iPosts

My engagement

2015-09-11T20:56:00.001+05:30

Fast forward a few months and I am getting engaged in three days. Can you fricking believe that? Me, this guy who has been writing all this is getting engaged to an actual girl.

I still haven't got the full hang of it yet. I have a couple sitting opposite to me who is taking care of a baby. The name of the baby is incidentally achu as well. His father keeps calling him the same again and again. The thought that I could be in the same position in a couple of years sends a shiver down me.

This journey has been mostly reflecting on the past and thinking about mortality. The book I was reading, Anna Karenina, gives food for thought here and there. The death of Nikolai is given in vivid detail which made me ponder on how ammamma passed away. Too soon I think.

Standing at this door of a train, I am looking forward to the next few days.

The part of my life called Doubts

2015-01-26T02:53:00.000+05:30

Doubts on whether I should get married.
Doubts on whether I am losing my way in life. I don't have anything planned for next few years.
Doubts on who I want to be.
Doubts on my character.
Doubts about who I am really.
Doubts on my will power.

Road trip Bangalore to Kollam

2014-08-21T08:30:00.001+05:30

With : CJM, Sanram and R

Started at 04:30 am

Reached 07:10pm

Total distance covered:648km

Route: Bangalore - Hosur - Krishnagiri - Salem - Namakkal - Karur - Madurai - Rajapalayam - Thenkasi - Thenmala - Punalur - Kottarakkara - Kollam

Started early morning, cool temperature, light drizzle

Filled petrol for ₹2500

That run of 120 kms was treacherous with lights, trucks, lots of potholes and unfinished roads

Halted for tea

R took over steering wheel

Reached Namakkal

Halt at Sanram's house for breakfast of Dosa and Paniyaram

Met SR again

Started with me behind the wheels again, this run was the real road trip

Wide fast highway, music and friends

I really enjoyed this stretch of the trip and it was then we reached the maximum speed of 110kmph of the trip

It was like playing the old video game of cars

U just needed 4 keys to maneuver in that highway, it was easy to ride but also the added risk of you losing the concentration was there since it was very easy. The biggest danger was you hitting the odd pedestrian or bike guy who appeared suddenly from the side.

None of that happened though and my memories often flew back to the trip with RR, SG and AM from Chennai to Coimbatore in Polo

After next 100km R took over again. It was then 300+ kilometers since we started out from Bangalore and it was sweating hot as well. I enjoyed the next 100km of high speed highway driving from the side seat with lot of selfies. There was also the Indian country side to savour with the mighty western ghats often surrounding us on all sides.

The mountains, when we first started seeing them, was very rocky with hardly any vegetation. As we proceeded south after Karur a little green and then a lot started appearing in them.

After Madurai we had to leave the national highway 7 and take the state road to Thenkasi. It became a roller coaster then with uneven roads and two way traffic with no dividers.

This was the time when R's driving skills were beginning to be tested. He was still in his early days of driving. That can work both ways since on the one hand you are more cautious and your speed range is limited since you are not sure of yourselves at high speeds. But on the other hand there is also the inexperience with you not very good at some of the decision making skills on the road and still have some unpolished driving skills.

We got through that bit with not many incidents and stopped for lunch at a little known hamlet of kalpatti. It was not very picturesque with what little could be offered of a stopover for trucks. We had a decent lunch though with very friendly hotel staff. Don't get me wrong, this was not a star hotel nor a very well kept one either. This was an "amma mess" which provided basic food. I enjoyed it though.

I was still fresh and took over from R for the hardest part of my driving in this journey. The road was not highway wide, overtaking was riskier and there was the odd town in between where you had to slow down to a scrawl as there was no bypass. To top it, my feet started hurting halfway through that part and it grew worse as much as I tried to ignore it.

An asshole started honking behind me at Rajapalayam. I hate, I mean absolutely hate, people who honk when there is absolutely no logical reason to do so. It is irritating, indecent and shows you are an asshole in life.

We went through the beautiful green countryside taking in the beauty of the scattered windmills and green paddy fields. Often the road would be banked with rows of huge trees. It was like you were driving through a tunnel of wood. We stopped again for some pictures and for relieving ourselves. It was nice to have that phone call with someone standing in middle of somewhere by your car in middle of a long drive.

R took over then, my feet finally taken out of those shoes to give them much needed air and some rest, for the ride up and over the ghats. We crossed through the Aryankkavu check post to enter Kerala. This part of the ghats was very low lying and hence there were very few hairpins for R to tackle before we reached the top and started the descent. Drizzle started then and he was concentrating hard on the hilly terrain. I could literally see him straining his whole body to drive. I asked him to relax since I felt it was important to enjoy your driving while tackling a difficult region.

We reached Punalur and then almost had our meeting with death. It would have been a terrible funeral. My parents didn't even know I was driving to Kerala. This was always the risk when you don't tell your close ones the honest truth. Anyway, I was checking the music for a song and looked up to see a Kerala State Road Transport Corporation. He cut back in and we escaped. The heart rate, however, suddenly went to 140. It was a narrow escape and a lesson learnt.

There were no further incidents and I completed the last leg from kottarakkara till his house. It was a very enjoyable journey and a sign of things to come.

Trip with Nikita to Mangalore

2014-07-22T23:18:00.001+05:30

Dear Niki,

Thank you for a really wonderful trip. Though this might come a little late, I had some real fun moments travelling with you.

And I love the way you adore your college. I feel the same way about my college and it was so good to see you have the same feelings for your college.

