make out whom to follow. Sometimes I think that whatever I do (for a living that is), if I consider it the means to achieve the ends (which are things that I love to do, some of which would require me to be financially independent) then all's well. On the other hand the second voice tells me it's the journey that counts and not the destination so if the means itself are not worth the pains the ends never will be.
Why am I not good at anything. I see people all around me, my friends mostly, who are very good at something and it ranges from various aspects of computer science to physics (mainly optics), from running a factory, working 6.75 days a week to being doctors. I hope I soon find my calling in life and when I do I hope to have the courage to follow it. For a third voice in me says that there are no ends and means, there's only one thing and that is Life.
Monday, July 24, 2006
Hello Bangalore
Act 1, Scene 1
Me: I was calling to inquire about the 3 BHK house in Koramangala......
Voice on the other side(VOTOS): Are you Bachelors?
Me: Ya , 4 of us
VOTOS: .....
Me: OK sorry for bothering you..
Act 1, Scene 2
Me: I was calling to inquire about the 3 BHK house in Levelle Road....
VOTOS: OK...the rent is 25 K with 10 month deposit
Me: Ah.. that's a bit high for our budget...Thanks anyway..
Act 1, Scene 3
Agent: Aap phele house dekhega to immediate lega ....bahut achcha .. independent duplex house... 2 Kms from MG Road...
The house turns out to be around 6 Kms from MG Road.
I have always wanted my life to be eventful. To have experiences which can be remembered forever. A month into Bangalore, that wish has been pretty well taken care of by the powers that be. Office has been pretty normal so as to say with the usual process of induction, training, getting to meet new people and doing other routine jobs. It's the weekends and the time spent commuting between office and home that has been the flavour of the month.
Imagine two fresh engineering graduates with a decent paying job and families to support them financially, roaming in MG Road (if you have been to Bangalore you would know what it is) with a total amount of Rs 40 in their pockets, unsure of where to sleep at night. On top of that one of them had lost his wallet a couple of days ago so has no debit/credit card and the other has the good old SBI ATM card, a memento from the student days gone by, which, true to its character acquired over 5 years, boasts of a princely amount of Rs 43. It's as pathetic and hilarious as it can get, both at the same time. Yes, this was my friend and me. That we managed to call up our friend and had the most expensive dinner in Bangalore till date is another story.
Commuting in Bangalore at peak office hours can be a frustrating and humiliating experience and to add to that when you don't have you own home and are staying at your friend's friend's (yeah that's not a typo!) house for well over a fortnight, which is about an hour's bus/cab/auto drive from your office, things tend to get a bit edgy. As a result, simple things like arriving home in 20 minutes instead of the 45 or so, dishing out only Rs 20 instead of the usual 36 brings immense pleasure and satisfaction.
And yet amongst all these seemingly frustrating and unnerving experiences there's always that dinner with friends at an open air restaurant designed like a beach with sand and the sound of the surf with one Raja playing "ajeeb daastan hai ye..." on his mouth organ and guitar (yes both at the same time !) and then singing "Wonderful Tonight" which makes you realise what a fine balance this life actually is.
"A Time To Make Friends"..said the huge banners in Germany and even here in Bangalore new acquaintances were being made both in the office and the at places I stayed in, some of which soon turned to friendships.
But all these incidents take a backseat when it comes to the real adventure. One which has been going on for the last three weekends and at times splilling over to weekdays too....House Hunting.
3 BHK, close to MG Road, close to Bannerghatta Road, good house, good locality (you know what I mean by good locality !), within our budget, splitting of the 10 month deposit into two parts and no landlord interference. The list of parameters to be satisfied was long and so was the search for the perfect house. Project "Bangla Mile Nyara" started with two people and moved from strength to strength as more members joined in the search. There were close to a score of houses seen, in heat and dust, in rain and wind, some at places where you can't differentiate between the road and the two drains on either side of it when it pours, travelling by bike, car, foot and mostly by auto rickshaws, getting so fed up of paying Rs 12 (the minimum fare) to the auto driver (some of whom swear by the name of Baba........ Rajnikanth to the the average Indian!) that you almost wished for a Rs 12 currency note to be introduced by RBI for this very purpose, standing at crossroads like vagabonds with the Eicher Bangalore map, pen, cell phone, Ad Mag and Free Ads spread around, alternately looking at the newspaper and the map to ascertain the location of the house, ringing up agents and landlords repeating the same starting sentences, circling up entries in the paper and then crossing them out as house after house falied to pass our stringent requirements; Project "Bangla Mile Nyara" was living up to its hype.
There's a lot more to write about, a lot more to think but for now let's leave it at that.
Act 2, Scene 1
Us: So can the deposit be split into 2 equal halves.....
Landlord: hmm.. OK that won't be a problem....
Me (to agent): Can we pay the commission after we get our salary
Agent: OK... boss theek hai..
Meanwhile somebody calls up from above: Yaar terrace mast hai .. dekh jaa aa ke....
Us (to Landlord): So we will come tomorrow to sign the documents...
Hello Bangalore................
