The Creative Writing Process
So here’s my entry for the Main GC Creative Writing competition last sem – I finally got my entry back. Surprisingly, it came second.
Two Lives
He was born in a restricted tenement. What that meant was that the government didn’t care enough for his parents to grant them citizenship, deeming them to be individuals of ‘limited worth’. So, they were confined to live in the restricted tenement 20, floor 48, unit B, which was a run down relic from five centuries past, with eighty floors, twenty units per floor and two families per unit. His parents did what they could to raise him well, well being a relative term. For you see, his two elder siblings had both died at birth. So it was only natural that his parents did all that they could to see him through his infancy and youth. If they were overprotective and heavy-handed at times, it was justifiable and not something one could hold against them, but he certainly did, for he was profoundly immature for his age.. for any age, really.
She was born in the same tenement, in the unit across the hallway from his, in 2048-A. Hers was everything his wasn’t. Her parents were as uncaring as his were loving and she was as sickly as he was healthy. Most importantly, perhaps, was the fact that she was just as loving and caring as he wasn’t. Strange then, that of all the children in the tenement, each got on best with the other. Or maybe it was only too logical, but it matters not, only that they got along is of any importance. By the age of six, the two were inseparable, and while her parents couldn’t care less, his were only too thankful for their friendship, and hopeful that her gentle spirit might, in time, temper his reckless one.
As they grew, each made other friends and grew socially, but their friendship with each other always held fast and true: whenever he had fights with his other friends, through his fault or theirs, he invariably turned towards her for consolation, and she invariably offered it, for his was a gloomy world darkened by despair.
There came a time, then, when they became eligible for the government’s ‘limited class’ education program, a program meant to discover and nurture talent and ability amongst the children of the ‘limited worth’ class. He because he was undeniably brilliant and she because she was tirelessly hard working. So, they were separated from their biological parents, to the great despair of his parents, and sent together to be raised further by foster parents who were full citizens of the state, but had had the singular bad luck of being unable to concieve biological children of their own.
A change of scenery, unfortunately did nothing to soothe his temperament, as she had secretly hoped it would; if anything, it worsened it, for now that he had been separated from his real parents, his despair had only deepened, driven by the thought that he may never see them again, and by anxiety about his new, and totally alien surroundings.
On the other hand, she was happier than ever before, for the dim candle of hope that she had kept burning during all her long years in the tenement had now become a roaring beacon as she daily became more convinced that the worst had come to pass. The only worry she allowed any space for was worry for him, for his despair seemed increasingly inconsolable for he was growing as detached from his surroundings as she was taking to them as a maggot will to rotting flesh.
They did well at their new schools: he because he hadn’t misplaced any of his sheer brilliance and she because she hadn’t ever let up and toiled as much as required, often more. In time they graduated from school and university, each answering what they believed to be their true calling; she became a social worker and he became a mathematician. Both achieve comfortable amounts of success from the very start and in time they found their secong calling: each other. Once the last barriers of intimacy had been broken, the thought of marriage came to their minds as naturally as suckling comes to a babe in arms. There were inhibitions, of course: they had been raised as brother and sister. In time, though, even this was overcome, as the fact remained that they had only been raised as sibling.
And so, preparations for the marriage were initiated and, as a surprise for him, she, knowing that he had pined for his parents since the day they had been placed under foster care, went about searching for them in the hope of finding them and bringing them to the wedding.
She did not take the news well. In fact, she commited suicide. They found a note next to her body. It read:
Dearest Brother,
This marriage cannot be. My parents couldn’t afford to raise two children so they offered my brother to your parents to raise as their own. I am pregnant with our child. I would rather that our child never see the light of day, for it would be too cruel a fate to let him live and I cannot live with the shame of incest. I am so very sorry.
Yours Forever,
Your lover, your sister.
And that was the day that Hope died and the world was only left with Despair.
Melting pots and latent suspicions.
Britain is a melting pot. And Gods know, with such supporting evidence as Shilpa Shetty’s recent victory, it seems fair enough to assume so. And yet they wish to chuck out doctors, and we find this:
The requirements for naturalisation as a British citizen depend on whether one is married to a British citizen or not.
For those married to a British citizen the applicant must:
- hold indefinite leave to remain in the UK (or an equivalent such as Right of Abode or Irish citizenship)
- have lived legally in the UK for three years
- been outside of the UK no more than 90 days during the one-year period prior to filing the application.
- show sufficient knowledge of life in the UK, either by passing the Life in the United Kingdom test or by attending combined English language and citizenship classes. Proof of this must be supplied with one’s application for naturalisation. Those aged 65 or over may be able to claim exemption.
- meet specified English, Welsh or Scottish Gaelic language competence standards. Those who pass the Life in the UK test are deemed to meet English language requirements.
For those not married to a British citizen the requirements are:
- five years legal residence in the UK
- been outside of the UK no more than 90 days during the one-year period prior to filing the application.
- indefinite leave to remain or equivalent must have been held for 12 months
- the applicant must intend to continue to live in the UK or work overseas for the UK government or a British corporation or association.
- the same language and knowledge of life in the UK standards apply as for those married to British citizens
All applicants for naturalisation must be of “good character”. Naturalisation is at the discretion of the Home Secretary but is normally granted if the requirements are met.
- From Wikipedia.
