I'm in Europe

Europe of clear twilight skies.
Everyday.
Europe of pretty trams humming along the city roads.
Europe of clean street food.
Europe of amazingly homogeneous groups of mixed race people from countries I had never heard of before.
Or could not spot on the map till yesterday.
Europe of Romanians.
Of Turks.
Of Polish, Greek, Ukrainians, Estonians and Albanians.
Europe of urban gardening.
Europe of punctuality.
Europe of frosted glass windows.
Europe of enormous food portions.
Europe of hourly weather forecasts.
Europe of foreign languages.
Europe of bloodied pasts.
Europe of humility.
Europe of responsibility.
Europe of historical guilt.

And Europe of unadulterated free mindedness.
Europe of progressiveness.
Europe of 10 PM sunsets.
Of long summer days.
And clock ticking on winter dread.
Europe of poetic town squares.
Of empty parking lots.
Of bicycles.
Or pillion bicyclists.
Of heated homes.
Of open windows.
Of yarn bombings and of organized graffiti.

Europe of street parties.
Or late late night street parties.
Of quiet strolls.
Of safety.
Of trust.
Of unhinged public display of affection.
Europe of my gay friends.
And their free-er lives.
Europe of choices.
Europe of personal freedom.
Europe of fearless women.
Fierce women.
Unapologetically expressive women.
Europe of labour dignity.
Europe of equality.

Europe of distinctly coloured hair and skin.
And eyes.
And tongues.
Europe of centuries old folklore.
And kings and queens.
And of country farms.
And of cheese.
And wine.
Of football.

Europe of full body hug greetings.
Or two pecks on the cheeks greeting.
Or one peck.
(I'm never entirely sure.)

Europe of tap water.
Of solar power and of jägermeisters.
Of red light districts.
Of legal red light districts.
Europe of acceptance.

Sometimes I miss India. Sometimes I don't.
     

Facade of Announcements

Sometimes I wonder, if people did all these great things and had no one to tell them about.. will it mean less to them? If you went to all the wonderful places in the world and had no pictures to show for it, will that be worth any less?

Why am I asking awkward questions? Well, here's what happened. I loved Twitter, and people on it and comments and all the wonderful wittiness that came along. Then, I got extensively busy in a project and had no time to tweet. Or check or keep tabs at all. The project got over and I went back.

It felt nothing like it used to. I just couldn't fathom how this is happening? I used to love this.. this that I now find irritating, shallow, prejudiced and prude. I used to love these people, those who I now find whiny and groupy-ish.

I find no entertainment in people announcing their being stuck in traffic, or getting new red lipstick, or complaining about Monday, or telling me what they're eating, where they're going, where they've been, who they fuck or that they dont fuck enough.

So bloody irrelevant. Honestly, I liked the liking twitter phase better. Like belonging to something. Having so many people know so much abut my life and opinions. One feels appreciated and even celebrity-ish. Now I feel like an outsider. Like being surrounded by a high school cult that I'm not a part of. But most times, I notice the positives that came out of this and I wouldn't trade them for anything. Like, valuing experiences for what they are and when they are, without feeling the need to let a 1000 unknown people know about it. The blessing of zero distraction. I don't even pick up my phone for anything during the nine hours I'm at work. I get so much done, work related and else. Like keeping things private. And keeping opinions unannounced. Letting go of the organized routine of venting about each and everything I dislike under the sun. I find that I let go much more easily now, and things genuinely bother me less now that I've refrained from #outrage (;) since  a while.

You want to get a perspective on something, step away from it for a bit and you might see it for what it is.

Anyway, I'm looking for new addictions, ideas anyone? :)   

Of Twitter and Paper Kingdoms

My profile on Twitter exists since January 2009, first few hundreds to be on Twitter in India. But I honestly cannot tell you, how many times, I have joined and rejoined twitter.

I have many problems with the channel and its ardent fans, but the biggest being, that it makes you feel, its more than what it is. It is, just a social networking site. No, do not take an offense, yet.

