Individualism
Tiring faith.
I had been trying to write down for a while about my romantic thoughts and experiences in the form of a series similar to my Adventure Series. I am doing it at last. This would be a three part series which I believe would be an atypical experience to the reader (Read all the parts before you come to a conclusion).
If the reader happens to be a friend of mine or someone known to me, don’t be surprised. And please don’t judge me on the basis of this series alone.
I know how it feels like when you don’t own a girl friend. You will consider yourself some kind of a loser and you envy the so called “lucky guys”. Few say ”You need charm to impress a girl” and I think only they understand what charm is. There are a lot of other ones, who firmly believe that you don’t need any such special talent to get a girl. But, I suppose you do need a special ability to win over any lass, given all their superlative looks nowadays. Boy! I could not believe, but women are getting prettier day by day. Men are definitely lagging behind. Adam’s gonna feel!
My faith started to wobble. It was the early days of my professional career. I was staying in Hyderabad. It was the time of rapid change of behavior in me. With all the professional talks, the way of communication, the work environment, I was losing most of my inhibitions. But, I still had nerves when it came to women. You can call it a milder version of Gynophobia, not Genophobia 
.
It was early February. My training period was over and I was moved in to a project after a short stint on bench. Luckily, I was operating from a city office. There was no need to travel to the outskirts of the city where the lush green colossal main campus was present.
The winter was always horrible in Hyderabad. There were freezing temperatures every morning. For a Chennai guy, it was a near death experience.
My modes of transportation to the office were the local metro buses. It normally takes around 45 minutes to reach the work place from my home. My travel timings happily crossed with the city college timings. A lot of colorfully dressed girls – it was some entertainment during the travel. The city teens seemed to have a better dressing sense compared to those in Chennai. Sadly, in engineering colleges back in Chennai, we did not have the liberty to wear casuals.
I could still remember the time that day. It was 8:38 in the morning. I was working on my mobile phone. The bus was a little bit crowded, rare in Hyderabad during peak hours (They normally run jam packed!). I was seated near a window and the cool breeze was constantly giving me a shudder. The bus halted at a signal. It was Ameerpet. Two girls, dressed well climbed the bus. One was fair, thin, had silky hair and was wearing tight jeans with a rainbow colored top. The other girl was wearing a neat white colored salwar kameez. She was wheatish brown. I felt a lot of eyes gazing at those girls. For some reason, I could not take my eyes off the white dressed girl. Something was perfect about her. I didn’t realize that I was staring at her continuously. She turned at me, raising her eye brows and gave me a sharp look. “What was that? A warning?” I said to myself. I immediately turned away and looked out of the window.
I tried not to look at her for some time. But, I kept checking at every stop that she was still there. After a while, in the pretext of looking at the other side of the road, I glanced through her. “Oops!” I said and immediately looked down. She was looking at me, but this time with a tender smile. I felt like she enjoyed my uneasiness.
The bus reached my destination. I got down and wished she too joined me. But, all girls have other plans during such situations. The bus started to move. Something told me “She is looking at you! Look there!” I did. “Alas! It happens only in movies”.
I had a heavy heart till I reached my office. But, once I entered the work area, the buzz removed all thoughts about her. I recalled her once during the way back home -“She looked like a pure essence of passion”.
I got down at Ameerpet the next day and waited for about 10 minutes where the girls chose the bus the day before. It was my first ever wait for a girl. I imagined what my friends would say, if they had known about this. They would be taken aback – “You…Waiting for an unknown girl at a bus stand?”. When I thought I would move on, a familiar face crossed and stood to my right. It was her, but not the same image. She was wearing jeans and a t-shirt with specs on. “Gosh! Do women change so quickly?”, I questioned myself. In a few seconds, I started to feel tense and thought of slowly moving away. I have never felt the breath of such a woman. I started to look in a direction away from her. “What ya looking at?”, she asked. I did not reply. I didn’t know she was addressing me. She repeated the question with a snap before my face. I looked at her. “It was brilliance!”. She had a flat look at me. A thousand emotions ran through my face. My heart beat faster than Armstrong’s while he was on the Moon. “I was expecting you”. I could not believe I uttered those words. Blood was gushing through my face and it turned red. I felt ashamed for some unknown reason. “Oh yeah! I thought you were looking for my friend”. A firm “No” followed her statement.
