From one of my Favourite Authors

Humans think they are smarter than dolphins because we build cars and buildings and start wars etc., and all that dolphins do is swim in the water, eat fish and play around. Dolphins believe that they are smarter for exactly the same reasons.

-Douglas Adams, writer, dramatist, and musician

Supply follows Demand

The other day Manju Bhabhi and I were discussing her numerous names (she is a prophet in disguise as mental inside). She remarked with a mild indignation (level one on a scale of 1 to 10) that one of her other frequently used name came from a soft porn star in USK. I asked, how come people who make porn are not respectable, but people who watch it are? The world is filled with such illogical moralities.

A poem I read today, brought forth these thoughts. The poem touches upon the age-old gender equation. The man-woman game though not my expertise, I found the poem raises some appropriate questions.


You Men

by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1651 - 1695 / San Miguel
Nepantla / Mexico)


Silly, you men-so very adept
at wrongly faulting womankind,
not seeing you're alone to blame
for faults you plant in woman's mind.

After you've won by urgent plea
the right to tarnish her good name,
you still expect her to behave--
you, that coaxed her into shame.

You batter her resistance down
and then, all righteousness, proclaim
that feminine frivolity,
not your persistence, is to blame.

When it comes to bravely posturing,
your witlessness must take the prize:
you're the child that makes a bogeyman,
and then recoils in fear and cries.

Presumptuous beyond belief,
you'd have the woman you pursue
be Thais when you're courting her,
Lucretia once she falls to you.

For plain default of common sense,
could any action be so queer
as oneself to cloud the mirror,
then complain that it's not clear?

Whether you're favored or disdained,
nothing can leave you satisfied.
You whimper if you're turned away,
you sneer if you've been gratified.

With you, no woman can hope to score;
whichever way, she's bound to lose;
spurning you, she's ungrateful--
succumbing, you call her lewd.

Your folly is always the same:
you apply a single rule
to the one you accuse of looseness
and the one you brand as cruel.

What happy mean could there be
for the woman who catches your eye,
if, unresponsive, she offends,
yet whose complaisance you decry?

Still, whether it's torment or anger--
and both ways you've yourselves to blame--
God bless the woman who won't have you,
no matter how loud you complain.

It's your persistent entreaties
that change her from timid to bold.
Having made her thereby naughty,
you would have her good as gold.

So where does the greater guilt lie
for a passion that should not be:
with the man who pleads out of baseness
or the woman debased by his plea?

Or which is more to be blamed--
though both will have cause for chagrin:
the woman who sins for money
or the man who pays money to sin?

So why are you men all so stunned
at the thought you're all guilty alike?
Either like them for what you've made them
or make of them what you can like.

If you'd give up pursuing them,
you'd discover, without a doubt,
you've a stronger case to make
against those who seek you out.

I well know what powerful arms
you wield in pressing for evil:
your arrogance is allied
with the world, the flesh, and the devil!

Vote for Flying Machine

The news channels are at it again. The day it rains a bit, they are out covering the water logged areas from morning to evening and reporting how it is not sensible to venture out of the house. Last Saturday Rascal happened to travel by bus from Colaba to Mulund and saw few TV channels stationed at Parel to give live report of the flooding. According to Rascal's aankhon dekha haal, there was no water on his side, traffic was moving smoothly, there was some water on the other side and he thinks the traffic jam must have been created by the vans stationed by them channels. I said, at least there was real rain water, over time they might bring their own tankers in the stealth of the night to flood some localities and create some news.

Now Parel and its step sister lower Parel are so low-lying, that if each resident of those chawl buildings lining the road decide to throw half a bucket of water on the road at the same time, they are sure to flood the road even in summer. As for warning the Mumbaikars, does anybody pay heed to the news. To let in a secret, we wait for the opportunity to walk home from Churchgate to Virar or VT to Thane or any place in between every monsoon. We need our yearly dose of adrenaline to take us through the drudgery of the rest of the year. This year we even have the Bandra-Worli sea-link to walk on: toll-free. The news channels are out to spoil it for us. If I had the power I would allow only 2 news channels and ration the news hour to only two hours per day, i.e, 4 half an hour slots. For entertainment we can all go back to watching Tom & Jerry.

