Music in my head: Anathema - Hindsight
Today's weather: Back to normal, after two anomalous, pleasant days.
For a guy who has nothing to do, I've been doing quite a lot lately. I went to another party, at an Asian themed restaurant- complete with Karaoke, except that they'd hired two people to Karaoke for the guests. There has been talk of hiring super-sophisticated French-Italian-Gourmet trained 'Eaters' for guests. It's all hush-hush now, but the little birds say that the illustrious wait-list includes such rich and famous people as Lalit Modi who're looking to spend their shady money in every way possible.
So I sat there listening to an insipid version of 'I want to break free', sipping on a glass of beer, watching my dad shoot nervous glances at his now 'grown-up' son, and all of a sudden, I was treated to a dire spectacle. I had seen an old lady sitting at a table across the restaurant. Now, it is not my habit to notice old ladies, but this particular woman was about a hundred feet around the equator (I'm allowed to crack fat jokes, because I'm fat). I had dismissed her as a venerable old cat. But, lo and behold! There she was, pumping her fists and gyrating to the Karaoke, the quintessential cheesy-comedy-restaurant-fat-lady-dancing scene. Thus, the emasculating Karaoke came with a groovy fist-pump in the nuts of your eyes (forgive the crude metaphor).
The food wasn't particularly good, but then buffets rarely are. I don't eat fish, and half the table was sushi. I drank my beer, ate some chicken and tried to picture my safe place in my head- a lush meadow with cows grazing beside an arena where thousands of metalheads are banging their heads to such demi-gods as Dethklok, Opeth and Meshuggah. It didn't work, of course.
Result: No more pseudo-karaoke parties.
.
June 09, 2010
June 03, 2010
Party Poop
Music in my head: Simon and Garfunkel - Scarborough Fair Canticle
Today's weather: Dustbowl
Yesterday, I had to go to a party. Not the cool kind, like the once we used to have back in the day. Yeah, I can use the expression 'back in the day' now. I just got my final CGPA. But I digress. I had to go to a party, with my folks, at an Army mess, dressed up in ironed clothes and polished shoes. The bane of the existence of every self-respecting Army brat. Yes, you get as many (soft) drinks as you want, and you can eat as many pieces of Chicken-65 as you want, but that's not the end of the story.
This is what usually happens at such an occasion- I enter the Drawing room with my folks. Everyone exchanges pleasantries. They ask me which class I was in. I smile a big fake smile and explain to them that I have, in fact, completed my B.Tech. They proceed to explain to me how I don't look my age, and sometimes add an anecdote which proves that looks can be deceptive. This is all acceptable. Yes, I have a very high tolerance level for extremely irritating, mind-numbingly boring conversation.
Next, they beam at me and tell me- "Accha, bete, bacche log TV room mein baithe hain. Tum vahi jaake baith jao. Hum pepsi udhar bhijwa denge. (Ok son, the kids are in the TV room. You can go join them. We'll send you some pepsi.)" I look at them with a quizzical expression. I just told you that I am twenty one years old, you age-ist old person. Isn't that clever? That's like discrimination based on age, like racist is discrimination based on race. In that awkward silence, I think up clever things like that. And then, of course, the big grown ups get their grown-up drinks and form their little grown up conversation circles. And that's freedom.
The window of opportunity to escape from the Drawing Room without having to be escorted to the TV room is very small. So I usually just get the hell out at the first chance. I go hang around at the garden or something. This time, when I walked out, I saw a metallic staircase. It was as if a spotlight from heaven had lit it up. I walked up these stairs, very slowly, immersing myself in the anticipation. It led up to the roof. There was some construction work in progress. I had found my spot.
