Shorts 3

This edition of Shorts contains two cue words from readers and one of my own. More cues for writing about are, as always, invited.

The third cue is the one I gave myself. The contributors behind the first two, in order of appearance, are:

• Bishal, an undergraduate student at CMI, a year my senior. He is also a rare male among my fellow Carmelites -- an alumnus of one of the few co-educational Carmel schools in the country. His focus of study lies in Mathematics, and he edits an online English-Assamese Science/Maths magazine called Gonit Sora. In leisure, Bishal is spotted obsessing over superheroes, movies, the occasional anime, and beautiful women.
• Arijit, the Head Boy of Hem Sheela in the term succeeding Nihal's and mine. A Xaverian and student of Commerce, Arijit has a keen taste for oratory and politics, especially political satire. He enjoys non-fiction literature, and is a steady source of world news for anyone who cares to ask. When not sending John Oliver videos and Onion articles to anyone who is online, Arijit is known to drool over Bengali, Punjabi and Mughal cuisine.

To all my readers, as always, I request feedback about my attempts.

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Petrichor

There is beauty to the nameless. Also, there is freedom in the lack of warmth and care and love. Sometimes, I think that to be free means to be cold and icy forever. The day you didn't listen to your mother who was worried that you would get a cold -- were you not free? Did you not live that day? Did you not sail boats, did you not hide your tears in the rain, did you not let the water seep through your smile and into your guilty gullet -- rainwater should not be drunk... acid rain... death...? Who cares? Wouldn't you die, if it meant you felt? Would you not leave, if it meant you loved? Would you not cry for a year to feel pure joy for but a day? Are standards so important that we must restrict the beautiful and define the transcendental?

I know three languages, and I could name you in only one -- and so you were home, heart, freedom, memory, soul. But then they had to go and find your English name. They had to define you in the language of slavery and classism and officialdom. They had to internationalise you, make you universal, viral across the internet as another 'relatable' post. And the moment they did that, you were no longer mine.

Yes, the word we use is perfect music -- but did we have to define what we meant, petrichor? Did we have to become public property, shared information, dictionary entry, spelling-bee question? Tell me, petrichor, were we not better without a name?

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Rahul Gandhi

Isn't he cuddly?

He is fair (them Italian genes, daadi-gasm!), light-eyed, dimply and a subtle demagogue -- perfect for Prime Minister. So why did he lose?

The answer lies in what we look for in our teddy bears -- do we want a runty teddy that makes squishy noises, or a big furry one that makes gurgly ones? We want our teddies like we want our demagogues -- unashamed in what they do, which is hug and befriend everyone, in every country, at all times. We don't mind if a teddy is a bit old and torn and scary, we still like the bigger teddy. We like confident teddies who are not timid to shoo away the green-white monster under our beds. We like teddies who can coo to the dollies and gollies of other lands and bring us many, many sweets (while calling them by their first names) -- and, most importantly, we want a teddy that is ours. We want our teddy unbeholden to their own Bearclans, and we want them to have bellies big enough to hide two-thirds of HoneyLand's cubs underneath. We want them to save moo-moos and hide Barbies away from bad things -- and RaGa Bear can't do any of this! He can only smile at ladybears and tell us that things will be okay! The janta no longer maafs their teddies for being squishy! We want gurgle, we want muscle, we want prickle, we want Mudi!

Sorry RaGa, but Mudi Bear is our chief. Isn't he bearfect? *glomp*

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Stone

Moulded beautifully in flow after flow, in a place where no man dares venture, there lives a solitary wall of stone. Millions of years ago it was soft tissue, throbbing with life, until weight and heat and time turned it hard, dark and, most importantly, potent. As a mass of living cells, the stone would never have lit the fires that it now could. It would never have conjured warmth and spark and war from nothing, like it did now. In losing the flow of life through its body, the stone gained the veneration that is due to the powerful.
As flesh that it was, it lived. As stone that it is, it is loved.

