Irrational Behavior

Well.. for nearly 4 months I had no time to blog, much less shower/eat/sleep/rest…….. Now its twice a day! Whats UP with that?! I watched this movie “The Social Network” last night. It was probably my 20th-30th movie in the year — I dont have a TV so, if I ever sit down for 2 hours to turn off my overactive brain, I put in a DVD and watch it on my laptop. It was pretty brutal (the movie that is) and Ive sworn off of this for a bit. I also watched with some amusement Barkha Dutt screaming for an entire 47 (or was it 48 minutes) trying to road-roll Manu Joseph in defending why she was just an innocent person with bad judgement. Man, women are LOUD these days! Most of her show and Rajdeep Sardesai’s journalism is just loud and obnoxious. More decibels per word or something.

In other news, I am 2 months behind work, waiting on a call, have mad hair having not been in front of a mirror in months and a tad outta shape after being in and out of hospitals all of November. However, I still harbor this distant dream that things will fall into place, despite being a middle-class citizen harboring some discontent with polluted cities, working out of Rural India where health-care is an alien term (we have to travel an hour for a decent hospital from Ropar, Punjab) and wondering what IT is all about.

I have realized though that people stuck at desks and offices ultimately have to kick and scream in some way (whether on National Television or in the pirvacy of their homes) as the quality of life here is not really increasing linearly with our amazing, projected GDP. I read a great article interviewing Rajeev Chandrashekhar who lays it out simply: Our growth measurements are bullshit. We measure growth by how well our infrastructure, mining and construction sectors are doing, happily ignoring manufacturing, agriculture, etc.

As an IP professional for a tad over seven years, I have seen more die-casting factories in the South than I care to mention… and one wonders why catch-phrases like “Ideate, Innovate, Idiot-ate” dont make sense. Where IS the innovation if we are letting the mothership hold all the IP? What happened to the breed of dreamers? Are they all dead?

Happiness

I have had a really rough week! I have not slept much, Ive been stressed about three different things and someone I care about very much is not well. In the melee of such a week, I had two choices, one to down myself in the stress or to hear only the good parts. I chose the latter. I have a very inspiring class of students, who work incredibly hard. One kid asked me about the project after reading the book and I was very impressed with the question. A few others wished me on Teachers Day and this made me very very happy! I hope I am worth all their trust.. Here are two cards I got… amongst many other messages (all of which made me “happy to be a teacher” as the boy would say).

Through the eyes of a child

Ive been pondering about love.. and how complicated it is, when we make it that way. Ive fallen in love, finally! I never thought the day would come. What with more than a dozen international flights a year, living out of a suitcase for half the year and a restless heart that cannot and will not settle.. I just dont get attached very easily. And nothing holds me down, not fear, not desire, not monetary reward… ocassionally satisfaction gets a hold of me but thats about it.

Anyway, Ive realized that falling in love in India is a funny thing…….. so many abstractions and super-classes, its mind-boggling. Thus, on thursday today, I decided to look through the eyes of a child…… Life is simplest then! Love == time, time > money, quiet == peace, satisfaction == achievement. I love equations I can understand! Complex rules confuse my Suppandi-like brain.

I know a sub-4 y.o whom I love dearly…. We talk fondly of Khujli and Chaddi, two runaway camels from West-India, from across the desert whose water conditions we know nothing of! This 4 year old minus has taught me a lot about how simple the thing callled affection is.

Life is a funny place today! I remember this one night at Purdue, the snow was falling and I was thinking of forgiveness…………. Sometimes, we just need to accept ourselves, for what we are.

As Casablanca dialogues might go:

Ilsa: But what about us?
Rick: We’ll always have Paris. We didn’t have, we, we lost it until you came to Casablanca. We got it back last night.
Ilsa: When I said I would never leave you.
Rick: And you never will. But I’ve got a job to do, too. Where I’m going, you can’t follow. What I’ve got to do, you can’t be any part of. Ilsa, I’m no good at being noble, but it doesn’t take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you’ll understand that.