The night time chats were a treat as well as fighting with you afterwards. I am sorry if I hurt you in any way. Sizzlers was an awesome treat and I will definitely go back there.

Thanks for a great trip dear. I just want to put it in writing that you are a really awesome friend to hang out with.

Ps: hope the tshirts were worth it 😊

My first bangalore post

2014-07-18T02:33:00.001+05:30

Well, I moved to bangalore and a new job on september 10 of 2013. This was almost one year back. I was thinking of jotting down my memories again and here I am.

This post's idea came about when I was watching the good movie "enough said". The well thought out middle aged couple love story has a very subtle plot. It resonated with some of my life events. The thought just occurred to me that I will also be faced with the same exact situation as the main character in the movie some day in my life.

This has all to do with some innocent (wayy back then it was) lie I had told about my own life (girlfriend issues) I had told to some of my friends. Its really going to be an awkward situation when the bubble finally bursts.

I just wanted to jot this down. More on this to come this way soon.

Pure...

2013-10-22T00:20:00.002+05:30

Read Quote of Neal Wu's answer to Mathematics: What is the first little bit of math that made you realize that math is beautiful? on Quora

My Snaps II

2013-05-11T18:53:00.003+05:30

From the Land of Cashews

Hung By a Bud

Nostalgia

What should I do when I don't know what to do?

2013-05-11T18:01:00.001+05:30

Here it goes, close on the heels of my last year's post..
I am pleasantly surprised as to how Blogger has changed since I first started blogging.

I am in the middle of something like a crisis here. I am not able to get out of this place. I have been working for that last two and a half years in the same firm and I am starting to hate my job. It makes me feel miserable most of the time. I have lost interest in the things I used to do. And to top it all, I am struggling to get rid of my Nicotine addiction. Even this post is a means to not go out for a smoke. I got so close last month. I went for about 20 days without a smoke and then came that stupid trip to Ooty, and I gave myself reasons to smoke. The cold, the rain, the trip in Bike. Damn me and myself. I have got to stop and take some control of my life.

Anyway, this post is not about that. Though me and my mind often goes wandering in that. It is about how you decide to do what to do next with your life. Not like for tomorrow or day after. But how to choose which direction to follow when you don't have a clue what to do next?

The situation is like this. As I told earlier, this guy has been stuck in the same job for 30 months, needs a way out, failed in one single opportunity, now he does not know anymore what he should do with his life next. He wanted to become a great web designer at first, then a great programmer and now he does not know. He did Google up on this and they told him to "Be yourself", write down things what you want to do, write down things what you want to achieve and so on.

A best friend has gone to another place finally. I thought I will be better off without him around me anymore. But now I feel all the more worse about everything. That fear that you will be no more than a failure is keeping up. Like Agarkar, with so much build up and potential, but failed to deliver. People are advising me that I am wasting my life here. I want to move on, but cannot find a way out. And the one to blame is me myself. I am so lazy now that I do not want to do anything to change my current situation.

That is the crux of the problem. Laziness. After 10+ hours a day in office for 5 days a week, I don't seem to have time for anything else. Oh fcuk the day I decided to start smoking. I used to joke people when they told it is not easy to give it up once you start. Now I understand what they mean. It all started because of that failure with her. Or maybe I just needed a reason.

I have fallen into this routine. What I need to do to come of this, I do not know and hence this post. Anyway, taking the risk that I am setting up too high targets for myself, like that movie, I have decided to create a list of things I should do with my life. In case I end up not doing any of these things, I can certainly consider my life a failure. Not entirely like my bucket list but still who is not dying anyway? "On a long enough time line, the survival rate of everyone drops to zero" right?

Travel to all the seven continents in the world. Chosen because it looks very daunting right now and because who does not like to travel
Give up smoking completely. I do not like the after effects one bit but still I continue. I want to be the pure good being I once was.
Give my family everything they need and see them happy.
Attend the marriages of all my best friends till now. It would be a crazy day when KM gets married. And Giraffe - I admire this guy since 6th standard, And Ivak too - that is coming up and is a certain possibility, And The Guitarist - that would certainly be a day when unorthodox is the normal thing to do. And the crazy S guy who barely makes the list. And sasuke too - I wonder how it lasted through all these years. And the one I cannot go for - because She is the one whom I loved for the first time.
Sing "Yellow" out loud to the one. I cannot listen to that anymore right now because it brings up so many memories.
Visit TKM with all the crazy people of Comskies 2010 once more.
Start up my own firm if at least for a single day.
Make a stranger feel good about himself/herself.

That about kicks it. I suddenly had a revelation what I really wanted to do. I am not sure if I will reach there, but at least I know what I really want to do with my life. Some time back, while on a walk with The Time Machine and Crazy guy, one of them posed me a question, "what you really want to do with your life?". I struggled to come up with an answer. Maybe this will help me.

But first I have to get rid of my laziness. Maybe the upcoming changes in my environment will help me.

Thanks for listening again..

Some movies from my viewing this month that I liked:
The lives of others, The Descendants, Saving Private Ryan, Big Fish, The Damned United, Into the wild..

and I certainly like Big Bang Theory. It certainly help me laugh through this mess...

Chennai - @ its heated best

2012-05-26T06:47:00.000+05:30

The mobile by my bed reads 5 am, i had started sleeping at around midnight. Usually I am a sound sleeper and can sleep through a full day easily. And yet I find myself in the quite frustrating situation of not being able to go back to sleep. I am sweating all over and I check in vain whether the fan is in full swing. In Chennai, this is just another story of the heat getting to you.