But then consider this: Britain’s been a melting pot for a while (not unlike India, actually). First came the earliest humans, the true British (and Irish), to be invaded time and again, by mainland Europeans. First came the Celts, then came the Romans. They intermingled. And became Romano-Britons. Then the Romans left. Soon after the Roman withdrawal, came the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes and occupied the majority of what is today England. And they brought their tongues and dialects with them, which soon caught on. Unsurprisingly, for the Romans had long used auxiliary Germanic troops to buffer their numbers. So the languages and dialects therein, that the Angles, Saxons and Jutes had brought with them, the seeds of Old English, were not foreign to the land, they had already been around since almost as far back as the Romans had been. So were left of the Romano-Britons, the Welsh and the Scots, and of the Celts and Gaels, the Irish. And the rest were Anglo-Saxons, the English. But it did not end here, for in 1066 William the Conqueror came to England, himself of Nordic and Anglo-Saxon descent, upon the death of the last Anglo-Saxon king, Edward the Confessor, claiming the throne for himself due to his descent from Ethelred, the Anglo-Saxon king who had initiated a blood-tie alliance with the Normans, in order to gain allies in his constant war against the marauding Danes. By the 16th century, the Normans had long lost Normandy, but had gained all of Britain. The repeated invasions of the land had finely meshed the British identity and well into Middle Ages, the Welsh called themselves Brythoniad, Brythons, Britons. The Irish and Scots, didn’t care less, and continued for a long while to exist as countries in their own right, and mistrust ran deep all around. The Normans and Anglo-Saxons played an active part too: the English name for Wales derives from the Germanic word walha, meaning stranger or foreigner.
So no wonder they don’t like it (though they might pretend otherwise, to the fullest extent) when we Indians (and Chinese and Vietnamese and Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, and other Asians) go there en masse. Perhaps some ancestral racial instinct is telling them that it’s yet another conquest. They haven’t learned yet how not to distrust each other, much less the rest of Europe. Against that deep-seated a mistrust of anything remotely foreign, added to a very geographically localized definition of all that isn’t foreign, what chance have we Asians?
No more imparted wisdom for you!
None whatsoever. None. Nada. Zilch. Cliche.
So, here’s why the slug horn never got blown. They thought it was too small. And rather like a lighthouse. Too much like anyone. Anyways, I find myself digressing.
So, recently I met a fellow who’s first exposure to ‘rock’ (in college) had been his room-mate’s impressive death metal collection. In time he got his own room, and started listening to all other forms of ‘rock’. So he heard Nirvana, and he seemed to enjoy it, but started hating them when he found out the drummer’s name. Why, fellow-I-recently-met, why? Well, actually, because his surname is Grohl and that sounded like groul to me (He has a weird accent. Imagine it. No, I can’t tell what the accent is, either. Figure it out yourself!) and that reminds me of death metal. So that’s why. No, I’m just fucking with you. There exists no such person (that I know/know of , at least). It’d be cool if there was someone like that, no? And it’s not even impossible. Could very well one day be an IITian. Or could already have been (an IITian)! Gasp!
The enemy has declared war, troops! Stupidy is attacking with all its might! So try and figure it out yourselves. Well, you’re smart, um, I’m sure you’ll manage something.. B-but? No buts soldier! The enemy advances, we must prepare our offences! Yes! But what tactics do we use? What are our bloody orders? Look, we’ve been over this! You! Will! Have! To! Figure! It! Out! By! Yourselves! Now leave me alone, I’m defecting to the other side…
Yes, it’s true. Kehdo na, kehdo na, life is a piece of (Your choice of word here. If you’re depressed/angry at someone/something or because of someone/something, you might want to put their name/the name that has been attached to the ’something’ in question by you, rather like a pointer in C. Or like a non-pointer in Python. Or you might just generally be pissed-off with everything, angsty, even, then might we suggest you put down ‘life’ as word of your choice. You won’t regret it! Or if you’re actually happy with life, might we suggest ‘cake’? Or, perhaps, ‘death’? So, an option, really, sort of a ”cake’ or ‘death” situation. You know the kind? The one where you have to eat cake if you want to live. Sort of like ‘your money or your life’.).
So, yes, to business. I got a job. In a company. In Bangalore. Mu-Sigma, the name is (of the company). Vanitha got the same job. Yes, thank you very much (the uber-text emotion exemplified by the grinning smiley face).
And, Isis rocks. Every once in a while, a paradigm shift occurs. I bet you all the surds in Ludhiana and New York and wherenot are sitting up and saying, “oye, ye pra-dime shift kya hai? Kya Prada ke prices ek dime se nicche ho rah hai?” But, again, I digress. So, paradigm shift occur once in a bit. And depending on their strengths and numbers, they can affect just the smallest bit of the ether around them and say, alter the day a guy decides to take a gun and kill his pet spoon, which has been haunting him ever since he was ten, and get rid of the thing for once and for all. Or they can affect great things, like the course of humanity! Yes, very egomaniacal of me. For me to assume the ego of the human race as a whole! Yes, the world ‘does’ spin about humanity! We refuse to believe the evidence to the contrary! We’re the only living souls in the whole of this Universe! Praise the lord! So yes, Isis is like a medium sized paradigm shift, drawing upon the dying energies of the paradigm shift that came before, Tool, and also from the Opeth shift. And it truely is a shift, for each shift must, to satisfy existence and uniqueness conditions, must have some certain originality, a different quiddity, some ‘new-ness’. So it sounds different from what Tool plus Opeth might. And better. Much better. So listen to it.
