5 things for this week (Part 21)

The first day back from home after your vacation is always the worst. The obstreperous nature of things inside your head makes you question yourself.

"What is the purpose of staying out here for four months, if 7 days at home is all you want? Is this sort of penance worth the money you are supposed to be making? Is this what I wanted all along, or what I want for myself?"

I know the answer to the last one. For someone who wished to be able to work in his home city for all his life, so that he can live blissfully in the same circumstances in which he grew up, I know pretty well that the answer to the first part of that last question is a big NO.

And when I consider that I'll leave for home again in December end and come back on New Year's day, I shudder to my bones. I'll be leaving when it's cold here, then spend some quality time at home when its moderately warm there, and then come back to a colder Delhi for another four, or maybe, five months of abstinence.

And it's hard to rue your fate when you made an informed decision three years back to NOT to go for that IT job, which would have eventually placed you in your hometown, but to go for the other job, which will take you far, far away from there. I don't think I need anything other than that singular decision to prove my insanity.

Anyways, here I am, trying hard to figure out the loophole in my prayer that God had exploited to put me here. I don't know what he could do with "Please help me get a good job here in Trivandrum.", but he did something. The pessimist in me had thrown in the towel and became an atheist long back. The optimist in me believes that since I didn't specify a time frame, he must have something planned for me back home, based upon the experience I have gained here.

With all said and done, on the basis of the thoughts on prayers that I've had now, this week's post is going to be themed on "Temples". Not actual facts, mind you, but more of what my experiences have taught me.

So, let's begin, shall we?

Did you know...

1. ...that you have to pray for the thing you actually wanted??

It is a common sight to see people breaking coconuts in front of Lord Ganesha for removing any obstacles in some effort that they are about to undertake. These efforts vary from writing an exam to going to get married. What I've personally experienced in such situations is that at the time of breaking the coconut, instead of praying to the God that he remove all obstacles, you are most probably going to pray that the coconut should break.

The ridicule-drenched looks you get on an unsuccessful attempt is enough to keep your mind sorely concentrated on the act of breaking the coconut, making you forget to specify for what you are breaking it in the first place.

2. ...that the best place to find beautiful gals are here?

Now, when I say there's beauty in a female, I know that it's arbitrary. My friends have never spared a moment to remind me that what I find beautiful is not that beautiful in the eyes of the general public. But no matter how skewed your scale of beauty is, I can assure you that you can find one specimen of the highest order if you visit a temple on an auspicious day. This is another reason why I often forget to actually pray when I get to a temple. I get immersed in the distractions walking around me.

3. ... that a temple is a good place to be on the look out for?

Look out for what, I hear you ask. Well, let's pretend that your parents are delusion-ed enough to suggest that you should get married. Let's continue with the pretending by assuming that they are actively looking for a possible match for you. In such circumstances, it might be plausible for their expectation to be not matching with yours. In such a hypothetical situation, it would do you good to go on a temple visit with your parents, where there shall be a variety of specimen of the female kind for you to, hypothetically, suggest one as your expectation.

4. ... that, hypothetically, if you meet again that girl, that you had hypothetically suggested to your parents as a possible lifemate, it doesnt mean anything?

Just keep repeating that to yourself. Hypothetically, of course. :D :p

5. ... that I've never set foot on a place of worship other than a temple?

I find this odd. In 25 years of roaming about on this Earth, in spite of living in God's own country for more than two decades, I'm yet to enter a place of worship that adheres to a different set of principles than that I'm supposed to follow.

The closest I came was in the May of this year, when I went to attend a Christian wedding at a church. But since we (me and my collegemates) were quite noisy, we felt it would be better if we just stuck to the little space near the juice stand.

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So, that's all for this week. I would have loved to hit a hat trick with three "special event of the week" posts on the trot, but the special event for this week has already been described by me in the past.

You won't normally find an aspiring writer who'll say that he has already written the best he could/would ever write, but I might be something like that. This past Wednesday, August 21st  had three special events on the same day for me. In the chronological order in which I was introduced to them in my life, it was the day one of my best friends was born; it marked four years since my grandfather died; and it was the second birthday of my nephew.