Back home in Kerala, this would be the time you would be looking forward to the time when summer is over and monsoon takes over. No such escape here. Rain comes here way back in October. Then again, I don't want rain either because the roads get flooded fully easily. I wish this heat would ease up though. I had defended valiantly when told that Chennai is hot. After all, for someone coming from Kerala, how hot can it become. Very hot, indeed, I have found out. This is my second summer in Chennai and I don't remember getting this frustrated last time around. Maybe, it's always harder the second time around.

And I realized yesterday that why my College life was a lot more better than the Office life I live now. Where people were more open and outspoken in college, you cannot be that any more once you are in an Office. There is evident competition everywhere and the need to put one before the colleague. People are not so into looking after each other any more. I need a change of scenery and need it pretty soon.

Have you ever felt the need to take that risk in your life to become happy again? I have been thinking about it a lot and I want to jump in for once or jump out or whatever. Basically, I can stay in one of these IT companies forever and be a happily ever after person. But I don't think I want to do that either. I want to become free and stay happy. Maybe i will do it once sometime.

Anyway, it is becoming a struggle to continue writing, probably because my head is feeling so heavy since I woke up. I will come back some time with some more thoughts and ideas, I am thinking about some kind of time lining.. till i write again..

This post is about....

2012-03-09T02:47:00.002+05:30

Indecision and life...

I don't know what to do next. Should i stay here or should i move? My life is like a junction now. I am not sure which way to go and there aren't many helpful pointers around.

And I am thinking, what will be the decision that I take today will look like 10 or 15 years afterwards and I look back on it. As I write this, I am getting a small answer. It might be because of the Pink Floyd music I am listening to.

Anyway, the dilemma is like this. I have about 6 months left on my bond period in my current place of work. After that, the initial plan was to leave and start out on my own venture or at least get a change in life. But now I am confused. Parents are asking me to study or go out of India. Naturally I am against both.

I want to start my own business. But the problem of course is Money and what to do IF it does not become a success. I guess you have to jump once in your life to feel what falling is like. So come September and I will be forced to make a decision. And right now, I don't know what to decide.

Don't people feel like afterwards what if they had done something different with their life? And I want to do so much with my life. Not just the job i am now in. No, certainly not. In this crucial turning point I am turning again to the tom riddle.

Since the time I started righting this, about 5 minutes ago, I got 2 answers. I don't just want to go on doing my current job in life. Everyone cannot make the perfect or even the correct decision. What I can do is make a decision and stand by it, come what may.

I am going to quit for sure. My job, that is. When? Soon. In 6 months and 15 days. What next? well, let me decide first.

My Snaps

2012-03-08T03:19:00.000+05:30

Color

Small is Beautiful

Light

my lonely outpost

2011-12-08T00:11:00.001+05:30

and its time for another post in my lonely outpost...

it goes like this, I often wonder whether I am a good person or a bad person. Though I keep the thoughts to myself all the time, it comes up again and again. And i hate everything other people like so much. Cynicism has been woven in. I like to design something new, who doesn't? I am starting to lose the velvet touch. I am losing myself. Till recently, I thought I was a good enough person with the occasional irrationalities. But now, I am starting to doubt myself.

Is all this just a fabric beneath which, at heart, I , me , myself was just another selfish, pitiless, cheat. Cheat! that word is something very bad. I don't want to be one, but sometimes I run out of justifications for my actions.

Right now, Mr ak asked for the key. I doubt what they think about me. I always try that, try to see from the other viewpoint. Though I remind myself everyday, that I don't give a penny's worth about what they think about me, I worry everyday about the exactly the same thing. Combine that with the anxiety surrounding my current existence of smoke and clouds, I see myself slipping into this long woven thought trains. More than a penny for those thoughts.

I feel better now though. I want all these thoughts to be poured out, though I doubt anyone hearing my thoughts will get it or even less, I am not sure what I want to really say. Sigh, sometimes I feel like I never came out of the effect of the weed I smoked long back which took me for a ride like never before. Life, it seems, is without its fair share of surprises.

I am living a lie every other day. That is one thing which is being a constant threat to my happiness. What happens when they all find out about everything. Will they still feel the same about me. Here I go again. I don't want to care about what they care about me.

In my own words, time constraints has made any option seem feasible. I don't know which way I will turn though.

Innocent Rambling again!

2011-07-10T00:48:00.001+05:30

i am back after sometime to blogger and I see that it hasn't changed much since the time i started using it. However, they have a login box in the front page itself. The old blogger where you had to click a link and then go to another login page was really annoying.

Well, what made me come back for another post?? Some booze and some restlessness. Life in chennai is coming very monotonous. Did you hear that I am working with mainframes now?? JCLs, rexx and abends have become the new common usages. Abend 3303 is a database busy abend, just down and up your DB and the job will run fine. Don't worry, this post is not going to boggle your mind with that cr*p.

This one is about weekends. I got the idea of posting this on the cab back home from office (it's free of charge!). The guy next to me was trying to make some conversation with the pretty girl in saree sitting next to him. And it was a Friday! what else to ask other than, "hey, what are your plans for the weekend?". I get a load of these questions now every Friday. I mean, what am i doing for weekends. Just the usual booze and lazing around. Back in college, nobody used to mind about it being a monday or a friday. All of a sudden, people expect you to say something cool you are going to do for the weekend.

