One more fucked up thing down the drain...I'm going up in the snake-and-ladder game but it's amazing the rate at which I'm losing out on people around me...I have screwed my social life completely for my professional one and I am not sure whether I am doing the right thing...Anyway, it's my decision and I'm going to stick to it. One, coz it's too late to go back now...and two, coz this is very important to me...may be more than anything else...

Starry Starry Night...

Starry, starry night.

Paint your palette blue and grey,
Look out on a summer's day,
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul.
Shadows on the hills,
Sketch the trees and the daffodils,
Catch the breeze and the winter chills,
In colors on the snowy linen land.

Starry, starry night.
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze,
Swirling clouds in violet haze,
Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue.
Colors changing hue,
morning field of amber grain,
Weathered faces lined in pain,
Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand.

For they could not love you,
But still your love was true.
And when no hope was left in sight
On that starry, starry night,
You took your life, as lovers often do.
But I could have told you, Vincent,
This world was never meant for one
As beautiful as you.

Starry, starry night.
Portraits hung in empty halls,
Frameless head on nameless walls,
With eyes that watch the world and can't forget.
Like the strangers that you've met,
The ragged men in the ragged clothes,
The silver thorn of bloody rose,
Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.

Now I think I know what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen,
they're not listening still.
Perhaps they never will...

Unchartered territories fascinate me…

I usually have this dream wherein I’m standing on a straight, unwinding road with a spine made of white stripes. I’m alone on that road for as long as I can see. There are no trees, just sparse grass all around this one road that has dissected the terrain. There are no birds. I wish that I could hear something other than my thudding heart. There is no one. The point from where I begin is of particularly no importance. It’s like some random position on that road. I don’t know how I’ve come to be there…

I don’t know where I’m going. I try to figure out about the destination, that where this road heads but the only thing I can see is that the road is getting narrower and narrower and finally becoming a single point where it vanishes into the light blue sky. I suddenly remember the desolate details of Road to Perdition. I understand that goddamn maddening feeling now. It was good for the kid and the father to be alone on the road, but here, the vacuum is killing me. Slowly, a deserted and abandoned feeling starts creeping over. I realize now that solitude has some sense and importance only when you are swarmed with people…

After a while, the feeling starts sinking in. That I’m alone means compleeeete FREEDOM! So what if this is out of compulsion? Freedom out of compulsion? No that’s a dense statement…But, in a way, that makes sense too…In any case, I don’t have to be answerable…and expectations play no role in deciding what I do next. I am dying to start but the commonsense prevails. For something to happen, something to stir somewhere and make itself felt. How can there be nobody? Absolutely no one? Maybe there’s danger lurking round the corner. But what corner? And who to be afraid of? Absolutely nothing around me. Tired of waiting after a while, I start, curious to know where this virgin, forsaken road heads. I walk and walk and walk. For minutes, may be hours. Without water and food. Everything is still, there’s no breeze. Slowly, the expectation of seeing someone dies but the excitement of finding where this road is leading overpowers me.

Range of emotions…

To start with, arrogance…
to come to a place where no one else has been before…
but that’s stupid, coz someone built the road…
anyway, whoever came, couldn’t survive, whereas I did!
Hah! That’s rubbish too! Someone left me here, so that person came and left! By choice!
Okay man, whatever…

Impatience and eagerness to go ahead and scan the rugged, beautiful terrain…I don’t know why the hell I feel that there’s danger lurking beyond what I see…My heart races, I can feel my veins pounding against the skin…But some part of me knows that this is what I want, this is what I've always wanted…

What if Lakshmi, Babu or Arvind come now? lol, that would be amazing…I miss them…especially on a terrain like this!!!

My breath is being burnt croaky with the surrounding heat…Water…Should I stop? What if I die?
And so what if I do?