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Not Another One About Rain

People have too many passive thoughts about rain. No, I do not speak of those in love: I'm done with that lot's interpretation of the rain -- we all are, if the relevant (single people's?) wisecracks plastered all over social media are any indication. However, I myself am prone, like many others, to react to the rain with as much mushiness as the wet monsoon ground beneath one's shoes -- as is evident from my recent post about my high school and the rain. Then again, there are those who immerse themselves in dark and gloomy thoughts whenever it rains, and manage to enjoy or even crave that process, which (more often than not?) gives rise to anti-sunshine literary ventures that deserve a second look -- at the least from psychologists, if not from literary critics. Whatever the form may be, I find that the general mode of processing rain seems to involve sitting down, pensiveness, passivity -- and that bothers me. Yes, the rain is beautiful, refreshing, brings back memories, etcetera -- been there, felt that -- but what about the rain that is more truthful than beautiful, more warlike than romantic, more hopeful than reminiscent? What about the rain that slaps you awake and tells you, akin to a certain Mr. LaBeouf but in a less amusing manner, to 'Do It'?

Now that rain is the kind I wouldn't mind having every day. Because, while I enjoy rain in all forms, this one is forever going to be my kind of rain. It shows no Grey World, but reveals the exact true colours hidden under layers of dust. It reminds me of no one but myself, and of my dreams and what I stand for. It removes false associations and presents everything at face value -- it removes the identities of Success and Failure and reclassifies them simply as Milestones; it melds Friends and Foes and makes them People; it takes Love and Hate and makes them Attachment. This rain falls on me but does not seep through because it is content to just be. This rain is confident in its silent potency, and cares not for provoking a reaction to itself. This rain connects me with all souls, but binds me to none. It asks me not to raise my face to it, but to drive my shoulders and my limbs across its path.

I like rains the most when they come with thunderstorms -- because each thunderclap is like a fresh start that whacks my self-doubt over the head and yells at it to buzz off; each bolt of lightning is like an epiphany, like a shocking bout of clarity from some inaccessible dimension, made available to me for a split-second. The rumble of a dying thunder across the sky is like the laughter of an eternally victorious spirit, beating a false retreat merely to amuse itself with the premature jubilations of the enemy, and announcing to all allies that it will return doubly enthused; and when the entire sky lights up in a flash of lighting, I feel the spirit throw me a mischievous, knowing wink, right before it disappears.

So, while the rest of you are looking at the rain, or dancing in the rain, or sitting or walking or laughing or crying in the rain, you'll find me standing alone and motionless, somewhere far out in the open, with the wind and the spray in my face -- my shoulders squared, my feet ready to spring, and my damn stupid mouth smirking itself silly.

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Title Credit: Mousam Roy, via Paint Me With You, specifically this.

The Spirit of New Year's

Image Courtesy: globzer.com via Google

When the sun rises this morning, the birds won't know the difference. Neither will the trees, insects, cats and dogs, or for that matter the rivers, streams and rocks. Even the sun and the earth won't know the difference, which is ironic because all the hullabaloo is because of the earth completing a full revolution around the sun -- they won't know the significance of the specific point on the earth's orbit which we pick as a cut-off for our calendar years. In fact, if we look at it, that point varies across cultures, and many New Year celebrations exist outside the dominant Gregorian calendar system. Even within it, time zone differences mean that the same moment is not shared as the defining one between revellers across the globe. Sad, isn't it? It can almost make one feel that this entire New Year ruckus means nothing. Yet, New Year's festivities constitute one of the earliest kinds of celebrations in the history of human civilization. This tells us that, aside from noticing the repetitive nature of season cycles and using it as a measure of time, humans have felt the need to document and commemorate their entire lives in terms of this cycle: appraising their lives in terms of tasks accomplished in one such cycle, and treating each one as a new chance at the same seasons and the same conditions, providing ample scope for alteration and improvement based on lessons learnt from the bygones. The reason we love New Year's Day so much is that it represents fresh chances -- which, while invigorating, is not entirely true, because in our complex lives, not everything comes back every year.

No one knows who first decided to celebrate the periodic repetition of weather conditions. I like to think that someone sitting in a prehistoric cave felt cold, or hot, and started counting days until the same feeling returned after an intervening period of different weather of all kinds, and then noticed that it is regular. I like to think that this realization of regularity was quickly followed by a realization of the finality of hope -- a realization that no matter what, favourable times and weather conditions will return, and that long winters and long summers are actually never longer than stipulated, and that the worst will always pass -- and thus New Year's Day was born. The flip side, though, is that the same person probably also realized that just like the worst, the best will also not stay for long.

