So, the rains are here. About time too. {cue: grin :D}

And I have a cold to boot. Which is not surprising, if you know the history I share with my barely functional respiratory system. Falling sick when you're alone has got to be the suckiest thing in the world. Yes, you grow used to it, but the suckiness stays.

Did I tell you that the rains are here? Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy {cue: more grinning :D :D}... everything is so wet and so f***in' green - it just kills you to look at it. Wait till it gets heavier. Just wait. I'm gonna stand outside my balcony and watch it pour. All day. Better still, I'll pull out a chair, sit with my feet on the railing and read a book. Who needs music?

The last two weeks, every single day, I've been like Calvin, except that I've been pleading for it to rain. And now it's here, and it's gonna be like this for a good two-three months. Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy ... okay, okay, need to get a grip on myself.

In other news, this blog is the first result on Google if someone looks for Neruda's Ode to Bicycles. {Pats self on the back} No, I didn't have anything to do with it. Apparently people kept looking and kept coming here. And Google rewards quality, you see. Or at least, that's what I delude myself into thinking. {Before people start lining up to explain how Google's algorithm works, I'll be all snooty and say: I know}. The funny thing is that post doesn't have even a single comment on it. Bah.

Talking about poetry, read this book of poems called "Ultramarine" by Raymond Carver. Carver is a writer I'm beginning to like a lot. His poems are like short stories and don't quite fit the "notion" of a poem but I like them all the same. The intensity does waver a little here and there but it's a solid collection of poems. They are never about the writer or his craft, no showing off, no "ooooh! am i clever or what?", just moments snatched from a life and presented as is. It's interesting how he makes his poems work and how they leave that lingering bit of emotion in you even after you're done reading. Need to reread them again. One "cute" {ok, so I just used that word} poem from the collection:

An Afternoon

As he writes, without looking at the sea,
he feels the tip of his pen begin to tremble.
The tide is going out across the shingle.
But it isn't that. No,
it's because at that moment she chooses
to walk into the room without any clothes on.
Drowsy, not even sure where she is
for a moment. She waves the hair from her forehead.
Sits on the toilet with her eyes closed,
head down. Legs sprawled. He sees her
through the doorway. Maybe
she's remembering what happened that morning.
For after a time, she opens one eye and looks at him.
And sweetly smiles.

It's fascinating how he paints these "word pictures", as he calls them. Lots to like about the guy. In case you're new to Carver, you might want to read this.

Polished off this book called "The time traveler's wife" by Audrey Niffenegger over the weekend. A friend had recommended it a few years ago and I finally got around to picking it up at a book sale last Friday*. It's "an old-fashioned love story" between Henry, who time-travels because of a genetic condition, and Clare, who meets Henry for the first time when she's 6 and he's 36, and gets married to him when she's 22 and he's 30. Did that intrigue you? Then you should read the book.

It's a good, well-crafted book, although the craft does show here and there. The book is downright hilarious in some places {like when Clare asks Henry if he thinks they are having too much sex; like when Henry's librarian friends bet about why he keeps disappearing; like when the older Henry time-travels to teach the younger Henry how to pick locks and pick-pocket}, delightful in the way it carefully ties every knot, engaging, moving, and much much more, leaving you with a lump in the throat when you put it down finally. I really should put a review up but then it's so much work. Oh, gah!

Other books read during a surprisingly good month for book-reading: The Black Swan, The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Vintage Book of Contemporary American Poetry, Selected Poems - Wislawa Szymborska and The Essential Hemingway.

Life is good :)

Meanwhile, it's raining outside :D

* - In case you're in Mumbai and love books, you might want to check out Magna Book Gallery in Fort; they have a 30% off on some books and 20% off on most others. The sale's on till July 3rd, if I remember right. They don't have a lot of books, but you can snag a few bargains if you're looking for classics. I got a Fitzgerald for 80 bucks :D

PS: A quick hi to people whom I don't know and are "following" this blog - much flattered.

The problem of looking for love, today, is a problem of handling multiple selves.

What we look for when we look for love is for someone: who will allow, and not just tolerate, these selves; who will have the curiosity -- and consequently the patience -- to want to understand us, and continue to understand, and not force us into spiritual cul-de-sacs and hold us hostage; who will nourish -- and not mutilate -- our various selves. Someone for whom we will be more than willing to spawn more selves, on our own terms, as we reciprocate.