Aaaand, That’s All, Folks! Hope You Enjoyed! Tune in, or don’t, the next time I write a post. Which might be anywhere between a few months or a few weeks or lesser, who knows? Yeeesss, that certain, ‘je ne sais quoi’! But, I digress… Tell him to stop! Oye, you idiot! Our slot’s up! Stop! That certain ‘hmm…’, or ‘gunh?’ or a veritable menagerie of weird sounds… Right, that’s it, pull the plu-
Matchmaking In The Distant Future
Imagine the future. The distant future. One in which the equations describing everything.. everything, from waffle irons to human social interactions, are known. IN fact, imagine that the equations describing every human are known. So think of humans now, each as a distinct point in an essentially infinite dimensional space, with an orthonormal basis, each base of which quantifies some quality of us: meanness, cowardice, shyness.. describing each and every one of our qualities which is an input variable of the scalar valued SI (Social Interaction) equation, the value of which would quantify hapiness, intelligence, etc. So wouldn’t matchmaking boil down essentially to a global optimisation problem on a (rather) large scale? Anyways, imagine that future. Imagine the consequence of being able to solve an infinite dimensional problem. Yes, we’d comprehend infinity. We would be intimately aware of it. So, different people, different points in an infinite-dimensional space, therefore, by induction, we arrive at different universes, different points in (another) infinite-dimensional space. Some measure of self-similarity, eh? And we’d be aware of and in touch with the beings inhabiting all the other universes in the multiverse. All of them (We know everything! Surely a small little thing like inter-dimensional travel would be but a unit in the knowledge bank account with infinite balance?).
So there you have it folks. A proof that the multiverse exists and is chaotic in nature. Of course, by the time that we have the required maths to provide a more rigorous, altogether non-qualitative proof, we’d already be in that future.
A hope, if you will. Now that it has been proposed that all the universes and everything contained within each one is essentially a point in an infinite-dimensional space, there is, however one problem: until we have the ability to derive the proof rigorously, we will not be all-knowing, and until we do become omniscient, we will have no knowledge of the parameters of the dynamics describing the universe’s trajectory in that space. Now, I hypothesize that there are only two further possibilities: either we can affect those variables or we can’t. Either possibility has a huge implication: if we can affect the variables then we stand to unknowingly make the system unstable until we reach a point when we have enough knowledge to avoid doing that, in which case we could just wipe ourselves out before we actually get to a point where we know how not to, consolation prize of course being that we are actually masters of our own fate and that we can (eventually) be all-powerful. Or we can’t affect the varialbles which would imply that everything is, in fact, predestined. Either ways, it’s a bit of drag, isn’t it? Either there’s fate, in which case, what’s the point, or we do reach a stage where we know how not to drive the system unstable, and then we’d know everything. Imagine the boredom! We might as well just commit mass suicide because, well, face it, if we’re just going to sit on our asses getting bored all the time then again, what’s the point?
Yes, the midsems are getting to me.
Utter Gibberish
It’s true, no, it isn’t,
Everything I just said was a lie,
It lay along lay lines,
Ending in Nexii of earth and
Pitiful sandwich sky.
The very nature of this,
Is transience,
Don’t try to force a response,
Tried to be the man,
Fuck it dude, you’re just another ponce.
Because all this is just gibberish,
Like the internet,
Like the T.V.,
Just, like everything else.
That technicoloured dream,
I had the other night,
Starring Alfred Mozezz and,
Fly Zebra Dee,
I know it all sounds like shit,
But ’twas truer than,
Everything real’s ever been.
Because all this is gibberish,
Like the internet,
Like the T.V.,
Just, like everything else.
An HSS assignment, if you please..
The Patient
Excerpts from the personal psychiatrist’s notes of Dr. Josephine Canard, at the Arkham asylum for the criminally insane:
Case no. 132
Monday, July 31
Interesting case. Male, of unknown age, looks to be in his late thirties. The subject has a face that ‘hides traces of past brilliance under a disarming mask of weariness’ (sic. Police report. They all think they’re poets). He has however committed a string of murders in the past month. All his victims were females and all were killed in the same way: he gouged out their eyes and then proceeded to hollow out their brains. Mortuary reports indicate that some patients died from the shock of having their eyes gouged out, but unfortunately most didn’t. It also indicates no signs of sexual abuse of any sort, which to me seems to rule out any sexual motives. He calls himself Narcissus and refuses to respond to any other name.
“Hello, my name is Dr. Josephine Canard and I will be treating you. What is your name?”
(Silence)
“Look you have to tell me your name or I’ll have to address you as 132. Now that’s hardly nice, is it? You can trust me; whatever we say will remain within the confines of these four walls. So come on, tell me your name.”
“Narcissus.”
“Now come on, be cooperative and tell me your real name.”
“I am. I did.”
“Very well then, Narcissus. Are you aware of the crimes you’ve committed?”
“I committed no crimes. I exacted the revenge that was mine.”
“Revenge? Do you remember what exactly you did?”
“Yes. I punished them for imprisoning me. And for silencing one who tried to help me.”
“Why did they imprison you? Who tried to help you? Look, there –was- no connection between the people you killed. They were all in different states of the country for God’s sake. Now I ask you again; are you aware of the crimes you committed?”
“They were not crimes.”
He kept up with this and we made no further headway today. Subject seemed detached, self-absorbed, seemed not to really be paying attention to what I was saying. Most likely the patient just suffers from acute schizophrenia. Delusional. Perhaps we will find his true identity tomorrow.
____
Tuesday, August 1
“Hello 132, and how are you today?”