Amidst this New Year revelry, I would like to be the voice of reason, and point out that while motivating oneself using New Year's hope, and pledging to make changes, and of course having fun, are all very well, one must recognize that changes are never made abruptly at the stroke of midnight, opportunities do not replicate themselves year after year, and that New Year's actually signifies time passed -- time lost, not time gained. So, while it is wonderful that we are the only species on this planet hopeful (and intelligent) enough to celebrate New Year's Day, it is perhaps prudent to understand that the exact day does not matter as much as the idea of it does. We could pick any random day in the year for this. In multicultural India, we already have a bunch of different New Year celebrations. What they all have in common is the human intention of appraisal and improvement -- an idea that, while reinforced on this festival day, should permeate our lives every day.

To put it differently, we don't know at which point the earth started revolving around the sun. We don't know at which point our planet was when the first life form or the first human was born. We have no decisive zero from which to start measuring our years. Which means that, if we want it to, every day marks the beginning of a new year in some sense: maybe not as 'Happy' a new year, but a new year nonetheless! So I say, let New Years' Day be less about the day itself, and more about the spirit of human hope and our constant efforts not just to survive, but to live and live well, as individuals and as a species. Let 1st January be a day to honour Time, the only resource beyond our control -- let it be about making fruitful negotiations with Time to make the best of its fleeting nature.

In short, we can't party every night, but let tonight's party be an expression of a yearlong drive to make Time give us all it can, preferably make it suffer for all the limitations it places on us -- because we humans are boss like that! So do keep smiling, keep working for the better, and be grateful for the opportunity to understand New Year's -- unlike the birds, the animals and the trees, who will never know why none of us are sleeping tonight. Happy 2015!

Of Change, Clichés and Reality Checks

I heard in some TV show of an experiment where they gave people glasses that fed them with an upside down view of the world. At first, they had trouble but in three days, they got used to it and could make their way around. Then, they removed the glasses.

The scientists wanted to know if the recovery of normal perception would take as long as the 'upside down' conditioning did. Knowing that the way we usually see the world is 'normal', you would expect it to take less time, wouldn't you? But no, the test subjects where just as disoriented as during the first change, and took all of three days to get used to the upright world.

The conclusion? Even something trivial as which way up is subject to conditioning. Our brain has immense power to adapt, and half the things we believe to be set in stone are not actually so.

Hmm, that statement got dangerously close to cliché territory, didn't it? Very self-help! Maybe the other day's motivational session courtesy Aakash (should I write about that or not... show of hands?) left me with some inspiration. But I know what it most certainly left me with. I volunteered at the session and scored myself a bar of Bournville... hey, hey, hey!

Ahem, focusing. Focusing.

So, people want to change things -- say people like me, and we're always up to making some noise. But lately, I find people throwing all their nonsense unplanned dreams into the world and expecting them to come true. I'm sorry, y'all, but if you want to bring a social revolution or something, my heart is with you, but you need a damn head! Back in Carmel, the SPICE Club did very little for the society and the planet compared to bigger organizations for similar causes; but whatever was done was planned and hence fruitful.

The other day this girl I know -- sweet girl, really, nice heart and all -- comes at me with this weird and creepy-ass rumbling ramble about wanting to go 'motivate' poor kids. Apparently, she got First World Guilt when she passed a slum on the way back from shoe shopping at the mall. She felt we should do something. I had to explain to her that this stuff needs commitment and expertise and not just good intentions -- doing something is different from donating to the Prime Minister's damn Relief Fund. You need something real, like the SPICE Club took up coaching some underprivileged kids. Besides, just talking to them would be intruding into their lives and wasting their time, probably getting in the way of their livelihoods and the work of real social workers, and leave with a fake self-satisfaction that we've done something. It's the typical thing we privileged people do to feel less bad about our indulgences and, well, privileges.  I know many great movements are born from the aforesaid First World Guilt, especially if said First World is ensconced in the Third World, as it is in India -- I, however, highly doubt that quenching the guilt is equivalent to an actual contribution.