Twitter's social norms are suffocating, much like the real world. It's filthy the kind of obsession people get for it. But more filthy, is the power trip. Twitter society has mass followers, say aam junta and then there are 'twitteratis' people with more than 3000 followers, round about. And in such scenarios, you will see aamjunta in their non-fruition repeated attempts to interact with these mega twitterers. Its appalling then, when you see these people with so many followers, shun the others, disrespect, make fun of, but mostly just ignore them. Reminds you of anything?

Twitter is a virtual world, much like Second Life. Virtual worlds are interesting social phenomenons for many. Small fry I am, but it interests me. Many people state different reasons for being on Twitter, news, updates, networking, and these are great uses. But it becomes different and skewed when people are on twitter for other needs. Needs such as belonging, of self-esteem, of recognition, and sometimes, even superiority. To understand it right, think of the two topmost slabs of Maslow's Hierarchy theory of needs, Self Actualization and Esteem. However this may sound to you, you might be at the edge of these for all you know. That's because all this is away from your real life. Nothing you say or do there, can affect you in your real life, unless you're a bollywood celebrity or a politician.

Twitter and similar channels give you an opportunity to be surrounded by people, and yet not be civil to them. Like a, "Who's watching?" "What can you do?". I'm not saying that we as people need to need to to chaperoned at all times, but wont you agree that when all of us are not, some intriguing things happen. Like the unannounced (or are they?!) kings and queens on Twitter? Are you too, mistaking followers for fans? Appreciation and interaction for paparazzi? Its sad mostly that these really young people are being made to believe in this farce. For when they behave like this and nothing really happens after that, what it is essentially doing is validating this behavior. Conditioning one to believe that if such psychopathic thoughts (for example) fetch me only more popularity with these 4500 people, well, this is uniquely me and I will continue this, no wait, I'll up the ante tomorrow. You can understand, how this can go very wrong. Twitter gives way to your self-harming sometimes, but most certain self-deluded narcissism. Being more than who you really are.

This is how you are when you feel you are a twitter celebrity. There is more from where this is coming. What happens to people who follow you/notice you when you act like a celebrity. When you feel it is a ridiculously huge achievement that you have so many followers and that factor, in some mysterious way make your viewpoint more right (or left, if you have more radical political views). In highly competitive people it starts a very serious war for followers. Imagine holding a grudge for someone you dont know, will never meet, for a metric which means nothing in your world and will not get you that promotion or the degree you work towards. But it is there, staring you in the face. For many others, their world views are constantly being shaped by these twitterati. And unfortunately, sex and scandal still rule and notions of a dejected minority clustered on one of the dozen social networking channels that exist, is being taken for a mass reality by an assumed total of twelve thousand for each influencer that exists.

An article I read states it best when it says, "Twitter is a like a human art installation!" . Scary isnt it? Well, there is much more to learn here than meets the eye, I reckon. Will write more as I learn. For now, thanks for reading.

Yes, Twitter and non-believer in the same sentence - sue me! And the ultimate reason for our ADD.

What in the world is Twitter anyway? Every morning I come to work and as a reflex sign into my Gmail, work email, facebook and well, twitter. Once done with the rest, I stare at Twitter. and I dont know what the fuck to write. I mean seriously, what could be happening? At every moment?

I'm completely missing the point. The stuff people write on Twitter, is meant for who? Themselves? Followers? Is it soliloquy? Who's reading my shouts anyway. And it's an ongoing stream of links and disjointed and disconnected conversations one after the other, after the other.

Like imagine this, you're sitting in your living room and there's the Ninja Blogger, the Ms. I'm from LSR-you idiots dont know literature, there's the local rockstar who thinks he's made it big with 700 followers, there's me - the I dont know I have nothing really to share person, the insane vagina lover blogger I follow like a maniac, there's the Indian TV reporter whose name rhymes with Marka Mut.

Wokay, so great y'all, glad to have you all in my conversation streams.

