Mean Streets Of Mumbai

I saw something today that troubled me for a long time. It made me do some rethinking about the kind of people I thought existed in the world. I was stumped beyond belief at the behavior of a fellow citizen.

We were driving down the beautiful Peddar road where we stopped at the Haji Ali crossing. (Always a red light there) A gang of young boys attacked the waiting cars with armloads of pirated books, hoping to make a quick sale! Now, I’ve bought tons of stuff from these crossing wala vendors and I’m sure that others have too. From the aforementioned books to flowers to toys... It’s always a decent deal.

A young vendor, around 10 years old, was showing his books to the passengers of a taxi. And suddenly the traffic lights turned green. The taxi sped away with all his books and didn’t even pull over beyond the lights to pay up. (As I thought it would and as it was supposed to)
The image of the young boy with fear writ large on his face, running among moving vehicles with all the speed he could muster behind the speeding taxi, a sense of despair which touched an emotional chord in me will never be forgotten. I was hemmed in by cars from all sides, couldn’t even help the poor kid as he ran from that red light to the next crossing looking frantically around for that one elusive car. Panting, he stood there desolate as the taxi mingled with all the other taxis, making it indiscernible.

How callous and how uncaring have people become? Somebody who can afford to ride a taxi, who can buy books on a whim couldn’t afford to pay the poor young guy his due??? How is that possible? Why did he do it? For a lark? For the kick of having robbed the boy of his job? (For he would surely have been fired that evening itself.)
This incident shook the very foundation of my belief that there is a basic goodness in everyone. I had thought people were nicer.

2026

Barely a month into third year, and that feeling of "damn, is college really gonna be over so soon?" has already started creeping on to us. And the feeling sucks. It's amazing how quickly time flies by when you actually want it to freeze.... but okay, we won't go into any of that depressing stuff now. Soppy weepy "I miss college" entries will be put up later. The genesis of this post took place one lazy afternoon (three days ago) when nostalgia - which should ideally have been reserved for the Farewell week - started flooding us all of a sudden.

And we began planning our 2026 reunion. Twenty years later & all that, y'know. And began speculating who would be doing what, doing whom, and doing how well in life. Well, here it is, our speculations out in the open.

--- Quick background info ---

Date: Aug 4-5, 2006
Venue: Day 1 - Nirula's. Day 2 - College canteen.
Speculators: Amiya, Harpreet, Ishani, Jayant, Neha, Vidur (and Richa, on day 2).

[ Note: Harpreet's a gal, in case the name left anyone in doubt :) ]

Q: In what order will everyone get married?

Sequence decided as per individual vote count:

Neha – Harry – Ishani – Amiya – Jayant – Vidur

Q: Who’ll be the richest?

Amiya thinks. . . Harry
Harry thinks. . . Harry
Ishani thinks. . . Amiya
Jayant thinks. . . Ishani
Neha thinks. . . Neha
Vidur thinks. . . Harry

So the vote counts stands:

Harry: 3; Amiya: 1; Ishani: 1; Neha: 1; Jayant: 0; Vidur: 0

Q: Who’ll lose their virginity first?

Amiya thinks. . . Harry/Amiya
Harry thinks. . . Ishani
Ishani thinks. . . Amiya
Jayant thinks. . . Vidur/Amiya
Neha thinks. . . Vidur
Vidur thinks. . . Harry/Vidur

And the vote count is:
Amiya & Vidur: 2 each; Harry: 1.5; Ishani: 1; Jayant: 0; Neha: 0

Q: Who’ll probably have an extramarital relationship?

Amiya thinks. . . Neha/Vidur
Harry thinks. . . Neha
Ishani thinks. . . Neha
Jayant thinks. . . Neha
Neha thinks. . . Neha/Vidur
Vidur thinks. . . Jayant/Vidur

And the vote count is:

Neha: 4; Vidur: 1.5; Jayant: 0.5; Amiya, Ishani & Harry: 0

Q: Who’ll be the fattest when we meet in 2026?

Amiya thinks. . . Neha/Vidur
Harry thinks. . . Ishani
Ishani thinks. . . Neha/Vidur
Jayant thinks. . . Vidur
Neha thinks. . . Ishani
Vidur thinks. . . Neha/Ishani

And the potential future fat count is:

Ishani: 2.5; Vidur: 2; Neha: 1.5; Amiya, Harry & Jayant: 0

Q: Who’s most likely to have a paunch by then?