I had written "The Last Wish" nearly four years before, to pay my tribute to one of the best personalities I've ever known. I recounted my last meaningful talk with him in that. And I believe that that is the best prose I'll ever write in my life.

That's all folks. See you next week.

Have a great weekend!!!

5 things for this week (Part 20)

Now, if I had done a post last week on a special day happening during the week, then it makes sense on my part to continue with that same philosophy for this week too. But don't think that this post is obligatory. This post is going to be sweet, short and simple. But if in some manner you deem this post to be obligatory, then please do sympathize with my situation. By the time I'm posting this, I'll be at home and I will personally be enjoying those 140 hours of freedom from THIS life - freedom being our choice of theme this week.

So, as you might have read in today's newspaper, it was our Independence day yesterday. Now, that sentence is a lie. Why? Because I don't know any newspaper which comes out with an issue on the day after a national holiday.

Anyways, August pandrah san unniz sou sayntaalees main, humare pandit Jawaharlal Nehru ji ne lal qila me bharat ka pataka udake bhaarat ko swathantre ghoshit kar liya.

For those of you who don't understand Hindi, or if you don't understand the "Hindi" that I wrote above, it's translation in English would be along the lines of

on August 15th, 1947, our Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru flew the Indian Flag atop the Red Fort, declaring to the world that India is a free state.

With that, we shall begin today's "5 things".

Did you know...

1. ...that Telangana will be our 29th independent state of the Indian Republic?

"On 30 July 2013, the ruling Congress party resolved to request the Central government to make steps in accordance with the Constitution to form a separate state of Telangana. The timeline for the creation of the new state involves an elaborate process, which has been allotted 122 days, or at least four months. The split has to be approved by the Parliament of India before the state is officially created."

So, that is another state's name your child will have to remember when he goes for his Social Science exams. Some people have extrapolated this increase in the number of states in India to come up with a future map of India, titling it "United States of India".

P.S. Let's let go of the states here and turn our attention to the union territories in India. There are seven of them. Can you name them all??

2. ...that the last time I sang our National anthem was some 5 years back?

This is a confession. I've to admit that since I left school, few situation have arose wherein I had to sing our National anthem. I believe this to be situation of grave consequences. Being the National Anthem, there are restraints of location and timing for the use of National Anthem. Our generation shouldn't be allowed to squalor in the songs of the west, but be given opportunities to sing aloud their National Anthem.

3. ...that the last time I took the National Pledge was back in school?

That would be the early part of 2006, a good seven years before. What I mean to say with the National Anthem and National Pledge points is not that we don't care. I'm pretty sure that you, like me, would repeat the words of both; refresh them in due time in your mind. But the basic aim of these two pillars is to imbibe the spirit of Patriotism in those who take part in it. It is not something that should be done by an individual, but by the community. There has to be more venues for doing the same.

4. ...that the person who designed our national flag is yet to receive a Bharat Ratna - the highest civilian award in India?

The name you are looking for is Pingali Venkayya. He was the one who suggested the idea of a national flag for India at an annual congress meeting, and was entrusted with the making of the same by Mahatma Gandhi. He used safforn and green to represent the major communities in India, Gandhiji added white to represent the minorities, and the Ashok Chakra was included to represent the laws of Dharma.

5. ...that a group of tribal girls, who have never played football outside of their village, came third at an international competition in Spain?

You can't keep me away from football for too long. I'll find some way to sneak it in here. But this is not something which we have to whisper among ourselves. These girls braved the odds, went afar, played to their full potential and came back glorious. Kudos to them and their mentor, Franz Gastler.

Well, that's it from me for this week.

See you all next week.

Have a great weekend!!!

5 things for this week (Part 19)

I just got off the phone after talking to a special person. Even though he is just about two years old, he has become a maverick at home, wooing and amusing all who are there with his antics. In between his calls of "Maama*!! Maama!!", he was trying to tell me about this cooker he was playing with.

*Mama is Uncle in Malayalam

I'm told that his reaction to the cooker is rather amusing, and depends entirely on the place where it is resting. All places bar the stove means that he is the master - he can lift it up, throw it around, bang it on the ground, play with it for an eternity as it may seem.

