Saturday, November 29, 2008

Funny things that i have done

I never believe in equality of men and women. Equality of people also. God has created everyone with a purpose, to fulfill their karma obligations and proceed to higher spiritual levels. I believe, everyone gets everything one wants in the end, if not in this janma in the next. These days, am so afraid of wanting anything in life. Am going to take life just as it comes with no expectations.

One of my section mates is getting married next week and all the institute gals made a video to be sent to his future wife and father-in-law which contained messages of how much each of the gals wanted him and felt bad that he was getting married. I was supposed to sob and say, how I was cheated and how sad I was that he was getting married. Another married section mate’s testimony was how disappointed she was that he left her, after she had left her husband for him. And so on.

All my life, it has mostly been guys asking and me escaping or carrying on for a while to eventually part and move on. The first and the only time, all my life, I ever initiated this crap was for one Oct 27 guy, even though I knew he was not my destined one. We had gone to M Engg college in final year for inter college fest, way back in 2002. It was past 4 pm and there was this face painting competition. Those were the days without mobile and I had no face to paint on. I was walking wearily towards to venue and suddenly he passed by and I kept moving on. Think god sent some signal; I turned back and asked him, if he would let me paint on his face. Yes, am very good at talking to strangers first time but I am never good at keeping in touch with anyone in the long run. He agreed. The venue was in the first or second floor. It was hot. Unlike Blore, Trichy is a hot oven. I was sweating profusely and I found I had 5 minutes before the competition started. I went and washed my face and found he was searching for me when I returned just in time.

So the event started and I appraised his charming face and painted his one side and the next side and went on to describe the theme and idea I was going to tell finally. Due to 6-9 Venus-mars combos, or I don’t know what, I kept stepping back once a while to gaze at him. I painted his eyes towards the end. He turned his face as I wanted and posed elegantly. He wore bright lemon yellow shirt that day and I had painted half his face white and half black with other things as well. Think, he was the college charmer as well. The gals who were the judges were flirting with him.

That evening, more than an hour later, he still had not washed his face and he came on stage for a dance with the face painting on. I was flustered. More than my painting, am sure, it was because he was the popular charming guy that I got the first prize that day. And I got one more first again, not for artistry, but for my wordings. It was 3 am when I reached home that night. Thanks to the actor who came late for distributing prizes. Phone was not working at home. Luckily there was one more gal from my place and I joined her father. Back home, my parents, would never bother asking, why I was late. If dad didn’t open the door, I would lie up in the terrace. But that happened just once.

For the first time, I lost my appetite, I tried to slim down, and I was more concerned with my appearance and was angry for the surgical scars and my legs. Ever since 1999, I had given up on my right leg due to the pain. He was the reason, I started to use my right leg to climb up stairs and it was a great joy to discover that I could climb up with both the legs. Later that night, I found my hands hurting, coz I used my hands for support. I had got his mail id and I simply could not get him off my mind. I kept mailing him all nonsense that I don’t completely remember. He replied. Probably he is the only guy in this whole world who called me a panni kutti, vaadi podi and I didn’t mind. I liked everything about him. He was unabashed in his replies. I told him about my caste and scars and he told me that he had an elder brother who was mentally challenged and he was the only hope for his orthodox grandfather. I had separate mail id created for his mails and 6 years later, I don’t remember the password or the id. I didn’t contact him after 2003. I saw him once on webcam, he was webcasting for his sister and I saw his elder brother. That makes me wonder about garuda puranam. Most of the mentally challenged kids that I see, are born as Brahmins. Some rule? I continued sending him bday mails and mailed for a while and as usual, I moved on. Even now, every year, along with poonam’s I remember his bday since they both share the same bday. Am wondering, whether it is a coincidence that my only school friend from 4th standard and he share the same b’ day. He was a moon Cancerian that reflected his responses.

I am very bad at concealing feelings, right from my mentor, to my lecturer, to all my college mates, and back home, he was the topic of my conversations. My lecturer was amused. My mentor told me his sad story after we called it quits.