It was magic. I was transported back to Trichy. There was this ugly structure coming up right in front of the main gate. For months we couldn't even figure out what it was. Then we realised that it was a flyover. We figured out a way to get on top of it. And then after braving a mercilessly sweltering Trichy day, we would go up there at night. We would sit there, listen to music and watch the headlamps of the cars, buses and trucks flicker as they passed by in the distance. And we would talk about the EPL, the sucky Profs, how the Project was a pain in the rear, how the lights look like they're dancing to the music that's playing, of cabbages and kings. And the cool breeze would refresh us, and the guards would give us suspicious looks. But at that moment we hadn't a care in the world.
And two months later and two thousand kilometers away, I felt like I was back. I felt the buzz of passing traffic. I played the music in my head. Headlamps of speeding cars danced in the distance. I narrowed my eyes to slits until the lights were a blur. I could hear stuff in the background- "Dude, Torres is God", "Dude that Prof can't even spell redundant", "Dude I've left my lip-marks on my Prof's rear. I hope I get an A", "Dude Steven Wilson is genius".
Then suddenly, I felt a tap on my shoulder. As my eyes came back into focus, I half expected myself to be greeted by the Guard anna. "Bhaiyya, khana lag gaya", he said. I was back from my sojourn in time. I went to the dining room, picked up some dinner, pretended to be interested in the dinner conversation. They could've been talking about cabbages and kings, for all I care.
The next time I'm caught in a tedious conversation, I'll just excuse myself, find the roof and sit there, looking at traffic, in my happy place, with my friends.
"Did you ever imagine the last thing you'd hear as you're fading out was a song?....
... Arriving somewhere, not here..."
Today's weather: Dustbowl
Yesterday, I had to go to a party. Not the cool kind, like the once we used to have back in the day. Yeah, I can use the expression 'back in the day' now. I just got my final CGPA. But I digress. I had to go to a party, with my folks, at an Army mess, dressed up in ironed clothes and polished shoes. The bane of the existence of every self-respecting Army brat. Yes, you get as many (soft) drinks as you want, and you can eat as many pieces of Chicken-65 as you want, but that's not the end of the story.
This is what usually happens at such an occasion- I enter the Drawing room with my folks. Everyone exchanges pleasantries. They ask me which class I was in. I smile a big fake smile and explain to them that I have, in fact, completed my B.Tech. They proceed to explain to me how I don't look my age, and sometimes add an anecdote which proves that looks can be deceptive. This is all acceptable. Yes, I have a very high tolerance level for extremely irritating, mind-numbingly boring conversation.
Next, they beam at me and tell me- "Accha, bete, bacche log TV room mein baithe hain. Tum vahi jaake baith jao. Hum pepsi udhar bhijwa denge. (Ok son, the kids are in the TV room. You can go join them. We'll send you some pepsi.)" I look at them with a quizzical expression. I just told you that I am twenty one years old, you age-ist old person. Isn't that clever? That's like discrimination based on age, like racist is discrimination based on race. In that awkward silence, I think up clever things like that. And then, of course, the big grown ups get their grown-up drinks and form their little grown up conversation circles. And that's freedom.
The window of opportunity to escape from the Drawing Room without having to be escorted to the TV room is very small. So I usually just get the hell out at the first chance. I go hang around at the garden or something. This time, when I walked out, I saw a metallic staircase. It was as if a spotlight from heaven had lit it up. I walked up these stairs, very slowly, immersing myself in the anticipation. It led up to the roof. There was some construction work in progress. I had found my spot.
It was magic. I was transported back to Trichy. There was this ugly structure coming up right in front of the main gate. For months we couldn't even figure out what it was. Then we realised that it was a flyover. We figured out a way to get on top of it. And then after braving a mercilessly sweltering Trichy day, we would go up there at night. We would sit there, listen to music and watch the headlamps of the cars, buses and trucks flicker as they passed by in the distance. And we would talk about the EPL, the sucky Profs, how the Project was a pain in the rear, how the lights look like they're dancing to the music that's playing, of cabbages and kings. And the cool breeze would refresh us, and the guards would give us suspicious looks. But at that moment we hadn't a care in the world.