My mind rebukes my torso in motion again…

I break all the barriers, I control all the seasons…Am I dreaming or did I really gain this much vigour and power? I did for sure…for one, the mind seems exceptionally and bizarrely clear in spite of some clear, loud wake-up calls from some far-off world…

There’s something beyond these 5 senses…I am gonna forget everything…everything that belongs to my past, everything that may belong to my future…this is a totally new context for me… I am gonna abandon all the existing things including my memory…they are all context dependent anyway…everything except love…

Just love…with no grief and no triumphs…just pure unadulterated love…

My world, my fortress slowly crumbles down…But what’s there to protect now? I have dumped all my memories - good, bad - already…I feel free now…Nothing to keep…So, nothing to lose…

Drench-clothed and tired-bodied…but that’s someone else now…coz for all these extinguished exteriors, in resides a clear-eyed, lucid-minded, free-spirited soul…and that’s the real me…

Maybe I am like intoxicated…so be it, why should I even try and come out of it, lemme enjoy it while it lasts…while I last…

In spite of all the stress here, I tend to forget the wonderful academic ambience...Everyday I recognize how much I know, and more importantly how much I don't...Every moment I appreciate the logic and knowledge I've gained here, and every single moment whatever I've gained here is tested against new and emerging problems and paradigms…

The grouse against this kinda life is still there…I have been here like what, 22 onwards, and will be here till I am 27...but then what the heck, who wants an easy, comfortable life on couch anyway? Everyone my age is kinda slogging anyway...Moreover, I say to life, kick me in the butt if that’s gonna teach me something new…what???

I am reading this absolutely fascinating book called 'Life' by Noisome Scuzzy.

What's with the media? The rat-race of finding new and path-breaking stories somehow leads these journos to work their brains overtime and churn senseless fodder. So what if someone suffers coz of your untruthful stories...I hate the way media goes onto this whole make-believe rampage...I hate the way they control our minds.

Last 2 weeks have been like the worst.

I have been trying but just couldn't concentrate on getting some important things done. For several reasons. when would people stop frolicking around and start working? That's not an unreasonable demand during the office hours. I am not a workaholic but I hate to waste time since I realize the 2 years I have would fly away anyway.

There's incessant back stabbing and bitching in a language some of my labmates think I don't understand :)

The Rc nests that I have been trying to transplant showed a great promise but fizzled out as soon as my boss started to show interest. I have also lost part of my data. I hate to think there's a conspiracy. Paranoia is setting in. PhD teaches you more than what you bargained for.

Some people I care about seem to be angry with me for what hasn't been my fault. I don't care. Someone I love inordinately has been battling for life. He's like one of the few connections to my childhood, reminding me about the happy days. It's so fucking frustrating to see him so miserable.

There have been so many instances when I came on the dashboard, even started writing and then left in between coz whatever I was writing would be nothing but a rant. It's nothing better now but now I can plant a smiley after every few paras.

Day hours are a complete waste of time...I plan to turn to my ullu-like schedules again with minimal contact with anyone around. At least one doesn't have to wear this I-don't-give-a-damn expression. Solitude would do me some good. How much more is the question.

Traurigkeit in meinem Leben wegen zu vielen Chocolat...

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."

- Bertrand Russell, Philosopher, Mathematician, Writer, Social reformist, Pacifist and Nobel Laureate (1872-1970)

When you make a mistake in life, you have to face the consequences, brunt or whatever it is. It can go unnoticed, but your conscience (if kicking) would make you feel little contrite anyway. This is about unknowingly done mistakes. Deliberate mistakes…A tougher verdict awaits for them.

But science gets funny and weird sometimes. A mistake is still a mistake. But the hierarchy changes. A deliberate mistake is lot better than a mistake that happens unintentionally. In case of the first one, it’s curiosity that holds the reign, in case of the latter, it’s the ignorance.

It's great to disappear off the radar once in a while.

In science, predictions aren’t drawn from one’s own superior genius. Neither are they dreamt one fine night. That works for religion, not for science. What prediction should come from is logic. However, even logic has its limitations.

