My room-mate!

Its amazing how we accidentally meet some people, only to be bewitched for life.

I remember how I met Joyshree. It had hardly been a week in Montfort, Tura. I was still getting rid of my old  Delhi habits, still getting used to the multi-cultural amalgamation of North-eastern tribes here, still deciding if I could sit inside a class once again without feeling agitated or distracted or bored. I was still unpacking my stuff & my thoughts. 

She was standing in the doorway with her Dad. I smiled at her & went ahead to my room. I saw Bijaya running excitedly towards me saying we have a deaf trainee this time & I should talk to her as I was the only person in the hostel who knew sign language. I pretended to be just as excited as Bijaya & went to meet her. She was surrounded with all the trainees - majorly Manipuris, as she was from Manipur. They introduced me to her. And we said our first 'Hi'! She seemed simple, shy, reserved, innocent like a kid just out of school. Little did I know, what a bundle of joy Joyshree is! 

We became room-mates. I started noticing her. She takes her time in opening to people. I do too. But once she is comfortable around you, she makes you feel that every small thing is nothing short of an adventure. She gives you undivided attention when you're saying something, something rare in our times, something none of us are used to. She is a girl, but doesn't like gossiping - another rare thing. She has trouble with her sentences - all deaf people do; but her ideas are refreshingly unique. And in sign language, these ideas, her feelings, her identity seem even more artistic & new. Her smile as well as her optimism is infectious. It's very hard to stay in a bad mood around her. She counsels you like a friend, cares like a mother, works like a woman on a mission to moon, plays like a child and worries like a wife. Interpreting the lectures to her, I survived the six months of training. I understood more about life, just being with her. She taught me how to dance with no music, how to laugh over mistakes, how to hold on to certain things &; how to let go of others. 

Maybe, being in a silent world does make you unaware of the noise around you. The noise of cribbing, the noise of condescending, the noise of careless words, the noise of unnecessary explanations, the noise in our hearing world. I remember walking in the grounds of India Habitat Center on foundation day of Noida Deaf Society. the whole yard was filled with people & everyone was talking. But there was no sound, except the occasional laughter. More than thousands hands expressing, painting, dancing in the air! I was mesmerized.

I wished for a world where there was more expression and less noise. I wondered how life would have been if everyone could sign. Since that would be asking too much, I guess my little world here in Montfort with my dear room-mate Joyshree and all the variety of kids would do just as well :)

Annoyingly stupid!

The world seem so annoyingly stupid at times! Can't make sense of it!!

Why would people spend their life savings on a marriage ceremony? And on top of that, spend that supposedly very special day, trying to please gold plated aunties, royal food wasters, some obnoxiously unknown but pretending to be close relatives and of course, several total strangers!.. Why do people care more about impressing & feeding this lovely bunch who obviously neither need nor appreciate it, than probably the ones who actually do!
Is it the bright clothes or the loud music or the absolute farce underlining the whole event? What exactly is so attractive about a marriage which makes you almost bankrupt?

An open letter to some school people!

My throat's a little scratchy (now),

my words might be crude..

my thoughts misaligned (like ever),

talking about the construed and the misconstrued..

Since we don't live forever and since I shouldn't procrastinate something as critical as this, I've decided that I'm going to spend my last few hours before my flight to Guwahati writing an open letter to some people  whom I've met during my school life and never told them things that they should be knowing!

Vivek Parasher : You were in my school (in 2nd or 3rd standard), and just because you were the topper, I told you once in assembly that I might marry you when I grow up. I was lying, didn't mean it then, and definitely don't mean it now! I was jealous of you, and wanted to destroy you in some way. Next and more importantly - Once I, fueled by envy as I was, told some students that prior to every test, you were told the questions by the S.St. teacher (Mrs. Kaamni or something like that). Somehow, she got to know that and asked me furiously why on earth I said something like that. Frightened by her red face, I lied to her that you had told me so. You suffered a tight slap in front of the class. I would like to apologize to you, for acting like a complete pig. I never knew I was such a coward, felt so ashamed could never bring myself to even talk to you and then you left school. And I kept this unsaid apology hidden in my liver - never discussed or told anyone about it. I am extremely sorry for that slap, it belonged to me.

Ms Maini : I was the 'Monitor' of the class (in 1st or 2nd standard), but busy finishing my homework in the last period (as I always did), I didn't notice the hullabaloo around me. You just came, asked -"Who's the monitor?" And slapped me. I want to tell you - You acted like a supernova BITCH then. Maybe you've improved, maybe not.  Maybe you're dead. But the point is, I hated you for a really large part of my life. You still seem to me the icon of the dragon-ism prevalent in education system. I hope at some point you realized your mistake and apologized in your heart to me and millions like me whom you've slapped all your life. If not, I hope you continue to live miserable life and sulk till death.

Devender : I used to sit with you during lunch (KG or 1st standard), but only for the green saunf-like (fennel-seeds) candies you used to bring everyday. I had no interest in you or any of your conversation (which never even got remotely registered in my brain). I am sorry for 'using' you for the candies. I wish I was better.

Some boy in the opposite bus queue : I never knew your name. You used to stand in the opposite bus queue (Nursery or KG) and I was absolutely fascinated by your hyperactivity. I also thought you were a treat to look at. I lost my infatuation towards you when one day I saw a teacher giving you punishment. I assumed you were stupid and dull. I should have at least talked to you before judging you like that. I am sorry for that unfair attitude!

Paramjeet Kaur : You were an excellent English teacher (class 4th and 5th). And you were the prettiest! I so wanted to have your fair and sparkling face, your thick, beautiful, black hair, your sweet voice - everything. I think I couldn't understand a word of what you said most of the times, because I was busy gawking at you. I should have been more attentive and less abnormal in my affections.