Do we have many selves? I think it's safe to say that. But we need a little clarity here as to what we mean about a self. Is it the same as a mood? Because then that would mean what we are looking for is someone who will just tolerate our mood swings. And if a self is different from a mood, how?

The difference between a mood and a self is, in my opinion, one of longevity and democracy. Where a mood comes and goes as it pleases, a self seems to be ... umm ... self-sustainable. While there seems to be a default mood that all moods are supposed to defer to once their fifteen minutes under the spotlight is are over, our selves, on the other hand, seem to co-exist peacefully, having agreed among themselves as to who will take over when, depending on the utility of a particular self under the given circumstances. Where a mood is puerile, a self is mature. To make it more fascinating, perhaps a self is just a grown-up mood that refused to go away.

So then, do people have multiple selves? I'm going to be slightly presumptuous and say that the majority doesn't, based on anecdotal evidence (very suspect, yes). And even among the minority which does, most of them -- that is the majority of the minority -- are not aware of all their selves, in the first place, or what drives these selves. These people, then, either struggle to accomodate these selves in a world that is, it has to be said, more kinder to such schizophrenia than it was before because it offers more opportunities for peaceful reconciliation of our multiple selves without self-destructive rebellion, or, are confused about these selves because more often than not a greater degree of ... ummm ... self-control is required to attain a reconciliation of selves than it is to shun parts of themselves to retain the illusion of control; it's easier to give in to order and method than it is to push oneself to the precipice overhanging the abyss of madness that such schizophrenia naturally is. Because, all said and done, the precipice induces a vertigo that is tempting to succumb to, a tempting vertigo at that*. "Madness is like gravity. All it takes is a little push."**

So, this then is the challenge of love: How well do we know ourselves? How well do we know each other? How selfless can we be as we strive to realize the essence of our selfishness? How patient can we be in our efforts at self-realization in the face of hormonal impatience? How willing are we to allow, understand and nourish? How willing are we to give in to the madness of our selves and yet not go mad ourselves?

* - Now why is it tempting?
**- Line from the movie The Dark Knight.

Rerecording

"Mmmm ... It is nice."
"Hai naa? See, I told you ... you like it?" :)
"Absolutely." :-)

A little after noon. Rain-washed campus frocked in green. Pitter patter of footwear on wet sidewalks.

"Do you wanna sit here?" Points. "Or do you wanna sit under the tree?" Points again. :-?
"Under the tree."

Two glasses of steaming tea.
Two pairs of hands.
Warmth.

"We used to come here just for the tea. Walk over from college, sit somewhere and just while away time over cups of tea."
"Mmm hmm ... I can see why." :-)

A deliberate initiation into rituals. A careful parting of veils. Peeks into the past. Hope for the future.

"What are you looking at me like that for?"
"Nothing." :D

The beginning of an understanding. A coming to terms with the reality of a dream come true.

"I know that man ..." Points.
"Who?"
"That man ... the one wearing the white t-shirt ..." Nods.
"With the beard?"
"Yup. Beard and the black jeans."
"He doesn't seem to have a butt ... you seem to know some strange men." :-D
:D
"He was my lecturaar at M------"
"Lecturaar? Is that what you call them?"
"Why? What do you call them?"
"Oh we call them lecturers, you know, just like how the English intended."
"Hmmm ... we call them lecturaars."
"Whatever."

Birdsong after the rains. Carefully testing the breeze, asking if there's more in store.

"Oooh ... look, there's an earthworm!"
"Where?" Looks.
"There, near the tree ... "
"Oh yes ... but is that an earthworm?"
"Yes, it is, must have come out because of the rains."
"Earthworms are like lizards, aren't they? As in, if you cut them into two, a new one grows out of each piece ... No?"
"You want to cut this one up and see?" :-o
"No, no, I didn't mean that ..."
"You're the one who likes beheading children" ;)
"No, no, I didn't mean that either." Exasperated.
"Really?" :)
"Oh, you're having me on."
:)
:-)