Wrong predictions, ideas or theories are in a way permissible because if there is a logical flaw, the idea will be discredited or rejected sooner or later. Rather, many times, people get credit for doing so, and therefore, wrong theories don’t remain in practice forever.

Wrong data however, persists as people can’t deny anything about things that are posed as facts. I will give a simple, fictitious example that comes from my area of study. The theory of why it’s beneficial for wasps to have seven legs rather than six can be logically broken down in a single blow. However, if someone says, they have come across a population of wasps with seven legs, it’s impossible to break that down logically except by simply calling it a fraud.

Don’t think for a second that scientists are holy men practicing apotheosis. Lazy, conscienceless scientists not only generate wrong data willingly, they often push it for publication(s). If they are lucky enough (which is very often the case), it does get published and sometimes labeled as a path-breaking discovery. Once it’s published, there’s absolutely nothing that can be done about it. Absolutely NOTHING! It’s frightening. Not only that. If it were a common and interesting enough topic, people working in the same area would start quoting and referencing that bullshit piece of work as well.

There has to be a course in ethics and principles for every researcher, there should be tough and secure publication rules in place and there should be more stringent reformatories for those who practice this kinda science.

Ibteda

The day I came to I.I.Sc. as a student was one of the happiest days of my life. Little awe, some anticipation but a huge, huge chunk of happiness.

I’d decided what I wanted to do long back at the age of 10 or 11. I hadn’t heard the word ecologist then. I didn’t know something like environmental sciences even existed. But I knew I’ve got to do something related to natural world.

At home, there was never a sense of expectation. To do any particular kind of work…to choose any particular stream as a career. No forcing, either direct or discreet, not even subtle hints. I think at times it’s easier for a child if parents’ wish is put forth. It makes everything so effortless…on a platter. Matters become straightforward and uncomplicated. It’s so much more easier to choose a path that’s laid down in front of you and choose it because you’re told to do so. One doesn’t have to rake one’s brain as to what one would like to do for the rest of one’s life. In any case, I’m thankful that my parents’ wishes were not thrust upon me. I could pursue whatever I wanted to.

We were always encouraged to learn new things. My parents were quite cool about the whole thing…not only about learning regular things like music, sports, painting, but unusual and wacky stuff as well. I remember…my brother in his teens and then I, in my teen years have spent two-three weeks every summer with plumbers, cycle repairers, carpenters, electricians…the list goes on. We learnt skills related to farming, watershed development, roof repairing, so on and so forth. The point is we were exposed to all sorts of dexterities.

May be it is the background all of us come from, may be it is how we’ve grown up…there’s always a sense of inferiority and superiority regarding career choices. For better or for worse. Say you are an engineer or a doc and the respect/appreciation soars…in contrast to that, say you are an electrician or a plumber, it plummets. In any case, I was truly and completely besotted with biology, in particular nature. I was meant to do that…

I saw my dad dabble in agricultural research, my mom in education and science outreach and my grandparents in voluntary social work. Largely inspired by them, I wanted something that would be a blend of all these. I can’t pinpoint that one profound moment when it dawned upon me. Actually, there may not have been any such moment. I guess it gradually developed. The love for ecology was of an unspoken kind. Like two lovers, who haven’t committed anything through spoken words, but are devoted to each other through undying, stanch but silent commitment.

Though it was never meant to be an escape strategy, all the efforts (or the lack of them) to become an ecologist saved me so much trouble. Everything was so trouble-free. Firstly, I didn’t have to have meritorious marks in 10^th/12^th. I could devote more time to people and situations that needed me during those times rather than running between tuitions and hassling myself unnecessarily. Then I did B.Sc. in Chemistry, Botany and Zoology. Anyone who has gone through that would understand what an easy cake-walk it is. No fancy and competitive subjects like Microbiology and Biochemistry for me. Then came M.Sc. I wanted to study ecology but ended up doing the master’s in Life Sciences. One of the best decisions of my life. One good consequence of that was I stopped hating and ridiculing molecular and cellular biology and allied subjects. I realized love for another discipline was growing in my heart. I would have never realized it otherwise. Biochemistry!!! But ecology it was in the end…Hands down! BC lured me for a while but like a faithful lover, I came back to my ultimate love.