At the cost of further cliché, I will say that one should rather start small, around oneself -- be nice to the maid and her kids, stop the elders in your home from mistreating the staff. I will also reiterate that most states of affairs that we take as unchangeable are actually a result of conditioning. Some take three days and some take three decades, but change is possible.

It has to be, however, real change, which comes from realistic effort and a mindset built for not dreaming but doing. Which is why I told that girl -- go and find someone who really knows this work, and volunteer with them instead of stepping out on your own. There is no point in ignoring all the work done by the experts and reinventing the wheel. In the change business, as well as in any other field, growth begins with learning. Always.

Ciao, and peace.

Meeting my Demon Slayer

These days I find myself living under a crushingly acute sense of anticipation. I say anticipation, because I cannot specify this as foreboding, excitement, eagerness, or any other specific emotion that defines my subconscious brooding about the future. With the Lok Sabha elections coming up, I have been painfully reminded that, next time it happens, I'll be voting. I have months, literally months, left before I become and adult, and hence responsible for the workings of my own life. I know that nothing will change overnight when I turn 18, but I also wonder what it will be like, being accountable for everything I say and do, as a complete individual, as an independent citizen. I wonder if I have somehow been leading an easy life because I get away with things on account of being a child, and if suddenly every person around me will want an explanation for everything I do. I wonder if I'll be expected to be kinder to children, nicer to the elderly, more discerning, more mature...

...but mostly, I wonder about identity. An integral part of being an adult, and being in college which is also not that far away, is officially having an independent place in the world, complete with defining choices and opinions: choices like subject of study, political leanings, food, clothes. Not that I never make choices now, but they are bound to get more specific, more involving, more important; and in case of things like political and social opinions, I shall be required, by my position as an independent citizen, to have an opinion. Neutrality will no longer be an escape: I'll be required to have a stand and explain it, even if, sometimes, that stand really is neutrality. I have already made irrevocable decisions but, with the passage of time, my decisions will get tougher and their impact more lasting. I'll have to build an image and stick to it. Those days are over when I could, if I wished, change my reputation and how people see me by changing my clothes, my TV schedule and my accent. I have to decide who I am, once and for all: and though I haven't changed that in the recent past, the idea of permanency is scary. Very scary, especially since I'm supposed to always walk the walk once I become and adult. There are a whole lot of irresponsible adults, but I cannot afford to be since I've been a good kid and now I have to be a good adult.

All the things I've always complained about: in society, in my family, in my friend circle -- there will no longer be an excuse to just complain. I'll have to act on it, or else shut up. For my country, I'll have to make an informed choice and vote, because as MTV says, if you don't vote, you can't complain. I'll have to listen to what our leaders say, because soon, when they yell 'bhaiyon aur behnon' from the loudspeakers, they will be speaking, in part, to me. ME. A full-grown citizen of India, morally bound not to cover her ears and go back to her book. And I'll have to vote, nay, nod to MTV again, I'll have to ROCK the Vote. In society, I'll have to speak to other adults like a fellow adult -- reserved, calculating, polite, firm, tactful. Starting this 21 October, I'll have to translate all my ideals into practice, take the power that adulthood will give me and the responsibility that comes with it.

One of my uncles once gave me a book of childish demon stories, and he wrote on the gifting page that one must learn how to recognize the demons around oneself. He also wrote that if I didn't slay these demons, who else would? At that early age, I probably gave off vibes of the busybody that I am. Teachers and friends and family saw it, and they expect me to be brave, courageous, a true contributor to society... their words, not mine -- and I've received those expectations with gratitude and grace and an elevated sense of self-belief. But the only demon-slaying I've done is on Runescape, and I have no idea how to carry that blade: that figurative, imaginary, but all-powerful blade that, if wielded carelessly, can turn on its bearer.

Don't get me wrong: I wouldn't have it otherwise. I'm used to responsibility, and I dare say I wear it well: but this will be the real deal, the official growing up -- as I write this I've realized that this whole thing stings so much because I'm different, I'm unique, and I've always been very vocal about it. That has always been difficult, but as an adult, it will be hell. This hurts because I know, without a shred of doubt, that just like I am now, I will be alone in all of this. Commitments are tough, and I'll be committing whole-heartedly to myself; and while that's thrilling, empowering even, that's one commitment you know you can't get out of -- there's no dropping out, no resignation, no break-up or divorce. This person I'll become, I'm stuck with her, and despite knowing myself all these years, I don't know her well enough.

