I'm frankly disgusted and appalled by my very mean and selfish spirit that just refuses to be satisfied. I have notions of change when I'm too busy and I cant sit still when I'm free. Its confusing to me and to everyone around me. I always seem to want more. More is actually a very significant word for me. I do get it a lot from people, I mean, in a way I guess... like - what more do you want? I always reply with a very confident 'I don't know'. Does not end well.
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Yes, Magicbricks, I would of course tell you, why I want to unsubscribe.
Dear Magic Bricks,
Thank you and very kind of you to suggest these lovely sales to me. But unfortunately I will not be able to afford this 3 BHK in Worli you just mailed me about. You see, I'm only 26 and neither my father, nor my mother are from Bombay. Which basically means I will need to live here and earn for 300 years to be able to afford a house I like. That seems like a bit of a tedious plan and so I have decided against it.
I would request you to please stop sending me these mailers. They mock me, even when they're unopened in my mailbox and all I can read is a subject line of "Apartment for Sale". If you can please stop sending me these very depressing reminders of my inability to afford a roof for myself and my loved one, I will most appreciate it.
Thank you.
Very humbly (like there is an option otherwise)
Nainy
PS: Please also keep me out of the Ghatkopar, Bhayander and Navi Mumbai circles. Why, I would rather just move to Indore then. Zank you zery much.
Thank you and very kind of you to suggest these lovely sales to me. But unfortunately I will not be able to afford this 3 BHK in Worli you just mailed me about. You see, I'm only 26 and neither my father, nor my mother are from Bombay. Which basically means I will need to live here and earn for 300 years to be able to afford a house I like. That seems like a bit of a tedious plan and so I have decided against it.
I would request you to please stop sending me these mailers. They mock me, even when they're unopened in my mailbox and all I can read is a subject line of "Apartment for Sale". If you can please stop sending me these very depressing reminders of my inability to afford a roof for myself and my loved one, I will most appreciate it.
Thank you.
Very humbly (like there is an option otherwise)
Nainy
PS: Please also keep me out of the Ghatkopar, Bhayander and Navi Mumbai circles. Why, I would rather just move to Indore then. Zank you zery much.
Friday, January 20, 2012
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.
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.
Monday, November 21, 2011
You and I
I get scared to tell you that I love you so much. It scares me so much that the moment I say it out loud that I cant live without you, you will be taken away from me. Almost as if, so much love is bad for us. So much love is bad for anybody.
I feel like a broken piece of glass. Poetic, still, fragile but only a hurting little somebody, noone wants to touch.
I feel like a broken piece of glass. Poetic, still, fragile but only a hurting little somebody, noone wants to touch.
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
A Journey that Changed Lives
I had never stepped out of my house alone, and was raised in a constraining and non compromising big Indian family. I was 24 years old and devoid of any story I could call my own. I was tired of being sheltered. Of being told what to do, where to go, and especially so, where not to go. In India women don’t tread in their lives alone. They need to be taken care of and the time had come where my care-takers needed to change hands. So my overtly ‘caring’ family had decided that I needed to be married off.
More often than not, you travel to escape and that’s what I did. I escaped. I pooled together some savings and got a plane ticket to Bombay. And with a backpack of two books, tooth brush, a change of clothes and a notepad, left the only city I knew all my life. I shut my cell phone down and the aircraft window. I had never felt so immensely alone and so alive at the same time. It’s like a world full of endless possibilities and the excitement of carving a whole new identity on a blank slate. I was 24 and this day forth, I could be whoever I choose to be. That plane ride changed my life. What it means to travel, to leave something behind you and move away. You don’t touch the brim and leave.
