THE HAPPENING

Why don’t you just come out and say what you want to. Ask your heart, is this what I need and the answer will be variably yes, coz intelligence is the greatest aphrodisiac. Let’s burn the world with the loins that could consume you and me when not together. You are the ying to my yang.

This conversation seems to be happening telepathically although involuntary and arbitrary as it seems. The boundary seems to be too rigid as one tries to be a good guy. It is time to shed the masks that make us want to be respectable, when it comes to this respect leads to inhibitions. Inhibitions can be shackles that won’t let us enjoy the time that we have together. This time can be extended to infinity if only you will open up your heart and see. I’m not in this for instant gratification rather an enlightment that would last a life time. 

RAM”S DILEMMA

So she is back. It’s been a week now, but I don’t feel Happy. She seems to be different. She acts the same but still there is something very different about her. Maybe it’s me who is different.

She seems so open now. At times she has this look which makes me tremble, a look that wasn't there before. She has seen things and experienced things, she seems to know a lot about intoxicants, and her perspective on life in general has changed. She is more “philosophical” these days. Am I felling insecure? Maybe. Did I like her when she was dumb? Is it my ego that has taken a beating? I’m lost.

When she was here and when I loved her, I told her to travel the world and to be open to new things and experiences. Now that she has, I don’t like it. I am a glaring example of a hypocrite with his male ego bruised.

She looks more beautiful than ever, but why am I having all these feelings? When she left me I was destroyed, I felt like someone took a hammer to by soul and shattered it into million pieces. I thought about her every waking moment while insomnia crept in and made my mind his home. I wanted to see her, touch her, smell his hair. Then slowly it changed. I got used to being alone and before long I was enjoying my new found freedom. She never nagged but my new found freedom was refreshing. I felt like I was a kid again, free to do anything. Now she is back and I don’t feel any love for her.

If I leave her now, everyone is going to raise their eyebrows. I have no reason to. She looks so beautiful but I don’t feel anything, not even an ounce of love.

I can only see one way out of this and that is to question her purity. This is so very wrong but being with someone who you don’t love is also wrong. To subject her to a loveless marriage is worse. What if I give her mukti, painless death and kill myself too? I could never bring myself to do that, her eyes, her beautiful eyes. I could never see them lifeless. I should take the cowardly road out. I will question her purity and shun her away like a leper. 

THE LADY OF THE LAKE AT 11:36

The Internal

Little did you know the mind could mold. For it melts from within and a new form takes shape. Disciplined, compartmentalized and fully in touch with your emotions. The surge of energy that it pushes out through your veins takes grip of who you are. An internal turmoil settles. The perspectives broaden out into the horizon, touching the Sun as he shines brightly on all of us.

The External

The Harmony of the place astonishes you, while peace is the air you breathe. Every little drop striking the earth scares you, while knowledge feeds your soul. Every step taken reassures you, while every turn throws up a doubt. Little by little you can feel your feet growing roots to nourish the weak inside. 

THE MUSE

















Art comes from everything. Every experience, every memory, everything tangible, everything intangible, everything can be Art. The muse is hidden everywhere around us, we need to tear away our self imposed blindfold and find her.

PART ONE

When I was younger, I had a lot of angst. I wrote. Every thought I penned down was caustic, yet shrouded in poetic beauty. I vented through words. It was my drug and I got addicted. I thought I couldn't write if I wasn't angry, if I wasn't miserable and I pushed myself down the stairs of Hell to get my high. I was delusional, naive and too young. I was consumed by the thought that misery alone can inspire great pieces. People loved it. The clichéd troubled manic depressive writer who hates his life seems to sell better than anything else. I lost a lot of friends and made some bad choices. I was getting deeper into my own ill conceived trap.  Then it happened, I was consumed by my own despair and needed to get out.

PART TWO

Everything you are looking for is within you. I went looking for answers. A million questions kept multiplying in my head until my head couldn't make out the answers from the questions. I thought that was a mistake. I thought I was never meant to part misery. Then it happened, my mind started settling into its new home. A beautiful place where there was just peace and nothing else. Nothing bothered me. I was in control. I made things happen with just a thought. Align universes. Let myself soar.

Then it happened. Everything turned into inspiration. My mistress; misery gave up and fled while my old lady muse decided to stay. Writing about the universe that I stumbled upon within me put a smile on my face and on the others. Every experience became an inspiration for a piece and everyone around me started contributing to my growth.

Tear that blindfold and burn it. See the world for what it truly is. Heaven. 

BEING A CRICKET FAN IN INDIA: It is not easy to find a cricket fan in India. In a country obsessed with cricket this statement feels rather contradictory but the bitter truth is - India is obsessed with Indian cricket not cricket in general. In Comparison a football fan in India would watch any form of football. You may argue that it is because Indian football team is ranked 162^nd in the world and what little they play doesn’t make for compelling viewing experience either.

Agreed the argument does pale in comparison with the hysteria associated with cricket in India but are they true fans of the game? Are they willing to travel miles together and watch a Ranji Trophy match? Given the overall population of fanatic Indian Cricket fans, the ones who take the effort to do this are miniscule when compared to the “Fans” who flock to see an IPL match.