Me: Morning! Friday already! I love it!
Marka: Government should set up a collegium. Representatives of govt, opposition and two -three eminent citizens shd be part of it.
Me: Umm, ok.
Ninja: " Behold all is vanity and striving after wind" Ecclesiates
Ninja: Just ordered some of my pics from last year's Boulder Marathon. See all my pics here http://t.co/Bze3iEr via @brPhototweets
Me: Yeah, about that...
Vagina Chick: Each time I remember that Gossip Girl isn't on again until APRIL 18 I feel so much irrational anger. Also filed under: THAT KISS. GAH. HATE.
Vagina Chick: @spitts27 Totally agree, they're awesome! Email me your address and I'll send you one :) nicole(at)coleismuchbetterthanthat(dot)com
Me: What the..
Vagina Chick: YES, THE FIRE ALARM WORKS. STOP TESTING IT. AH. DEAF.
Vagina Chick: Don't keep your email open all day. Don't keep your email open all day. Don't keep your email open all day. #trainingmyself
Me: Dude, seriously calm down!!
Me means LSR: @dramoli I agree though- since data collection in villages thro health/ anganwadi workers is questionable - we may not fully know incidence
Me means LSR: Factual Evidence shows that women who read are way better to cope with life threatening situations than men. (Men? Shit, did anyone say that M word? I hate Men? I'm gay.)
Me means LSR: @MEN you're all sick rapists. Let's fight. Yes, thats why they teach us at our college, how to pick fights with anyone of oppsite sex, at the minutest of your inconvenience, oh that and verbal vomit.
Me: hehe.. I totally made that up. No, they dont "actually" (admittedly) say that.
Rockstar: Life is overrated. I like suicide. Seems the way to go for us all to be dead famous.
Me: Dead.. hehehheee.. you're funny. RT
Rockstar: I'm playing at Blue Frog tonight. come! And check out my pic with seven chicks totally ready to give me all www.twitpic.com/1245
Me: Yeah, you see, I'm at work an..
Rockstar: and here where I was at the beach, shaking my booty..oooohh yeah!!! www.twitpic.com/5677
Rockstar: And here - I had to show you that I "actually" know all these people! bit.ly.667/pic5 arre see to the right, that boxer shorts with "bum main dum" facing backwards, is mine!
Me: SHUT THE FUCK UP

Ok, I'm now tired, but you see, this is a completely frustrating conversation - for anybody! I think people tweeting are running their conversation in mind and just dont give a shit for what is actually going on. And so many links, jeez, link to my blog, link to my eleven thousand photos that I now take since I have an iphone bitches, link to my rest of the post since i dont know how to write in 140 characters, link to my site, link to my contest, link to this post from some totally random guy just cause I think its RAD! NO. NO. NO. NO. You've got it totally wrong. Lets repeat once again - I did NOT sign up for spam. Did. NOT. Did not. And twitter is like spam on acid. And I will not contribute. Will. NOT. Will not.

And what are these hashtags that you randomly create and think the world has thoughts on the same and one fine day they'll all be collated and you'll be the guy who bought it to light. #pukeonmycouch #HoHoHellNo #sickbastardmustdie #kittykitty #myparentsroom #stomachflab #chotachetan #kaminikabmaregi #charliesheensinning (the last one was me, oh! come on! I think it's funny). No but seriously, these are not topics of public interest, or one where we all have a say in.

If one of you smartasses is now reiterating the same old - it's for me! and what I wanna say regardless of anyone hearing. Well, then this is massively confusing. So you wanna write things for yourself and not for others, but you want to say it on a public forum all the same. TIRED AND BORED. Still confused.


PS: If any of you actually clocked on those links for those pictures. Seriously, sympathy, you have a lot of time - get on Twitter. Oh and respect, for your general interest and curiosity in random people and their pictures.

Experiment 1: On Changing Your Story

This is not an experiment, well sorta. This is optimism put to test. This is every part of me swearing that I'll try and every part of me wishing it works.