He joined MTech in S and we had off campus there. I was again all excited all the way from home to his college and was hoping I would bump into him some time. But guess, life has other plans. So the point is, those were the years, when I was thinking, it is the guy who should propose. But in the video we took now, every gal acted so convincingly as to how much we “loved” V and didn’t want him to get married. In the long run, nothing matters. Even if a person gets married or loves, that is just a temporary phase dictated by planets. When the combos turn sour, so do the very same intimate relationships. I have seen people loving for 7 years before marriage and fighting and abusing each other physically, verbally later. What is the point? Some even resort to murder. Whats all this fuss about marriage and love? For something so temporary, so ephemeral. Except for those minority padminis and rare guys, are there any faithful guys left. Again, what is this selfish love that you feel for that one person that makes you kill another person to protect your loved one, or hate the rest of the humanity for treasuring that one love? Is it that, if in the previous janma more than one love one person, then in this janma, he or she might have two partners phased out. I remember Autobiography of yogi saying, love everyone, coz, you might never know, they might have been your fathers, mothers, kids, wives and husbands in the previous janmas.

If we could all love each other selflessly, and generated only positive thoughts, the whole world would be a beautiful and peaceful place without acts of such terrorism. It is because one lustfully or selfishly loves one person above this whole world that all the worlds’ sorrows arise. What gives one the most joy, creates the most distress in its absence. Is it true joy in the first place, if it was merely satisfied with senses? And if life now is not for gratifying your senses but abstaining from all this, what is then the big deal? Is it just escapism to shirk from your worldly duties and want liberation? What is moksha?

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Western Ghatts with Mom

Inception
Well, it all started because of SGN. He described the beauty of Kollur Mookambiga and the idea for Sringeri came from YL amma. She was the one who suggested I go to Sankara matt, that lazy Sunday and the Vivekacudamani (it took me quite some time, to get the pronunciation right).

I was supposed to have gone with SGN on the weekend before summer placements, but it got canceled because of prasna with his guruji. And last weekend, my section folks were going unfortunately to Wayanad. If I had not gone this April, I could have gone with my friends now and had a galla time. Ok back to this weekend.

The trip
So how unplanned can one get for a trip? I was asking my roomie S, our hostel office uncle, couple of friends, Udipi seniors and at last, I decided, enough of this planning and left on the spur of the moment to majestic, without even looking at the bus timings in net. Mom could not cut office on Thursday for the KSTDC tour. I reached majestic at 5:45 and booked tickets till Sringeri and return tickets from Murudeswar for 23 November. Nothing else planned. The bus was supposed to leave at 8:45 and we had 3 hours. So I took an auto and went to ISKCON to kill time. It was the 5th time I was going, and it was the 3rd for mom and we were already bored with ISKCON. I could never sense the vibrations theere that i could feel in a small temple like Gavi Gangadhar temple.

Sringeri
So we took the ordinary bus to Sringeri and the road was so riddled with potholes at places. Somehow, both mom and I agreed that it was actually good for body, since the bus actually threw us up and down and since we were lying down, it actually, really helped me a lot. I had no pains of bus travel the next day. I dreamt of Shanmu’s mom who metamorphosed into my 5th class Saroja ma’m. I was half asleep and dreamt of sunrise.

We reached the temple around 6 am. From outside, it didn’t look like a temple at all. Some tin fences and a reception office. We were searching for a place to take bath and found the temple accommodation. The guy out there directed us to go to the temple reception. We took on the nearby lodge but there was no one there at the reception. So we walked back to the temple reception and found that reception guy, gave rooms only for those who had contacts. So we had to walk back and tried the lodges out there once more and later, we decided to walk to the other lodge a little bit far away and found the place was yucky and the charge of 450 disproportionate for the place. So we again made a first round and took bath in the free place. It was not so neat, not so disgusting as well. Water stopped while I was till brushing my teeth and came only after I had finished my bath. I found, I had forgot to pack my chudidhar pants and had to roam about in my grey jeans and sweat pants. Mom was not feeling good about this whole thing. There was no place to keep our luggage as well and we had to take it inside the temple, where it was clearly said, the temple is not responsible for the luggage. We left it at one sannidhi and took on to seeing all other temples.