(Silence)
“Alright then, Narcissus, how are you?”
“Fine thank you, Dr. Duck.”
“So, Narcissus, tell me something about yourself. Where were you born, what were your parents like?”
“I believe you call it Greece now. And they were.”
“Were what?”
“Just were. They aren’t now. No one remembers them anymore.”
“Oh, so sorry… So tell me, what were the like?”
“It doesn’t matter. They did me no harm.”
“So, Narcissus, Why do you choose to call yourself that? Do you love mythology?”
(A low guttural laugh, slowly building to a crackling crescendo)
“Did I say something funny?”
(Dying laughter) “No, not really… well, in a sense. You won’t understand.”
“Yes I will, Narcissus. They pay me to do just that, you know? Tell me, and even if I don’t, I’ll try my best, that’s a promise.”
“I am him.”
“Come again?”
“I am him. I am it. I am the embodiment of the myth. I am Narcissus.”
“I’m sorry, I find that hard to believe, but I did promise that I will try my best to. So tell me, if you really are Narcissus, then how’re you still alive? The myth, I’m led to believe, is at least two millennia old.”
“Dr. Canard, ‘let’s say you believe me’. Do you really know who my parents were? I’m sure the myth tells you that as well.”
“I’m afraid you’ll have to tell me, I’m not much of a mythology buff.”
“My father was Cephisus, and my mother was Leiriope. Do you know what you would call them today? Gods. Divine beings. Anthropomorphic beings. And that really is the truth.”
“That still doesn’t explain why you are still alive today.”
“You answered your own question. You knew me. You knew of me. It’s the same thing. No one remembers my parents anymore. They don’t embody the rivers, the idea of spirits anymore. No one remembers them. No one believes in them. I, on the other hand am the very embodiment of narcissism. I am built right into your characters, to varying degrees, but always there. My existence as a concept assures my existence as an individual.”
“… I, I don’t know what to say. You make a very strong argument, unscientific as it sounds.”
“I think you’ve had enough for a day, Dr. Canard. And so have I.”
The subject is deeply delusional, much more than I thought. But he made a deeply cogent argument today which makes me doubt my initial diagnosis. There is a sincerity in his voice that transcends all medical reason. Could it be that he isn’t lying after all? Now that would have interesting consequences.
____
Wednesday, August 2
“Hello again, Narcissus.”
“Hello Doctor.”
“So how’re you feeling today? Ready to talk some more?”
“Fine. Yes.”
“So tell me about yourself. What was your childhood like?”
“Good.”
“Come on, surely you can do better than that?”
“I wish not to.”
“Alright then, tell me about your imprisonment.”
“I was imprisoned.”
“By?”
“The nymphs. They played on my vanity to assure their own immortality.”
“To assure their own immortality?”
“Ask me not how they did this, I am unsure of it myself. But I do know that they sought to entrap me and immortalize me in order to feed off my life-force to attain their own immortality.”
“And how exactly did they entrap you?”
“Surely you know my myth? That I fell in love with my own reflection?”
“I’m afraid that’s about all that I do know of it.”
“Well, I was a vain young man and ‘tis true that I spurned the love of the nymph, Echo, but it weren’t her prayers that cursed me to fall in love with my own reflection. The poor thing, she tried, in fact, to warn me of the trap that lay ahead, but knowing the love she bore me, hopeless though it was, the other nymphs cursed her to talk only in response to me. Unfortunately I asked all the wrong questions. I wandered to the nymphs’ pond and I was caught in a spell when I gazed upon it. But it wasn’t the spell of my own beauty, which -was- unsurpassed. Only a fool might, and I was no fool. It was a device of the nymphs’ making. They trapped me and whence they had devised the flower that also now bears my name, to mark the spot where I was trapped, they sped me away to the underworld and imprisoned me there.”
“That is quite a story you’ve spun. What else did the nymphs do to you?”
“You do not believe me. My rambling this way is pointless. I must show you.”
(A brilliant flash as Narcissus’ face becomes etched in light and transforms into a thing of utter beauty)
“Now do you believe me, doctor?”
“Oh, my God. You… you weren’t lying were you?”
“I told the whole truth.”
“I, I think that is enough for today.”
“So be it.”
It is him. He is in my hands. The next move is mine to make.
____
Monday, August 7
“Hello Narcissus. This will be our final session. I have heard enough and will try my best to do all that I can for you. Now I have one final question for you. Do you recognize me?”
“Should I?”
“Look closer, Narcissus. You showed your true self to me yesterday. Now let me return the favor.”
(Another bright flash, as Doctor Josephine’s face becomes etched with light and transforms into a younger, more beautiful form of itself)
“ECHO? Is that you? This then is my most fortuitous day yet! I am a man much wiser than the vain young boy who spurned you all those long year ago! For your warnings shall not go unheeded this time.”
“Umm, yes, look, about that. The nymphs and I sat down and had a talk. A real heart to heart, you might say. And we came to the conclusion that I don’t need to waste my life being in a dead-end situation, what with loving you and all that and that immortality in general is better for us, all around, so if you don’t mind… oh, what am I saying, of course you’ll mind, he he.. Well, in any case, I’m going to see to it that you’re locked up here, temporarily of course, until such time that we can arrange to break you out and return you to your lodgings in the underworld. Which reminds me, how did you ever manage to break out? We’ll have to make them more escape-proof this time, you know, and I rather we got it out of you without having to resort to… unsavory means.”
“YOU WILY CREATURE! HOW DARE YOU? RELEASE ME AT ONCE!”