Amiya thinks. . . Vidur/Neha
Harry thinks. . . Vidur
Ishani thinks. . . Neha
Jayant thinks. . . Amiya
Neha thinks. . . Jayant
Vidur thinks. . . Neha

And the dreaded paunch count is:

Neha: 2.5; Vidur: 1.5; Amiya & Jayant: 1; Harry & Ishani: 0

[ So I'll be the fattest, but I won't have a paunch. Lucky! ]

Q: Who’ll have the sexiest spouse?

Amiya thinks. . . Harry/Jayant
Harry thinks. . . Harry
Ishani thinks. . . Ishani
Jayant thinks. . . Amiya
Neha thinks. . . Vidur
Vidur hopes Vidur but he thinks. . . Jayant/Harry

And the lucky bugger count is:

Harry: 2; Jayant: 1; Amiya, Vidur & Ishani: 1; Neha: 0

Q: Who’s most likely to have gotten arrested by then?

Amiya thinks. . . Harry (for drunken driving/doping)
Harry thinks. . . Jayant (radical activism)
Ishani thinks. . . Harry (something to do with being too drunk)
Jayant thinks. . . Jayant (activism) / Neha (killing her husband)
Neha thinks. . . Harry
Vidur thinks. . . Jayant

And the likeliest jailbirds are:

Harry: 3; Jayant: 2.5; Neha: 0.5; Amiya, Ishani & Vidur: 0

--------

Okay, just for the record, coming up with great enough questions isn't easy. While this entry only lists some of the more interesting Qs, there were also many that we came up with... then chucked. Sample this:

Jayant: Hmm... Do you think Amiya will have written a book by then?
Ami & Ishani: Dude, will YOU have written a book by then?!
(For those who don't know, Jay's the writer amongst us)
Vidur (thoughtfully): Do you think I will have read a book by then?

And if you happen to know Vidur, you're expected to drop dead laughing here, right here.

--------

Now back to our questions.

Q: How does everyone see everyone else’s future spouse/partner?

Q: What’s the wildest thing everyone SEES others as having done by then?


[ To quote Jayant, so around the time we're all 30, you'll mostly see Vidur naked. ]

Q: And what’s the wildest thing they probably WOULD have done (for real)?

There. This entry shall go up on the net as our final speculation on each other's future, and our 2026 reunion shall reward all those whose guesses came closest to the reality. May the best guesser win.

PS:
If you read this so far, and have decided to leave a comment, please copy your comment & paste it on Amiya's blog and Jay's... that feeling of all-togetherness and soulmate blogs and all, y'know.

Book-Tagged

Oooooooooookay, I've been tagged again. AGAIN. I told you, didn't I tell you, and let me quote - "By the way, I just KNOW you're waiting for me to finish this tag. So that you can come up with another one real soon, to torture my poor soul. I just know it."
However this tag is close to the heart! It's about BOOKS, for chrissake!! :D
But I'm a natural born cribber, so I will crib, particlarly becuase I wrote this one line which I liked a lot! And that is - As I said, these TAGS will be the death of me. Ah me! Such a martyr! :D :P

Anyway, without further ado let's get down to business......... Here is my book history!

Number of books I own
Ummmmmm.... Damn! Can't believe I got stuck on this one! I think, around 300-350. Not counting my various comics, which constitute a totally different section!

Number of books lent out to others that never came back
A set of 30 'Archie' comics, which I lent to distant 'cousins'. NEVER returned!! Imagine.......30! And I was 12 then and those comics meant the world to me! Sniff sniff! :(
Besides that, at least 4 Enid Blytons lost to stupid stupid STUPID classmates!! Arrrgh! :x

Number of e-books I have
Again.... A toughie! I think around 200. (Maybe I should ask Swetank.)

Last book I bought
'Undercover Economist' by Tim Harford.