If people in teens could have their way, they would declare the 30+ fossils.

From Zen

This pain is not to make you sad, remember. That's where people go on missing... This pain is just to make you more alert--because people become alert only when the arrow goes deep into their heart and wounds them. Otherwise they don't become alert. When life is easy, comfortable, convenient, who cares? Who bothers to become alert? When a friend dies, there is a possibility. When your woman leaves you alone--those dark nights, you are lonely. You have loved that woman so much and you have staked all, and then suddenly one day she is gone. Crying in your loneliness, those are the occasions when, if you use them, you can become aware. The arrow is hurting: it can be used. The pain is not to make you miserable, the pain is to make you more aware! And when you are aware, misery disappears.

- Osho

So you are waiting for Mr. Right to come riding on a white horse and take you away? stated the wise one.

Said I, Oh! so that was Mr. Right who had come on the horse and was talking some gibberish about sweeping me off my feet and taking me to some far away land. Well I reported him to PETA. What was he thinking riding the poor horse on the busy roads of Mumbai.

The wise one gave me a pitying look.

If I marry a black, white, yellow or any other coloured man except brown of course, will the offsprings from such an union be known as multicoloured?

What if this is as good as it gets!

A person can not get by in life without two things, spouse and hair-dye, says the wise one.

Copy Quotes

Today, while trying to make some repetitive write ups interesting, I unearthed the following quotes.

“Few people can be happy unless they hate some other person, nation, or creed”
-Bertrand Russell

Love the fascist just like you love your neighbour. ;)


“The fact is, you have fallen lately, Cecily, into a bad habit of thinking for yourself. You should give it up. It is not quite womanly... men don't like it.”
-Oscar Wilde

Not man, convention is thy greatest enemy woman, convention.


"I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much."
-Mother Teresa

The recession is hitting me hard :D


“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.”
-Neil Gaiman

Brilliant! I don't agree with the last sentence though.

When things fall in place

I don't remember at which station we boarded the train. It was Amravati-Mumbai Express. When we got in it was crowded with the short distance travellers and we had to fight for our seats. We were six; lawyer, her mother (to be referred to as aunty), 17, 18, Doc and I. The rest of the group was split into two other compartments.

At the next station an old pervert who had the lower berth ticket in our row got in. He insisted on sitting next to the window. So doc and I had to shift to make place for him. Next while putting his bags under the seats his hand touched my thigh, though I was sitting quite far from him. I let it go thinking it must have happened accidently. The second time I lost it and confronted him. He said, he had asked me to move before he placed his bags under the seat. He even verified his claim with the family of four sitting opposite us. They said, they did not hear him say anything. This obviously didn't go down well with me and I called him an idiot. To which the man took offence. The hilarious part is, at this point Doc intervened and told the man I wasn't calling him an idiot. I wanted to ask her then who according to her was my ire directed at. Doc and I had 17 & 18 to take care of, so I did not get to my flying in the air and kicking stage.

In the meantime, GG our camp coordinator came and suggested that 17 & 18 could move to the next compartment and two of the guys from there could join us here. As is bound with rich, pampered kids (girls in this case), 17 & 18 wanted to check out the other compartment before they would decide to move. And as is bound with fearless, Ninja women, doc and I accompanied them to check out the other compartment. Doc in the front making way and I in the back making sure the girls were safe between us(do I need to mention the fearless, Ninja women).

Once we reached the other compartment, the girls decided they didn't want to move after all. We did an about turn, this time me paving the way and doc watching our backs. Holy cow! if the train was crowded before now it was overflowing with people. Apparently while we were on our mission, the train had stopped at some station and unchecked herds of people had got in. Somehow we managed to cross into our compartment and reach our seats only to find them occupied with more people. A sick man was sitting at the edge of one of the seats and his family - wife, mother and three men were standing. We had to fight with a woman occupying our side seat to get her off and make the sick man sit comfortably. There was 17, 18 and the sick man on the side seat. Doc, I, the little boy from the family of four and the idiot on one of the inside seats. On the opposite seat, lawyer, aunty and the rest of the family of four.