Two hours later, I emerged in this city. No lover, no family, just self and a lot of dreams, I set out to find my destination. I like to believe I’m still traveling and all that I see, I must see before I get to where I need to be. Bombay opened its arms to me immediately. I travel from the most insane clubs in Bombay to the most dreadful slums of the world, with the same fervour, the same excitement in my eyes and no vision. After all, if we always know what our destination will look like, I reckon, we stop living each passing moment and sleep through it looking for that one perfect tick of the clock. So I look, with the same raw appeal to each block of the road, to each sign on a rickshaw, to every bite I take of the road-side food in Bombay and I smile at every new face. Bombay is the place to be if you’re not pacing to and fro and can come to terms with the reality that life, just like this breathtaking city, is messy and is chaotic, and that’s just where it finds its beauty.
On a map, I’ve traveled less than 500 kilometers, but its one full life away, and it made me the finest and the most spirited version of me, and I will forever look back to the courage it took for that 2-hour journey and overcoming the fear of stepping out alone and just be.
More often than not, you travel to escape and that’s what I did. I escaped. I pooled together some savings and got a plane ticket to Bombay. And with a backpack of two books, tooth brush, a change of clothes and a notepad, left the only city I knew all my life. I shut my cell phone down and the aircraft window. I had never felt so immensely alone and so alive at the same time. It’s like a world full of endless possibilities and the excitement of carving a whole new identity on a blank slate. I was 24 and this day forth, I could be whoever I choose to be. That plane ride changed my life. What it means to travel, to leave something behind you and move away. You don’t touch the brim and leave.
Two hours later, I emerged in this city. No lover, no family, just self and a lot of dreams, I set out to find my destination. I like to believe I’m still traveling and all that I see, I must see before I get to where I need to be. Bombay opened its arms to me immediately. I travel from the most insane clubs in Bombay to the most dreadful slums of the world, with the same fervour, the same excitement in my eyes and no vision. After all, if we always know what our destination will look like, I reckon, we stop living each passing moment and sleep through it looking for that one perfect tick of the clock. So I look, with the same raw appeal to each block of the road, to each sign on a rickshaw, to every bite I take of the road-side food in Bombay and I smile at every new face. Bombay is the place to be if you’re not pacing to and fro and can come to terms with the reality that life, just like this breathtaking city, is messy and is chaotic, and that’s just where it finds its beauty.
On a map, I’ve traveled less than 500 kilometers, but its one full life away, and it made me the finest and the most spirited version of me, and I will forever look back to the courage it took for that 2-hour journey and overcoming the fear of stepping out alone and just be.
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Unlearn
When I was little, my mother once told me that crows grab your eye balls and eat, just to make me duck when near them and not go feeding them on our terrace. Till date, when I see a crow flying towards my direction (and by god bombay has its more than fair share of crows) I think its coming after my eyeballs. I dont think that's true anymore. And it irritates me that I believed it and was scared of it happening all my life. Maybe there are more things that I'm scared of, who arent meant to being scared of. Like being alone. My family made me believe that if you dont get married you have a loserly life. You're incomplete and mostly that is the worst thing that can happen to anybody. That they dont get married.
But maybe not. Maybe its okay. And I dont have to feel terrible inside being scared of it coming true. Its probably not half as bad as they told me. The relationships and marriages I've seen, only add to my suspicion for this weird notion. Maybe its not so bad at all to be alone. Not so bad at all.
But maybe not. Maybe its okay. And I dont have to feel terrible inside being scared of it coming true. Its probably not half as bad as they told me. The relationships and marriages I've seen, only add to my suspicion for this weird notion. Maybe its not so bad at all to be alone. Not so bad at all.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Life Befuddles Me
Yes, it does. And in ways that I seldom understand. The past two weeks have probably been the toughest since I moved to Bombay. For some reason I find it difficult to be honest today and yet, I'd like to talk it out. I feel depressed. My health is all over the place, my family is not at its best and well, I just don't feel at rest now. You know, its not the best time in the world when every day, at least once, you ask out aloud, when will all this stop?
You know I'm going around minding my own business, why cant I just be left alone.
You know I'm going around minding my own business, why cant I just be left alone.
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