What weekends?? Its just two days to do your chores which you have been putting off for the last two weeks and would probably put off again if you can. I mean that shirt could use another two weeks in the office before it goes into the laundry right?? As its the case, we got drunk this saturday and started conversing about anything and everything. And the topic of lies, obligations and life comes to my mind. The lies i have been living through nags at my consciousness every now and then. The lies i have told about what i am are really annoying. These MNCs and the boring 9 to 5 jobs are stupid dude!, except for the salary you get every end of the month!

Well back about being at the weekends! Weekends have become the all important part of life in Office. The fact that you have got nothing to do for weekends is so out of fashion. Come on! What is so bad about not going out for another useless stroll in the city and the stupid malls.

Its her birthday this 21st. Lots of memories come flooding back. Do you know what really missing someone or something means? Its that, every irrelevant thing brings back those memories and you think about how better off you were then. You think of the better things and the better life. The obligatory struggle that you live now is so much torture. Like the slow but sure advance of death in your life.

On the technical side, I have some projects that are coming up. I dont know why but i think a lot now-a-days. Thinking too much can make you go crazy, they have told me, really?? Back in those days, you didn't have to care about how other people would react to your off hand remarks, Its so damn irritating and the fact that i have become a non stop smoker doesn't really help. Ok, to my recent projects, some stupid java work i did at my office have got them to appreciate me. It feels good though, being appreciated and valued once in a while.

However, i dont think i have a future in any of these things. I am just biding my time doing some coding until my big thing comes up.
And i miss cynthia and gmj, the two little better things of my life. I wish i have another chance at them. Oh! those good times of no worries and so much happiness. The past looks so rosy and the future so bleak. Mainly money worries though. I wish i had enough just to pay off my debts. Debts to bankers and debts to friends and debts to strangers. All are debts and all are same.

That was nice chatting with you riddle, see ya!!!

Traffic

2011-01-28T00:19:00.005+05:30

I got back home for this weekend, actually for 6 days starting on 26th, Republic day. Which seemed a far better idea than waiting in Chennai hoping that the RMG guy will call us for a project some time soon. Work has become so idiotic at TCS. Your training got over more than a month ago, the recession seems to be over all over the world and still we are looking for projects to work in. The biggest irony is that they are recruiting another 50000 freshers by the end of this academic year. I wonder how they manage together all this as a cost effective organization. Must be the 40-60 ratio one hears now and then. The client pays 100 bucks for the work and the guy who actually did all the work in the company's name gets only 40 or lesser than that. Very argumentative..

Well, this post is not about TCS or the work anyway. Home for the weekend, a movie out seemed to be in order and hearing the good opinion about it, we all went for 'Traffic'. The movie was a far better attempt at film making than the usual low grade stuff you see in malayalam films these days. The treatment of the subject is very well done. You can feel throughout the movie that you ought to expect the unexpected. The cliched scenes have all been reworked into more pleasant and intriguing takes.

The basic plot of the movie is the seemingly impossible attempt at transferring a heart from a donor to a patient who is 150 km away in under 2 hours by road. However incidents surrounding all this and how the director chose to use them is all what makes this movie a money-well-spent-on. Its how the various people who are going to be a part of this journey in someway or another reached that particular part of their lives. The scenes have been creatively shot though a little over dramatization could be seen at places. Good actors like Roma have been under utilized too. Srinivasan, as usual, gets into his role with his usual nonchalantness and does a wonderful job playing the good cop gone bad under circumstances and who wants to make up in his life for that.

The climax is truly the best part of the movie. All the often used operation theatre drama where you are put into suspense about whether the heart will work or not has been all cut out. The films glides into the climax where each of those characters feeling satisfied that they have done something good with their lives or as in the case of some others relieved at having got over a bad day.

It has been a very good attempt of a film and the director Rajesh is someone to watch out for.

Back in kollam, you are getting unusual nostalgic feelings for this old home. Went to all the usual hangouts in this city again and the memories start to flood back in. Its going to be a loooong journey back to that second home called Chennai.

On other news the cigaratte addiction is on full flow now and if I dont get a laptop to work back there in chennai soon I am going to be a chain smoker soon. I want something to concentrate my mind on so as not to think about anything else. Ideas are starting to cloud up... will post back sooon...

[Edit on 8th July]: i am a chain smoker even though i have a laptop now!

The Dreams

2010-12-31T02:47:00.000+05:30

They are starting to haunt me. Today morning when I woke up it was as though I had lived through all the agony of losing her. The head was completely messed up and the visions of the dream started playing around in my dream. I dreamed about her marriage and the day I am going to lose her. The bad thing is that you can run away from there in life but the dreams leave me helpless to feel that pain. It was some kind of big hall or some church, it would have been a church obviously being that she is a christian. However the scene soon changed to me watching from the back and someone shooting at me and I am trying to get out of range but I cannot. I remember so many weird things about the dream but the only thing that I was sure about at the end was that I still love her from that some part of the heart. Bloody hell achu, you have got some serious issues.

And now 'Yellow' is bringing me back all those memories and those feelings I have tried to hide under many a puff of smoke and depth. She is watching me she is wacthing me not. Kuntham.. i am out of control. Sorry gtg riddle bye

Being on the staircase

2010-12-16T17:59:00.000+05:30

Life is going great now a days. Which other job pays you about 800 bucks a day for sitting at home doing nothing?? That is happening right now with a whole lot of TCS trainees. Training at TCS has officially finished. Its officially called ILP or Initial Learning Program by tcs. Now after we reported at tcs office, the RMG or the resource managment guys there who are supposed to put us into projects, quite in a jolly mood told us "guys, we dont have any projects for you, but you have to report here everyday" and do what?? Dont ask that question.