Me: I was calling to inquire about the 3 BHK house in Koramangala......
Voice on the other side(VOTOS): Are you Bachelors?
Me: Ya , 4 of us
VOTOS: .....
Me: OK sorry for bothering you..
Act 1, Scene 2
Me: I was calling to inquire about the 3 BHK house in Levelle Road....
VOTOS: OK...the rent is 25 K with 10 month deposit
Me: Ah.. that's a bit high for our budget...Thanks anyway..
Act 1, Scene 3
Agent: Aap phele house dekhega to immediate lega ....bahut achcha .. independent duplex house... 2 Kms from MG Road...
The house turns out to be around 6 Kms from MG Road.
I have always wanted my life to be eventful. To have experiences which can be remembered forever. A month into Bangalore, that wish has been pretty well taken care of by the powers that be. Office has been pretty normal so as to say with the usual process of induction, training, getting to meet new people and doing other routine jobs. It's the weekends and the time spent commuting between office and home that has been the flavour of the month.
Imagine two fresh engineering graduates with a decent paying job and families to support them financially, roaming in MG Road (if you have been to Bangalore you would know what it is) with a total amount of Rs 40 in their pockets, unsure of where to sleep at night. On top of that one of them had lost his wallet a couple of days ago so has no debit/credit card and the other has the good old SBI ATM card, a memento from the student days gone by, which, true to its character acquired over 5 years, boasts of a princely amount of Rs 43. It's as pathetic and hilarious as it can get, both at the same time. Yes, this was my friend and me. That we managed to call up our friend and had the most expensive dinner in Bangalore till date is another story.
Commuting in Bangalore at peak office hours can be a frustrating and humiliating experience and to add to that when you don't have you own home and are staying at your friend's friend's (yeah that's not a typo!) house for well over a fortnight, which is about an hour's bus/cab/auto drive from your office, things tend to get a bit edgy. As a result, simple things like arriving home in 20 minutes instead of the 45 or so, dishing out only Rs 20 instead of the usual 36 brings immense pleasure and satisfaction.
And yet amongst all these seemingly frustrating and unnerving experiences there's always that dinner with friends at an open air restaurant designed like a beach with sand and the sound of the surf with one Raja playing "ajeeb daastan hai ye..." on his mouth organ and guitar (yes both at the same time !) and then singing "Wonderful Tonight" which makes you realise what a fine balance this life actually is.
"A Time To Make Friends"..said the huge banners in Germany and even here in Bangalore new acquaintances were being made both in the office and the at places I stayed in, some of which soon turned to friendships.
But all these incidents take a backseat when it comes to the real adventure. One which has been going on for the last three weekends and at times splilling over to weekdays too....House Hunting.
3 BHK, close to MG Road, close to Bannerghatta Road, good house, good locality (you know what I mean by good locality !), within our budget, splitting of the 10 month deposit into two parts and no landlord interference. The list of parameters to be satisfied was long and so was the search for the perfect house. Project "Bangla Mile Nyara" started with two people and moved from strength to strength as more members joined in the search. There were close to a score of houses seen, in heat and dust, in rain and wind, some at places where you can't differentiate between the road and the two drains on either side of it when it pours, travelling by bike, car, foot and mostly by auto rickshaws, getting so fed up of paying Rs 12 (the minimum fare) to the auto driver (some of whom swear by the name of Baba........ Rajnikanth to the the average Indian!) that you almost wished for a Rs 12 currency note to be introduced by RBI for this very purpose, standing at crossroads like vagabonds with the Eicher Bangalore map, pen, cell phone, Ad Mag and Free Ads spread around, alternately looking at the newspaper and the map to ascertain the location of the house, ringing up agents and landlords repeating the same starting sentences, circling up entries in the paper and then crossing them out as house after house falied to pass our stringent requirements; Project "Bangla Mile Nyara" was living up to its hype.
There's a lot more to write about, a lot more to think but for now let's leave it at that.
Act 2, Scene 1
Us: So can the deposit be split into 2 equal halves.....
Landlord: hmm.. OK that won't be a problem....
Me (to agent): Can we pay the commission after we get our salary
Agent: OK... boss theek hai..
Meanwhile somebody calls up from above: Yaar terrace mast hai .. dekh jaa aa ke....
Us (to Landlord): So we will come tomorrow to sign the documents...
Hello Bangalore................
Thursday, June 29, 2006
A New Life
As I boarded the B'lore bound Jet Airways flight from Dum Dum airport, Kolkata, with the tickets of 2 more between B'lore and Delhi already booked, two thoughts kept me occupied: 1) had France managed to qualify for the 2nd round to give Zizou one last shot at glory & 2) the lines from the song "Thoda Paisa" by Aghosh "..jahan bhi jaenge, jaenge flight se aha, are aha. Aur Sunday manaege Friday night se haan.....". Viera and Henry made sure that the talismanic Zidane gets another chance and later the perennial underachievers Spain made sure that Sunday will see a repeat of the '98 finals between the favourites, who are yet to show their Samba Magic to full effect and a team which has somehow managed to scrape through with most of their players in the twilight of their career.
