Slice of Life :: Changing Lanes

Through the breezy high noon din, the kind he was now well acquainted with, came the melancholic feeling of hope. Carrying the various hues, the aroma and other vignettes of assorted memories, he got into the metallic snake that had hissed itself to an indolent stop. The capsule he had chosen was inhabited by just one other passenger, he noted. A young petite blonde in a red sweater with downcast eyes; the kind you’d have a hard time distinguishing if there was a book on her person, or a cellular device or, worse – maybe she was asleep! Eyes and their tricks, he thought to himself as he settled down facing her, several rows away, with giant cushion seats enveloping everything else except her face.

Soon the snake yawned out of its momentary respite and caught pace, pushing itself past the complacent traffic that followed its rails. It flew past metal poles, cheap graffiti by ambitious vandals and several meadows of lush greens mixed with majestic browns. In his mind’s eye, he could still see the girl. Sitting with her eyelids covering the mysticism that probably were resident behind their alluring shades.

And then just like that - his mind began to go astray. Like a lovesick Koel calling out to its non-existent mate. Koo! Koo! In the flickering shadows of light and lighter, he could see her immaculate beauty now. That slender neck, positioned aesthetically over her tender shoulders. That slightly pointed nose that held a subtle yet distinctive ear-ring on one of its sides. Those locks! O the magical spells they bound him by. The way they entwined against one another, forming gorgeously silky coils that seemed to catch the bouncing rays of the sun and ooze them slowly all across the isolated bogie’s emptiness. A haven, he reflected, that was capturing both their souls within its emotionless cocoon-like umbrella. O, a time that is truly to be treasured, he observed allowing himself to desire her.

He noted he was in the ‘Quiet Zone’ yet his heart was making a dozen noises. Melodies of sorts that could only be heard by the instrument of his silent eyes. Tunes, he hoped, he could give that feminine divinity who sat a few rows away from him, taunting him into restlessness with nothing more than just her anonymity. Rhythms came to his lips that were being manufactured with each passing second from the lyrical radiations of her glowing face. ‘O lovely creature’, he said to himself with his pathetically laced adherence to the reality of needs. ‘What shall I name thee?’ he continued imagining her splendor in his arms. Holding him. Loving him back.

The metallic gear driven adder, now shifting lanes with its thud and crackle, approached its next provisional halt. A feminine robotic voice crooned the name of the stop over the audio equipment that pierced its way even into the ‘Quiet Zone’. And on hearing this – she finally opened her eyes.

For a moment the ambiance was filled with the euphoria of her grace. That sluggish unhurriedness with which she picked up her handbag. That languid enchantment with which she got up to leave and that…

He looked away suddenly. Looked at his watch nervously. 02:49PM. Looked away once more and resisted all temptations to subdue the unforeseen flair of his carnal desires this chance encounter had brought upon him. From the corner of his eye, he saw that flawless allure of his fleeting ambition disembark with an extremely loaded stomach that would get a physician’s touch anytime soon.

And just like that – it was all over. Until, of course, another one walked in and sat right across him. This time, though, he continued looking away.

..ShaKri...

Ragging - a national shame!

As I reluctantly go to links of popular Indian newspaper websites these days, I am never sure if I will find something there to be proud about or will what I find there make me more ashamed of being an Indian. If one particular news piece reads ‘2 Oscars for Madras Mozart Rahman!’ then the one sitting directly next to it in another column will read ’19 year old youth dies due to excessive ragging’. It is a feeling that leaves me nauseated every single time along with the common conclusion – should I be happy for the achievement or sad for the disgusting root rot our society continues to exhibit so shamelessly? I am never sure.

I am not delusional – of course I know there is no such thing as Utopia where the grass is always green and streets are always clean. But notwithstanding people’s constant urge not to be preached to, the question still remains – what is wrong with our society? What good is our ground breaking technology and booming economy if we blatantly sit by and allow such heinous crimes to take place? Where is the justification to call ourselves ‘a progressive society’ when boys and girls are abused so openly right under the stinking nose of the so-called administration? How many more candles should we light in order to finally slap the sleeping ‘protectors of social justice’ and tell them – ‘Get up or get lost!’

I don’t get it. I just don’t get it.