But when the said cooker is placed on the stove (the stove hasn't to be lit; it just has to be there on the stove), you won't find him within 10 feet of it. He'll seen hiding behind the curtain on the door frame, trying to sneak a peak of whether someone is going to move his "toy" into a more non-hazardous area.

Even if you try to take him near to the cooker, he will start getting agitated, screaming "Shoo!! Shoo!!", referring to the obnoxious sound that emanates from his favorite toy.

After he got bored with talking to the phone which sounded like his Maaman, he started asking my mother to take him back to the cooker. So, my mother gave the phone to my father to cut the call.

As I was saying my regards, I heard something in the background. Cries of "ALLAH HO AKBAR!!!" from the mosque near my home. Since my blog this week is themed on "ISLAM", with it being Eid, you might think that this is suspiciously convenient for me, but I think of it as nothing more than a happy coincidence. A sort of "you are doing things the right way" signal from someone above us.

Coming back to the cries that I heard, I still remember the early mornings I used to have on exam days. Roughly two and a half minutes after I had snoozed my first alarm, I would be jolted out of my half-sleepy state by this cry ringing out clear and loud from the mosque nearby. It was God's alarm to remind me that I had about two hours to mug up some more so that I don't face more problems than necessary at the exam.

Living at a place which was two minutes away from a temple and a mosque meant that I never thought of people from other religion as something different. I didn't need someone to teach me the customs and practices of people from other religions are different to mine. I observed as much in my daily life. I believe that this is a far better tool to make us less bitter in the inside.

I've been always been horrified at all the hate I've heard about, and recently seen, towards this particular sect of our fellow denizens. Like I said before, maybe it's because I've never thought of them as any different to us.

If we are going to blame a community for the doings of a few among them, then think of all the things that the earth will be blaming on the seven billion of us living on her.

If we are going to retaliate on the whole for the act of a few, then think of how you will protect yourself, if all the animals in the world retaliated for the cruelty hurled upon them by a few.

Most of us would have seen the above picture in some social networking site, and had a laugh - if not at the apparent stereotyping, then at the levels to which humans have degraded themselves to.

I know it is hard to change the views that you have had for years, but I think if you can be a bit more lenient in your thoughts and words, then this world can be a better place for everyone here.

"There's already enough hate in this world without you adding to it."

It's a cliche, but such cliches exist because we can't seem to follow what it says.

So, as my little step towards fostering an amicable relation towards the followers of Islam from the rest of us, today's "5 things" will be about the customs, practices and rituals of Muslims.

Shall we begin then?? Alrighty then.

Did you know...

1. ...that the religions of Islam is based upon the "Five pillars of Islam"?

They make up Muslim life, prayer, concern for the needy, self purification and the pilgrimage. They are :

1. Shahadah (belief or confession of faith)
2. Salat (worship in the form of prayer)
3. Sawm Ramadan (fasting during the month of Ramadan)
4. Zakat (alms or charitable giving)
5. Hajj (the pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in a lifetime.

2. ...that Muslims fast in the month of Ramadan because they feel that it brings them closer to God?

In the month when the Quran was revealed, Muslims all over the world fast from sunrise to sunset. They abstain from eating, drinking and conjugal relationships for that time over a period of month as a penance. This carries a significant spiritual meaning for them. It teaches one the principle of love: because when one observes fasting, it is done out of deep love for God and to learn self-restraint. Also, this enables them to feel compassion at the plight of those who are less fortunate than them.

3. ...that the Hajj is the largest gathering of people around the world every year?

As a part of the "Five pillars of Islam", it is the religious duty of every able-bodied Muslim, who can afford to, to go for pilgrimage, at least once in his or her lifetime. As a part of this, millions of believers folk to the city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia to fulfill their duty.

4. ...that a believer must pray five times a day?

This prayer is the cries to the God that I heard as I grew up. Called Salah, this ritual consists of repeating a set of prescribed actions and words. Obligatory salah is prescribed at five periods of the day. These are measured according to the movement of the sun. These are: near dawn, after midday has passed and the sun starts to tilt downwards / Noon, in the afternoon, just after sunset and around nightfall.

5. ...that the Muslims believe that Jesus is a prophet?