Not even close.

Same old, same old

So. First post after ICSE, and I have nothing special to say, because it doesn't feel special anymore. The results are not out yet, but the new school will start soon, and with that we gear up for the next big exam which is less than two years away. Once again there will be studies, some fun, new friends, old friends, home, school, gaming, mall, blog. The only difference: no more studying Geography, Bengali, and most importantly, History.

Speaking of History: kids need to know about the past because of tradition, heritage, not repeating the same mistakes, understanding where we come from, belonging... I get it. However, I find that very less History is written with these things in top priority. I'm fully aware that I'm probably not the first person to notice that our History books, even those taught in Primary school, are full of violence. Yes, the past is unchangeable. Human beings have done some terrible things which we cannot go back on, and I do not advocate covering it up and never talking about it again. I do, however, emphasize the need to exercise great caution while dealing with past human acts which are not that glorious. It goes without saying that the way tyrants and butchers are termed heroes will have a negative effect on children, but my chief concern is elsewhere. I fear, and experience confirms my fears to a great extent, that the tiniest of kids, not to mention the know-it-all adults, learn to hate a religious or linguistic or ethnic group based on what someone from that group did some time. History becomes a 'we or they' deal. Some greatly educated and respected men and women I personally know can't stand the thought of behaving sociably or even civilly with Muslims. Some others have the same problem with the Chinese, or the Sikhs, or white people, or whatever. And their justification is what 'they did'. I understand that when terrible things are done in the name of religion or national pride, people on the receiving end might develop a general fear of that religion or nation, and I excuse the poverty-stricken, starved masses of my country whose opinions are dictated by the vested interests of some people who could afford literacy or affluence. But what about the "educated" ones? What about the esteemed executive of my city, who happens to be the son of a Hindu family, who lamented to me last year about how ‘Muslims were taking over our country' and how 'we shouldn't allow them here' because of 'what they did to us'? And I find that the History curriculum taught to 16-year-olds portrays the last years of the Freedom Struggle here as more of a struggle for religious supremacy between various factions rather than a struggle for democratic self-rule. Coincidence? I think not.

Presenting facts without emotion can be difficult, but this is something that History books, especially school textbooks, must do. They must stop presenting their opinions about which party disrupted a coalition's working: just say they didn't agree! And stop adding adjectives about how one side's army 'brutally' attacked the other, as if the other side didn't kill anyone: just say who won, and maybe mention that there were a large number of casualties without naming sides. Not as simple as it sounds, and the lines can get blurred: I know. But they must try, and children must be given the right attitude about organized conflict before they are taught about it. If they are too young for that in primary school, teach them Language, Science, Math, Geography and send them home: or limit History to conflicts not involving one's own race or country, and definitely not that bomb called religion. The curriculum of those years is mostly repeated later anyway, so why not start with it when they have developed some human values. Meanwhile, the onus is on teachers of History in classrooms, in schools and colleges, to ensure that children do not view the morality of violence based on who is committing it, and that the only loyalty that the subject inculcates in them is the loyalty to human welfare, human progress, and peace on earth. For all. History teachers nowadays probably affect children more than Value Education teachers. I know some who know the gravity of their influence, and try very hard: but the books are not helping them.

Recently I was given a hugely thick History book, a non-academic one, which I have by now read about a sixth or perhaps a fifth of. It is hitherto doing a good job of presenting History neutrally when it gets hairy and humans start fighting, but I'm not recommending it here until I see how it handles the real problematic parts: 19th century to the present, and especially the 20th century with its two World Wars and cauldrons of hate. I can tell that they have tried, though -- and unless all other books and all teachers take note of what is wrong with the present method, History will inevitably repeat itself. World War III: Nuclear Conflict... sound nice to you?

Makes one hell of a video game title, yes, but we won't be alive to play it.

Diamond fricking Jubilee. Urgh.