Despite the constant itch for global recognition we find a thousand ways to keep scratching why are we still so uncultured? Why on Earth do we behave in such carnal ways and continue to prove that the filthy cesspool that Slumdog Millionaire’s young protagonist gleefully jumps into to get a superstar’s autograph was indeed a disgusting metaphor to the way our country continues to ‘progress’ each year? One step forward means ten steps backwards. It is absolutely sickening. The deep seeded mode of constant denial and appalling levels of merciless complacency in our nation makes me cringe.

I have been hearing of this ragging menace for as long as I can remember. Why, even today I can recall vivid conversations my mother used to have with us explaining how ruthless college hostels in India were and how the junior students there were physically and mentally abused before being ‘accepted’ into their ‘college clan’. And oh what a glorious clan indeed! Nothing more than a bunch of mind numbingly dim witted moronic rowdies who parade around their over inflated ego just for the one ludicrous reason that they are ‘older in age’ than their victims. Are we really this juvenile? Do we really have to make front page news across the globe for such asinine reasons from our 'shining' world of academia? No wonder none of the students from around the world want to study in India! Ever heard of an American or European student almost dying to go to a University in India? No? Well...mystery solved! How can we ever claim that we are a ‘potential super power’ when we can’t even control our own messy back yard? How many more deaths should take place before college administration finally brings the hammer on the sorry little heads of these criminals who reside in thousands of places all over the country? Shameful! Absolutely and utterly shameful!

Take Aman Kachroo’s example. What was his fault? That he wanted a bright future for himself? That he had dreamt of becoming someone someday? That he wanted to help the society that had given him a context by becoming a doctor? And what happened instead? Some crooks who called themselves ‘students’ did him to death in the name of ‘ragging’. A sad bottom line to the story of a man who wanted to give life but was eventually denied the same in the end.

As much as I feel angry and betrayed by the education system and the gubernatorial powers that be in India about such cases, what I also know is this isn’t the first and this wont be the last. It is in this grass root level of complacent mediocrity and shocking outrage that I send my deepest condolences to Aman’s family. Your son did not deserve this death and I hope – I sincerely hope – that his untimely, unjust and unacceptable demise does not go without being avenged.

May his soul rest in peace. Amen.

..ShaKri..

Goals matter

Maybe it’s the fact that I tend to associate every philosophical discourse to something I can actually relate with. Or maybe it is just that I am so bored sometimes, that I start to notice the weirdest connections in the most unlikely places. Maybe it’s both. I can’t say for sure. But as I sat at that diner today gorging on that vegetarian pizza something struck me as very odd. Now before I go on, some background here. I, about once a month, visit this ‘all you can eat’ pizzeria on my way to the Indian groceries in the city. While the food is good and comes at a standard price, there is one little oddity that always has me pondering. Ordinarily if I were to go to a regular restaurant and order a pizza, then I see myself lapping up every single slice of a large pizza without any leftovers along with a large coke! Why is this odd? Because, in this earlier mentioned ‘all you can eat’ diner I find myself struggling to go past six small slices! I have tested it each time and somehow, the mind refuses to acknowledge that in a different circumstance, I can easily down 10 slices without a problem as long as I can see them all at once.

This got me thinking. Is it because there is no limit to how much I can eat – ergo meaning, ‘no goal’ – that I find myself stopping at six? And in other cases when there is 10 slices, I have a goal to meet? And hence I manage to eat them all? I don’t know. Come to think of it, the same is true with other things too. Imagine having to go to a mall or a bazaar without any goal in mind. Chances are you will spend a few hours there and end up buying nothing important. Same case, if you go with maybe a list of things to look at, then you find yourself not only buying the stuff you need but also in good time! How about shopping at a supermarket when you go there without a list? Don’t you always buy 10 more things you never thought you would? And don’t you find yourself bringing it home and wondering ‘God…why did I buy this?’ and never using it ever?

I don’t know. Maybe all this means nothing. But today as I left the diner having devoured six small slices and feeling very full, I wondered if next time I should try putting 10 slices at once on the plate instead of having to eat three at a time. But then…maybe that won’t look too good, would it? So I guess then it’s settled. Goals do matter regardless of its purpose. Even if it means just ‘lunch’. What do you think?

..ShaKri..