Now, before I cause any unnecessary controversy, let me make my point clear. If you would be kind enough to click on that link you will read the following,

"Muslims believe that God had previously revealed Himself to the earlier prophets of the Jews and Christians, such as Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. Muslims therefore accept the teachings of both the Jewish Torah and the Christian Gospels. They believe that Islam is the perfection of the religion revealed first to Abraham (who is considered the first Muslim) and later to other prophets"

(and an extra one for today)

...that the food at Muslim wedding is unbelievable?

Unbelievable because of the variety of dishes served. Unbelievable because of the taste of the served dishes. Unbelievable because of the amount of the dishes you would treat yourself to. You have to go to one to understand how good it is.

Another surprisingly convincing thing in this blog will be that my neighbour (who is a Muslim) is getting married on the 15th of this month, and as my luck would have it, I'm at home from that day for my second vacation of the year. You would think that I would now go on and gloat about me having a non vegetarian feast on the day I reach home, but no, I won't do that.

Why?

Because I'm a vegetarian on Thursdays.

Why?

I'll tell you some other time. I'm now off to buy a toy cooker.

See you all next week.

Have a great weekend!!!

The purpose of THIS

I came across this image on the internet in the recent past.

If you can't see the image, here is what's written in it.

"Time changes everything.
That's what people say. It's not true.
Doing things changes things. Not doing things leaves them exactly as they were."

I came across all this and more at a site called "quora". There, they have civilized discussions on all topics under the sun, from "what's your opinion about a guy who worked as a professional footballer for over 20 years without ever having to step onto the pitch" to "Do female astronauts were bras in space?". Like I said, they discuss all kinds of topics there. ;)

Anyways, I found the picture that I've shown you in a discussion happening in that site. The topic being discussed was "At age 25, would you pursue a good paying corporate job that makes you unhappy or a hobby that makes you happy, but has no guarantee to pay the bills?"

Well, just picture me reading that question. A 24 year old guy, in a good paying corporate job, who is partly unhappy because he finds himself not anywhere near where he wanted to be by now. And sad to say, I don't think I'm that good enough at any of my hobbies to earn a penny from it. After all, knowledge in most matter relating to the football club called Arsenal; or knowing how to use the computer in an optimal manner; or writing something every week is not going to make me any money.

Moreover, I don't think I want to make money from them. It's all well and good, if you can work in a field you love, but for people like me, who have a mediocre skill set, it's always safe to make sure that the hobby is just that, a hobby. Something you do to derive pleasure from. Something which strokes your ego. But there was a time when I felt that it was tedious to make an effort to do your hobby.

That was the time when I asked myself this question over and over again - "How do I make myself happy?" That is a question that has plagued the minds of the best. I saw my friends trying for higher studies; trying for high paying jobs; trying to get into government service; trying to follow their dream; trying to go and study abroad; etc etc. I evaluated each option and said "NO" to each. The fact that I had to "try" for them put me off from doing them.

Don't get me wrong. It is not that I'm lazy or anything. I look at where I am now, and I feel that if I step in any other direction to better my career, it'll be asking more of me in return. I won't say that the job that I've and the work that I do are perfect, but, to be honest, it suits me fine.

There is no never-ending, undue pressure on me; the work is always doable; I get my weekends off; I'm valued for the work I do. These are the things I want from my work. Of course, I would love to get paid thrice the money for doing a quarter of this work, but you can't have it all, can you?

It is in this scenario that I accepted my friend's advice to work on my writing skills as a means of improving my look on my life. And what better way to better your writing skills than to write regularly. Jerry Seinfeld is a popular comedian in the Western world, and this is what he had to say about how he continually achieved creative success.

"Seinfeld explained his method for success: each January, he hangs a large year-at-a-glance calendar on his wall and, for every day he wrote new material, he had the exquisite pleasure that can only come from drawing a big red "X" over that day.  Drawing those Xs got to be pretty fun and rewarding, so he kept doing it. Eventually, he began to create a chain of red Xs.

The idea was to never break that chain.

Not only does this approach program the body and mind to sit down and write daily – it also motivates you to continue that beautiful string of big, red Xs. If you don't write one day, you don't get to draw the X."