Sringeri Temple
The best part was the unpainted Vidyasankara temple. The whole place permeated some kind of radiance that transported you to another plane. It felt so divine there. And we moved to the rivulet and found such big big black fishes which jostled against each other to gobble the little pori and biscuit that people threw. Man, I kept watching those fishes. It was as if the whole river was black with moss, which turned out to be these big black fishes. Mom said, it looked as if these fishes were bound by some promise.

Once we finished our darshan, we went out had breakfast at a place next to Maruthi bhavan, where the idlies were horrible and I left mom there to check out the bus timings to Kollur. We had the option to go to Horanadu, but I thought it would be overkill to tax mom. Besides my ex roomie had said, that the temple was not all that great. But yes’day my senior SB was saying, Horanadu beckoned him, it was such a beautiful place. And then I felt, yes, we should have gone there. So after making the enquiries, I dragged mom back to the temple where we crossed the bridge and went to the ashram were people came dressed in panchakajams and madisaar with lots of fruits for some pooja. I sat there, trying to read lalitha, and found I was soon distracted with the way people dressed and by the sexy legs of maamis walking like demure Japanese ladies clad in kimono. Think, it was not my praaptham to see Bharathi swamigal. I could have sat for almost an hour in that meditation hall kind of thing and found myself walking away, few minutes before Bharathi swamigal came in. There was big line of people waiting to see the seer. Guys were asked to remove their shirt by the security. I was amused to find “Beware of Snakes” instead of the usual warning. I wanted to see a snake. There were two elephants, undecorated. Mom said, they had so many scars because the mahouts had poked them with metal hooks, which I was not able to spot. We had our lunch at hotel in the first floor, which was again horrible and boarded the bus to Udipi.

Kollur Mookambiga Temple
The trip back to Udipi was nauseating somehow, with the bad road and the ghatts. I tried on lie on mom’s lap and it was a great relief when we alighted at Udipi. I wanted to see the temple here but found a Kollur bus was about to start. We sat in the first seat and after a long time, I found myself enjoying the way, in which the driver overtook and sped by, instead of experiencing heart attacks with every sudden brake. We reached Kollur around 7 pm and we found a room right in the bus stand for a mere Rs. 60 a night. It was spacious, clean and really good. We took bath and had a peaceful darshan and had dinner in the temple. Hot food and decent one on banana leaf for annadhanam. We returned to the room and I collapsed till 7 am. Mom was ready by the time, I woke up. We had apples first thing in the morning and again went back to the temple. I dragged mom to see the place, where Sugi was apparently swept down the shabernika river, when she was 18 months old. I sometimes wonder, whether this is linked to the fact that this is her last janma. The temple was crowded and we finished darshan.

Kodachadri
After temple, we found a jeep waiting to go to kodachadri, which just required 2 more people. We were told it was 150 per head and we were charged 175. We sat in the front seat along with the driver. We had a mallu family behind us and there was a wailing kid uphill. Downhill, it sang songs and that was good.

Once we reached a small brook, the driver got down and opened the jeep front windshield or whatever you call that and fresh cold breeze caressed us. Mom was instantly transformed. She exclaimed, hey look water. Hey look at this and that. I was glad for those moments. I really wonder how the guy drove the jeep. It was fabulous though. The view was awesome. I kept wondering, how come, there was so much of water logged between the mountains; it was like a river meandering between the mountains. Or is the water simply floating between these hilltops. At kodachadri, we walked up to ganesha cave, where Shankaracharya was supposed to have reached Kollur crawling through that cave. There was an 11 yr old Praveen who gave me a hand and acted the guide. Right at the beginning, mom stopped and said, no more, it took so much of cajoling to get mom up to the ganesha temple and later when the driver came to know, that we went only till the Ganesha cave, he was laughing that we missed the main parvatheswar 10 minutes further up. Well whatever, the view till ganesha temple was too good. The shadow of the clouds falling on the green hill tops, the strong gust of cool breeze, lush greenery all around, I felt like a bird flying high.