The ‘education’ paradigm

MAITRI AND VIKAS have been together for almost five years now. Maitri works for an ad agency while Vikas is a freelance photographer who has his own studio in the city. After half a decade of closely knit courtship, they finally decided to tie the knot. Despite the fact that they had lived together for almost three years, they felt the need to officially solemnize the relationship with the seal of matrimony. I have also been invited to the festivities and I hope to make it there to wish them both a world of happiness and bliss.

Now, what does Maitri and Vikas have in common? Except the fact that they are seriously mad about each other – nothing. They come from ridiculously different backgrounds. She is the quintessential Gujju (short for Gujrati) girl steeped in various cultural variations of her own roots which include a monthly visit to Swami Narayan temples with her family. He, on the other very distant hand, is an atheist who finds the concept of God and religion a complete hoax. Despite being bred in a fairly orthodox Iyengar family, Vikas found his Almighty in his photographs. He neither worships anyone else nor intends to. Well – maybe with the fair exception of Maitri.

There is one more strand, apart from these concrete platforms these two stand on, that tell them apart – their education. Maitri has a decorated MBA from one of the finest Universities of the country while Vikas never even finished college. My conservatively liberal upbringing let out a spark when this fact breezed by me. As someone who has been fed on a rich diet of the clichéd - ‘Arranged Marriage Good / Love Marriage Bad’ – I could not help but wonder what it would have been like had these two met under different circumstances. For instance, had they interacted with each other through a regular marriage alliance or a matrimonial website? I can wager quite confidently that Maitri would have declined Vikas’ proposal. Reason – he wasn’t educated enough to match her intellectual prowess and hence would harm her family’s sense of pride.

There was something about this possibility that bothered me. Considering that the concept of arranged marriages is most prevalent in countries like India, how much value do the others – read Americans, English, Europeans et al who do not consider the semantics of the other person for love and hopefully more – really give the formal education of their partner? Does it even matter? As I spoke to one of my Italian colleagues, she almost laughed at the question. ‘As long as he is a good man and knows how to treat a woman’ she said with an air of assurance that almost made me blush. I could not help but head back to the hundreds of profiles of prospective brides I had seen in the past few months where a girl with Bachelors in Commerce was looking for a doctor or an M.D or in some cases a PhD holder! I could not quite fathom the logic behind this sense of match making. If one looks at the relationship from a purely financial point of view, then there is some room for the argument that a person with a higher qualification stands a bright chance for a better job – hence translating into better income which then equates itself into wonderful living.

OK.

But does it really mean that a person with a PhD is a better human being than someone with a BCA degree or even just a diploma? Hardly. From experience if there is one thing I have learnt is that the most irrational and outrageous behaviors come from highly qualified individuals. Not to belittle their accomplishments – since I know some wonderful human beings with advanced degrees as well – but their educational milestones are rarely a reflection of their personality. I was reminded of Muniyappa, one of the ground staff who used to work with my father when he was in the Central government. During my three years in Chennai, I had never met a man – apart from my father of course – more affectionate than him. My father used to joke that maybe he was a woman in his past life since there was no other explanation to his deep sense of kindness, gratitude, humbleness and above all - honesty. He was happily married and fathered three wonderful children. He was truly an image of what a human being should believe in and follow as a principle in making the world a better place. As it turned out, Muniyappa had stopped his education after the tenth grade.

There are several such examples where a person with lesser exposure to academia has turned out to be the ideal person one wishes for while someone with illustrative multiple degrees attached to their shoulder turns out to be the biggest imbeciles one could ever meet.

I do not debate the fact that education is definitely a must if a society has to grow and prosper, but my reservation is with gauging a person’s character based on his education. Ideally one would think the two would be directly proportional – but the reality is that they are not. Education is merely one tool that helps bring awareness and knowledge to a person but it is not the only tool. There are so many more parameters that shape an individual’s character. Some of it is experience, some is the hardship one has gone through while others include understanding what love means and how to respect the opposite sex. If people fail in these vital categories, no amount of education helps.

As I get ready to wish Maitri and Vikas on their joyous day, the words of Aristotle ring true – ‘Character is that which reveals moral purpose, exposing the class of things a man chooses and avoids.’ So the next time you meet someone with lesser intellectual milestones than yourself, try not to walk away too soon. You might be about to meet a true gift to mankind or who knows … even a life partner!





..ShaKri..