The call

Its 6:36am, Im sitting a bit groggy-eyed and waiting to get my first workout done and dusted. I am thinking of the old John Masefield poem, “I must go down to the seas again”, and I am also thinking about my adventures. There are days when you just know you have to go. Where you go, how you get there, what challenges you face on the way, what sunrises make the trip worth the effort, these are all secondary things. All you know is that you have to leave. I have that feeling starting to set in today. In fact, its been haunting my dreams for a bit, the open road, blue-skies, people’s bullshit-free living… I feel like setting goals again. I feel like smelling failure and success all over again, in whatever measure. I feel it in my bones that today is the start of a new adventure..

Brownian Motion

Bic Runga has been on my mind.. notice a bit of a pattern here? I am obbsessive-compulsive! If I get hung up on something, there is nothing else to take away from the experience. This compulsion extends to naming my shoes, my bike, my toe-nails (two of which I just lost last weekend), talking to trees on my way to work (silently of course, I have to share the ride to work with some asinine creatures, imagine my consternation if they actually could extend their imagination beyond their petty egos), dreaming with the butterflies that flit across my path from home to work, by the dozen.. they may live for just 4 days but they really live. My best friend Derek Vohs taught me how important it was to learn to live, that is the greatest gift a friend can give another. He also wrote me funny stories, created so many memories to live by, live with and loved his mom who raised him single-handed, which was something I often hoped Id find someday. Children make us proud in so many ways and looking at them tells us a lot about their parents.. My heart is full today but Ill never forget Derek.

Ive had some time to dream here in the last month. Apparently, this never goes out of fashion. I had the pleasure of meeting two shorties, who stole a piece of my heart within the first five minutes of meeting them.. they told me a couple of stories and showed me a few dance moves so, Im training to be the next MJ, watch out! They also had strong opinions on the food I was eating (and others were subject to) so, this made me think hard!
So much so, that I decided to go on a cooking extravaganza last night. I got home around 7pm after a bumpy-as ride, minus butterflies… they were all at a music show across the town and had no time to wait for me. Id been preparing exams to give my kids on Monday and I hope they all do well. They inspire me to do my best, every class. Exams are just what we make them to be… and they are perennial. Back to the 7pm hour, I managed to get to a local market here in rural Punjab. I could easily walk around here for hours and talk to people selling the vegetables and other things. I plan on doing this soon! After two to three handfuls of veggies, we stopped at a fruit vendor for a few more handfuls of fruits.. after this we went to a department store and picked up a few more things. I got home around 8:30 and decided to call mom for some expert advice! She was on a date with my dad and giggling the whole time, I could tell exactly what she was thinking but, I decided to ignore it… She started giving me instructions and within half a minute, my head was spinning. I decided to chop up the veggies, take a shower, turn on the AC, sit down for 20 minutes and then start cooking. So, we agreed that she would call me after I had done all of the above.

Thank god for food processors (mine, I am emotionally attached to), a bit of the chopping went by quickly! This was an industrial production..

There was a bit of a snafu with the tomatoes, which were beaten to a pulp by mistake and ended up in chutney rather than as garnish When in doubt, try to fix it rather than throw it away!

The first dish was something that was supposed to resemble avial but, minus too many veggies as some of my audience (or poor suckers who had to eat this) were not feeling to flash and I didnt want to test their pallete.

Of course, all this cooking action left a mess, which made me want to pick up a sharp object but, I was too tired to do so Delirious almost! Cooking with an induction heater is also pretty challenging. The last dish on the menu was Uthappam, which I prepared the mix for and left the kitchen ready to make this in the morning. Even Cinderella had a midnight deadline, Im just an ordinary mortal!
I managed to wash all the dishes on time.. When in college, I picked up the habit of doing my own dishes and then every one’s elses from my friend Cort Stratton! I worked as a dishwasher for my first scholarship so, that work experience served me well. There is a lot of zen in washing dishes.. besides, I love bubbles

I slept well and was up again to start my morning series of fresh food cookin’, still sleepy but happy about being able to indulge in my all-time favourite activity.