I hate monarchy. And I've said that before. In continuation of that and in context of this whole ruckus about the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, I reiterate that I'm sick and tired of their worthless worship of people based on birth. I don't understand how educated people of a developed nation can be alright with holding onto something as disgusting as a monarchy, and not just holding on but celebrating it and indulging it at every opportunity they get. Maybe it is what they have been taught from their babyhoods, that's why. But I can give myself no explanation as to how some people, from all over the world, are hanging on to their TV screens to watch it. RuneScape, the MMORPG I am addicted to fond of, is from Britain, and they have put up a celebration inside the game! The game is not played by just the British, you guys!. To me, what RuneScape did sort of smells imperialistic: like Britain's still trying to rule the world. How can they brand the monarch of a nation 'a very Royal guest' inside a worldwide multiplayer?

Which brings me to a slightly wider issue. Meaningless ideas of superiority, including those involving race, religion, gender, etc. are present in every section of society. However, seeing them happen as something mainstream, within the territory of a permanent member of the Security Council (more on that irritating thing another day), is just appalling. They worship some people because of their birth, whereas very few of them compare to the standards of achievement set by 'lesser' people. The gender, race, public vs. private schooling and orientation ratios in the House Of Commons is nothing like the ratios in the population: if it was, then nearly all of Britain would be private-educated straight white men. A teacher who's been to London tells me that the city is organised in circles, and the higher classes live nearer the middle. And, something I recently found out: the Royal Standards flies in precedence to their Union Flag. That, I think, is the ultimate way to downgrade the importance of the common people. Unfortunately, common British people don't seem to understand that.

Which brings me to an even wider issue. Recently someone pointed out to me that the fact that some countries have monarchies and other's don't is greatly a matter of chance, if we look at the historical background of how their present governance systems came to be. I agree to that, and I wonder why then do we see this widespread worship? The current population of Britain and countries like it didn't make the choice to have a monarchy. They are completely exposed to the ways of the rest of the world. Then why? Would we behave the same way if we had a monarch? Maybe, maybe, maybe we would. We do have a strange affinity to unquestioned supremacy. It gives us a sense of false security and stability, which perhaps we have retained from our 'herd' days. That is why more people in the world prefer to follow the ideals of some other person, through religion or ideology. The thought of true independence probably unnerves us. I admit that the possibility of our love for 'people's power' holding only to a finite extent, scares me.

To conclude, I come back to the basic fact. Monarchy along with all its pompousness and impracticality is defended as tradition by a leading economy. Conferred titles and privileges continue to prevail (Also, House of Lords. Ugh.) The Britons are celebrating their monarch's Diamond Jubilee, and it eats at me. For the past few years, slowly but surely Britain has lost a significant part of its international respect, the more-credible-than-me analysis of which I will link to if I find a web version. Not that I care, as it can only mean good for its former colonies. Meanwhile, the swans glide on the Thames, and the Queen drives without a license.

The perfect diary

I had tried maintaining a diary in 4th grade, but my activity on it dwindled and finally ran out sometime in 5th grade. Looking back the diary is a good read for myself (though embarassingly childish) and I still like the idea of documenting my life date-wise, except I don't really feel like writing everyday. Sometimes I feel like drawing, doodling, scribbling, trying my hand at calligraphy... and often the problem is I don't want to get up and fetch my diary. Another thing I don't like is making my diary a fortress of secrecy: I prefer not writing things down that I want to obscure from the public eye forever. Sure, I don't want people to read my diary. Tiny little embarassing truths and private moments will be there, things I won't intentionally tell anyone: but at the same time I don't want to spend time hiding it. Moreover, (and I know this sounds crazy) I very rarely feel like writing secrets, and sometimes feel like the stuff I'm writing about is not worth a diary. Somehow the conventional diary puts me under a compulsion to be absolutely honest to that piece of paper: something some people might like feeling but I don't. I like to sort the difficult things of life out inside my head. I don't want to write everything down. I don't like making it a day-to-day journal. Maybe I want to ignore. Maybe I want to forget. Maybe I want to draw something instead, which may or may not reflect what I'm thinking.