“Goodbye Narcissus. Don’t worry, I’ll visit you on my yearly vacation to Hades.”
____
To: The District Attorney, Gotham City
Cc: The warden, Arkham asylum Bcc: Dr. Gregory Malloy, head psychiatrist, Arkham asylum Date: Tuesday, August 8, 2006
Subject: Regarding case no. 132, ‘Narcissus’
Dear Sirs,
I have carried through a thorough psychiatric examination of patient no. 132 and based on the results of these and my sessions with him, I have concluded that the patient is suffering from extreme schizophrenia and is very mentally unstable. It is my advice that he be held here at Arkham asylum for the criminally insane under maximum security for he will constitute a major threat to society should he manage to escape. Furthermore, I would advice that my sessions with him continue as before, for he would yield a fascinating case-study in schizophrenia.
Yours truly,
Dr. Josephine Canard.
“Nicely done, Echo. I can see that you have taken to being a human like a duck takes to water. Tell me, could that be the reason that you chose the surname Canard? I took a jab at it, but you seemed not to notice.”
“Narcissus!? How… how’d you manage to break out? You were under heavy guard!”
“Shush now, surely you’ll allow me my secrets? Anyways, the reason I came to see you before I left was to say goodbye.”
“And kill me?”
“No, no, you tried to save me once, and I owe you your life for that. Of course, if you try to get in my way again… goodbye Echo. Don’t try to stop me. You are no match for me, and I wish not to harm you… directly. I can honestly say that I hope to never see you again.”
“Please, stop! I can’t let you go. You have to fight me. You have no idea what the others will do to me when they find out! Death at your hand would be infinitely sweeter a fate.”
“To almost quote Rhett Butler… frankly, my dear, now, as then, I don’t give a damn.”
– Ende –
When you’re feeling lazy… be lazy!
And now, ladies and gentlemen, wiffout any further ado, I give you…. (drumroll) …. something I wrote ages back (just because I’m too lazy to write anything new, thus the title of this post)!
Here I lie, behold me in all my glory
A windswept beach at sunrise, the sun just about breaking over and above the horizon. An altogether too familiar scene. On the beach lies a wretched wreck of a human being, muttering something so softly as to be almost unintelligible….”perfection….. must strive…. I…. must try”. The mutterings of any drunk homeless. Ignorable. Safely so. Thus is society. Those that don’t contribute, don’t matter.
I am K. This, very predictably, is my story. Born an only child into an orthodox family, I was raised bigoted, opinionated and chauvinistic. I was taught to believe in God. I was brought up to believe he was a good God, a just God. Some things were right and some things were wrong. Some people were right. Some people were wrong. Hate the ones who are wrong! They are the evil ones! Stay away from them! They will mislead you. They believe in false gods, the blasphemers. Lead a good life. Grow up, get a job, get married, have children, raise them as we did you, live a happy man. If God did indeed exist, and if he wrote our fates, it would’ve appeared as if my fate was a well plotted course, laid out clear and obstacle-free in front of me by my parents, acting on behalf of god. All my job was, was to walk down that path. And a lifetime of drilling to think as I had been trained to would ensure that I would walk down that path as complacently and obediently as a sedated dog on a leash.
Sadly enough, my parents were not God. Some things that I’m sure He would not have looked over, my parents did. I decided to think. God forbid, he thinks for himself! What will ever happen to him? Well, there was a contingency plan just for such a situation apparently. The answers to all my questions always seemed to reaffirm everything that I was taught to believe, everything that was diligently drilled into me by my loving parents. Believe. Don’t think. If you must think, make sure your thoughts wander to exactly where we want them to. In a perfect little fascist world, this would’ve worked just fine. Unfortunately enough, though, the world is far from either perfect or small. Fascist, perhaps, but not the other two. And so I kept questioning, but I kept a few questions to myself, safely stowed away in a cubbyhole at the back of my mind, there for the asking when the time was right.
And so the years passed, dull, mundane and utterly forgettable. And then came my first whiff of what I would later mistake to be freedom. I went away from home, away, away to university, for a further education, for it was deemed that in order for me to get a good wife, my resume would have to be buttressed with a good college education. After all what woman could resist a young thoroughbred of a man of good upbringing, with a university education no less? Look ma! Look at all the tricks it can do! It jumps through hoops, it drools when you ring a bell and it talks! But best of all, it has a university education! I want that dog, oh ma, won’t you get me that dog? Pavlov would indeed have been proud of me, had he had an opportunity to know me. A bleak past and a seemingly even bleaker future. Life was joyous, or at least I was told that that was what it was meant to be. So, obedient as ever, I went to university. Oh how they wept the day I left! Looking back, I rather sympathize with them. After all, after I’d left, who’d’ve been left for them to instill into, their skewed morals and ideals?
I was ill prepared for what awaited me. Scratch that, I was, in fact, not at all prepared for what awaited me. I took me not long to immerse myself diligently into all the vices that I had been shielded from all this while long. I was soon the resident drunk, and a dope-fiend to boot. Out the window the morals of a lifetime of upbringing, in everything I was ever taught to keep a distance from. The leash had been taken off, the sedatives worn. Somewhere along the line, I realized that making up for lost time was not the same as what I had become. And as the realization came, so did thought. Ah, the joys of unrestricted thought. The truest freedom there is. And all those questions came to the front again. All those questions that I’d been to cautious to ask of my parents. I was free to ask these and more. Many, many more!
