Random Thoughts

it is strange to see how your life starts getting ruled by money matters sooner than you realize. one moment you are there with your friend chatting idly, sharing your thoughts and thinking that this friendship will always remain strong, pristine and totally uncorrupted by the earthly things related to money. but alas !!!! times change, people change, though one always likes to believe that one is that same little innocent boy that one was when 5-year old. sooner before he/she realizes, the friendship gets eroded at the very core, and the vestige stands precariously on that very base of materialism that he/she had once wanted so desperately to avoid.

it is very hard to realize when you have lost your facade of innocence. but when you do, quite ironically, it doesn't hurt you as much as you had thought. probably this explains why people get so much anxious when someone criticizes them, why there are professional classes on how to deal with criticism. when the veil of integrity and morality is so thin, so silky, you hardly notice when it falls off......


and today i had just that same experience. my friend is having some problems with his academic career and so is unable to accompany me to a foreign university which had selected us to spend a term there. we both were supposed to get scholarships, but somehow i didn't. today i called to enquire about the status of his application. what i am thinking is that if he has got it, probably that can be transferred to my application.
now let's think about the situation from that other guy's perspective. for him, i am a person who didn't call him when he was in trouble. he himself had to call me to seek for some solace. i never enquired about his well-being in a new and unknown city (not that i could have done anything about that, but still i should have done that out of sheer courtesy). and one day i do finally call him. the reason: to enquire about my own status of application. the conversation, quite predictably, was focused on the topic of interest to me. never even once i could ask him about his own work.

it is not that i am happy with my own attitude. given a choice, i would have loved to talk to him before this fateful day about things that concerned him. but i couldn't do that coz my stupid mobile phone never had enough balance in it. i didn't get any enjoyment out of that conversation. to me, the phone call was like asking a beggar how much he was willing to get paid for the last strand of clothing left on his body. but i couldn't have done otherwise. i did have to think about my own financing. there was, and is, money involved. and there is lots of it. then if i say to my friend that everything, and everybody, in this world has a price tag attached to him/her, am i wrong?.......innocence comes dirt-cheap, it only takes green rectangular pieces of paper to buy that.....

why should a guy, who is at the tail end of his academic career, be interested in opposing the reservation policy? in past few weeks, many of my friends have asked me my opinion on the issue of reservation. and each time I reply that since this topic doesn't affect me any more, i am not thinking about this. this approach is quite smug, i know, and that's why today i've decided to give some thought to it.

let us discuss why i should not, or need not, take part in these protests. after studying in two of the most prestigious institutes of the country, i don't have to worry about my own academic/professional career now. my children of course will be affected by this, but even that event is at least 20-25 years away and so i can safely ignore it right now. another poignant reason that i can think of is that my own institutions, which have made me not only what i am today but also who i am, will get suffered by this perverse reservation policy. as an alumnus, it is my moral responsibility not only to oppose the policy myself, but also to try to unite my other friends on this topic. if people who don't deserve to study in IITs and IIMs start to get admission there, ultimately it will result in erosion of their brand equity. this, in turn, will also effect my own academic reputation.
the last point is actually very reasonable and, quite frankly, i don't have any points of my own to counter this. perhaps the reason why i am still not protesting is that i am too lazy to do this. when there already are thousands of medical students out there on a hunger strike, i don't see any way i can help them. I have full support and respect for those agitating students, and i think that the best i can do is to give them a token of support. but still then, i don't think i have to be physically present with them to do that. signing a petition will do as good.

however, thinking deeply, i realize that perhaps it is not my laziness which is preventing me from doing anything. the real reason is that i still hope that our leaders will come to senses before it is too late. that the other parties will set aside their own parochial agenda and presurrize the government to revoke the constitutional amendment, or at least delay its implementation. that the government will start listening to the voices of students who are protesting all over the country. that there is at least one sensible person in our political system who will be vocal in his opposition, and will bring all others under the umbrella of his inspiration. I may be wrong, maybe i am putting the politicians on too high a padestal. you can call my stand as that of a callous youth who has got what he wanted and then has forgotten his country and his countrymen. you can call me a coward who has lost his will to fight and has accepted the slavery of an oppressive system.....

but still i am hoping.....my uncle once said that hope is the denial of the truth. only time can give a verdict on its truthfulness.......