"I think he's going to the canteen."
"Your lecturaar? If he teaches at your college, what's he doing here? Your lecturers bunk class too?" :-o
"Maybe he likes the tea here too." :)
"Or maybe he's here for a smoke." Points.
"Oh ... I didn't know he smoked." :/
"Well ... seems like you know a lot else about him." :-)
"Oh I do know that he married this Scottish woman ..."
"... Scottish?" :-o
"...yes, Scottish ..."
"Really? That guy? With the beard and no butt?" Shakes head.
Giggles.
"Yes ... this place is full of these intellectual types, you know ... cigarettes and Sartre, wine and women ..."
"Hmmm ... Scottish women" :-/
"He used to teach us Horace, I remember ... had this sweet, melodious voice ..."

Eyelids narrow. Eyes start to twinkle. Thumb and forefinger of the left hand curl up into an 'O'. The other fingers stand slightly apart. A gesture from memory. An expression of fondness for the intangible.

"... barely carried past the first few benches ... you had to strain to make out what he was saying ..."
Looks.
Looks right back and smiles.
"... but it was worth it ..."
"Mmm hmm?"
"Mmm hmm." Nods and bites lower lip with a goofy grin. "And I would go 'aaaaa....'"

Laughs.
Gently rests head on shoulder. Dishevelled hair falls hesitatingly onto t-shirt.

"I should go and say hi to him, shouldn't I?"
"Yup, you should. He'd be happy to see you. My teachers from school are always happy to see me."
"But it's been a few years. I'm sure he won't recognize me ..."
"How does that matter? How do you know he won't? All you have to do is go say 'Hi' and take things from there ..."
"I don't know." Mewls.
"You're so useless ... I mean, it's barely 20 yards from here to there ..."
"I don't know." Mewls.
"Go ... go ... go now ... look, he doesn't have company and it won't be long before his cigarette runs out."
"I don't know."
"You're so useless."
"You know what ...?"
"What?" Raises an eyebrow.
"You should go talk with him." ;)
"Me??" :-o
"Yes. You." Bites lower lip and grins goofily again.
"Me go talk with him? Yeah right! And what would I talk with him?"
"Anything. You know ... you could talk to him about Schopenhauer ... I'm sure he'll be happy to chat with you."
"Yeah yeah yeah."
"Go naa ... you should go meet new people ... that's how you make your life interesting."
"Look who's talking!" Raises both eyebrows. "Forget new people, you don't even wanna go say hi to someone you know and here you are asking me ..."
"See, it's easier to talk to strangers ..."
Pauses. Looks up and smiles.
"Is it now?"
Looks down and smiles right back.
"Especially ghosts." :D
"Especially ghosts." :-) "I know what I'm going to do. I'm gonna walk up and tell him 'Hello, there's a friend of mine who wants to talk with you but is a little shy, so would you mind joining us for a cup of tea?'"
"You would?" :-o
"You know I will." :-)
"No, no ... don't do that. Let's just sit here and watch him."
"I can't believe how useless you are."
"I can't believe you don't wanna meet new people, especially interesting people."
"Look, he's your 'lecturaar'." Mimics.
"Oh, hush ... let's just sit here."
"Lazy bum." :-D
"Yes, that it is." :D
"I mean, God knows when you're gonna see him again."
"I know." Mewls. Sighs.
"Gah! Useless."
"'Gah! Useless.'" Mimics.
"Stop imitating me!"
"'Stop imitating me!'" :D
"Look, your lecturaar is leaving!"
"Oh dear ..." Sighs again.
"You're gonna regret not talking to him all your life. Go now. It's now or never." Exaggerates.
"I'm just gonna sit here like this." Rests head a little more firmly on shoulder.
"Useless."
"'Useless.'" Mimics again.
"Stop imitating me!"
"'Stop imitating me!'" :D
"Gah!" :-)
"'Gah!'" :))
...

Loyola

[Rewritten to eschew obfuscation]

Where does time go?

Ancient walls whitewashed to hurt the eyes. Smell of fresh paint moistens the imagination. The mind is visited by visions of time serving detention between layers of fossilized alabaster, by the feeble shapes of stairway conversations snatched during recess.