You are supposed to report to the staircase everyday and idle about until 4. However the testing RMG man (truly godsend) went one further. He told that there was no need to report to the staircase but be at home comfortably, just be within the reach of your cell phone wherever you are. Being in that great testing stream, I too got to sit it out at home taking my cell along with me literally everywhere. I watched like about 7 films in two days and "Mystic River" really stands out. If you havent watched it yet, its a good one to spend your time on.

On other news, I have finally quit smoking. It happened last weekend. I was being totally fucked up in the mind with the booze of the weekend and the packet of miles that got consumed somewhere between saturday and sunday. One of best friends, Rijin, was over here for the weekend and it was totally out of control in the weeked. Two full bottles of vodka on the saturday night got all of us really going. I have never been that out of control on booze. To say the least, if someone asked me for the Google password I would have gladly given it to them that day.

Well, after all the hangover on sunday night things started to clear up and yeah that slogan came into my mind, "Think Simple, Think Clear". That ended the cigaratte craving. I have vowed to not touch that thing again. This time I think maybe its final, but what the heck you never really know!

Have I told you that I took a swing at pot over the last month. The first time was at the office and it was pretty wild but it was nothing compared to the second time in my room and that one was totally weird. The problem was I smoked a whole joint to myself and things got pretty out of control after that. I had smoked it on top of the water tank. If I has stayed there for another 2 minutes I would have slept there until the next day morning. The mind started rolling around and it was and unending rolling. Reality really gets fucked in there. I am still not sure whether I am living in the dream or the reality. You lose control of your conscious totally. Well that episode did put an end to my adventures in that side unless I get someone else to try it along with. It is really frightening stuff to say the least.

It is the third day today sitting it out at home and I am starting to experiment with CakePHP today. I don't really know whether i will go on with that but its nice to try. Augustin, my idiotic roommate, is going home back to Kerala for the weekend. I dont really know why i said that but he is fuzzing around here asking all sorts of stupid questions. That guy has some really serious problems coming up in his life.

Going back to that booze party day, I started msging like hell about gmj once i got high. I dont know where this is going but she is one of the reasons I am still having my sanity. On occassions its really hard to say which one is reality and which is not. So happy to be still here, I may be back soon. later

The Mall Life

2010-10-09T04:43:00.001+05:30

Whats so attractive about shopping malls that gather in the large crowds?? Things cost quite a fortune in there, nothing much to do unless you have a fat wallet and still they keep coming in. We have been wandering in and out of the malls in Chennai. The mall culture doesn't seem to inspire much good feeling in me anyway.

I would rather be happy sitting in the roof (did I mention we have a roof to ourselves with our flat?) with a glass of whatever that happens to be in the fridge and a packet of kings. That seems to be the routine nowadays. Degradation, some of my flatmates call it. My perverted mind calls it getting the s*** out of your system. The body is yet unwilling to corporate but I am enjoying what I am doing and thats it. 7 hours a day for 5 days a week, the work is getting routine.

If I read this sometime in my future, let it be an established fact that I have no regrets about any of it. The only blemish in the clear October night sky is that I dont happen to have my dear gmj with me. Have another get together in another mall tomorrow or rather today, its 4 am now. and I trip through the wires.... u2 is blaringh

Life @ Chennai

2010-09-30T04:34:00.005+05:30

The time right now is about 4 am in the morning, I am in my flat with my 5 other flat mates or roommates who are all asleep and I have a problem. I am confused. I am confused about everything. Is it called a flat because its so small and tiny with no space at all to turn around in??

To those of you who have not yet met with me, I am ~~achu~~ blogging now from Chennai. I am here because i joined up in TCS, that is Tata Consultancy Services, as I had nothing much else to do with my life. I could have tried to move on in ~~read a small city somewhere in kerala~~ with my own little franchise or company or whatever else but like many other things, my head strongly felt against it whereas the heart was stranded in the middle. There was no money, i was afraid of failure and naturally had an ill feeling about it. So the protagonist was put to sleep inside and I boarded the train.

Now that I am here, the pasture seems to be greener back there man. I mean i am one of the 277 who wound up in TCS-Chennai and already it feels like a decade though in reality it has hardly been 10 days. The shift is from 7 to 2 where they train (or make us learn as they put it) us on sitting in front of a Desktop. The whole of South India is represented in big enough numbers in my batch.

The problem is not chennai, nor TCS nor the flat for that matter. Its the competition everyone including me seems to be participating in and I don't like it a bit. Each of us seems to be competing against each other for that step up in the corporate world ladder. The secrecy in thoughts, the reluctance to trust each other, the enthusiasm to show off the knowledge, everything points in that direction.

I am not saying i am above all such nonsense. It's just that I was not this person in my college and suddenly I seem to be adapting to this environment. I don't want to, i liked the earlier me but the head seems to win again. Be the change or be changed they tell me.

To overcome the loneliness and the confusion of thoughts smoking has come up as an alternative. However in the course of time it just adds to my list of worries. I need it to give me that moment of truth which assures me that I am on the right path, but my body doesnt take well to smoking. I enjoy the lonely excursions on the rooftop with my cigarettes but afterwards its all quilt and forebodings that dominate me.