And two months later and two thousand kilometers away, I felt like I was back. I felt the buzz of passing traffic. I played the music in my head. Headlamps of speeding cars danced in the distance. I narrowed my eyes to slits until the lights were a blur. I could hear stuff in the background- "Dude, Torres is God", "Dude that Prof can't even spell redundant", "Dude I've left my lip-marks on my Prof's rear. I hope I get an A", "Dude Steven Wilson is genius".
Then suddenly, I felt a tap on my shoulder. As my eyes came back into focus, I half expected myself to be greeted by the Guard anna. "Bhaiyya, khana lag gaya", he said. I was back from my sojourn in time. I went to the dining room, picked up some dinner, pretended to be interested in the dinner conversation. They could've been talking about cabbages and kings, for all I care.
The next time I'm caught in a tedious conversation, I'll just excuse myself, find the roof and sit there, looking at traffic, in my happy place, with my friends.
"Did you ever imagine the last thing you'd hear as you're fading out was a song?....
... Arriving somewhere, not here..."
June 01, 2010
Kashmir
Music in my head: Sigur Rós - Glósóli
Today's weather: The damp after the storm.
Round and round the rugged rocks the ragged rascal ran. As for us, we spiralled our way up from the barren valley that is Leh, through precarious roads and endless hairpin bends to Fotula pass, before we wound our way back down to Kargil.
It was an eight hour ride, and by the time we reached Kargil, I was full of dust, pins-and-needles and insightful thoughts resulting partially from multiple power-naps and a few conversations. I am not going to describe how picturesque the scenery was, I just don't have the words for it. I'm just putting up a few thousand below, just so you get an idea.
I'll put up the rest of the pictures on picasa soon. For now, I'll share some of the more interesting thoughts, perhaps epiphanies, I had during the eight hour road trip.
The common Kashmiri man is a closed box. He is cut off from the rest of the world by about ten hours in time and 400 kilometers in space. He gets yesterday's newspaper, and all he reads is the bollywood section. He survives without cable TV, heck, without power, twelve hours a day. But he is hard as a rock (not what you're thinking, you perv). He can brave icy winds in spite of just one layer of clothing, as opposed to the four or five layers we have on our backs. Hence, one can safely summarise that he is a strong, ignorant brute. I made these inferences from the two drivers in our little convoy. The clincher was the following conversation I had with one of them:
Hence proved.
Now, coming to the women. Leh is predominantly a Tibetan community, so the women there are like the women you see in Darjeeling- dressed in the latest fashion, sporting shades and weird hairdos- the works. But in Kargil, you couldn't spot a single woman who wasn't wearing a hijab (a scarf that covers the head and the neck). And they're all really fair and well proportioned to boot. So, initially I cursed the Gods for denying me the enormous amount of eye candy that Kargil has hidden away under layers of wool.
But as time passed, and I started observing more carefully, I remembered a discussion I had with a friend back in college. The conclusion was that if a woman wears skimpy clothes, revealing all she has- her cards are on the table. That's it. Take it or leave it. But when a woman is hidden away under a burkha or a hijab, you can let your imagination run wild. You don't know what she's holding. Could be a pair, two pairs, maybe a straight, maybe a full-house, maybe even a flush. Whatever she bets, you'll call. As you get used to it, you can conjure up a straight flush every time you see a wrapped up woman. So ever since I had that awakening, my whole stay at Kargil just filled up with light.
So that's all about the men and women of Kashmir. I might continue my travelogue later, or I might not. Delhi's humid and I'm lazy. So in case the Universe doesn't conspire to create another such creative moment for me, I leave you with my sum-up of Kashmir- it's like being in the music video of a soaring post-rock song. Look up the song that I've been looping for a while now- Glósóli by Sigur Rós. Close your eyes. Turn on the Air-conditioner. You're in pseudo-Kashmir now. Enjoy your stay.
Today's weather: The damp after the storm.
Round and round the rugged rocks the ragged rascal ran. As for us, we spiralled our way up from the barren valley that is Leh, through precarious roads and endless hairpin bends to Fotula pass, before we wound our way back down to Kargil.