But wait. The answers came, but not as I had thought they would. Where I had expected truly unbiased answers, free of all my opinionated restrictions, I found but other answers, equally biased as I would have expected of my parents’, albeit, a different bias every time, but always a bias. Was there no truly free mind? Was there no one who could answer me, give me the truth and not a perceived truth, distorted, by whatever the belief might be? If there is indeed a God, I imagine Him to have been sitting up there in his heavenly abode, having a jolly good laugh at my expense. What a young fool. What did he expect? Did he really expect to find a viewpoint that’s unbiased? Fool. Still, he is but a mere human. An imperfect image of me. Imperfect. Does he not know that such a thing does not, could not exist? That is perfection. That is me. And you are not me. So at least I concluded that if God existed, He was perfection. And that was an ideal I had to strive to achieve. No matter what the cost, I had now but one aim. Find God, or become Him. Free my mind. Unclutter it. Erase the bigotry, the near unshakeable beliefs of almost a lifetime of upbringing. Not an easy task, But I had to try.
It has now been ten years since I made that decision. I was booted out of university, disowned by my parents, and shunned by the world at large. I wander aimlessly the streets all day, lament my humanity all night long. I have long since become resigned to the fact that I am but human. I am imperfect. I was biased, I will always be biased, hard as I may try, I am but human. To be human is to be imperfect. To be imperfect is to give up, and despair our wasted lives. If there is a God, He must really be laughing his head off at my pathetic attempts at perfection. And me? A chauvinist to the bitter end. I still think of God as Him. Why not Her? Why not It? Because I am human.
So I am now an undistinguishable part of that faceless mass of humanity, the homeless. I have often been told by my many of my homeless brethren that I have a tendency to mumble incoherently when under the influence of alcohol. Something about striving for perfection, they say.
The Council of wha..?
Statutory Warning: All that follows is fictional.It’s scary. This day and age where you have to keep abreast of everything going on around you and you have to have an opinion, or you’re stared at with disbelieving stares of mild to heavy admonishment and disgust. Yes, I admit it, I’ve been at the receiving end of this attitude, and I’ve decided to change and give in to this near-omniscient state of being, and have an opinion, and expound at length at why it, and no other, is the right opinion. It’s the latest rage. So I am going to write, perhaps at length, on the latest musical and quasi-religious news item: the Council of Sa.
That it happened is stated in recently discovered documents of what is being hailed in underground circles as the ‘Rosetta stone of the 21st century’. A papyrus scroll of autobigraphical recollections written by Indus-Saraswati drunkard and poet-extraordinaire Malluskun Thyagar in both, the script of the Indus-Saraswati Valley civilization and a proto-dravidian language which, along with Sanskrit, is the suspected progentitor of all modern South Indian languages. They were discovered hidden in earthen pots in a remote cave in the Kutch region, by a group of local village elders who had abducted a lower caste woman to the caves so that they could rape her uninterrupted at their own leisure. They were released on bail and subsequently all charges were dropped against them, in case you were wondering. Fine, so it didn’t really happen, but if Dan Brown can pull fiction out of the fact hat, then so can I, damn it! Let’s just say that it does exist, has been discovered, but is being covered up by the present Indian givernment, which doesn’t want any proof of Hinduism not being native to their beloved Hindustan being made available to the citizens of this fine nation, should the seeds of blasphemous thought (Gods forbid) be planted. A conspiracy theory, yum. People just love to lap those up, don’t they? So there, the mood has been set, an untruth has been uttered and made into fact. So on with the Council of Sa, what say?
Much in the spirit of the Council of Nicea, where a bunch of holy men decided to codify their religion, in the Council of Sa, there was a bunch of court musicians and singers, all clamoring to be heard, all trying to prove that the pitch that they sang Sa at, should be the pitch that all others should, as well. According to Thyagar, what finally emerged as the now commonly accepted pitch for Sa was the one proposed by the royal entertainer at the courts of King Mojo-henjo, ruler at Mohenjo-Daro, purpotedly the strongest kingdom of the Indus-Saraswati civilization, you know, the one with the most military might, not unlike present day America. And so you have it. The history of the note Sa.
There’s a theory making the rounds that another one of the reasons (apart from the obvious one, that is) that the government wanted to hush up the discovery is that it is shameful to the Hindustani spirit, the thought that the basis of all Indian classical music, the notes Sa to Ni had their origin in anything but Aryan culture.. go figure.
Well, there’s another interesting theory making the rounds.. apparently the government decided to increase the OBC quota in order to cover up the furore that would undoubtedly have been raised, has news of the woman’s rape gotten out. So what happened to the poor woman who had been abducted? She was given a job as a permanent under-maid servant at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, purpotedly the logic being that it was better to be raped by a bunch of sleazy corrupt politicians, who at least had the common decency to pay her her meagre daily salary afterwards, than a bunch of impoverished village elders who had nothing to bring to the table but a steadfast belief in a hypocritical caste system and the resulting profit-less atrocities that follow as a result. But fret not; apparently, in a recent secret interview of the woman, she claimed that she had, ‘never been happier in her life’, and now possessed enough money to buy the whole village from the elders and turn it into a urban theme park, with a strict no-upper-caste admission policy.
So, children, what have we learned today? People will do anything for money? Yes, Chintu, was that you who said that in the back? Good, correct.. any other lessons you can think of children? What, Ravi, what did you say back there? Might is right? Is that it, did I catch that correctly? Yes, brilliant! Perfect, yes, that is the other lesson to be lerned from this. I’m so proud of you children! You’ll all make such well-rounded adults in time!