Sometimes love rips you apart. Sometimes love is the only thing hurting. Sometimes you want love so bad, you scare away love. Sometimes love changes you. Sometimes love makes you want more. It makes you cruel. It makes you nauseatingly faithful. Sometimes its more bitter than sweet, but always what you really want.

Sometimes your whole being becomes a paradox. Sometimes you want things, you don't realize you already have. You have the smartest lines and you know you're being foolish. You can own him and then end up doing miserably pathetic things to have him touch your hand when you reach out.

Real love never feels it's going to break, and for that reason, real love will go to any means to make each other suffer. Real love is bad for you. Its so sinful and so self absorbing, you become a void in yourself. Real love defines who you are then, and then on the afternoons your real love hurts, you don't know who you are and what you are around people without it.

Real passionate love is very overconfident. It will play your mind and your heart. Love is like the ghastly drill machine which goes straight to your core and messes you up. Its like a slap across your face and shows you what an extreme person you can become, you self praising kind soul you. Real love terrorizes your mind. When you love so bad, your mind refuses to believe it can end and thats why you're never really scared. You'd be frustrated, you'd be so mad you'll start attacking walls with your fists, but you'll never be scared.

And thats why real love never compromises. Two people in mad passionate love never really make up. You be an ass to him and he'd be just as big an ass to you. That's what happens when you've made up your mind on 'this is the guy I want to annoy the fuck out for the rest of my life'. It's ongoing and its tiring but its never done.

Real love is an entity in itself. Two people in love are like mutually dependent parasites who feed off of each others happiness, energy, aura and sadly, sadness. Real love is a helpless spiral. Upwards and downwards.

Love is funny and love is unreasonable. You have lived twenty five years of your life, not knowing that this one person exists. And then one fine day, from nowhere, one crazy dreamer walks into your life, no different than any other crazy dreamer you've met before. And something about them messes you up. You enter a no exit trance of a one point agenda - of having this person. This one person, who you know in your heart had a one in billion chance of ever meeting you in this life, that one person will start owning you. And you're helpless. You can think you're in control, but you're not, at least not in your own. Not his either, just some strange vision you weave together.

Love hurts. Oh my god, love hurts. Its not a hurt of toppling from the stairs which hurts only physically, scabs and vanishes, leaving behind a funny bar story. Love hurts from inside, its a soul hurt. It aches and its the suffering of not having your senses to work. It makes you mad.

Love also distorts your understanding of language and generally accepted semantics. Few words which are just like any other million words in the world that you've read and spoken and even joked about in the past, those same words turn into monstrous glass splinters who crawl up your eyes and refuse to be ignored. They're the sly vision itching insects which remind you of their presence at all hours. Words hurt. I wish words were more tangible and physical in their appearance. Like a glass vase, on which if I was mad and couldn't stop thinking about, I could break it, throw it out of my house and have my satisfaction of destroying the evidence of its existence. But not words, nope.

Love is not a choice. Love is over powering, over whelming and once you've loved, you wont rest until it feels the exact way it felt that one beautiful taxi ride.

So here I am. Having my love own me and trying to own my love. It needs work and it needs nourishment and its needs a lot of love. And if anything I know about myself, I know I'm full of love. I love love.

I have always believed that only a truly happy person can make another person happy. And "I'm not happy" uh, that's my story. And that is right. It's a story. It's just a story. I've made myself believe it and act it and live it. I reckon, I can make another story preferably more fun, more happy, more beautiful and make myself believe that, live that and act that.

It's really simple actually and I can explain how I got to this. A while back when I used to meditate regularly I used to read a lot (double past tense). Meditation is a lot about breathing and how it dominates your being, right in the centre of your body with just a coming and going of a whiff of a air. Breath overpowers how you feel. And whenever you feel something emotionally or physically, your breath is the first thing to get affected. For example when you're cold, you breath becomes short and narrow and you take lesser air in, and your body wants to occupy as less a space as possible. The theory goes, it can be reversed. When you're in a really cold environment, you must stop yourself, and breathe as calmly as possible, long breaths with enough pauses and your body starts relaxing by yourself. That is how the old Sadhus in the Himalayas can be covered in snow and be as calm as the southern lakes.