A diary I received long ago was lying empty with just contact details written in it, on my computer table, at or near which I spend at least half my free time (the TV's in the same room, so are old magazines). I initially started using its blank back pages for drawing. Then one day I decided to take the plunge and start drawing on the 'actual' pages. Then I felt like opening it up to writing... but I don't like writing without giving it a title... and I'm terrible at putting titles... why not just put today's date? And then it struck me that this could be my new kind of diary -- my anything, everything, whatever-I-want diary. I could draw on it when I want, write when I want-- it would be the ultimate space for indulging my whims. It would be a chronological progression in tandem with my life, at the same time I wouldn't have to sit down and spend a long time filling it. I could make a doodle while my game loaded, another while my inbox loaded... and in a way it would document every day, in more detail as the intervals would be smaller. Then again sometime it would only highlight one incident, if I wanted it to. It would automatically be filled a little bit almost everyday as I sat at my computer. Since then I have drawn human figures, anime figures, cartoonised Egyptian pyramid art, weird figures, flowers, faces, doodles and what not. Few days ago I wrote a poem in it. I wrote about Medha on it. And I finally feel happy about the whole diary deal.

Back to the basics

Not strictly, that is. I've returned my blog to the regular look after deciding that I'm too tired of specials to do a Diwali special and also that fireworks are difficult to integrate into a ramble blog. However, I am experimenting with the description line. It used to be "Expressions of a free-flowing mind". My blog involves showcasing both my creative side as well as the interesting (and not-so) things that happen in my life, in my dreams or around me. Not that they never overlap. Often do, actually. Basically stuff: as I've chosen to put this new description: "Little Stuff, Big Stuff. Stuff."

I intend to convey through my description line that I have myriad items here as opposed to a single topic, but with a consistency in the sense that it's always something that's going around inside my head: it's always something I need to say. My blog is my journal, my gallery, my whiteboard and my soapbox all rolled into one. [rambling]It's my life, that is going to live on after me. It's my dream, that's going to give me strength because I will know there are always people to listen, look, criticize or support whenever I need it. It's my little corner of this absolutely fabulous community of blogs and bloggers. [/rambling]

At the same time, there is material for those who enjoy topical blogs: I have the label cloud handy just below the tabs, and readers can selectively visit my blog just for the poems, the events, the wallpapers, the narratives or even the link library -- whichever they like.

In a nutshell, I have a lot of things to convey in a first impression, and a merciless limit imposed by, well, human psychology and the ever-growing pace of life, especially online life. And sticking to the same old is a guaranteed way of wooing less new regulars. That is why I am always open to suggestions as to what it should be, so that people know what they're in for as soon as they read those first few words -- those first few crucial words. Brownie points (non-redeemable!) for anyone who can add to all that an oblique request to comment. Ciao!

L, l

First blog post with the letter L. I found it to be the next letter I'd never begun a post title with. So here you are: L, l, lo, lid, line, llama, loiter, leopard, lavender, lethargic, liberalism. Bonus: legislature, lexicography. 13-20, anyone?

100 posts, now 101

So I didn't post for two days and am posting a little less now. Yes, I do have many wallpapers queued up, but you see with my intermittent connection it takes me lots of time to finish my other internet work and I hardly have time left to blog.
But hey, I still managed to reach the 100 post-mark with the last post, or so Blogger tells me. I'm too lazy to count. And yes, Sherlock, this is the 101st post. No brownie points for deducing that. It's way too elementary.

J, j

Once again employed the idea of typing in letters to find a letter I've never begun a post title with, and then ranting about it. Because I don't have anything (much) else going and it's too late at night to go through the trouble of uploading a wallpaper -- as I said before, the post editor hates my images, and it's even worse when I try to add one to the standing wallpaper page.
So, here goes: J looks like a traditional umbrella handle and like an inverted cane. Or better still, a candy cane. J, j, jo, jog, joke, joker, joyful (reminds me of value ed class dammit), janitor, junkyard, juxtapose, jackhammer.
Bonus: judgemental :)

E, e

I was thinking what I should write about today. I began typing alphabets into the post title field, and the auto-complete drop-down showed previous post titles beginning with those letters. I'd written with A, B, C, & D. The first one returning no match was E. So here you are: E, e, ea, ear, earn, eager, effect, earnest, epilogue, endurance, evangelize. Anyone game for 11 through 20?