The weight of a century bears down on the cross-beams. The heaviness of routine, like a stubborn odour, hangs everywhere: of 45-minute periods and weekly time-tables; of monthly tests and quarterly exams; of annual fests and summer vacations ... generations of rebellion disciplined around a time-regimented education.

Cool hard benches, languid yet orderly; ebony and varnish. The familiar comforts of butt on academic wood and desktop graffiti. 'Suneetha'. 'Crazy bitch'. A mean bolt of lightning in fashionable Powerpuff pink -- someone with a sense of humour.

***

The winds must come from somewhere when they blow,
There must be reasons why the leaves decay;
Time will say nothing but I told you so.

-- Lines from 'But I can't', A villanelle by W. H. Auden

***

Tension ticks in the air. Twenty minutes left.

Tall Jesuit windows paired with ventilators above; three spare pairs to a wall.

Wind hustles the broad corridors outside. Neem trees sway religiously in the morning sun. The 9.17 rolls into the station in the distance, slows downs, breathes itself to a stop.

A small steel stool stands outside the doorway, shining in the sun; a green plastic pot sits on top, filled neck deep with water; uncouth aluminium tumbler lolls from a blue nylon cord tied around the mouth of the pot.

The train booms, leaves.

Pitted blackboard sprawls across the wall up front; poster of the Virgin Mother overhead. Chalk-white-dust nostalgia. 'Class Strength: 40'. 'Boys: 23'. Boys ... 'Girls: 17'. Girls ... 'Present: 37'. 'Absent: 3'. The luxury of redundant information.

The 9.27 rumbles in punctually. Pencil points are poked against trembling fingertips. Three minutes left. Prayers push past pursed lips.

***

Time doesn't go anywhere.

Time comes here to file her nails sitting in the library, to dry her long white hair while she waits reading a book in the cafeteria, to lie under the trees in the campus and balance her soulsheets.

Time comes here when she's tired of herself.

Time comes here when she wants to grow old.

Every evening, the sunset fills up my room.

No, make that: Every evening, I let the sunset fill my room up. It's a very deliberate act, delusive, egocentric and narcissistic.

Tchaikovsky starts to play on my Nokia at 3 'o' clock. I switch off the fan, reach for my mobile phone -- a little amused at the thought of the eternal inside a box, switch it off, reset the alarm from 1500 to 0700. I walk over to the windows on the western wall, pull aside the curtains thereby diluting the darkness, unlatch the panes, swing them open and stand back.

I watch how sunlight instantly floods the room, how its fingers seem to intimately know every nook and corner of my room. Like the caresses of an old lover. Well, almost.

I then plod back to mulling over information asymmetry and the marriage market; or plunge right back into a conversation about Chitrangda Singh on GTalk; or come back to a high-pitched argument with Mr. Schopenhauer about women ... sometimes I just listen to Atif Aslam and sit in my chair, doing nothing.

Self-improvement is masturbation.

Sometimes I talk with a certain Tyler Durden.

Self-destruction is the answer.

Presently, the superstar in the sky dips below the sunshade, swinging down his chosen longitude for the day.

Sometimes I wonder how it must feel to stand somewhere on that precise geographical minute, in the full glare of the setting sun, at that confabulation of space and time.

Sometimes I think about a ball of sunlight, bursting out of the sun's core, unravelling untrammelled through millions and millions of miles of nothing, the photons then tumbling through the atmosphere and a convenient hole in the ozone, thrashing through all that smog, past the grill on my window, all that distance, only to be stopped flat by a puny plank of wardrobe wood. Sometimes I think about how it's happening all the time and I'm depressed. Sometimes I think it must be lousy being a sun. Who'd want to be a sun? Not me. A meteor shower -- now that would be cool.

Dad comes in to ask me something and starts clamouring about how hot it is in here. I tell him I'm meditating and silence his protests. Sometimes I think parental salvation lies in being outsmarted by one's kids.

The room is turning a shade of ripe summer yellow. The marble flooring starts to heat up. My skin feels like a flame has been drawn across its surface. Naturally enough, I'm sweating now. Trickles start to crawl down my forehead and my temples.

Sometimes, I think of sweat and the travesty of its colourlessness. Would sweat be any precious if it was the colour of blood? Or would blood be any trivial if it looked and smelt like sweat? Sometimes I remember asking my sister if sweat evaporated and became rain. Sometimes I can recall the look of disgust she shot me across the dining table.