Right, well, I’ve had my say. I’ve become an over-informed and opinionated member of society… well, that’s what you wanted wasn’t it? Wha? It wasn’t? Oh, so I have to have an opinion about the truth, you say? Right, sorry, my mistake, won’t happen again. Hey, I tried, right? What, no, that’s not good enough? Damn you all, what do I have to do to please you all? What?
I’ve been tagged..
.. So I have to now go on and write up an introspective piece called ‘My Fifty Firsts to Familiarity’. Feel free to go ahead and write your own after reading these:
1) I’m never quite sure about most things.
2) But I don’t really care either.. well, usually, anyways.
3) I don’t like people whom I think are undeserving (that’s almost everyone).
4) I dislike people who are unfair or rude. I think they’re the aesthetic eqivalents of the hostels 12 and 13. Eyesores.
5) I hate people who are unfair or rude towards those I love. I’d gleefully dance on their graves if such an opportunity happened to present itself.
6) I feel life is unfair in the short run. People would have me believe that it is however fair, given a long enough timescale.
7) I feel the required timescale is too long.
I’m extremely impatient.
9) I love music.
10) I hate noise.
11) I hate crowds too, for that matter. Partly because they tend to make too much noise.
12) I don’t get jazz. I really don’t.
13) I don’t get art either. I’ve tried, but I just don’t.
14) I think religion’s a powerful concept, with infinite power to do good.
15) Unfortunately it’s been used too often for just the opposite for me to be entirely comfortable with it.
16) I really hope God exists.
17) If he/she does, I’d like to pick a few bones with him/her, given the opportunity.
18) I think doctors are worse than useless.
19) I think engineering can be an artform unto itself.
20) I’ll never stop loving my parents and my oye.
21) I really don’t think that life has any purpose any greater than having fun while you’re at it.
22) I lean slightly to the left.
23) I dislike government employees. They’re too secure in their jobs to even pretend to be anything but complacent.
24) I think capitalism and communism have a good deal to learn from each other. That’d be a good system of governance.
25) People are stupid. Might as well make some money off them.
26) I like doing nothing.
27) But it can get boring after a while.
28) I don’t particularly like to dress up.
29) Bodies of water any larger than a swimming pool are inherently evil.
30) I’m not all that in touch with my Indian heritage. In fact I think calling it my heritage is a bit strong. Perhaps more of a background check.
31) I like comedy.
32) In general I don’t like Bollywood movies, because usually they have nothing much to offer.
33) I think I’m overcritical.
34) Old hindi movies, in general, rock.
35) I might just be too cynical for my own good.
36) I’ve never had a religious experience.
37) I’ve had many medical ones.
38) Surprisingly I’m still alive (see 18).
39) I’d like nothing more than to make a ton of cash early, and then use it to make even more.
40) I think I’m capable of doing so.
41) I prefer to start off being indifferent to people when I meet them.
42) Unfortunately, I form opinions very fast. Usually lasting ones.
43) I really think that the best punishment for rapists should be rape.
44) Not so for murderers. They should be tortured a bit first.
45) I keep hoping that there’s a secret police that doesn’t bother with the legal process.
46) I’d love to be its head.
47) I might just be very evil.
48) Or the nicest person ever.
49) I will, however, never be a vegetarian painter.
50) Despite all this, I have great faith in the human spirit.
The gutter rat
He lived. And then he died. Nothing much exciting happened in between. Vagueness is the order of the day (and night), you see? So in that vein, I am proud to present… ‘The Conversation’.
(13:57:00) Me: btw, stand up comedy (in english, thank heavens) is very likely going to be a competition during mi
(13:57:07) Me: so enthu to help me write some?
(13:57:11) Another bored soul: now he tells me
(13:57:17) Another bored soul: ah ye
(13:57:18) Me: thinking of including of teri ma ka doodh…
(13:57:19) Another bored soul: of course
(13:57:27) Another bored soul: as in…the whole passage?
(13:57:42) Me: and meandering my way out of that by following some completely arbit tangent
(13:57:44) Me: no no
(13:57:50) Another bored soul: then?
(13:57:51) Me: just elements of
(13:58:04) Another bored soul: ah…yes. a milky standup routine
(13:58:07) Me: 
(13:58:20) Me: don’t know, basically
(13:58:24) Another bored soul: mention boobs a few times and you’ll be a hit in IIT
(13:58:31) Me: true true
(13:58:51) Me: even better would be if i could con some woman into coming on stage during and flash the audience
(13:58:56) Another bored soul: you vourld even go litereary: The Mammaries of the Welfare State
(13:59:03) Me: !
(13:59:12) Another bored soul: (its a book)
(13:59:20) Me: (is it?)
(13:59:30) Another bored soul: (oh yes…indian author too)
(13:59:33) Me: (also, btw, you figured out mandel’s broth, right?)
(13:59:43) Another bored soul: Your butterfly
(13:59:48) Me: good good 
(13:59:51) Another bored soul: you bitterfly
(13:59:54) Another bored soul: butterfly
(13:59:56) Another bored soul: damn
(14:00:01) Me: what?
(14:00:09) Me: why bitterfly?
(14:00:10) Another bored soul: i wanted to say “you butterfly”
(14:00:17) Me: might as well be dankefly
(14:00:30) Another bored soul: bitterfly would be good for when you get angry
(14:00:34) Me: ah…
(14:00:45) Me: and dankefly when i’m in a thankful mood then?