I have a long way to go still, but I’ve settled down a bit in my career. I’d certain issues with my work when it was offered to me and when I started working on it initially. Issues regarding applicability to the society. You see, our group works on social insects…wasps, ants and bees. How unfashionable, not in vogue. More importantly, how uninteresting! Or was it really? Slowly, it started making sense. The new, interesting facets of the subject unraveled. I started enjoying my work. Not only that, being a part of this department, being a part of I.I.Sc. gave me a kind of credibility and a platform…people listen to me seriously now. Not only that, they want to hear what I have to say. And I suppose, that’s half the battle won.

How I wish mom had been here to see me graduate in few years (yeah, it’s still plural!).

It feels so great to be part of such a heritage. Not only that. All the ambitions harboured since childhood coming true! The goal my heart had instinctively, little childishly and somewhat absurdly nursed, the aspiration for which all these 17 years of education was savoured (!!!), and the dream for which all the criticism and brickbats that were taken in stride from all the unreasonably intrusive nosey parkers…that dream has came true.

These are new times, new seasons in my life. I have seen such a tremendous growth in myself in last 2 years, a little for worse, mostly for better! This is a new world, full of new dreams.

It’s ridiculous and somewhat hilarious but everytime I pass the main building of I.I.Sc., I am reminded of all those scientists who were products of this institute and did excellently well for themselves and for the country. In spite of myself, a feeling of reverence creeps in, and I still can’t believe I have come here…that I’ve been part of this place for quite some time…it all seems dreamlike and a bit too fantastic.

What a journey it has been…Wardha, Pondicherry, Bangalore…who knows what’s in store next! What do I want to do next? Hmm…There’s some time for that now and that would make for an entirely new entry in this e-journal. Whatever it is, hopefully, it’ll be as good as it’s been so far.

What do you do when you want to beat the shit out of someone but can't do it?

You vocalize your resentment…to everyone...at least to those who are ready to listen unwearyingly. Does it help? You realize it doesn't help. And in all possibilities, you have already started feeling helpless, deranged or accountable after some time, depending on the situation and depending on how many things you have added yourself to make your own side sound more forthright...

You listen to some music. Even KK and Kath Bloom are futile here...

You try to watch some movie. Even Tom & Jerry fails to cheer you up...

You log onto GTalk. Well, the fact that you can't become invisible only adds to the irritation...

You go to T-Board. Litchi juice is utterly tasteless...

All this because some moron at your workplace has ruined your day...all these stupid, inefficient thick, dense, morons...

As a last resort, you step out. To buy a gift for someone. A pair of sea angels and a pair of gold angels do the trick. Their luscious bodies are constantly on move. I am fascinated. Like a young boy. I try to feel them with my hand. They are ultra slippery. I am kept wondering...when do they sleep? I wish someone would have been as innovative when it comes to thinking of b’day gifts...

High time to get a Pensieve

The thoughts that are organized and properly compartmentalized and stored in my brain are less. Most of them are spread all over my head in a haywire fashion. In no apparent harmony. If they could be seen as extensions of my brain cells, they would surely give me an appearance more horrid than Sanjaya Malakar’s ponyhawk. A perfect fuzzy head (well, that in some sense is an oxymoron).

My eyes or other senses have caught them sometime or other in a rapid succession of events, because of which, they are sometimes stored in to-be-bothered-with-later zone. And as happens with all such things that go in folders with a miscellaneous tag, they soon start tangling, overflowing and the outwardly effect of that translates into fuzzy actions.

They are single stranded, silvery transparent structures, which are not transient, but appear so. They fool me in believing that they do not exist (another oxymoron). But that’s how they work. They need just the right amount of stimulus to be provoked…they need just a very appropriate amount of light coming through the shambles of memory and strike them at perfect angles to make them perceptible and visible.