Last book I was gifted
'Shantaram' by Gregory David Roberts. Though I still haven't seen it! My parents have bought it. It's my gift. But it's still in Bombay! :)

Last book I read
'False Impressions' by Jeffrey Archer. Awesome!! Awesome!
And I have to mention the second last one too - 'Freakonomics' by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. Awesome!!! Awesome!! AWESOME! :D

I'm currently reading..
'Undercover Economist' - Tim Harford
'The Eldest' - Christopher Paolini
'Parineeta' - Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay
'Gora' - Rabindranath Tagore
'The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer' - Mark Twain
'Murder Of Roger Ackroyd' - Agatha Christie

AND looking for more!

Five books that mean a lot to me
1) My entire 'Harry Potter' series.
I don't let ANYONE touch those!

2) 'Atlas Shrugged' and The 'Fountainhead'.
Both these books taught me something totally new and different.. Masterpieces!

3) 'Freakonomics'.
It's just a recent purchase but I love it! It's brought about a whole new meaning to our dull economics and it means a lot to me for just that.

4) My 'Shakespeare' collection.
God! I love that man... And his comedies, his romances, his tragedies!! Everything!

5) My 'Archie' comics collection.
Yes, I made another one after losing those 30, and that is why this one is even more special! Around 80 comics in this, I just can't bear to part with them even after my mother's constant admonishing that they take up too much space!

Three books I started reading, but never completed
1) 'The Three Chimpanzees' by Jared Diamond.
2) 'Steppenwolf' by Herman Hesse.
3) 'Ignited Minds' by A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.

Book that made zero sense to me
1) 'The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari' by Robin Sharma.
Actually all the self-help, I-will-teach-you-how-to-live-your-life-because-you-don't-know-anything kinda books just don't go down well with me!
2) 'The Alchemist' by Paulo Coelho.
Again similar. Let-me-tell-you-about-the-world-because-you-don't-know-anything kinda book.
My most treasured books
Basically EVERY single book I own! I don't think I can part with any of them or bear to lose them or see them soiled in any way.. Books are way too special for me and I just can't understand those who don't enjoy reading! I think they're missing out on something absolutely beautiful!

People I Tag
I didn't tag anyone in my last tag post.... So I think I'll continue that trend.
Though Jay, you might wanna try your hand at this! :D

The MBA

An MBA....
The ultimate goal of many poor souls like me.... And when I say 'many', I mean MANY. Phew, sometimes the sheer size daunts me in my task...The task of doing well enough in the CAT exams to be called for an interview and the GD, and then the even difficulter task of doing SO well in them so as to be invited to study in those haloed institutions, the IIMs.
Hmmmm, HALOED? Or just plain KILLING...

I know I might sound silly or deranged but, COME ON....We all know the admission procedure is no walk in the park. The entrance exam, the interview AND the GD, all have scared the best of people out of their wits...
Why is it so tough to get into those blessed places? I mean, I know why.... So many people apply, this is probably the only way to cut down the exesses but still....Just a rhetorical question...WHY? :(

Allow me to vent please, I'm feeling damn worried about MY prospects.
First comes the written exam:
I can safely say my english is pretty decent, others have said that too, but that's still not accounting for at least a 1000 people better than me. I suck at maths... so now what? MAJOR trouble spot...Okay okay, practise will make it manageable...fine. The DI part should be alright... So there. the written part isn't scary, but then, for me - it never was.

Now we come the two ugliest words in the history of the English language - Interview and GD. Ugh! ( To use my favourite expression these days ).. Plain and simple UGH!

People say I'm confident. confident enough to give a decent interview. But I, as a matter of fact, know that I'm confident around the WRONG people. I even had a talk about this with a pal of mine, and unfortunately, he agreed. ( Silly fool couldn't assuage my fears! ) That means that I don't think I'd be able to hold my own in an interview. I know giving those is very scary, I've not had a lot of practise but I've given some and they've told me a lot of evil things :(

And the even worse GD, especially designed to KILL students like me.. Again for the same reason, I'm confident around the wrong people.. In my group of friends, I can go on talking, arguing over just about anything...And I'm one of those non-stop talking types :P , but then again, that's the wrong kinda people to be confident around. Now don't get me wrong, dear friends of mine! What I'm trying to say, and doing a poor job of, is that, my friends ( Though highly special ) don't decide my getting admissions in places I want. Public speaking has always been an issue. Even in school, Where I was considered to be a good speaker, debating and the like used to give me nightmares. Give me a speech, I'll learn it by heart and go puke it out on stage...THAT is fine and dandy, but it was the elocutions that used to be my biggest concerns. Coming up with things to say while standing in front of a group of people gives me shivers up and down my silly spine... And that is basically what the GD is all about.