The biggest concern for a true cricket fan is not whether the so called God can get his 100^th 100 but our performance in the Test Arena or should I say the future survival strategies that we need to adopt to avoid embarrassments. With the Big Three about to retire from the longer format of the game coupled with the slow death of enthusiastic fan following for it, the true fans of cricket in India will face a drought of quality cricket for a few years to come.

The “Indian Cricket fans” however, do not have to worry about such silly predicaments, as India will still win at home even in Test matches thanks to the tracks that will help even a part-time spinner pick up enough wickets to make him delusional enough to call himself an all rounder. The Big Carnival called IPL is only going get bigger; I suspect they will add a few landmines to make things more interesting.

So the question is why do people in India act the way they do if they don’t truly respect the game for what it is? The Answer is much simpler than one suspects. Indians like math, this is one of the reasons why we watch cricket. We are obsessed with batting averages, strike rates, and of course the much talked about 100^th hundred, because that makes 10000 runs in centuries. The guy who is about to achieve this magnanimous feat is an Indian and this does play into it a little bit. If an Aussie or a Brit was to achieve this it would make little impact in the Indian Cricket obsessed media.

One thing that puts a smile on the faces of true cricket fans is the revival of good cricket in the past few years. The overall standard of the game has risen after the lull that was created in the international circuit after the retirements of great cricketers, especially the ones from the Australian team. This revival is very promising. The questions that loom large over the younger generation of Indian Players will be answered very soon and we will know whether they can stand the test of time like the current senior players.

However, it doesn’t take an expert to gauge the temperament of the real cricket fans in India, who even after the thumping victory by the Indian Cricket team in the biggest stage of them all had a melancholy smile as they knew the road ahead was laden with thorns. And this indeed was proven right, ever so succinctly by the same team in the England series. With the Australia tour coming up one can hope that this entire article will be rubbished by a thumping victory by the young Indian team in turn transforming the real cricket fans into becoming Indian Cricket fans.

GUY FAWKES:  The Mask of Guy Fawkes has become the symbol of revolution across the world. Anybody who has seen “V for Vendetta” knows that Wachowski brothers are the ones responsible for this phenomenon.

The funny thing is that even people who are gathering at Zuccotti Park protesting against wall street in the now famous “Occupy Wall Street” are also using this as a symbol. Do they know what this symbolizes? If they knew they wouldn’t use it. Let me explain this to the poor souls who haven’t Googled “Guy Fawkes” yet. Guy Fawkes was associated with the biggest failed plot against authority. So, if you are fighting against authority why would you use this as a symbol?

Not just this when tortured he spilled the beans and gave up the names of all his co-conspirators. This showcases the blunders of revolution in the civilized world where we are brain washed by the media so much that a revolution is close to impossible. The protestors at Zuccotti park for instance are going for a horizontal decision making committee for they believe a vertical structure will create a hierarchy amongst themselves which would reflect the system that they are fighting. Sounds good as a theory like how communism makes sense on paper. The end result of such a weird decision making system has been the fact that they cannot come to a consensus and haven’t even decided on the terms for which they are fighting for.

Revolution can always be sparked off easily when you know your enemy. When you can put a face to him and organize people to take up arms or a peaceful protest against him. Everyone has been excited since 2010 as a result of numerous revolutions in countries like Egypt, Libya, Syria, Morocco and Yemen. Can this be replicated in countries like the USA or India? Highly unlikely. The reason being we don’t know our enemy. There is no face to our enemy as we are fighting a system. While people are trying to Occupy Wall Street rather unsuccessfully the policy makers who are responsible for the economic debacle are sitting pretty in Washington. Without a proper decision making committee there are just hoardes of people gathering at Zuccotti Park and chanting slogans and picketing. Is this really a revolution? And the Guy Fawkes’ mask makes the whole thing rather humorous to watch.

THE CONTEST: CNN IBN was running a contest, asking the contestants to write a piece about their favorite movie and why it is their favorite, in 200 words or less. These are my 200 words.

Every night I take the DVD out of the shiny cover and dump it in the drive. Dust brothers’ soundtrack takes you to a place where even insomnia seems like a blessing. Tyler says, this is the best book to movie adaptation. Chuck Palahniuk is a genius, he says. I feel threatened by chuck, I disagree. I tell him LOTR was better.

Tyler says, reading books have never made anyone famous only writing them has. If nobody reads them then how do they become best-sellers? Advertising has us chasing cars, clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. Pretentious people buying books to decorate their drawing rooms. Faking intelligence in a world filled with idiots. That’s why books sell. It started to make sense in a Tyler sort of way.

       Why this movie? Because after watching it, everything in the world gets the volume turned down. Nothing can piss you off. Your word is law, if other’s break that law, even that doesn’t piss you off. Tyler’s words coming out of my mouth.

People are always asking me, do I know Tyler? People are always asking me, which is my favorite movie? Isn’t it obvious?

PS: I didn’t win.