The uthappam reminded me of the time when amoeba crawled the earth, in giant sizes Additionally, my expertise with induction cooking made for some burnt, thick initial versions (quality control was on holiday, it was too early in the day for them).

I then realized, I could adjust the heat on the induction cooker (how many engineers does it take to hit a button?) and this adjusted the quality of the burning a little better

I then packed everything and looked back at satisfaction with my handiwork. If nothing, it looked like I had been toiling!!

Cooking is like dancing, the happier you are, the better it tastes.. of course, using uthappam mix is lame but, for a quick meal, why not!!

Until next time, Im back to indulging in some Brownian motion and smiling about something good thats come my way. My nutrition secrets are like so: I eat what I want, within limit. I think hard about what that food means to me an to everyone that grows it. I try hard to cook and eat my own food, rather than processed stuff. When I am really happy, I love cooking for people. I earned a reputation for my dinners in Christchurch My only rule for my friends is that that they dont tell me how it tastes I desperately need to feel like Kungfu Panda in my own kitchen, blindingly awesome!

Suddenly Strange(ly) missing the Rungas

1:19pm on a Saturday………. I woke up late at 8am and lay in bed till 9:30 with a song in my head, a smile and some gladness in my heart. I had no care in the world and did not miss my newspaper or the internet.

Its hard to go through a dark tunnel and then accept the light. Im not in denial anymore though. I live for the day and that brings out the best in me. All the cliches about not being able to control one’s life is all good… however, one must make sure one is working hard to break bread and living independent of others’ sweat and that is OK to want. Its also OK to want that, as it is OK to want to live a little irresponsibly, no judgement. Hardwork is overrated too…… this is not the Animal Farm.. right?

Today, I miss New Zealand. I miss the soulful quietness of people. Its not all about talk, talk, talk, more talk, talk, talk.. Ive met some asinine creatures in the last three weeks and they are all about the TALK and Im so glad I am me I know its been an age since Ive felt good about myself but, it takes a bit of the good and the bad to see and believe and appreciate and fall for………. New Zealand is my favourite country……. coming back to which, when I was in North Carolina, tooling around, I used to teach kids who belonged to familes of domestic abuse victims… we used to read a book called “The Very Quiet Cricket” to the kids. It was an amazing story and new zealand is a quiet cricket. Very very quiet or very very loud when the wind blows from yonder.

Today’s blog can be summarized mostly in the words of the beautiful and talented Bic Runga… one of the greatest artists that lives!

To the many new paths I find I am surrounded with and the happiness that simmers like mist, there and gone, Id sing:

Sway my way, dont come and go, like you do!

To my old doubts and critics and all the villains in my life, Id sing:

And just so you know
This secret part of me never showed
And when you run around like you don’t care
I’m suddenly aware
I know its time

To my running shoes and the blue blue water (as my alter-ego is a water buffalo, no place Id rather be than in the water on a hot hot day), Id sing:

We could sit in the sun
Let the days all roll into one
How could you take so long to decide?
How would you know until you tried?

To all the trails I didnt run in when I was too busy working, Id sing:

Wring out my guilt and hang it on the line
Its been raining all week, it won’t get a chance to dry
I’ve been looking round the pantry for a box of sorries
I’m all run out

Ill tell you about Bic’s sister Boh, another day! She inspires a lot of things too…………. I miss New Zealand! Did I already say that?

To a God Unknown

I picked up a very old book of mine, a Steinbeck, the shorter stories…… Of Mice and Men is one of my favourites as is The Grapes of Wrath.. some stories do get out of your hand though, before you can read them, cover to cover or start to finish. I think people are like stories too. The have beginnings, protagonists, great loves, grand failures, soul searching choices to make and an ending. Joseph Wayne was the main character in this story “To a God Unknown”… speaking of a time when the redwoods, streams, squirrels and children were also like stories, with beginnings, childhoods, adulthood, twilight and endings. It takes a while to see the story though. It takes even longer to understand it. The story begins with a quote from the Vedas so, this was even better.. Steinbeck and the Vedas.. hmm.. So the story set in the places of Nuestra Senora and Our Lady of Joseph, Burton, Thomas, Benjy, Old Juan, Romas, Old Willie, Juanito, Father Angelo, the wives Elizabeth, Harriet, Rama, Jennie, Alice Garcia, the kids Martha and John, the old oak tree, the circular rock and the stream of life all came together in 4 days of reading with an upset stomach and persistent headache! I think this heat will do me in, or make me stronger, whichever comes first… or maybe, as some wise man said “Perhals there isnt any change, ever, in anything. Perhaps unchangeable things only pass.”