Bainoor-Bhatkal
It was 2 pm, when we came back to kollur busstand and the driver suggested Arya bhavan hotel, which served mallu lunch, that was too good compared to what we had been eating all this long. The moment, we came back to bus stand, there was bus starting for Bainoor. It was hot by then. At Bainoor, we took a van to Bhatkal. Who invented this thing - jam packed? It should be van packed. The last time, I traveled in such a van was in cognizant 1st year. The vans were later abolished following few kids’ deaths. There were 5 in the front, 4 in the middle and 5 behind, 3-4 next to the driver. We took another van to Murudeswar where, we sat near next to the driver.

Murudeswar
Murudeswar was good. It was not like going to temple, it was more like going to a beach. I quickly finished darshan to play in the sea water. We took on to the boat and missed sun set by matter of few minutes. It got dark so soon. Mom wanted to reach the water and found that water was not reachable since the boat parted water. It was the last trip and the boat was going to all other boats and the guys clambered to this big boat one by one. I felt, what if these guys were pirates and took on to knife and demanded money in the middle of the sea. Leave my paranoia. The guys were just jumping and shouting after a hard day’s work. Mom was in a hurry to board the bus at 7:30 pm. So at 7 pm, we moved away from the water and ate hot tasty parotta and green peas kurma in Bharath Bhavan which the auto guy suggested as pure veg hotel. He dropped us in a dark place stating that this was the bus stand. There was no current and it was pitch dark, past 7:30 and I was worried thinking, I had missed the bus. I tried calling up ksrtc customer service no. given behind the ticket, but no one answered. It was small bus stand, and I was wondering, whether the autowallah had dropped us at the right place. Luckily I found, there were other guys who were going to Blore waiting for the same Rajahamsa. That bus came close to 8 pm and we boarded it. Later it developed some problem with the crankshaft and with great difficulty, the driver got us till Shimoga at 2 am. After waiting for almost an hour, we got another bus and reached hostel at 9:30 am. Temple wise Shringeri was the best, convenience wise Kollur, but scenary wise Kodachadri beat them all. Back to studies now. Got test tomorrow.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

15 minutes

I have decided to write only for 15 minutes. So much to do now. S got into P. They actually sent a bike to get her from the hostel block and she made it and am really glad. Not sure abt K though.

The thing, i wanted to write abt was my silver anklet. Yes, nothing is mine in the long run. I realized that this anklet could come out without unhooking, once when i removed my socks last month. I didn't realize it was that loose. The first time, it slipped out was while i was searching for PG in blore early this year. I thought, i had a slimy, slippery insect inside my shoes, only to find that my left anklet had come slipped into my shoes. This evening, after waiting till 5:30, i decided to push off and found that on coming back to my room, again my left anklet was missing. I retraced my path, but it was a bit dark by then. I told the receptionist, security, the helpers sitting on the grass, the cooks in MDC dinning hall. But don't know whether i would get to see it again.

The first time, i wore something for my legs was in 7th standard for bharatnatyam. I got to get my first anklet only after my left ankle was scarred for life with orthochondrosis. Those were the days, when even my chudi pant rubbing on my ankle, used to be so much to bear. But i loved anklets and wore them. Once, after a fight with mom, i removed these trinklets and vowed to become a nun. And the last time, i removed them was before the last surgery.

After that, it was on his suggestion, that i got back to wearing anklets from April and now to see only my right leg having the anklet, somehow makes me feel lacking something. Okie but what is the big deal. Why bother? What is the worst thing that can ever happen?

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

So much hoopla over Summers

We had Thakur's fundae being circulated, which boosted one up. We had all the best of luck slips of paper slid under our door. We had seniors mailing us and giving us speeches, we are there for you, this is not the end of the world. And i was wondering, oh my god, why so much? Probably it is for those sincere folks like S and K.