The window panes gradually blush a flaming orange, and I think of the rasna kid. Sometimes I wonder what happened to her. Sometimes I wonder if executives at Coke and Pepsi are involved in efforts to accelerate global warming. Sometimes I think of frisbees on the beach, of budding biceps and capri calves. Sometimes I think of our dog, Tiger. Sometimes I think of coming back home after kindergarten and tumbling with him in the yard. Sometimes I think of how he died in a pool of his own blood. Sometimes I don't think at all.

A twilight purple on the walls announces the arrival of a violet dusk. I'm drenched now. Hair roots, arm-pits, t-shirt, shorts ... I get up, shut the windows, flick on the compact fluorescent lamp, grab a towel and head for a shower, gently closing the door behind me, a little satisfied at having boxed the eternal. For today.

A particularly perceptive line of dialogue from the movie The Village goes thus:

Sometimes we don't do things we want to do so that others
will not know we want to do them

Yesterday, at dinner with friends from college, when we talked about a whole lot of people from back then, it was instructive to note the names that weren't taken up; names that should have popped up without any effort on anybody's part; names that eventually had to be content with hanging around the dinner table like shadows.

More importantly, it was interesting to see people walk gingerly around their memories. Which is when that dialogue came to mind.

This.

And this.

I never knew a search to better understand Bayes' Theorem could be so rewarding :-)

Long personal post ahead. Read at your own risk.

I had a brief but interesting feedback session with my manager and my VP the other day. It was part of a performance assessment ritual that happens now and then. More to the point, it was my first such session at the new place having joined the company in February this year.

Among other things, they told me that I had a lucid structured thought process, that I communicate well and report early, that I seem to lead my team by example, that they are happy with the rapport I share with my superiors, my peers and my juniors, and that, in their opinion, I've gone beyond the call of duty when it came to maintaining good customer relations (the customer being our collaborators in Hannover). They didn't have any negative feedback and wound up the session asking me to raise the bar a notch.

I somehow downplay achievements and tend to obsess over my failures to the point of losing sleep. I think it's a throwback to a middle-class upbringing where one was told not to 'think too much of oneself' and that failure was always around the corner. To be fair to my parents, I think it probably was their way of instilling humility in their children (and God knows my brother and I needed to learn that quality!). And there have been times when I've regretted not feeling good about things I've done. So I left the cabin with a grin plastered on my face and a warm feeling climbing up my back (no, it wasn't the difference in the AC).

I guess what made me happy is that a few months after I started working three-and-a-half years ago, I came to the painful conclusion that my thinking wasn't as good as it needed to be, and that despite being good at my job, I sucked when it came to communicating (not just talking and arguing, you know). More importantly, I could never fit snugly into a team. I guess it was due to my inability to take sides, my commitment towards being unbiased and a strange principle that personal relationships at work could only hinder professional output. My team-mates tended to look at me as this humourless guy they could turn to for help but not someone they could feel comfortable with.

Introspection and self-improvement are something I'm big on. Looking back, I think my interest in philosophy seems to have paid off in other areas of my life as well. Being an engineer, in my opinion, asks you to play the devil with yourself on a daily basis (which is not to say other professions don't; I'm just talking from my experiences and from a purely personal viewpoint). It somehow is never enough to solve a problem. You need to solve it in the right way. And at times, the most beautiful way possible, even if 'most beautiful' is synonymous with 'cheap' (or 'cost effective' to use jargon). One somehow needs to cultivate the dual ability to tirelessly generate solutions (De Bono anybody?) and choose between them without being sentimental. Philosophy, to me, seems to ask of you the same. To look at various truths, see if there are any others that have been left out in the bargain and evaluate them objectively purely from a need-to-use basis. This is where people get it wrong when they say philosophy is such an arm-chair science (or art, if you want) and that poetry is for the jobless. If poetry is about acknowledging human frailty, philosophy is about the human ability to gather the courage to find ways to live with that vulnerability. Philosophy is all about practical usage.