Without another remark I waved at an auto. The auto wallah came to us and I got into it immediately and said “clock tower”. The driver waited for a few seconds. He was imagining the girl would join me. I looked at her once and said “chalo” to the auto guy. She wore an awkward look. We zoomed past her in an instant.
I was trying hard to relax in the auto after the little discussion. I felt bad at myself for doing such a silly thing at the girl. I was wondering what she would think about me.
Part 2 and 3 to follow soon….
Yes it is! Always! Wikipedia is worthy of imitation. One of my favourite web 2.0 sites which had been of great help since I had ever known it. It was a service started in 2001, supported by the non-profit Wikimedia foundation. Few know that it was developed from Nupedia, another internet encyclopedia project.
There are around 13 million articles written and maintained by volunteers in a dozen different languages (OMG! I am sorry. There are 262 Wikipedia language editions. Incredible.)
More than the Wikipedia articles, I find a lot of critics sustaining themselves disparaging those articles. That is indeed one way of living your life. I plainly don’t understand why such run down when simply Wikipedia makes you more knowledgeable. I see all those critics pulping me when I say the word knowledgeable. It is where exactly their problem lies. They say Wikipedia does not provide accurate information. Damn it! I don’t care. The source is for general information, not definite.
If ever, I had the reason to research on something significant, I’d always first try out Wikipedia for the subject’s overview and then tread into other detailed information elsewhere. I am never going to submit reports with data from only Wikipedia. I always keep this in mind. So does millions of others, except for the critics. I wonder how they forget this fact.
I say Wikipedia makes me knowledgeable because it encourages me to read more with its extremely tidy layout of articles. I love it simply because I study more; know more information on completely alien things. I love anything alien!
Wikipedia is the second most visited page by me on the web, only after Google. I think it is time to put Jimmy Wales on my inspiration list. I always speculate how the social networking sites have become more popular these days, when Wikipedia brings people together for a better cause. It is true that I find my lost friends in Facebook or Orkut, but at the same time I waste more time there. I’d call it unworthy. OK! I can hear your question “Why use Facebook, if it is unworthy?” I can always live without it, but I’d be called a NERD the next moment when I say “I am not on Facebook”. A catch-29 situation. Agree with me!
The most interesting and popular thing about Wikipedia is “It is Free!” It lives on donations and that’s the best part of it. All critics, I guess should first go through the comments by people while donating money. They’d hide their faces.
I also wonder how Wikipedia would look like, when it is into some profit making organization’s hands. Full of Ad banners! I cannot imagine that.
I feel happy now, after writing about Wikipedia. I always wanted to do one. 
Call it a revival or whatever! I am laying my hands on the keyboard for a new post roughly after 2 months. All along this time, I was waiting to finish my Romance series (I had started this while I was Chennai 3 months back) so that I can have it as my 100th blog post. But with the possibility of finishing it looking bleak, I have gained the nerve to write this down as I don’t want to hamper at least my mediocre writing abilities.
The shift to Bangalore had created a dumb clone of mine. I have no common work here when compared to that in Chennai. I lay down in my room all along the weekend watching movies, exploring new sites, washing clothes (the dumbest thing), searching for good food and occasionally exploring Bangalore. Bangalore is worse without a girl friend. You are ****ed up here without one (I kinda feel with it when I use the F word. I am fucked up!). There is nothing else here to appreciate, let alone the climate.
A lot of things are happening here lately. From tennis classes (Boy! I wonder how could I go out of form even before learning the game. True! I started well with the basics in the first 2 weeks. Then my Forehand game goes completely flawed). I am starting to look fucked up in the court before the korean girls. Then comes my job. Too much of the same work over the years is making me slow. The hope of finding something more interesting has bore some fruit. I have to make a choice. And my study plans are always green and settle unachieved.
I have started to miss all my friends and past colleagues. I sometimes feel why the hell am I doing this? And suddenly I wanted to become a solitudinarian. I think I have a high EQ. That keeps me in bay.