And now the icing on the murderous cake, the new reservation bill...I know pages and pages have been written against it and I agree with almost all of it, but I can't stop myself from mentioning it again... This just makes things just about perfect, don't you think? The difficult task has now been made almost impossible.. The worst part is, all the OBCs etc. have their precious 50%, but IF by any chance some OBC gets in through their merit, they get a seat in OUR 50%, not theirs... So basically, what they have is MORE THAN 50% of the total seats in their hands... Told ya it was the icing.

OH MAN! What's gonna happen to me...My dad has such high hopes from me, it makes things tougher.. Not that he says anything, but I just KNOW. One day he was telling me about some daughter of a friend of his, who didn't make it the first time she tried and now is just sitting at home twiddling her thumbs, waiting for the exams to come around again. He said he doesn't want me to waste a year..And I'm not really fond of that idea myself....CRAP.

So that's the thing which has been bothering me for a pretty long time now... What I want to know is how everyone else is feeling about our CAT exams.. It took me a long while to decide if I should put this up on my blog ; I'm generally not the kinds who'll discuss problems with others...But in the end, the need to get some sympathy (:P) overcame my natural habit.... So empathise, dear readers, EMPATHISE with poor ol' me.

Five points to me for updating my blog.

So this tag thing...I can never understand why humans come up with weirder and weirder and more sadistic means of torturing their fellow humans....I mean, Amiya, Jayant, Amod ?? I thought we were friends... How could you do this to me?? How....
Bad people.

Anyway..... Jayant (or was it Amiya) tagged me early in my blogging life ( Not much of a life though ). It was one of those write 5 these and 5 those things about yourself tags... Avoided it and was still trying when Amod came long and tagged me again (GRRR). I will choose to ignore the fact that Amod's tag is a write 7 things about yourself tag. So peer pressure and other scathing, sarcastic remarks have forced me to get down and complete this post. (By the way, I just KNOW you're waiting for me to finish this tag. So that you can come up with another one real soon, to torture my poor soul. I just know it.)

Now without further ado, here is a list of the many 5 things that make up my life..

FIVE THINGS I CAN DO

1) Drive a car!!
2) Dance
3) Read and write.
4) Vello for HOURS without a guilty thought in my mind
5) Make people laugh till their tummy hurts.. :D



FIVE THINGS I CAN'T DO

1) Cook ( Where's the kitchen? )
2) Swim ( If I fall in some water? Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa )
3) Whistle ( One thing I want to learn real bad )
4) Skate ( I've tried many many times but gravity always had other plans )
5) Be mean



FIVE THINGS I WANNA DO

1) Lots of adventure sports ( At least, I think I wanna do that )
2) Learn 5 more languages ( Notice the '5' again!!! )
3) Get rich
4) One little world tour
5) Become a secret agent/spy and do all the cool stuff they show in the movies!!



FIVE WORDS I USE A LOT

1) Damn ( Read da-yy-am)
2) Oh shit/ crap/ fuck.
3) Nalayak ( For all those who fail to do their living-close-to-Ishani duties )
4) Chill ( For all those hyper-ventillating souls I know )
5) Don't die ( I'm such a good samaritan.. :P)



FIVE THINGS I DISLIKE

1) Pink
2) Chilly in food....Arrrrgh!!
3) Horror
4) Dogs ( Okay, so I don't dislike them, but I do prefer to stay faaaaaaaaaaar away )
5) Empty headed or way-too-full-of-themselves people ( If you get my drift )



FIVE THINGS I LIKE

1) Me :P
2) The rain
3) Shakespeare
4) Cricket/ Basketball
5) ROCK!!



FIVE GIFTS I'D LOVE TO GET

1) A blank Cheque would be perfect, but if you can't afford that then,
2) A car!
3) A new I-Pod. ( My old one is a piece of junk now )
4) Books ( Mostly fiction )
5) Flowers!! ( Ooooooooh! Love them! And lucky me got tons of those for my birthday this time!! Yay!!!! )



FIVE MUSTS IN MY KINDA GUY

1) Chivalry ( I mean, what kinda guy is a chivalry-less guy?? )
2) He HAS to be tall
3) Sense of humour
4) Intelligence
5) Decent clothes. Please. (DO NOT come up to me wearing those awful shaded-patched-wannabe artistic-embroidered jeans or anything in that category. )


Okay, so that' it. That's me. I'm done. Happy now?