To think about all that and not be able to speak to anyone is so irritating. The friends over phone didn't work very well. Maybe it is because of the New Me, but my friends all attain a new face in front of me. Even my gmj doesn't seem to be the same anymore. Hence I have turned to my Tom Riddle Diary here and pour out my thoughts in search of an answer. If any wanderer comes up on this let it be known that you are free to idiotize, laugh at, feel pity or do what so ever you would like to do, upon these line of thoughts. At least it will be a break from the careful cocoon everyone seems to have built up for eveyone where criticism is guarded, friendship bounded by cubicles and where the exteriors are just facades to a deeper abyss.

Signing off

Is That Love?

2009-07-18T21:46:00.001+05:30

When do you know you are in Love? Does the lightning really hit you everytime that you feel true love? I don’t really have an answer. That’s why I am asking you folks. Now that college life is showing me some of the finer details of life, I’m really, as in really real, confused. I have heard all about the hormonal thing and the attraction and all, but how do you really know whether its love or not? What if its just another passing fancy like the one you get when you go window shopping?

Ok, lets shoot at the heart. Surveys say 60% of relations that you find before getting out of college don’t withstand the test of life. Its like a dialogue from ‘Dan in Real Life’, when Marie says: “To be that certain, to feel that much love. You are so lucky”. The bottom point is even in this world where you ‘Stay Connected’, it has become that much more difficult for you to find the real ‘One’. And the real tragedy is when you get so sure about someone, they just can’t be yours either. Life and love really plays some cruel tricks at times.

Now I will give you another situation. A guy tells out his love to a girl. She says she doesn't have any interests in such things. Next thing you see, she is gladly in love with the guy's ~~best friend~~, ok- one of his best friends, and the guy accepts the situation. Do you think he should have said something in that matter? But if it is love they have found out, as they know it, wouldn’t it be better to take some pointed dialogues from colleagues and let them get on with their life?

Bleeding hearts, broken noses, and still more broken relations. I think it would be better if you don’t go around looking for love. Let love find you and yeah, before its too late anyway. Hoping for the best….

Signing out!

Painting red in the elections….

2009-04-15T12:37:00.002+05:30

When I was really young, like in 5th or 6th grade, I used to wonder what all this fuss about the elections was. Now I am going to cast my first vote, and still haven’t figured it out completely, though in a different way.

Why do we have to vote for someone who we see only every 4 years? Just ask yourself, when was the last time you saw the MP from your place? The answer would probably be last elections. And they are way too old around here, that even the poster makers can’t make them look good. These are the thoughts of many a middle class youths.

Ok ok…I know, all are old arguments. Then again there is always that zeal within the youth to work for change and we want to see the elections as something we can use to create a change. But what are the options we have?

Here, in Kerala, there has always been a cyclic nature to the parties being elected. If it’s the communists one time, next time they make way for the congress people. Does that point to the inefficiency of the people who govern us or is it something to do with the people? There is never a talk about the BJP getting elected from here. We are secular enough to not allow those vermins to come up here, whatever be the case at the centre is.

Then, between the communists and congress, this time I think communists are in for a good shock. You can just feel it in the pulse of the common people here. Everyone has something bad to say about the government of present. Not the one at the centre, but here in Kerala.

There are three things that mainly comes up- the internal fighting in the party, the accused alliance with the communalist PDP and the general rise in price of commodities. The last argument maybe a little harsh, but no one can say that the other two haven’t been brought on them by themselves.

There have always been many fake communists within the party, those who preach communism in daylight and behave like bourgeois in darkness. The left will be well rid of such poisonous breeds, but alas, all the bickering between the so called ‘official faction’ and VS group (supposed), have not rubbed off well on people here. They are tired of them trying to eat each other up rather than do something good for the state.

As for PDP, the communists should never have gone on to make an allegiance with such a communalist group. The leaders should’ve known better seeing that they had such good results last time around without any public allegiances with any of such communalist groups.

One can say for sure, even in the middle and upper class, there are people in Kerala who still truly believe in communist ideals. Whoever says communism is a fading phenomenon in the world should realize that though confined in majority only to 3-4 states in India, communism has never lost its roots there, and never will. If communism can survive over 5 decades of suppression and pessimism, and still have a very strong base, it certainly is not a fading phenomenon.

I believe in communism, but I hate many of the so called communist parties. I hate their political gimmicks, I hate many of the leaders, I hate their governance sometimes, but I have faith in the ideals of communism. That, I say, will never change. I am going to vote for the first time in my life, and it feels good to know that I have some responsibility vested on me.

I don’t care much for the system anyway. I know I can’t do something big enough to change the world, but I can still be the light in a small dark room. Do those small things in life with which you can make those small changes. Help others and hope for a better tomorrow.

The Motivation or the lack of it

2009-03-14T10:12:00.003+05:30

At last, I have run myself to a halt. After all the sound and fury of three years in a college, I’ve no more will to move on. The other day I was reading this post at the lineofsight and I suddenly felt it all coming back again. The monotony of following life like everyone else, the endless exams, the chitchats and doing all those things that has absolute meaning at all. I am seriously considering dropping out, but 3 years of my life, just wasted. Maybe this is a phase every college student passes through, maybe it’s just me.