We realised that 17 & 18 would not be able to handle sitting on the side seat with the ever increasing crowd. So we exchanged seats with them. A fat man got in and seeing the one cm spare space next to me, tried to fit into it, but only managed to sit on my lap. I gave him a what's happening look, to which he asked me to shift a little. He was so fat, to accommodate him doc and I would have to get up and he would still be resting part of him on the sick man. Doc told him we wanted to have dinner so could not make space for him. Dinner finished, the man again asked me to move and make space for him. He had to get down at Jalgaon so he would sit only for 10 minutes. Now why in this world can a man not stand for 10 minutes! This time I gave him a speech. I asked him if we were women from his house, would he have liked us sitting crammed between two strange men. The man looked visibly embarrassed and even helped us put our bags back on the upper berth.

At Jalgaon some people got down and we got some space to breath. The 3 men with the sick man went to find a TC to get their tickets confirmed. After somewhile they came back with no success and requested me to somehow accommodate the sick man, his wife and mother and they went to the general compartment. They were going to Wockhardt, Kalyan to get the sick man operated. It was time to figure out the sleeping arrangement. Nine berths (it was the new train with 3 berths on the side) and 14 people. Idiot had his lower berth, the opposite lower berth was confirmed by the TC for the family of four, nobody had come for the middle berth above them (which we realised later). The 2 upper berths, 1 middle berth above the idiot and the 3 berths on the side were ours.

We asked the sick man's mother to find a place for him to sleep. Poor soul went up and down the compartment but every square inch of floor space was taken. Doc and I decided to give him one of our berths to sleep and we would share a berth. 17 & 18 chipped in, they wanted us to sleep comfortably as we had office the next day and they would share the upper berth as they were going to sit and talk anyway. After little urging we agreed to their plan. We asked the family of four to use the unclaimed middle berth. So there we were, the girls on one upper berth, Lawyer on the other, 2 members of the family of four in the middle berth and the other two on the lower, sick man in the opposite middle berth and idiot on the lower. Aunty on the side lower berth, doc in the middle and me on the upper berth. Sick man's wife slept between the seats and his mother in the aisle. Everything in place.

Everything that a man takes for granted and a woman has to fight for, she is called AGGRESSIVE.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY IN FIVE CHAPTERS
Portia Nelson



1) I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I fall in.
I am lost...
I am hopeless.
It isn't my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

2) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don't see it.
I fall in again.
I can't believe I'm in the same place.
But it isn't my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

3) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in...it's a habit
My eyes are open; I know where I am;
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

4) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

5) I walk down another street.

:) Found it here http://buddhism.kalachakranet.org/resources/poetry.html

Full Circle

It all started in December of 2005. I was at Bangalore airport with Ganju. We were standing in a queue, and both at the same time happened to notice a handsome young man a little ahead of us. Immediately after seeing him for some bizarre reason I am still clueless about, I looked down at my feet. Lo and behold! there I was staring at Viyer's blue bathroom slippers adorning my feet. I tried to remember how I ended up in those slippers instead of my floaters. Surprise turned to ruefulness and I felt a little bad for Viyer, imagine having to wear floaters to the toilet every single visit. I called and spoke to her; she was kind enough to let the slippers travel to Mumbai and also assured she will return my floaters when in Mumbai. While all this was happening Ganju continued to ogle at the handsome guy.

Since then such lapses have been occuring much to my inconvenience and my friends' entertainment. My friends still warn Viyer to guard her footwear when I am around. Last year I forgot to call almost everybody I know on their birthday, and considering the number of times I asked Rascal, 'Holi kab hai?', he was convinced that Gabbar's spirit had possessed me. Some times I even forget to carry my laptop or mobile to the office. As I take the laptop home only occasionaly I used to reason that that's why I seem to forget to take it back. But yesterday's incident takes the cake. I forgot to carry both my laptop and phone to the office and had to go back home to get them. Never appreciated having my office close to the house so much. Here's the icing on the cake. In the evening, yes I forgot something again, this time to wear my sandals, and left the office wearing slippers. Looks like I have come a full circle.

Now what could be the reason for these memory lapses? My preoccupation with the numerous bubbles in my head or is it that the fat accumulated around my midriff is slowing down my brain?