I came across this after I started the "5 things" series, but I'll gladly accept that this is in fact something I keep in my mind as I continue the series. I know that I might expose myself to ridicule just because I write for the sake of writing, but I feel it is necessary to write something every week. It makes me happy in the sense that I feel like I've met the target that I set for myself.

Speaking of ridicules, "She has a blog, and to tell the truth, it is ten times better than yours."

Let us forget for a moment that this comment is coming from a person actively stalking the said 'she', who is a new joinee at my office; and just concentrate on the last part of that sentence. 'it is ten times better than you.' But just after a short while.

Have you heard about the Infinite Monkey Theorem??

"A monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type a given text, such as the complete works of William Shakespeare."

I'm someone who believes very much in the possibility of that happening. So for a person, who believes in the prospect of a monkey outwitting him to full-on literature glory, I'm at peace with the fact that the world contains people better than me.

For a language as widely used as English, there are only 26 letters for you to work with. And with just those handful of letters, it opens up the possibility of a great love story; an emotional prose; a poem describing the beauty of nature; a phrase encapsulating the universal truth; a sentence about the current socio-economic situation; a word on the lifetime achievement of a legend, etc etc.

No where is it written that you can find a gem of a sentence, but at the tip of a genius's pen. What the internet has done is to provide "monkeys" like us a platform to showcase what we have typed. It has opened up our work to an unequal amount of praise and ridicule. It has provided us a way to know how good we are in the eyes of the world.

But if ever someone says to you that your work could improve, never be disheartened. Just realize that you might have to type some more on that typewriter, before you find your own literary gem.

5 things for this week (Part 18)

Something happened last Tuesday. It could have been Wednesday for all I know, but since the event happened during the night when I was lost in sleep, I didn't check whether the hour hand had gone beyond the 12 hour mark or not.

The incident itself was not that big a thing. My fan - the one which provides me with circulated wind, not the one who stalks me - made some weak explosive noises, followed it up by some ghostly moans, and then went about its usual business of being always on the move, rotating endlessly. Even though I was awakened from my slumber, I was too lazy to open my eyes to check out what had happened. Actually, I didn't want to open my eyes and be able to see the "ceiling fan dropping down from the ceiling onto you" nightmare become a reality.

So, I laid there, and lulled myself back to sleep in the cold draft that the villainous machine was producing.

It was only on Wednesday evening that I found out that the explosions and noises from the other night was with regards to the fan blowing its capacitor. To those of you in the dark regarding the electrical miracles that happens in this small machine, the capacitor is required for the starting of the fan. As you would have inferred already, I was left with a defective fan. I decided to get it fixed.

But deciding is one thing; being focussed about it is another; and the actual act of getting things done is Herculean.

You see how this ends up for me right??

It's been three days, and I've been consistent in finding trivial, but convincing reasons to not get it done.

1. "It's raining. How can I go out now?"
2. "I'm an Electrical Engineer. I shouldn't be asking a electrician to do this. I'm gonna do this myself...... right after I finish watching this movie...."
3. "Aahh!!! Leave it. I'll do it tomorrow. It's not like I can't live without it."
4. "So I've bought a capacitor. Seems like I'll have to do this now. But, where do I put this in? I think I'll go and call that electrician. But maybe after taking rest for some time. After all, I'm tired from going out to buy this capacitor."
5. "I think she'll be coming online today. Which sane man will go after fixing a fan, when he has a chance to do something better?"

[Don't you worry. Those are not the "5 things" for this week.]

This is on top of the fact that I'm currently sleeping in the hall on a sofa, which is five and a half foot long. This leaves my head and feet hanging out of its two ends, giving me cramps when I wake up every morning. I used to sleep by 11-11.30, but since I had to shift into the hall, I don't sleep before 12.30, because someone would be out there talking/doing stuff.

You see, even the physical discomforts I've had to face aren't stopping me from being who I really am. So, who am I?

Just kidding!!!

I'm a Procrastinator - one who religiously follows the below mentioned universal principle as dictated by the laws of Procrastination.

Now, to put this whole saga in prespective. I told you last Friday that I was going to do a back-to-back blog fest on Football.

I didn't.

The irony is that I spent the weekend playing FIFA instead of completing the blog. And then, I "procrastinated" over the whole week, making sure that it is as it was before - a half finished blog. And it joins the not-so-elite club of over a dozen blogs, who are still waiting to be completed; some of them, for more than a year.