(14:01:04) Me: hey, lets spam your comments box
(14:01:04) Another bored soul: yeah. Ze German flibbertygibbet
(14:01:10) Another bored soul: Lets not
(14:01:16) Me: (i’m getting bored)
(14:01:18) Me: but why not?
(14:01:26) Me: it’d be a good fun activity to pursue!
(14:01:38) Another bored soul: yes…so get started
(14:01:47) Another bored soul: shwoing my cousin the juicebox video
(14:01:59) Me: ahh, okay
(14:02:09) Me: (i have (gotten started))
(14:02:15) Me: your turn now
(14:02:39) Me: zipedy doo dah but done by portishead
(14:02:41) Another bored soul: (nested brackets!(very nice))
(14:02:53) Me: (yes, i’m famous for such insanity)
(14:03:02) Another bored soul: Zippedy Do Dah by portishead?????
(14:03:22) Me: (i believe thyat good can triumph over evil)
(14:04:46) Me: (but how could i feel pain when you’re being so supportive?)
(14:05:02) Me: (the hokey tokey by kraftwerk)
(14:05:11) Me: you know what i’m on about by now, surely?
(14:05:23) Another bored soul: nope
(14:05:26) Another bored soul: no cvlue
(14:05:29) Me: bill bailey
(14:05:32) Another bored soul: ah
(14:05:33) Me: part troll
….
(14:10:30) Me: ya
(14:10:35) Me: das hkey tokey
(14:10:47) Another bored soul: eh?
(14:10:55) Me: i’m bored out of my mind!
(14:11:12) Another bored soul: but what is dad hokey tokey? Kiddie dope song?
(14:11:14) Me: did you get the ball rolling yet? (with reference to the comment box spamming?)
(14:11:17) Me: nope
(14:11:20) Another bored soul: no not yet
(14:11:29) Me: the hokey tokey in german (part of)
(14:12:19) Me: i’m in room with nothing much to do, really…
(14:12:29) Another bored soul: its the summer sun
(14:12:40) Me: its killing me!
(14:12:47) Another bored soul: Its in my blood
(14:12:51) Me: (and i have nuffin to smoke)
(14:12:51) Another bored soul: god i love that song
(14:12:55) Me: seriously!
(14:13:07) Another bored soul: i’ve been playing it at least 3 times a day
(14:13:08) Me: (have you, by any chance -checked- my reply to your reply yet?)
(14:13:35) Me: (listening to it right now)
(14:13:37) Me: hahaha!
(14:13:42) Me: one upped you, didn’t i?
(14:13:52) Another bored soul: yes you did
(14:13:58) Me: i’m going mad!
(14:14:02) Another bored soul: But I’m…”Up on a hill”
(14:14:46) Me: ergo i’m up on a mountain… unless the mountain i’m on is a very small mountain, and the hill you’re on is a very tall one.. then we might be in trouble
(14:15:51) Another bored soul: trouble?
(14:16:04) Me: because then i might’ve not quite managed to one up you
(14:16:32) Me: one being some arbitrary unit with dimensions of length
(14:16:54) Me: and up denoting the direction along the unit normal to the earth’s surface
(14:17:02) Another bored soul: ah…I’ve been wthout sodgiri for so long…I have to get used to it a gain
(14:17:05) Me: postively oriented
(14:17:17) Another bored soul: positively oriental, if yo ask me
(14:17:18) Me: what, seriously? i thought i scarred people for life….
(14:17:43) Another bored soul: hopes
(14:17:43) Me: a definite chink in the armour
(14:18:15) Me: i need some small rocks!
(14:18:57) Another bored soul: try Elf…the lead singer, I’m told, was a midget
(14:19:13) Me: was he then?
(14:19:39) Another bored soul: his name is Dio
(14:19:42) Another bored soul: not Deo
(14:19:55) Me: so he doesn’t necessarily smell good, then?
(14:20:38) Another bored soul: nope
(14:20:49) Me: crap-crap-crappity -crap
(14:20:49) Another bored soul: YOu must have heard of him…some metalhead
(14:20:59) Me: yeah, but he’s useless
(14:21:04) Me: bloody awful music
(14:21:25) Another bored soul: ah
(14:21:30) Another bored soul: my cousin here is a metal type person
(14:21:31) Me: i’m an executive metalhead, not a fucking weirdo metalhead
(14:21:36) Another bored soul: he palys the drums pretty damn well
(14:21:47) Me: ahh, gut(enberg)
(14:22:15) Another bored soul: guts i tell you
(14:22:27) Me: and blood
(14:22:32) Me: the stuff of gory dreams
(14:22:39) Another bored soul: never had a gory dream
(14:22:56) Another bored soul: apart from the baby-turning-into-mush dream
(14:23:06) Me: babies turn to mushrooms?
(14:23:12) Another bored soul: Do so. and forever hold your piece
(14:23:17) Another bored soul: not mushrooms…mush
(14:23:20) Me: damn
(14:23:45) Me: and here i was hoping for magic mushroom dreams in vivid technicolour
(14:24:05) Another bored soul: not until I actually consume said lifeform
(14:24:23) Me: ah, rightly so, rightly so
(14:24:35) Me: so until that point in time? black and white dreams eh?
(14:24:42) Me: or just sort of shades of octarine?
(14:24:57) Another bored soul: not I get green too y’know.
(14:25:00) Another bored soul: Green isnt bad
….
And so on.