And so that is my plan. I'm going to make Happiness come to me. When I'm happy, I eat a lot, I smile a lot, I love interesting facts on TV, I make fun of things and not judge them, I keep in touch with my family, I talk to my friends a lot, I meet my girls, I gossip, I write, I read, I crave tandoori chicken, I dance and sing at the top of my voice, regardless of which house it is and whose party it is, I listen to my music, I watch my movies and I love my theater, I laugh louder and with shameless lustful spite at times, I think less, I'm more easy going, I dress better, I complain lesser, I feel warmer, I'm bitchier (yes, I like it that way) and again, I eat all three meals, sometimes even four.

So now we're working backwards people. I will do everything I do when I am happy and it will come to me. Of course. Cause you know what? There is nothing to be so sad about. Shed. Shed. Shed. Shed. Surrender.

And since none of my best friends live in this city.. are you listening chinky, priya, nidhi, ishaan, shivangi? Damn you all! I'm going to be my own best friend and give one tight slap to myself, and be the sexy bitch that I am and shed this righteous, sacrificing, cutesy girl get up, who likes things clean. I don't give a shit about cleanliness dude.

So back to be the default me, this typified custom model is just not working dude. Not working. Love can be maddening, crazy, tiring, come one, come all, I can take this. Cool as cucumber. Calm. And patient. And happy.

Donning my hippy socks and tune out the world earphones now. Hare Krishna everyone.

Re-examine

I want to change things around. I feel stagnant. Not like I always feel nauseated when I am stagnant, just this is not the time to be stagnant. I feel like a bystander in my own life. Maybe I'm a bit of a control freak. Once again, maybe I watch too many movies. I feel like time is going by. I want to travel. I hate living like I'm supposed to be living. I hate conforming to so many rules, be kind, be honest, be as great a person I can be, and still not feel happy. I don't know what I want. And maybe thats what troubles me.

I used to think I'm passionate about writing. But the more writers I meet, the more unsure of myself I feel. If writing really was my passion, how is it that I've written 11 pages of my so-called book some 2 months back and never touched it again? The summary of which I did another 6 months ago? Then maybe my book isn't it. Or maybe I don't have my story yet.

I feel confused. I feel I'm in a perpetual trance of everyday things. I truly love the people in my life. But maybe thats not all that I want. I love bombay. But I dont love any place for too long which makes me feel tied. I want to go to fucking italy. Please someone take me to italy with them.

Ok, stop, pause, everyone. Breathe. I'm making a new plan. It just came to me, while writing this. Fuck everything. I deserve every bit of happiness in this world. Now this is what I'm going to do. I just got a raise. So.. I'm going to save every month and by my next birthday, September, I'm going to leave this country. I've always, always wanted to live in different countries. If I don't do this now, I cant do this ever. I have to, I need to do this for myself.

I have to do this.

And now, I have to save - no more splurges. I have to think of a country which talks to me the most. I have to prepare.

I think I've finally nailed what I've been irritated about. I have a vision of myself living like something, somewhere and I cant wait to start it. But I'm waiting, without a date, I feel like I'm working towards a non-existent goal. My life and my purpose is blurry around all this waiting.

I don't anymore want to wait around for anything, anyone. I cant wait to start this life and I figure at 25, half of my life has already gone. More sad than happy. And who said, the balance has to be this off? The clock is ticking and I need to get going. Thats the only thing good for me. An unhappy me is an annoying me. An unhappy me is everything I don't want to be.

One wait leads to another wait, and before you know it, there is a whole checklist of your ducks that need to be in a row. If I can wait for someone and their plans, wait, what about my plans? I at least deserve a date. And I hate pushing for a date, people need to respect other people's dreams and dates..umm.. time I meant. Yes, people need to respect people's time.

I'm also really hoping rupee value goes up, oh and also, I'm hoping I get a fucking job in another country. WOW. That's a lot for me and my poor little bachelors of a degree.