So, this isn't me giving you an excuse/explanation for not writing that blog. This is just what I thought as I brooded over the ever growing "Drafts" section in this blog. This is this week's theme - Procrastination.

So, let's begin shall we??

Did you know...

1. ...that we procrasinators are not that easily mended?

Society has always been about efficiency and maximization and hard work in every sphere of life. So, procrastinators have always been held in contempt. We have people imploring us to be better since forever. From Horace in 65BC - "Tear thyself from delay" to Elizabeth Kubler-Ross in the 20th century - "It is only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth - and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up - that we will begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had." 

They've all tried to eradict what one among them called is the gravest disease to inflict man kind. But even today, among the people out there, there are more procrastinators than not. Why so, you ask? Because being lazy is awesome!! And easy!! :D

2. ...that I'm on African time?

Before any racially charged thoughts start filling your mind, how about you click that link?

This "time" isn't dependent on a race/region. This is what you can call a lifestyle, adopted initially by some people in the African continent. The lifestyle is heavily based on Procrastination. It includes "the more leisurely, relaxed and less rigourously scheduled lifestyle found in African Countries".

But be careful of where you use this word. In the current phase of its expansion, the English language uses this phrase as a derogatory term to describe those people who are inherently incapable of meeting targets/deadlines/appointments.

3. ...that "Prevention is better than cure" is something we are strongly against?

Last week, one of my friend fell down from the bike, and got a big enough scratch on his right arm. Instead of taking him to the hospital, we decided to do some home medicine - rub some dettol on the wound and then forget about it.

In two days time, it made my friend very aware of its existence by swelling up and leaking pus. We then took him to a doctor, who went on to perform what can only be called a medically approved torture on it. He poured various burning liquids on it; started rubbing on the wound like you would rub on the stain on the plate which refuses to go away; poured some acid on it; and topped it off by applying Betadine.

Needless to say, the Hemophobic me almost went into a Syncope. (That is me going all medical on you!!!)

The moral is "Prevention is always better than the cure". But no use saying that to a procrastinator.

4. ...that there are fifteen instances of the word "Procrastinate" in this whole blog?

Now, why is this so important. It is just to show you that even though I'm a procrastinator, I can be arsed to do more. I wanted to check how many times that word was used in this blog. But instead of using the "find" option to ease my task, I decided to "challenge" myself by counting it one by one. And I arrived at this number. So, it's not like all hope is lost in our case. We can be made to do work. But there should be rewards and perks - like having a mutually acceptable amount of cash transferred into your account at the end of every month. That really gets us going.

P.S. The perk in counting "Procrastinate" one by one, was to counter check the grammar and spelling of this post. I've been getting reviews that I should spell check and proof read at least once before I post. (-_-)

5. ...that "Good things take time" is the mantra we use?

A distorted version of "Good things come to those who wait". This phrase lauds the virtue of patience you will find in a man, who keeps on doing what he does, irrespective of the result. This is equally applicable to a hard working man, as also to someone, who procrastintes (is too lazy to get off his ass). 

Missed deadlines, physical hardships, broken relations and what not can never break our spirit to continue to be in our state of rest. All those things might scare us at first, they might drive us mad, but in the end, we'll look it in the eyes and say, "Meh!!"

********

By the way, I may be procrastinator. I may continually keep breaking my promises. But please do give me credit where I'm due.

Some four months back, I was crazy enough to suggest that I would blog about "5 things" every week. Given my track record, it shouldn't have gone beyond two weeks tops. But somehow or the other, I'm compelled by some unknown force to make these posts. That force provides me the inspiration, the topics, the sentences, and the words. I am merely its instrument.

Or maybe, my multiple personalities might have held a meeting and arrived at the decision that this blog doesn't come under the purview of the Procrastinator in me.

Either way, it is nothing short of a miracle. This series rolls on. And I hope to be able to keep entertaining you with this.

[There, I did it]

Good things come to those who wait, right?

Well, wait for me till next week then.

Have a great Weekend!!!

04-08-2013... UPDATE - The fan was fixed by yours truly. I think that'll be enough to prop up my professional ego for a few months.