It was an eight hour ride, and by the time we reached Kargil, I was full of dust, pins-and-needles and insightful thoughts resulting partially from multiple power-naps and a few conversations. I am not going to describe how picturesque the scenery was, I just don't have the words for it. I'm just putting up a few thousand below, just so you get an idea.
I'll put up the rest of the pictures on picasa soon. For now, I'll share some of the more interesting thoughts, perhaps epiphanies, I had during the eight hour road trip.
The common Kashmiri man is a closed box. He is cut off from the rest of the world by about ten hours in time and 400 kilometers in space. He gets yesterday's newspaper, and all he reads is the bollywood section. He survives without cable TV, heck, without power, twelve hours a day. But he is hard as a rock (not what you're thinking, you perv). He can brave icy winds in spite of just one layer of clothing, as opposed to the four or five layers we have on our backs. Hence, one can safely summarise that he is a strong, ignorant brute. I made these inferences from the two drivers in our little convoy. The clincher was the following conversation I had with one of them:
Driver: Bahut thand hai na? (It's really cold, isn't it?)My dad later told me that he's met a teacher in Kargil who couldn't name the President, didn't know how many states there were in India and couldn't even name five of them. I can't change anything. I'm just listing the facts.
Me: Haan Bhaiya, Bahut Thand hai. (Yes, it is really cold)
Driver: Toh, tum kaha rehte ho? (So, where do you live?)
Me: Hum log Dilli mein rehte hai. (We live in Delhi)
Driver: Accha. Par proper gaon kaha hai? (Ok, but where is your hometown?)
Me: Voh to Kerala mein hain. (That's in Kerala)
Driver: Accha. Kerala kaha hain? (Ok. But where's Kerala?)
Me: Voh to kaafi neeche hai, kaafi south mein hai. (It's way down south.)
Driver: Oh, accha accha, Jammu side mein hain kya? (Oh right, it's near Jammu, is it?)
Me: (with a startled smile) Nahin, nahin bhaiya, bahut south mein hai. Samundar ke paas. (No no, its really way down south, near the sea.)
Driver: Accha, accha.
Me: (To break the awkard silence) Toh aap kahan ke ho? (So, where are you from?)
Driver: Kya, karein. Kargil mein janam ho gaya. To vahin pe rehna pada. (What can I do? I was born in Kargil. So I have to live my life there.)
Hence proved.
Now, coming to the women. Leh is predominantly a Tibetan community, so the women there are like the women you see in Darjeeling- dressed in the latest fashion, sporting shades and weird hairdos- the works. But in Kargil, you couldn't spot a single woman who wasn't wearing a hijab (a scarf that covers the head and the neck). And they're all really fair and well proportioned to boot. So, initially I cursed the Gods for denying me the enormous amount of eye candy that Kargil has hidden away under layers of wool.
But as time passed, and I started observing more carefully, I remembered a discussion I had with a friend back in college. The conclusion was that if a woman wears skimpy clothes, revealing all she has- her cards are on the table. That's it. Take it or leave it. But when a woman is hidden away under a burkha or a hijab, you can let your imagination run wild. You don't know what she's holding. Could be a pair, two pairs, maybe a straight, maybe a full-house, maybe even a flush. Whatever she bets, you'll call. As you get used to it, you can conjure up a straight flush every time you see a wrapped up woman. So ever since I had that awakening, my whole stay at Kargil just filled up with light.
So that's all about the men and women of Kashmir. I might continue my travelogue later, or I might not. Delhi's humid and I'm lazy. So in case the Universe doesn't conspire to create another such creative moment for me, I leave you with my sum-up of Kashmir- it's like being in the music video of a soaring post-rock song. Look up the song that I've been looping for a while now- Glósóli by Sigur Rós. Close your eyes. Turn on the Air-conditioner. You're in pseudo-Kashmir now. Enjoy your stay.
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