I need to stop talking now. Wokay then.

Accepting Differences

My present college, my earlier university and almost all b-schools in the country pride themselves on their student diversity. Infact, as an HR major I’ve read courses in Diversity Management, several hundred papers written about it, that I researched for own my paper. What rings true is even after so many of “I’m different” and “I don’t belong here”, I rarely meet someone I can hardly understand. All diversity means to people is races, ethnicity and languages. But that’s not all, there are economic classes, skin tone bias, accent bias, marital status bias, different schools of thoughts, acceptance of varied value systems, to name a few. And, are any of us skilled to handle that? Anyone ever taught us that? In our well thought approach of talking about everything in a politically correct manner, and our b-school’s proactive approach of giving us a brief on it, before we really face it, the question is we don’t yet recognize the real diversity and the fact that many of us lead our lives in our wonderful confiscated little cocoons, not realizing how royally we screw up in real lives.

Let’s start with a few. The distinction of people belonging to the smokers category. Worse yet, if you’re a girl. The sect cliché for the female smoker group goes: Females who smoke sleep around. Truly, people who smoke all know the health hazards of it already and still choose to do it, there is nothing else common between them. Infact, Smokers are less of a cult than MBAs. MBA league, so called diverse background are relatively a homogenous mix, as compared to smokers. Most smokers have nothing in common: timings, frequency, or even brand, let alone their sexual preferences. Girls who’ve atleast lived in the diverse arrangement once, and smoked would testify. They’re looked down upon, are judged about our relationship status, attitude towards the opposite sex (sometimes even same sex, really). Its more amusing to me than anything else.

Should I start writing about Marital Status? Broken marriages are scary, to anyone, and I don’t deny that. But most people are not equipped enough emotionally to handle it. They either stop talking to divorced people, or spread rumours about their sexual activities, or the assumed past sexual activities, without basis ofcourse. The funny part is, this is not even happening to them, they don’t have to face it. They do not have to face the agony of a past scar so deep that it almost always affects their present lives everyday, they don’t have to face social judgments, they don’t have to face awkwardness of not letting yourself be, the loud smirks your brain and your heart makes inside your head everytime someone mentions the M word. And still, even as an outsider they cant handle their world. And by experience, what have we learned, people who cant do it, stand out and curse it. And again, its more amusing to me than hurtful now.

How many of us are going to be man enough or more aptly woman enough to accept the skin tone bias? Ofcourse, it exists. Not just during love selection, also during roommate selection, while making work group, chum selections, class representative election, choosing Ms. Fresher. Apparently, logic and intelligence only come in handy when you have a skin tone fairer than the rest to go with it.

Language Barrier? Not the usual cross cultural slides we learn in OB. But the true language barrier we face in our country. Most of us MBA’s do not have to face it. Come on! We come through selection tests which marks us on an English scale of a far-fetched high standard, are interviewed and GD-ed and really what do you think are those communication marks for? English. Most of us, taking the worse case, know people who have bad grammar, and that’s all, this is our definition of a not-so-good education. Do either of us have an outlook open enough to know that someone in the present India, who does not speak a word of English is just as smart, or even more? Unfortunate as it may be, I even know people in my own class who think less of others cause they didn’t know who Dylan is.

This is still touching just the brim. There are spending power assumptions, believers are frowned upon more than the non-believers, introverts are taken as stuck up, extrovert females are tagged flirtatious, extrovert boys become Mr. Fresher’s and many more. Ironically, no one judges people with two boyfriends, or un-countable girlfriends, no one thinks less about people who abuse teachers who make you work, noone is held accountable for making stories about others, or about conniving morons who get back at you by asking implausible questions at the end of your presentation.

I’m just let down I guess. I thought elite education gives a certain sophistication of thoughts, and sensitivity in perspective. But maybe not. People are people, no matter what, and no matter where. Even still, does anybody else think it’s so uncanny that as individuals we hate them and as a plural entity we are them. We the people, suck.