The college is good, but not good enough. The friends are amazing, but they are not quite there. The life is fantastic, but even that word has lost its meaning. Day after tomorrow is another exam day, the music is blaring in my ear and I have no intention of taking up those books again. What do we all work towards anyway? If you look at life from my point of view right now, the answer is obvious- nothing, nothing at all. Ok, maybe I am being very pessimistic here, but I am feeling that oneness about whomever it was that said- 'I was born intelligent, but education ruined me'.

A friend of mine once told me, all this wont last forever, those we feel are very close to us won’t even be here tomorrow, but it’s those moments that we spent with them that make life special. Don’t mistake me, I am really enjoying my college life, but of late, there is this sinking feeling within me about what it would be after all this? Is it because I am on the brink of entering my last year at college? Is it because I am torn between love and friendship? I don’t really know, but then again I can’t understand lot of things lately anyway. Love, friends, chitchats are all part of college life, they tell me. Well, let me introduce to you some strange characters I meet around here. Not in this post, it would then be too long.

I haven’t felt like writing in a long time, but now I think I should let myself out someway. I can’t blurt out all these feelings in a civilized society like ours, can I? I don’t really know if I will ever post again, but for now I am searching for answers that seem so far away from me.

The Romantic

2009-02-15T20:40:00.000+05:30

Love and never be loved back
Care and never be cared back
Such was the disappointment
that he lay in shambles

His was the smartest voice
His was the foolest choice
He tried to hold on,for so long
Yet the guillotine dropped

In agony,his cry was faint
Yet his mind was still untaint
For love he still looked
For the drop in the ocean

The laughter has long gone
Yet the lives must go on
The stage artist retreats
The curtain has fallen...

My First Post in 2008

2008-08-08T23:31:00.000+05:30

Sounds lazy, right? You bet, I am.

And you knw what? It is a tag again . What's with this amooma and tags? Whenever she makes a tag, she seems to remember me ;). As she once said herself, maybe SNPS favouritism (we both happen to be from the same school, SNPS).

I also got tagged by Pr@tz from njaan.wordpress.com. This tag was different from the other one. Incidentally, he is not ~~njaan~~ who writes njaan.blogspot.com, but this is another one, pr@tz, earlier also known as ~~njaan~~ who writes the wordpress blog. What is with a name and is there any difference?

Anyway to the tag, I took this tag because it looks interesting, interesting enough to break my hibernation from this blog anyway.

So here goes,

Eight Things I am Passionate About

Blogging: Don't judge by the frequency of posts in this blog, its because I have been busy with another blog. It's often sad to hear people say they are not interested in Blogs, because they don't want to read someone's daily diary. Blogging is surely a powerful social interaction tool. Try it, if you are not a blogger yet. Besides the social part, if you are any good, you can make a living out of it too.

Sports : I try to take up anything that I can play. Crazy about football and cricket.

Socialism I was a hardcore socialist to start with, but now-a-days I don't want to care which way I support. The core ideas behind socialism always makes me passionate to it, but what I see in practice prevents from being too passionate about it. In heart a socialist.
Coding What I have done till now is too little to really call coding, but I love the way I can make a program. It's the same with web designing. I did a fair bit of jiggling with all the blog's template I work on. It is interesing to see the results

Music : I love to hear music all the time, and hence I also have a hidden craze for an iPod. I am just able to afford to buy one now, all thanks to blogging.

Motoring : No, its not because of the thrill you get by speeding, but rather because of the easiness of it. I love threading through traffic too. In kollam, you get lots of it. There is always another inch for you to go through

Travelling : Usually alone or with someone talkative(read someone from fairer sex). Though both the travelling experiences I had alone were horrible, I would still like to backpack someday. Waiting to get out of the shell called college life

College: Seems contradictory na? But over the last two years, I have understood that College life is special too, though College studies may never be. The freedom, the flexibility, the craziness, enjoy it!

Eight Things I want to do before I die

Marry: Obviously. Did you know the female:male ratio in Kerala is almost 1200:1000, but I can't find any of those extra 200 anywhere here. sigh

To find and meet a long known but unseen friend of me, whom I met through the good ol' way of yahoo chatting

Sing a song without getting tomatoes or koovals in return. I know I have it, the audience is never there you see. The last time I attempted it, well never mind....

Get over my fear of heights and jump out from an airplane at height, hopefully with a parachute

Give money to someone who is in absolute need of it, when I have enough of it.

Travel to many, if not all, interesting places all over the world, especially Old Trafford, Manchester.

Do something that someone someday will remember me by, positively.

And yeah, some usual things. Show all those ex-girlfriends of me what they missed out on :P, play in the snow, walk on moon, become a billionaire and ....

Eight books/blogs/anything I have read recently

The tale of two cities By Charles Dickens. It was lying dusty here for sometime. Had enough time to read it during the study holidays.

Harishanker Met him via ~~njaan~~ oops pr@atz. Seems like me and him are on parallel roads.

TKMIT College Magazine- Because the editor was my benchmate, He got 10 photos of himself in half as many pages. All we get in our magazine is illustrations of life of Great Communist leaders. I support communism too, but isn't that too bad stuff for a college magazine?

Backroom Tech. It's a technical blog, interesting...

Injipennu From Naalukettu Been reading all the high drama stuff related to this blog. Njaan evide illathayi poyallo( translate asI wish I was here). If it's not too late, I too protest against those unethical morons over at Kerals.com.

C and C++ programming Books

Balarama- Still loves soothran and sheru, yeah go on, you can call me a child.

Mobile SMS es - Latest one : 'U knw wat, a girl actually called me the other day and said, "Come on over, there's nobody home." I went over. Nobody was home...'