The bottom-line of this rambling is that there are quite a lot of memories that surface themselves from time to time and leave me wondering where I picked them. Some are crystal clear and yet vague and unclear that they take me to another realm. For minutes, I’m kept wondering about the possible occurrence of that event that may have already occurred. Or may not have. I wonder whether it’s a trick my mind is pulling on me. Thankfully, if the RAM is not much entangled, I’m able to trace back the thoughts, either to exact time or to my imagination…

Some incidents that probably never took place, some things that probably were never said…sometimes the unreal ones claw their way into your chest and try to gnaw at the heart….sometimes they stay alone…sometimes they get mixed with the real events…and then it’s really difficult to tease apart the real from the surreal. Sometimes the unreal ones don’t mix randomly but create a fine border…and then it’s interesting to fathom out the exact reason or motive why my mind would want to bring the real and unreal parts together…

Are these early symptoms of some delusional disorder, o' Dumbledore? Something like Schizophrenia :)

Everyone takes criticism so personally. Even on the professional front. If you tell someone that there's still some scope for improvement (and that's sometimes putting it very mildly), all hell breaks loose...people react in their specific ways...sulking, angry retaliations, defensive answers, etc. Goddammit, it's just your work I'm talking about yaar. Not making some value judgements.

People sometimes forget that there's always a specific clue in criticism as well.

Brain is like an engine, we can either keep it on or keep it off. Most of the time, most of us choose to keep it off...

The Blue Umbrella

I'm eagerly awaiting for 'The Blue Umbrella' by Vishal Bharadwaj. The promos appeared ages ago. Hope this one is not in cans.

Pankaj Kapoor utters a line jo hamare dil ko chhu gayi...He says, "Dil ki baaton me nafa nuksan nahi dekha jaata...bas kuchh pichhle janam ka rishta lagta hai"...

I want to go to a polling booth in the next elections, and write 'None of you deserve to be the one who takes important decisions for me". In CAPS. In RED. In short, I wanna vote but to no party in particular. And I want them to KNOW that!!!

This is for you, AT and AB...

Memories...they are tricky. Some are pleasant, some are awful...some make you gloomy, some make you happy, some make you nostalgic...about someone special, about some particular place, particular words, particular gestures...memories are very vivid.

No that's wrong actually. There are some, which are there, lying dormant and resting. You have long forgotten about their existence. You didn't attach much importance to the moment when it happened, and hence, you don't even know that they exist.

And suddenly the memory comes...on a gentle waft of air. First as a gentle scent, then slightly more heady fragrance, then takes you over with the perfume it carries, and finally drenches you completely...

I was going to write a totally different post. But then Sonu Nigam started crooning 'Ab Mujhe Raat Din' from Deewana...it coincided with messages from two of my best friends. They popped up immediately, one after the other...bas, utna hi kaafi tha yaaron tum dono ki yaad aane ke liye...

This is what happened 7-8 years ago. I am in 11th...These 2 friends and I, we are stranded in rain. There's nothing much to do. We head for our favourite destination...a card store...called Card Magic...with that dim yellow light, and very faint background music of the latest hindi film songs or the Backstreet Boys, it is the only such place in Wardha. It has ambience, it is totally different from anything we know then, and the place had a character...a very dreamy and quixotic one...also the place to catch all the chick medico babes...

We reach and it pours...we huddle in a corner of the store shade, but it's still not enough. We gotta go inside. We do...we shuffle through the cards randomly...someone asks me what's a fiance...I get a little embarrassed before the chick crowd...everyone looks so beautiful and gorgeous in that dim light...I stare at someone...time flies by...it's still raining...I just peek outside...it's unbelievable. It's wet, cold and no traffic on the road...this is just too much to remain indoors. I try to drag these friends outside but they don't want to get wet...BAAH! I come out and stand in the shades again...water flowing through the open gutters doesn't look horrendous anymore, it's just blended with the rain...and people there on the streets, they have just melted in the smoldering water drops...

Just as I am in this memory…

Memories are tricky...