Lot of new things making news. From The Lost Symbol (my experience with it was fairly good) to the Yas Marina GP (Vettel finished first), I have missed quoting many items. I hope not to tread that line any time soon.
You won’t miss me again!
“Please ignore this, as it is a test post.”
Ignore the above statement. I am editing this post because I had come across a very good cartoon snippet today in the Times Of India. I am very eager to share it with you as it sounded wise and also described our state of minds. I could have posted this as a new post, but I wanted my centennial post to be a memorable one.
[My 100th post would be "Romance Series ". It is going to take considerable time because this one is running lengthy]
FYI: Mr Wizer is WagonR’s mascot. You can find Mr Wizer’s snippets on TOI News Papers every Friday.
Bye.
I thought it was a very poor judgement to bring poor kids, no more than 8 years old, to a rich and highly developed IT environment to play their real lives. There was a small program organized by the so called Innovation Campus with the help of an NGO which had small kids play acts of their own lives….picking waste, fighting, doing chores etc.,
They do it on the streets. The last thing you will want them to do is endorse their status. We have seen how life is on the streets for the underprivileged kids. Every Indian is aware of their plight. It would have been a gracious attempt if something was organized to make them realize what life is when he/she is in a developed environment. That way you inspire them to live better. Nevertheless, the effort should be applauded.
I am not a critic here find faults. I know what it takes to organize something of that sort. I wish life were painless to all beings. Poverty at young age is one bad thing I hate.
Encounters of the first kind are always meant to be fascinating, irrespective of who you are. It doesn’t matter if you were a CEO of the most prestigious IT company in India. You would still have something to feel and pronounce. It was the case with Nandan Nilekani when he was introduced to the Parliament as a Cabinet Minister. He heads India’s Unique Identification Project. He describes his experience below.
It was Minister of Textiles who had a comment to make before the next point on the agenda. He made a request that I should be attired in a more austere way instead of a flashy suit. It did not go well with the image of a minister who should live to serve the common man and should be less ostentatious in his habits. I stood up to reply. I offered my apologies to the Honorable Minister and assured that I shall be in a more acceptable dress next time. I felt that he was right. We also used to have corporate dress code in Infosys. So it’s here as well!!!!
I sat down and felt somebody nudging me. I turned around and to my surprise; it was the former Indian skipper and one of my favorite batsman Mohd. Azharuddin. I remembered that he had recently won the elections. I smiled at him and mentioned to him that I used to like his game very much, shaking his hand. No Rolex, I noticed. Azhar told me that he would “fix” me an appointment with an Italian designer who had designed his dapper Kurta suit. An Italian designer in Milan doing Kurtas!!!!! I made a note of this and reminded myself to give this example to Friedman for his next book,” The World Markets are flattened”.
Since there was no doubt about the “Fixational” capacities of Azhar, I told him to give me the details and I would consider. The proceedings of the House went on with numerous bills being debated and passed as I sat as a passive audience waiting for my project’s turn to come up. After the lunch break, it was the moment for me!!!!
MY PROJECT”S FIRST REVIEW CAME UP FOR PRESENTATION.
I was at seat. My laptop did not have any reserve power. I went to Manmohan and apprised him of the situation. I was sweating. He calmly replied that this would not be a cause of concern. I was flummoxed!!!! The Speaker asked me to explain to the House on what were my plans for the Unique Identity Project. I replied that I have a plan prepared for 30-60-90-120 days’ milestones and I have presentation to make for which I need a power socket, a projector and a screen. I had no idea what was going to happen after this.
The next couple of minutes were a complete jolt for me. I was completely in a tizzy. Let me just summarize what happened. A Joint Cabinet Secretary Committee was set up to judge the feasibility of my request. The Under Secretaries for the Ministries of Power, IT and Broadcasting will prepare a Viability Report after scrutinizing National Security threats to my request. This was because the power socket comes under Power, laptop comes under IT and projector comes under Broadcasting. I have also been told to reconsider my timelines of 30-60-90 days and start thinking in terms of years. Probably, they are right. I did not have the foresight in this matter.