Weird Sanskrit Sir : You used to always give me 100% marks. In fact you would yourself correct my mistake in blue ink and give me 100%. I understood that I was good at the subject and that it's hard not to like me. But I found you very weird somehow and never wanted to talk much to you. The day you were leaving for Varanasi ( I guess you were fired, because you were almost in tears), you apologized to me. I didn't even react as if I understood. I wondered for many years if I misunderstood. 

Meena Sharma : You were the creator of a lurking nightmare in my life for almost two years (9th and 10th). You taught us S.St. and you knew nothing about the subject or how to teach or how to behave yourself. However you were a gossip-monger, shameless gift-seeker, rude and cheap sycophant. You praised and loved me in public and hated me in private. Very slyly you bitched about me to everyone that I'm not a good person, that they should maintain distance. And they did. For two years I was just clueless about how though there was communication, there was no warmth. Though they were around, I felt isolated. Couldn't understand but as an egoist I could never ask anyone. You rendered me practically friendless for two years. For the first time, I experienced real pain in my life. You were the meanest hypocrite I thought, till I met Shubhi (in my college). However, I learnt that 'mob mentality effect' - how people as a group would do and say things they might never as an individual and I also learnt how it feels to be hated by everyone for no fault of yours. I am confused whether to abuse you or to thank you. All of that did make me more self-analyzing, detached and careful with people kind-of person. When I first found out about what you used to say about me behind my back, I wanted to throw a black cobra on you. Now I am much calmer. If I meet you now, I might not say anything except - "You were such a BITCH. I hope you had a terribly rotten life so far. But thanks for the crash-course in social psychology, it's been indispensable".

Weird!

I learnt the word really late in my life - 'Weird'. It was my engineering college room-mate who used this as an all purpose descriptive word for all the good - bad - non-average things in life. May be that is the reason, I've found the word indispensable and very very attractive in the following years. No conversation could be interesting without its mention. No person could be truly appealing, unless there was some 'weirdness' attached. Of course, there were other words - Strange, Odd, Eccentric, Unusual, Abnormal, Bizarre but none of them had the wildness or the impact or the perfect mix of sobriety and sluttiness that 'Weird' has. It has 'it'. If I was to carry on - I would delve into the whispering melody that it offers and yet a crisp and indifferent undertone that it eventually takes. But that will be so verbose, that it will suck all the honesty out of this post.

Anyway! if ever a word had the power of guiding a life, if ever it could influence critical decisions, if a word ever had the potential to become more than just a word, it was 'Weird' for me. I realized that it could take all the ugliness of an unconventional, inexplicable, meaningless action/person/thing/event/phase/feeling and still appear 'cool' and 'harmless'. No wonder, I kept falling for it over and over again. And now when my new room mate from Montfort keeps signing this word for every other peculiar thing (after I told her what it means), I can see she too has fallen in love with the word!

अड़ियल

 क्या अड़ियल तबियत है

जब पास है इतना कुछ,

नाखुश हैसीयत है.

कुछ रविवार के छोटे होने से,

शिकवा है मुझको..

और कुछ खुद की बुज़दिली

तले दबी खामोश खैरियत है.

ज़िन्दगी का जहाज़ ढलान पर है,

कुछ तेज़ दिन है लुढ़कते..

और कुछ फिसलते फैसलों

की तेज़ हकीक़त सी है.

Inspired by an old alcohlic, book-lover, propriety advocator, occasional wife-beater, isolated father, an unhappy but intriguing gentleman living in my neighbourhood.

10 things I don't like about managing..

Other than the futile need to look older than your age and the vital need to act older than your age, there are many things I don't like about managing. For any of my future interviewers, THIS IS WHERE YOU SHOULD STOP READING.

1.Mostly you get paid the most for doing the least amount of work.

2. You're expected to remain calm at all times, even when you are dying to explode.

3. You have to have a clean desk.

4. You can't crack silly jokes for the fear they might not take you seriously.

5. Before you know it, it changes you into something else.

6.. You have to pretend you don't have any vices in front of your team (No smoking/drinking/drugs/affairs/profane talking etc.)

7. In a situation you don't have a clue, you can't say "I don't have a clue".

8. You are expected to know the stuff you never learnt.

9. You have to sound excited about the most lethargic aspects of your job.

10. You have to write a lot of useless mails and tolerate a lot of useless meetings.

Unfulfilled wishes..

Just finished with the free online lectures about "Introduction to Psychology" by Prof. Bloom, Yale University. :) (in about two and half days :)) He speaks, and he speaks in an amazingly gripping manner about Descartes' Dualism, Freud, Skinner, consciousness, evolution, language, love, sex, memory, differences in individuals, emotions, personalities, disorders and many more things of deep interest. I'm not going to get started on this, as I might not stop.

What I really felt like sharing was that I've always been super-fascinated with this sort of stuff. Spent hours contemplating how conscience worked, how much you hide inside it, how people react, how you could trick yourself and others with your thoughts, how memory tricks you, how non-real scenes from a movie or painting or description could become part of your own real life if you kept thinking about it, how silent we are about the most intriguing things in life, how much of you is in accordance of your perception of you and so on.. It was one of my many unfulfilled wishes to be a psychologist/psychiatrist immediately after knowing that this a field of science and is not that obscure either.

So today, a beginning has been made; many more unfulfilled wishes are to follow :) The thirst for understanding human psychology is still there, but at least I've drank a little bit to sustain, theres a lot to be unfolded. Wouldn't want to die without knowing what is it like to find out answers to questions that keep slipping out in drunk conversations or solitary flights of mind or out of sudden deep observation on life in general :)