POETRY!!!

Ok this is my first attempt at 'poetry' (Well, not exactly..... but technically? Yes!). So there I was sitting in class and doing what all students do - trying to listen to the teacher, and suddenly the first line of this 'poem' pops up into my head and starts pirouetting all around. So I thought, "wtf, lets create"... and the following is what got created.

((This is also an attempt at a new post when I can't think of anything else...thanks to my exams. Me being my usual lazy self don't really feel like writing something especially for the blog at the moment..Coz I'm supposed to be busy studying! And everyone is asking me to write something and not make my blog a one post thing only.))

If you sit in a dark room

Think about the past present and the future

It will seem not far away

Burn burn burn

What do you see?

An empty space

Where trees line a desolate path

Smiling longing begging...all gone

Fire and ice

Thirst and pain

Far away is the way to glory

Look on look on

Wonder what happens next

Take the lower plane

Conceal the unconcealable

Forgive the unforgivable

Forget the unforgettable

Dream the impossible.

PS - Please do not try to read between these lines ( despite the name of the blog). There are no hidden meanings, double entendres or the like. It is just words strung into lines and lines written one after the other to resemble a 'poem'. Also note that the word 'poem' is in quotes everywhere.

I doubt many people will like it. If you do, then WOW!! If you don't, then DAMN! :P

R.R.isms

Now I'm sure that each and every one of us has had our share of funny teachers....You know the ones who do those idiotic antics in class that make you start snickering as soon as they turn around. But now and then there come these totally CLASSIC pieces of art that make boring, un-attendable classes worth attending!!

One such fine masterpiece teaches us a subject called 'Money And THE Financial System'. Lets call him RR...won't tell ya the whole (W-H-O-L-E) name coz God Forbid he comes trolling around here, then I'll be dead meat.You must be wondering about the funnies in the last line....don't worry, just sit back and start reading and you'll understand it all!! :D

So here it is.....here comes the much-cherished, much-painstakingly prepared list of crap our dear RR has come up with in the past few months that we've had the honour of having him teach us.It may give you a heart attack to read the stuff he's said...( coz sometimes he can get sooooooooo wonky) So hold on to your seats, dear readers....and BEWARE..

THE LIST:


1)RR: Please be patient. By that I mean you must have patience. Of course, I don't mean you should be a patient. (In Amiya's tute class)
Ooooooooh how caring

2) (He has divided the entire class into various groups & each group has to submit a report on their respective topics. So this one group had managed to impress him and....)
RR: So now the ball is in their court. Of course, there is no ball and there is no court. It's just a manner of speaking.
OMG such vital info....

3) RR:I am talking about an industrial plant, not a real plant. You know the ones that breathe.
Really sir? For a minute I actually got confused. Thank you so much for clarifying.

4) RR: Chakravorty Committee was set up in 1985. Jayant, (An unfortunate soul who happened to be looking up at that time) when were you born?
Jayant: Urm..1986, sir.
RR: See, you weren't even born then.
WHAT??

5) RR:Since you were not available to me 13-14 years back, I have no control over your thought process.
Egad! We are just pieces of meat, ready for sale.....

6) RR: What does Tarun (Another unfortunate soul) do in Ecosoc (Our college economics society)??
Amiya (A brave soul): Sir, he is involved in all aspects, in the whole of Ecosoc.
RR: You mean whole, as in the W-H-O-L-E of Ecosoc...
Our teachers are as DIRTY as us.

7) Vidur: Yes sir, there are private autos in Chennai.
RR: Really. This is very amusing to me.
Not 'this is a surprise'...not even 'this amuses me' but...

8) XYZ (A student): Sir, I think you missed this point.
RR: Yes, I deliberately left it out because I wanted to test you..
Aaaaaaaaah he never makes mistakes, you see!!!

9) RR:If you cannot answer a question you will be embarrassed. Fine.
But if you get embarrassed then I will get embarrased. Ooooooooooook .
And then society will make a fun of us..
I swear, I'm gonna gag any minute.