(In case you're asking 'of what?', I'm sure you wouldn't be able to do it anyway so stop bothering).


Did anyone ever give it a thought that 'E' is three-pronged? Like a trident? By the way, it's also like a trunk between two tusks, like in an elephant.

Something awesome

From the Wikipedia article for ambigrams:

The big word reads two ways!

The last two papers

Physics was okayish, but awfully lengthy. Computer was nice. Finished in little above half-time, as usual :P
So... exams are over, holidays, now to wait for the results. After results we usually have a few more days off, but for the coming year's class 9 (that's us), we are going to have 5 days of 2 and 1/2 hours special classes for English because our teacher will be on a long leave soon after school starts in April. And she hasn't found any of the suggested replacements to be good enough, which I believe because all the substitute teachers we get nowadays are outright crap.
Just ONE more day of going to school as an 8th-grader. Oh. My. God.
Special consecutive post, in the honour of the Great Exams That Finish.

Yesterday's Eng Text & Beng Lang

English Literature: Lengthy. Very lengthy. Had to omit some points to finish in time. Most of us found it lengthy.
Bengali Language: Reasonable length, pretty nice. Pleasant surprise, however this means we can expect really strict correction. Which is a bad thing, because easy+strict is a worse combination than hard+lenient. Because teachers are very liberal with strictness, and miserly with leniency.
13/15. Two papers to go.

Oh man.

First things first, my internet bummed out so I couldn't talk about exams.
So, Maths II sums were easy but horribly lengthy. And I had a tummyache during the exam. Chemistry was pretty good, not too long, not too short. But there were some outside-syllabus questions which were replaced or converted to optional questions, however our teacher said that it was 'too basic' and we were all 'spoonfed children' for complaining about it. Is she crazy? Effervescence is easy to understand, but difficult to express on paper. A quick read from the book would've been enough for the answer to stick in our heads, yes. But did she ask us to read it? No. It carried two marks. Did we have enough time to sit there and think and frame an answer? no. There was one more similar question, and then there was an experiment. A whole experiment! Outside-syllabus! Experiments mean diagrams! We can't draw diagrams impromptu, without revision!
Really, not fair, don't you think?
So... 4 papers left. 11/15 done.

Sorry Sorry Sorry

Yesterday Blogger screwed up. Anyways, 9/15. Majority! Nice English Language Paper, was going to write the descriptive essay but story idea popped in so wrote that one. Horribly lengthy History paper. Next session going to be shortened. Adjustment in process for shifting to Jan-Dec session from current Apr-Mar. So coming session Apr-Feb, after that Mar-Jan, so that next can be Jan-Dec.

Fifteen, sorry

That was 5/15, not 5/17. We have fifteen exams in total. And now it's 7/15. Yay. Maths Paper I (Arithmetic) was so easy. I loved it. Bengali Literature was easy to answer but so extremely lengthy that we had to cut down on explanations. Nearly none of the questions were demanding short to-the-point answers. All in the range of 4 to 8 marks per question. 1 mark question means 1 line, but 4 marks always means half a page, or half a mark. And then there were those monstrosities carrying 7 and 8 marks and demanding more than a full page. Mind you, exam pages in my school are register-sized. And you should've seen the devilish delight on the face of our teacher when we reported back to her about the exam. We heard from the girls who take Hindi that the Hindi Literature paper was equally bad. Holy-moly, is this the famous class-8 slashing we hear about? Are we now in the middle of the very horror that creeped into our hearts and stole our souls away slowly as we crept up through middle school? Suffering, crying, praying, begging to be free, to be let into the freer realm of true ICSE knowledge and school domination. Class 9... oh. When I get older...

Wish me luck

Tomorrow's the 2nd levels of the Naitonal Science Olympiad and the International Mathematics Olympiad conducted by SOF. Plus yesterday's exams didn't go too well, as you know I can't stand those subjects, but though yay, yay, yay! Last EE and GK exams, heh heh. And Monday commences exams proper, with the most terrifying theory-plus-practical-in-two-hours thing we have for Biology, followed by Geography, with its maps, interesting facts, boring teacher, horrible teacher. Hobble bobble wobble, students all topple.