This blog seems to have affected me in ways I can't quantify. If anything, I've learnt to communicate, to write for an audience logically and clearly, to listen and argue patiently, despite the few occasions when I've lost my cool (For a SWOT analysis at my first job, I wrote 'Weakness - inability to tolerate fools'; I think I've improved on that too :)). I can't overstate the importance of keeping an open mind, to acknowledge that you were wrong (and stick to your guns when you're right) and to understand that the point of a debate are the perspectives that one comes away with. But then again, I've learnt to be ruthless when dismissing trite, poorly reasoned arguments. It's a tricky balance and one I struggle to achieve on a lot of occasions. I've learnt that when communicating, it's not enough to be professionally blunt but that with every word you speak and with every line you type, you are building a relationship that will help you do your work better (I know that's a very capitalistic way of looking at it but let's not give in to romanticism here). That, in many ways, is the single most important lesson I've learnt. Anything that will help you work better without sacrificing your integrity needs to be worked upon.

Leading is something that comes naturally to me only under certain situations -- either on a playing field or where there is an established hierarchy of authority. Whenever I find myself outside these "set-piece" situations, a social outing for example, I'm a very reluctant leader. I think I like it when people don't have a choice but to obey. But if it comes to coaxing or cajoling people or using one's charm, I shy away (too egoistic you see). It's not something that comes naturally to me. But then like everything, it's something I've worked upon. You see people like Ganguly and Dravid and you learn that charm and man-management are as important as leading by example. One without the other is useless. Grovel when you need to grovel; yell when you need to yell. Like I said, anything that helps you to work better without sacrificing your integrity. Earlier, in my first job, my boss used to like me because I would "call a spade a spade" and that I would not think twice about "challenging people outright". While I still think those are qualities one must have, I've realized that the "packaging" matters. That you need to take people along with you. Iniya ulavaaga innaadha kooral / Kani iruppa kaai kavarndhatru.

While I'm glad that I've been able to break out of a 'personality-shell', I can't help but think if I've lost a little bit of myself in the process. Like I was telling a friend the other day, I seem to have lost the ability to write poetry spontaneously (not that those poems were any good but still ...). Whenever I write a poem these days, it's with a lot of effort and exertion of every nuance of the craft that I've learnt. I used to be able to sit back, not let pressure get to me and generally be lax. But now I'm running all day to meet some deadline or the other, professional or personal. I don't know if that's a good thing or not. I think the trick with self-improvement is to indulge in it only as long as the marginal utility of improvement remains high and let go once the law of diminishing returns sets in. That is something I still need to figure out. But in the meantime, there's a bar I need to keep pushing higher.

Noticed ...

... this on a girl's t-shirt on my way to lunch -

I'm rich ...

I'm single.

Pink short t-shirt. Glittery lettering.

*Sigh*

Untitled

Bing!

He wakes up. Looks down at his watch. Ten thirty. "ETA 15 minutes" says the monitor up front. He reaches sideways for the seat-belt, breathes in and buckles himself up.

"There, that's the city," the girl to his side gestures at her grandmother. The old lady sits up to look out the window. He leans back so that she can get a better view.

The plane turns to port, homing in on the airport, breaking through the last of the clouds. The city looms up slowly. All is quiet inside the aircraft. No banter. No calling out to the airhostesses. No watching tv. No talking into cell phones. Even the babies have stopped crying. If silence is prayer, then they were all believers now. Very soon, they will be back to being people, back to their quotidian lives, back to the numbers and words that populate daily existence. But for a little while longer, they will remain passengers, deprived of their egos and the security of their bounded imagination, forced to exchange faith for convenience, rebellion for conformity, time for thought.

He reaches into his jacket and starts his ritual.

Passport. Check.

Did Icarus have a checklist? Did it have a bullet point saying 'Beware the sun at all times'? Was it just testosterone, a fatal transgression committed in the fever of youth? Was it because he wanted to go to heaven without dying that the Gods sent him back? Or was it just disguised suicide? Pity. Someone should have told him. The sun never lets you near. Maybe that's why we glorify him. Flaws shine in intimacy.

He takes his passport out, flips to the visa, looks at the immigration stamp.

That's when they take your identity away, don't they? That's when you take a break from existing, don't you? That's when you become a position on the plane, a statistic curled up inside a spreadsheet, that's when your life remains suspended in this aluminium coccoon where hope is neither absurd nor a refuge, but a compulsive state of mind. Suspended until you land. Suspended until they stamp you back into the assembly line of existence, returning your self to you whereupon you drive away into the welcoming morass of your life.