The summary of the issue is that I need to come up with a more inclusive, democratic, comprehensive long term plan for this project to be executed over the next five years. I have also been given a presentation slot 3 months from now (by which the issues related to the power cord etc will also be resolved). I am filled with mixed reactions. I was planning for a quick resolution; the management wants a strategic solution. I come out of the House and text Murthy.
“You won’t believe it but these guys work just like us. I am on a NATIONAL BENCH for the next three months!!!!!!!!”
I am back after a lull. New posts would follow normally. But, the below one isn’t a new one. It was written for an AIDS awareness program a long back and was rejected. A possible reason would follow the post. I hope it sounds like a STORY.
He didn’t earn, the ghoul would follow him and chase his life. Samantha opened the door with a gentle smile sealing her ardour. Her hubby was back from a short business trip. What made her more exhilarated was the jaunt her husband had promised after his arrival. But she didn’t pull in that it was her last real little laugh.
It was the train which he chose to travel back home. As he rested on one of the berths, he felt some sharp tingle on his back. He could feel the blood oozing out slowly. He reached his back and pulled out a piercing needle….cursing them who held it there he threw the needle out through the window..
Days passed by and Samantha was carrying their second child. It was time for her to consult a medical practitioner to check out her baby’s health. It was all faint when they saw the reports. Samantha was already on the floor. His heart felt weak when he noticed that Samantha and the baby were both HIV+. It was his turn now. The doctor called on for a blood test of his..the same final result. He wished it wasn’t true.
He could not surmise how it happened. He had had no intimate relationship with any other woman but his wife.
He then came to know the sources of AIDS through the doctors. It was then the needle ran into his mind and the fate it had drawn upon him and his family. He could not think of any reason why the needle was set there. The future seemed heading nowhere. The doctors advised him to stay calm and follow the medication prescribed. “what about the baby and the kid” he reckoned..there was no answer. Both of them walked out of the hospital with crumbled hearts. Silently followed the ghoul.
Who would have thought a peg would have the makings to claim lives. It’s always of the essence to know the grounds of AIDS and take necessary precautions to avoid the deadly virus.
Though I am not aware of the exact reason why the story was rejected, I believe it was discarded because of the means through which the guy contacted the HIV. That might have sounded alarming for the judges. Because, the HIV virus doesn’t normally spread in such ways, through some abandoned needles which can puncture your skin.
I knew the causes of AIDS at the time when I wrote this essay, but due to some reasons I preferred this kinda plot since it would sound like a real one. I know that the HIV cannot survive room temperature and would immediately perish on contact with the atmosphere. But, imagine a rainy day or a very cold snowy day, where the temperature would presumably be in single digit degrees. There is a slight possibility for the virus to survive such temperatures. And also there is this mode of HIV transmission where people share syringes to take drugs. In this case too, there would be a considerable time gap before the second shot is taken by someone else. How about that?
Someone out there, if you are clear about the thing, post in your responses.
I have a dire tendency to ignore friends. I can’t explain why. It makes my friends think that I forget about them at times. But that never happens. I neither discount them nor stop thinking about them. I can certainly say that I haven’t spent a single day in my life without sensing at least one of my ex-best friends. By ex-best I mean my pals who I am not able to meet because of Geographical reasons.
From Deepak (my best friend in school) to guys whom I hang out with for eternity, I have a special list of selected guys who are in my best friends list. Apart from them, I also think about my virtuous days with a lot of other comrades at school, college and work. I think of them many a times and wonder how good those days were. Life sucks these days.
I draw the same tendency towards my colleagues as well. I stop talking to them once I stop working with them. So they always think that I cease to follow them. I am not able to ditch this habit which makes me feel abysmal at times.
I would like to indicate to my friends and other special ones of my life through this message that “Guys…I’m sorry for what I have done and going to do. It doesn’t matter if I don’t have a chinwag with you. I will always revere you as long as possible”
Be Good.
RGV to direct Surya in a serial killer movie. Trisha to act opposite Akki. It’s all happening for the K’wood stars. I’m sure Surya’s capable to woo the Hindi audience, but I doubt Trisha’s vigor. She’s old for that.
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