A letter from Stephen

Stephen is an awesome young man I know in Bangalore. Him, his brother Andrew and his friend Daniel were at a Booster Juice talk on running Marathons. This was the audience I loved the most in the whole set, my age-group is really in the 4-18 category, grown-ups think I refuse to grow up, my contention is, wheres the fun in that?

Anyway, Stephen just had an amazing performance at his school choir and wrote me about it.. I suppose he had all the pre-performance butterflies but went ahead and delivered a great SOLO show anyway! Now, thats what I call AWESOME Thank you Stephen for being my friend and inspiring me to also do my best

Hey Anu……….
Guess wat?? Ppl who came der said i was awesome…….. firstly i din kno wen i was supposed to sing k, then after one song the guy suddenly says come down!! ur’s next…by the time i was down my songs intro had started n i was just in time der to start…. then i din realise t solo mik was turned off i kept goin closer to t mic n then bam……. t mic waas turned on n it was loud. I modulated accordingly n since this was my first solo… i gav my ALL I was so satisfied wit the way i sang… Our Choir on the whole was just brilliant tat day!!! V even got an offer to go fa the international choir festival in tokyo but it all depends on our coll Princi don think he’l let us go!
Oh… i’ve been to kullu n manali n all….. tat part of India is just Awesome…but nothin beats Namma Bengalooru
N yup…don wit my first internals so chilled out now… actually not

stphenbaptist

Idhellam Doopu

Exceptionally dull Friday here with CRAWLING internet speeds… Look what I found on my player to make me burst out laughing!

sogam azhugai sombal kadhal tholvi
kaduppu exam fail erichal
veruppu vedhanai kobam pirivu nashtam
pada padappu pazhi vaangal paavam
pottu kodhuthu poraamai kindal elappam
echa buthi irumaappu saguni velai
sadhi seyal kozh mottal kurukku buthi
ottu kettal ora vanjanai poi pulugu moottai
dugal velai duppan koothu arakka thanam
peela build up pisaththu kolli kannu kusumbu
chinna thanam sindu mudiyal alla-k-kai alpum
delmaar dimikki oola udhar oppari jaalra
drug adiththal thiruttu velai
thillu mullu sandiththanam

idhellam doopu
jaali than toppu

Stunday Afternoon

Chocolate, No. Happiness, Yes. Something good will come our way, yes. frowning, no. Yelling, yesterday. Stress, last night. Headache, last week. Hope, today. Genuine affection, yes. Understanding all your talents, yes. Wasting a minute, no. Wasting two minutes, no. Wasting 6 months, no. working always, yes. Sleep is for the dead, yes. disrespect, no. False sympathy, no. Lazy people, no. Stupid people, maybe. tolerance, yes. Snobbery, no. Pedantism, no. Poetry, yes. Life, yes. Contradictions, happens to the best of us. Perseverance, always. Mom’s food, sometimes. Appreciation, yes. Cockiness, sometimes. Arrogance, no. Self stupidity, sometimes. Acknowledgment, sometimes. Acceptance, always. Contentment, never. Colors, pretty. Fatso syndrome, temporary. Bluish green, maybe. Greenish blue, never. Admit you are wrong, sometimes. humility, always. giving an inch, only when weak. Pay people on time, always. comfort, never. Peace, sometimes. Discontent, perennial. Disillusionment, temporary. Comedy, all around. Gratitude, always. Obsequious, never. wonder, always. reverence, sometimes. pusillanimity, once in a while. perseverance, always.