It's been 5 days since I landed in B'lore after having a fortnight's break with my parents in Bokaro which followed a momentous event in my life; that of my completing my final project, graduating and becoming an engineer, the reason for my hiatus from blogging. I have always been a here, now kind of a guy. Future plannings, setting long term goals, looking ahead are things which I am seldom able to comprehend though I tend to think about them a lot. So as I stand at a crossroads of my life, I find myself at a totally alien environment, that of the software industry, in a city which is fast loosing its charm to outsiders though the weather is still awesome especially if you happen to come from Delhi, unsure of what I want, unsure of the course of my life in the next one year, hoping to find my true calling. It's a big jolt to say the least. Make no mistake though, I am neither worried nor sad. It's just that things haven't yet fallen into place for me here. Instead of the twenty odd familiar faces that I used to see everyday, now I see only one, the 3 to 12 sleeping schedule has given way to a 3 (Thank God there is the World Cup) to 9 one. Office is mostly boring and banal. The guest house is pretty impressive and most importantly has a TV. The soccer has been dramatic though predictable and is destined to get better in the final stages with the prospects of a Ger-Bra or Arg-Bra Finale. Krissh turned out to be more melodrama than super hero so hopefully Superman Returns soon.
The fortnight long vacation with my parents was spent packing my wardrobe with formal wear or cotton casuals as the brand would name them, replacing my 4 year old 3310 with a flashy one with camera and radio and what not (I don't remember the model number) and mostly basking in the glory of becoming a graduate, trying to fathom the reason why my parents were so happy when I hadn't done anything more than allowing things to take their own course. Somehow I knew things are going to be very different and it was a time to let go. Let go of not washing yourself or your clothes till God knows how long, let go of living day in day out with lots of people and noise around you, let go of familiar places, let go of your Dad's money, let go of your lifestyle for the last 5 years. Suddenly the proud and spontaneous answer to an elderly gentleman's query or a lady's with two beautiful daughters in a train to "Kya karte ho beta...." had changed to a very everyday and commonplace just another face in the crowd types. It was time to let go of student life and take a step towards the professional one. Meanwhile I also had counselling sessions with two more new entrants to the college I left and the hopes and aspirations of the boys as well as their families were so akin to those of mine and my parents' half a decade (wow that seems long!) ago that it almost seemed I was doing it all over again.
So here I am, in the garden city trying to find my footing (and more importantly a house!), waiting for more friends to arrive in mid July to lend a bit more familiarity to this place, hoping also that the next blog is not this bad and random.
It's been 5 days since I landed in B'lore after having a fortnight's break with my parents in Bokaro which followed a momentous event in my life; that of my completing my final project, graduating and becoming an engineer, the reason for my hiatus from blogging. I have always been a here, now kind of a guy. Future plannings, setting long term goals, looking ahead are things which I am seldom able to comprehend though I tend to think about them a lot. So as I stand at a crossroads of my life, I find myself at a totally alien environment, that of the software industry, in a city which is fast loosing its charm to outsiders though the weather is still awesome especially if you happen to come from Delhi, unsure of what I want, unsure of the course of my life in the next one year, hoping to find my true calling. It's a big jolt to say the least. Make no mistake though, I am neither worried nor sad. It's just that things haven't yet fallen into place for me here. Instead of the twenty odd familiar faces that I used to see everyday, now I see only one, the 3 to 12 sleeping schedule has given way to a 3 (Thank God there is the World Cup) to 9 one. Office is mostly boring and banal. The guest house is pretty impressive and most importantly has a TV. The soccer has been dramatic though predictable and is destined to get better in the final stages with the prospects of a Ger-Bra or Arg-Bra Finale. Krissh turned out to be more melodrama than super hero so hopefully Superman Returns soon.
The fortnight long vacation with my parents was spent packing my wardrobe with formal wear or cotton casuals as the brand would name them, replacing my 4 year old 3310 with a flashy one with camera and radio and what not (I don't remember the model number) and mostly basking in the glory of becoming a graduate, trying to fathom the reason why my parents were so happy when I hadn't done anything more than allowing things to take their own course. Somehow I knew things are going to be very different and it was a time to let go. Let go of not washing yourself or your clothes till God knows how long, let go of living day in day out with lots of people and noise around you, let go of familiar places, let go of your Dad's money, let go of your lifestyle for the last 5 years. Suddenly the proud and spontaneous answer to an elderly gentleman's query or a lady's with two beautiful daughters in a train to "Kya karte ho beta...." had changed to a very everyday and commonplace just another face in the crowd types. It was time to let go of student life and take a step towards the professional one. Meanwhile I also had counselling sessions with two more new entrants to the college I left and the hopes and aspirations of the boys as well as their families were so akin to those of mine and my parents' half a decade (wow that seems long!) ago that it almost seemed I was doing it all over again.
So here I am, in the garden city trying to find my footing (and more importantly a house!), waiting for more friends to arrive in mid July to lend a bit more familiarity to this place, hoping also that the next blog is not this bad and random.
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