That's it. I am running out of ideas and sleep. Now I have to tag someone back. This is the most easiest part of writing a tag I think, payback. I was planning to give it back to Penakathi, but alas, she has already taken the same tag from ~~njaan~~ pr@tz .

So I tag njaan at njaan.blogspot.com, clever na? it's not to the wordpress one who tagged me and harisanker, because he does not seem to have answered any of the tags.

GETTING TAGGED

2007-07-07T21:14:00.000+05:30

So.......

Blogger tells me this is a post here after a very long time. It wasn’t because I was lazy (wink) but I was busy with the other blog which is, say, more rewarding than this one. Peep into it too sometimes. Livewares-The free softwares blog. See the effect? Now it has become a habit to advertise it all over net. To those few who will ever read this, you are about to read some secrets.

And to the matter at hand, getting tagged. After getting blogs, getting IM’s, spams, scraps and whatever things crazy weirdos brought out, this seems to be latest with bloggers. You give a tag to some person and he/she should put a post in her blog depicting 8 facts or habits about them. It’s a game, far better than some of those stupid games in orkut communities so I thought, what the devil, lets do it. For the records, I got tagged by this amooma.

The rules of this game, as ignited to me by amooma, are as follows:

* Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
* People who are tagged need to write posts in their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
* At the end of your post, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.

Well, I wonder what people do to pass time now-a-days. There seem to much fewer people chatting over net now-a-days. Maybe all are invisible to me. (Sigh)

So to the game and here are the 8 commandments:

1. The first one is always easy. I am an optimistic though recent happenings have dented it. These include a suspended adsense account (u can feel it around this blog), a suspended yahoo email id which was mine for over 3 years (how dare they?) and, the ever present no-use-at-all harder than steel, exams. But hakuna matata, says me.

2. I love reading so much. But that, of course, was before I got a PC. The books are a real friend to those in loneliness. As my priorities changed, ‘The White Queen’(its not a new one, Victorian times), ‘The People Next door’, ‘The Sherlock Holmes’ and all fell to the back shelves. Maybe I will look them all up when the always not-so-far loneliness comes back again.

3. I like to see Sachin, Agassi, Steffi Graph, Beckham and Schumacher on action, but not necessarily in that order. Three of that are not any more in action, one is going for another celebrity stunt and the first guy seems to be in a roller coaster ride at the end of his career. But I love my memories of them though. Sachin in Sharjah, Becks in Manchester United’s colours, Schumi in podium and Graff and Agassi making a very nice pair. Gone are those times, the nostalgist whines.

4. I love kerala from afar as well from inside. But the idea is to get a job in some MNC, make some dough and come back here to start something useful to this beautiful God’s own country. The plan, of course, won’t always work out as scripted.

5. I am running out of options now. Well, the phobias. I am a registered acrophobic, claustrophobic and cricket-ophobic. That last one is, of course, recent. Guess all Indians in one way or other are too..

6. My favourite hobby is walking in the beach with some friends (girls preferably). Since I don’t have both nearby, I compensate by being with them on net.

7. I hate over the head girls and ruthless demolishing persons. For the second reason I completely hate Australian cricket team and Roger Federer. Would like to see both of them lose once in a while just for a change. Hopes, again... No one should be too perfect, what are humans then?

8. I love the words anti hero and maya. The motto I try to follow is something like, If the crowd is going to the right, you should go to the left. This isn’t really the factor why I favor the lefts in the politics of Kerala, but its ideas is.

So it goes….That took me most part of a day to type down. So lets get some tags for others now. I hate to not strike back…so the batton needs to be passed and these are the chosen ones,

a. Miss Honest, The Happy Person….She is my senior actually, but writes pretty well, I should admit.

b. Njaan, Another senior…seems like college pass outs or fall outs are the best bloggers :P He is very popular though.

c. Writings on Sand

d. Irritant

e. Aruninte Blog, because I like it

f. A vagrant Soul, I liked her blog’s first impression

g. Pazhampuranam, nice mblog....that is Malayalam blog not mobile blog

h. Ahh the last one, goes to….Jithuji, because I like poets.

You know, most of them here are strangers to me. But I liked their blogs…so….ahh well, it has been nice getting tagged, but I am not looking eagerly to the next one because for one reason, etreyum blogs tanne oppichatu tanne kastepettaneee….( in english as getting even this much blogs is like a PITA).

And to end it a quote, pardon me to say:

Dream but always with your eyes wide open.

ALONE

2007-05-03T21:07:00.000+05:30

The grasses looked greener
When the bird looked out
And the sounds sweet
When it hopped around
T’was the first small steps
Into the golden unknown
Met many traps on the way
Fell in some but escaped
With scars to remember
Did things that when
Looked back at now
Look darker than grave
It’s all so enigmatic
In a way, all lives are
Saw the spark far off
Sure it was the sun
That it was hoping for
The Promised Land
On it, it day dreamed
Hope soared, brain undone
Can’t say it didn’t
See it coming at it
Nevertheless hoped
Hopes that were soon
Found to be fake
Made to look like
A clown in silk
But enjoyment was
What it looked for there
For the sake of one
Second, it dropped
What now looked at
Seems to be its life
Never again it vowed
Nonetheless a voice says,
It will happen again
Voice of the brain, never
Heard in the clear,
Till the time passes
And it is too late to be of use
Well, it seems the time
Has come for it to move on,
The grasses greener…
The sounds sweeter….