Wallet. Check. Ipod. Check. Paperback. Check. Ipod. Check.

He smiles when he catches himself double-checking the primary source of music in his life. Music removes him from the mundane, heightens every moment, shades his life with colours he would otherwise not perceive. Music is what he uses to negotiate with the world.

Terms of negotiation. Give and Take. Give, give, give, or take, take, take. At times slave, at times master ... every moment you trade with the world, but then you like to play games on the planes of your consciousness, you don't like to believe that you don't barter, that you are above and beyond human need. But then you need. All of us need. Love, hate, solitude, communion, power, submission ... it pays to adopt an attitude to help you get through your days. As long as it helps you trade.

"Pretty excited huh?" the girl asks him. He smiles at her and nods his head. "Yes."

He'd helped her board her grandmother. They'd got talking. She was touring the continent with the old lady. He was on business. Strangers thrown together for the duration of the flight. And like it happens sometimes in such situations, a common chord had been struck ... You get on this plane or bus or train. You meet people. You strike a conversation. Sometimes you like the other person. At other times, you keep politely skirting the fence of personal contact and decline to venture further. Sometimes you bid goodbye and remove these people from the vicinities of your memory. Sometimes you exchange phone numbers, fall in love, marry, beget children, die. Where is the excitement in all this? Excitement exists in those shadows where the light of consciousness cannot penetrate, in the deluded mind which thinks but does not realize it thinks.

And yet, when people ask him if he's excited, he almost always says yes. He cannot understand why. Maybe it's wonder, a sense of intirgue, a need for confirmation that he feels, but he cannot bring himself to accept that since these, in turn, would spawn excitement. Or maybe he realizes that the glaring light of awareness is too much to bear and that people are better off living in darkness.

So, either way, he says yes. Because he's undecided.

The plane starts dropping. His ears pop. Another reminder of the imminent confrontation with reality. He can feel the plane tense, the metal plates pull together as the aircraft plunges through the stratosphere. All pretense is up now. Anything could happen. The earth zooms up rapidly, streets and houses whiz by in a blur of urban colour. The overhead cabins get rickety as the plane picks up speed. Faster and faster.

And then the feel of rubber on tarmac, the bumpiness of the earth below them.

Touchdown. Deliverance.

Relief in the air inside the cabin as the passengers let out a collective sigh. The plane taxis down the runway to the gates. If it were not for propriety and seat-belts, he believes they would all get up and let out a cheer and pat each other on the back. It brought to his mind a conversation from the past.

So did you like flying?

Depends. I don't like to fly for long. I like the earth too much.

Poor Icarus, he thinks and reaches up for his bag.

***

In Hannover, Germany on work. Expect posting to be sporadic (as if it already wasn't).

The little known joys of a weekend

Friday evening.

I'm inside the lift, on my way home from work. Along with me are three middle-aged firangs in business suits, from the office across the corridor. One of them is going on about a house-warming ceremony, drawing parallels across cultures. The guy he's talking to nods, apparently very interested. The third one wears glasses and stands too close to the door, head hung, lost in thought.

The lift stops. Mr. 3 almost steps out. The talkative guy restrains him, "No, not here. This is the third floor. Still three left."

He then turns to Noddy, "Statisticians need bodyguards, you know."

Laughter erupts. Mr.3 goes red in the face. I smile sympathetically at him.

I can so see this happening to me a few years from now.

*

Saturday morning.

The alarm clock wails. I smack it down with disdain, wake up and loll about in bed, staring at the ceiling, looking out the window, thinking about the long weekend stretching out lazily in front of me.

And then I go back to sleep again.

*

Sunday morning.

Nila kaigiradhu at 6 A.M. on the terrace. Harini, A. R. Rahman and my MP3 player.

Bliss.

*

Sunday afternoon.

Home-cooked lunch and then shooting the breeze with a friend.

Warm nostalgia.

*

Sunday evening.

The soft, furry feel of a brand-new tennis ball nestling in the hollow of my palms; a catch well taken.

Contentment.

*

Life is good.