somtimes it seems quite strange how one's priorities change so suddenly. stock market specialists have claimed that people have short term memory when they are investing, but it seems myopic thought extends to all other aspects of real life as well.

today my mama is coming, actually he has already arrived by now. he is bringing with him some sweets and home-made food that nani has made for me. it may sound very sweet, but not surprising, however. after all, nanis and nanas are supposed to be full of fun and love, isn't it?. but your view might change once i tell you that my nani was diagnosed with cancer few months ago, had to endure severe radiation therapy, lost half of her weight (and her hair also) in the process, and her face was deformed for ever. a woman, who hardly can do even daily chorus, sat for 4 hours making those tikris-pirikiyas just so that her grandchildren could taste them.

now we come to the other side of the story. quite strangely, and i am afraid of it, i am not thinking about those sweets today. in fact, i can not think of my nani at all. the most important thing that has happened today in my life is that i have refused the offer to see a movie in a mall with some of my friends. and no matter how hard i try, i am not able to ignoer this.

but man being a rational animal, i try to find some answers, some justifications, which may reduce the burden of the guilt. one possible way by which i can soothe myself is by saying that the times change, and one can't keep attached to one's relatives for ever. it is the biological processes built in our bodies that force us to get attracted towards new people, since the older ones are not going to remain around for ever.

rationally, i accept my own proposition. but still, logic can only defeat the mind. can it make the same food that my nani used to make for me? can my new friends give me the same joy which i used to enjoy when nani used to sleep beside me and tell stories ? maybe i don't need those stories any more, because i've grown up. but i do long for my nani, and i do want to taste those mithais.......

Shakespeare once said that those who kill time are killed by it...but he forgot to add that those who don't know how to are also meted with the same fate. Even though I haven't had much expectations from my training anyway, it has proved to be much more boring than I had expected. It seems as if this whole duration of 8 weeks is going to end up as an extended vacation for me, but with minus the comforts of staying at home. I don't have any work at all in the office, and frankly speaking I go there only to enjoy sitting in the AC. In the past one week I have thought through at least 10 summer-time activities, but have rejected all of them either because the courses are organised too far from CP, or they are expensive. So, the only options open to me right now are watching TV or studying up the boring finance books that I have brought with me. TV I stopped watching years ago and after going through one full year of gruelling academic schedule of IIM Ahmedabad, I am in mood to touch my books, either. All in all, I am getting more bored than Tom Hanks would have been in Cast Away. At least he had his pumpkin.....:)...

It has become a routine for me to think of some ideas so that I could kill some time. (Actually, though I don't want to admit it, this thinking about killing time itself has become my favourite time-killing activity)....:)....So anyway, today I have decided to learn face sketching. Actually I had thought of it months ago when one friend of mine showed me the sketch of Aish that he had drawn. But today I have actually decided to start learning it.

But the problem is, I am no natural painter. Well, most of us aren't anyway, but my problem is somewhat more seriuos. I got the first hint of my drawing skills in the third grade. Our drawing ma'am had given us an assignment to draw a tiger. I gave my best try, spent several hours in the home, and went to the school the next day with a broad chest and a proud smile on my face. The ma'am took a look at the picture, and raised my notebook in her hands so that the whole class could see it. And then she said, "Class, this is the perfect example of indiscipline!! You children are always talking in the class and don't even pay a little attention to what the teacher is saying. Just how many times had I told you yesterday that you are supposed to draw a tiger, not a goat !!!!"

From that day, I knew painting wasn't going to be my cup of tea. But well, the whole world lives to dream, isn't it? I have decided to give it one more try. The next question that one will ask is - why face sketching? One thing that is sure is that sketching face is more romantic than sketching houses or mangoes. (I can't do either of them, but that is a different matter). I mean, you sketch the face of a beautiful girl correctly and you are bound to get showered with some words of praise and adulation ....:).....(believe me, I have had the first hand experience with a German girl). And that will be the biggest recognition of talent for a bachelor like me. but that is not the only reason. the main point is that you can draw a face without using any color. for any other type of object you will have to use color, and I am very very bad at applying color.

Enough about this sketching thing. Now it is high time I stop writing about it and start searching for some website tutorials.