10) RR:I cannot insult you by giving you something easy in the quiz. Please insult us. Atleast we'll pass that way.
It should be something that you can attack. Huh?
Something that strikes you. You want the questions to hit us?!!?!?

11)RR:If you are the governor of RBI, which you might be one day, ...(Haan haan, dukaan khol kar baithne jitna aasaan hota hai na.) then how will you bring in money?
XYZ (A brave student trying to answer): Uh! sirrr........
RR: You can't ask your employees to sell tomatoes and potatoes to earn revenues.
XYZ thinking....When did I say that?

12) RR:A stitch in time saves nine. But what are you doing here? This is just a loose rope.
XYZ thinking....How do those sentences connect?

13) RR:When both of yous set ups the plant. (The industrial one)
Aaj 's' free mein mil rahe thhe so I'm using em so liberally.

14) RR:There was a lot of hue and cry about it. Not that people were actually crying. It's just that they were reacting vehemently.
Seriously??

15) RR:If you like something then you say this is of a GOLDEN ERA. (We do?) Actually there is no gold around. It is just a saying.
WOW!!

16) RR:If you want to make a quick buck or a fast buck, (Choose the word you like the best) by hook or by crook...(Aaj toh mein dictionary learn karke aaya hoon).
I am using these phrases because you use them and understand them...
Achhaaaa?

17) (He had asked us to make a flowchart and it was spread horizontally)
RR: I hope you have drawn it in the 'landscape' mode and not the 'portrait' mode.
And I also hope that you haven't made a real landscape, just used the landscape mode.
So hopeful.

18) XYZ: Sir, how do you spell 'PROFLIGACY'?
RR: I don't spell it because I do not teach you English.
Avoided the Q....Oooooooohh...He didn't know the spelling himself!!! hee hee!!

19) RR: Austerity measures....now don't ask me the spelling of 'Austerity' also, because I will have to become an English school teacher for that.
He didn't know the spelling of this one either!!

20) (Asks a student something & her reply turns out to be not entirely correct)
So RR: Ankita (Poor thing!!), you were partially true, and I have told you before that 'partially true' is 'false' and 'partially false' is also 'false'. Do you realize your mistake?
Ankita: Yes, sir (Thinking....No sir )
RR: That is very good because now you are on the path to perfection. After all, we only want truth... the absolute truth.... that's what we're seeking.
I pity thee Ankita, for unknowingly treading the path of perfection!!!



OK that's it folks....for now.
Die...die laughing.
Wait (with bated breath) for Part 2.



PS: I know I must have missed a million other fantastic R.R.isms. So all the people who know the true identity of RR [:P] are invited to tell me what I forgot!
PPS: Isn't this a really, really long post!!



PPPS: Happy Budday Vidur!!!

My First Post Ever

Ok this is the first post on my first blog....oooooooohhh!!! :P

I have absolutely no idea why I've started it...Maybe to facilitate commenting on my friends' blogs (read Richa) or maybe to actually publify (is that a word!!??) my ramblings......(stupid idea really)

I know for a fact that Amiya and Jay will be happy with this development - they'll have one more link on their blog profiles.....
That's what they do - collect silly stuff.... like scraps, friends (on Orkut that is, links blah blah blah!!

I had so much trouble just getting started....HOW MANY NAMES DOES THE RUDDY SITE NEED???
One needs to be highly creative to come up with something for the following:
1) a user name
2) a display name
3) a blog title
4) a blog URL
I mean, whats the difference?? I had to call up somebody to figure this all out....
(Note to pro bloggers:"I am not dumb.")

I, for the time being, am sticking to my good old name. After all, there's nothing better than that, is there?? Sources have told me that everything can be changed/edited/improved etc etc so I'm content... at least abhi tak...

And this is not the grand opening of my blog that I had imagined. It should have been something witty, funny, witty some more that would have had people rolling on the floor with laughter.....but what the heck! I was never meant to be a Shakespeare or a Maupassant. If i were, would I have been doing economics??

So there. My writing abilities are out in the open. LOL all you better-writers-than-me ppl.



PS: I can't believe I've gone on and on long enough to make a decent length post.....PHEW!!! :D