S dragged me for a walk, in my formals and kept on saying, how much she felt bad on not getting even a single shortlist. She said, she regretted leaving IIT, BITS and NIT for Pune University due to various reasons. She kept on saying the same thing over and over again. I felt, i should put in use all my listening skills and help her out. I was praying that she get calmer and god give her some sense of peace. She was saying, how deserving candidates like her were being discouraged, since the geela companies like H were recruiting fresher gals who had come in NorthEast quota. She went on and on. I got her back to the room after some time and got on to reciting Lalitha. Probably, even ambika was not ready for my droning. My sis interrupted me with her phone call and later K barged in. I never lock my door. Since i am too lazy to get up and open the door every time someone knocks. It is always open, even when i go out, since i am too careless to take care of my keys. And even after i have lost so many things, i feel, if it was mine, it would be there. If some took it, they needed it more than i did, but if i missed what they had taken, then, it is going to be of no use to them as well.

So K came in and took the laptop and started searching something and i could see her throat working up. I could see the tear drops swelling in her eyes. I could hear the tremble. She kept on saying how unlucky she was. Man, she said, she does not want any of these jobs. She will think, that 9 lakhs have gone down the drain. She said, she was afraid to get married, since she thought she was unlucky. God, you should look at their resumes. It was god like and these 2 were crying. K on not converting her 2 shortlists. I tried to console her in the way i could. But it didn't help i guess. She still felt bad, though a little bit better. She said, she was not even able to cry. After 30 mins or so, she said, she will go to G and Sr my seniors and later she came back stating that she was very happy now and they were angels. I agree, they are.

In fact, i had scheduled a mock interview with G, but felt lazy. Sh had said, i would be lazy like this since Saturn had conjoined Sun in my case till 2010 third month. But think, i am always taking astro for excuse. I have so far, successfully struck to my resolution of not seeing astrogyan or astro sites or seeing hora or seeing thithis and my sadhana and kshema star days for doing tasks. So far think, it is almost a month now, i have stood by my resolution. But Sh came and told me about my kundli. He told me, the reason, why i should not see this astro stuff. He said, tantriks have a horrible life and astrologers who say pariharams will get part of the bad karma effects. I agreed. My only thing is to stop reading my own hands.

So back to track. G herself came to my room just now and she did my mock. (Left to myself, i would have watched the last part of King Arthur). God, how helpful the seniors out here are. God bless them all. God bless this whole world, let peace and good will descend on this earth.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Who invented these ghost stories?

Who invented this puliamarathu payee story? I don't know. Yes'day, was a day of ups and downs. I was speaking to sugi over phone and casually went to the swings in the professor's kids' playground. That is my favourite place and i swing there for hours at times. All alone in the night. I never used to bother about my surroundings or timings. I was one person, used to doing what i felt like doing at that time. But yes'day for the first time, i described the surroundings as it was to sugi. You know how it will be after 11 pm in the night. With crickets and what not screeching and a lone tube light once in a few metres and the whole area was deserted with no aaal nadamattam...

i was oblivious to all this. I had walked through a patch of green thing to reach the playground enclosure. I opened the gate. And the gate opened with a screech. Imagine the sound that you get in those payee movies. That kind of creaky metallic dirge. I walked pass the wet grass and sat on the metal cold swing seat and continued speaking to sugi. Only then i started describing my surroundings to Sugi. I had a banyan tree with ghostly leaves shining palely in the dim tubelight on my right at a distance and this pulia maram right next to me on my left. I remember lakshmi, the servant kid telling me if i wanted tamarind fruit from the tree in the broad day light. But now around 11 pm, that tree seemed to be haunted with all the boothas and prethas in my feverish imagination. Couple of dogs were howling pitieously at a distance. I was swinging at a comfortable pace with one hand over mobile and another at the swing chain. And the swing was also producing this creeky sound, this sound got even more amplified in my present state of mind. The half moon was peeping behind the banyan tree and suddenly after i had finished describing the scenario to sugi, all i wanted to do was just escape to the main road. I felt there was something just behind my shoulders. I felt, there were creepers ready to entangle me as i walked past that green patch. i felt the puliamaram and alla maram branches were ready to scoop me up and throw me into oblivion. I told Sugi, continue talking to me, i will come out. And thats what i did whilst, i heard my heart beat aloud inside me. God, it is all within me. Yes. I had played in these very same swings, unmindful of the timings, but yes'day was an altogether different revelation.