The Philanthropist

It's a really nice ad... the one for the new Volkswagen Passat... There's this bicycle rider going down a ghat road, and his headlamp goes bust... then comes the Passat from behind him... He signals for the car to overtake him, but as he sees that the car is staying put, stuck by his butt, he ups his pace and in new confidence, owed to him by the right to sight, he quickly gets through the treacherous ghats while the well meaning car, with its turn actuated headlights follow his fateful path. At the end of the ad, the rider nods his thanks to the driver at a traffic signal, conveying his thanks, while the voice in the background reminds you that the turn-following headlights are one of the not so standard features in the new Passat.

So when was it when that you performed a philanthropic duty? My question is not meant for you Darshana, but it _is_ meant for almost everyone else... when was the last time you got over your fear of robbers to help a hitch-hiker needing to reach his/her destination, on a city road. Or was it that stranded car that drew your pity but you had somewhere more urgent to reach. Or maybe that fellow by the side of the road really did need a trip to his exams, rather than to his friend's place, as you thought...

I want to get my conscience clear... I usually don't refuse lifts on the bike... in my car I've never refused a lift that I've been asked for either, because I've had only one, from 2 students. Simple reason... At some time in my past, I've given (to me) miraculous lifts... Two occasions stand out in my mind:

1. I was going towards Deccan from Aundh rd., a relatively busy stretch, by anyone's imagination, in the day... I was about to join the new concrete Aundh road from Bhau Patil Rd. Basically, for the uninitiated, I was going to get on to a better road from a country road... on my bike... when I saw this van stranded by the roadside. I was riding my bike wih Tum, when I'd almost passed them... The husband was sitting by steering expecting the van to move in some miraculous fashion, while the wife and he 11 year old kid were trying to push it into life...

They weren't even moving it... Out comes the superhero, the saviour of the meek, I basically...:) I stopped my bike behind their van, and against the better judgment proffered by my scared wife, I offered my services. One silent shove is all it took. The van came alive and I got bestowed a thousand blessings and the hope that someone else would do the same for me (they'd already done it, I was merely passing on the favour).

2. A drunk gets highlighted in my headlight and I stopped. This was much before I had even bought my bullet. I was on my scooter, and I kinda stopped. Then I really stopped. Because the poor soul was meandering across the road, leaving his battered M80 by the roadside, in search of something, I have no idea what, on the other side of the road, calling out for her.... or it.... I stopped. I got off, I walked up to him and told him he had to go home and sleep (he seemed to agree with me). Then I escorted him behind his battered vehicle to Katraj (some 20 kms off my way) so that he'd be safe.

I'm glad I'm done with my beating-of-the-drums... blowing-my-own-trumpet... etc... I was doing a favour onto someone in the latter, whereas merely passing it on in the former. I cannot really forget the help from the truckdriver the day I'd broken my leg in the Khambatki Ghat...

That aside, when was the last time when _you_ helped a fellow road-farer. Don't take my words without the caution with which I impart them... Don't give lifts if you are uncomfortable giving them. Don't risk your lives... But do help out. I'd like to believe that help begets help... so the chain will continue...

Happy days :)

Yay!!! I've got my first laptop :). Its big, but its powerful, lots of RAM, lots of processing power, lots of graphics memory, lots of hard disk space, and a big wide screen :) Bliss... Now I can blog sitting in my bed... And I can sit back and type instead of hunching over the keyboard... Life is good...

Any guy would understand this feeling... at least most guys (and some girls) would... The feeling of having a new gadget in your hands... the chance to set it up just the way you like it... It can be a new TV (setting all the channels, exploring the menus, checking out how loud it can get), a new mp3 player... hell it even extends to software for me... I love finding out all the things that the software I install can do for me... I've spent the whole day today just configuring my laptop... the wireless setup to the wallpaper :D... and now its all working fine, I can roam around the house and listen to the radio on yahoo! music... yahoo!!!

I even went all around this rented house I'm living in and made a video using my webcam so that I could send it out (and get to use Windows Movie Maker properly for the first time).

Hey this is a weird feeling... I have nothing gothic to talk about... as I'm wont to do at this time of the night... I'm loving it..

Lyrics and Poems

What really is the difference between a lyric and a poem. When I started to make this entry two hours ago, I'd written 2 paragraphs of derisive stuff against poetry before I remembered "Mr. Tamborine Man" and the Dylan vs. Dylan contest in "Dangerous Minds". Bob Dylan wrote poems... That's as concrete an example as you'll ever get of a poet-in-a-song-writer's-skin as you'll ever get... That made me think... I'll get back to what it made me think, but first some examples of lyrics that should have been in poems:

(in 'Brother' by Alice in Chains)
Roses in a vase of white
Bloodied by the thorns beside the leaves
That fall because my hand is
Pulling them hard as I can...

(in ‘Mr. Tamborine Man’ by Bob Dylan)
Though I know that evenin's empire has returned into sand,
Vanished from my hand,
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping.
My weariness amazes me, I'm grounded on my feet,
I have no one to meet
And the ancient empty street's too dead for dreaming.

(in ‘Wish you were here’ by Pink Flyod)
And did they get you to trade
Your heros for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange
A walk on part in the war
For a lead role in a cage?

If you know those songs, can you avoid singing them in a tune? I’m not well versed enough in poetry to comment about the converse being true for poems. That little fact showed me that maybe I should shower my wisdom from elsewhere, namely:

http://www.musesmuse.com/poem-vs-lyric.html :)

Here’s what some people have to say:

---
The major difference is that the writer calls poems "poems" and song lyrics "song lyrics". In other words, when you write you decide what it's going to be.

Songs are spritual. Poems are intellectual.

Seriously, the intention of the writer.
---

There’s therefore no difference between a good lyric and a good poem. The Metallicas can wait for their accolades :).

Philip Larkin

I'm not much into poetry... Infact I'm not much into literature either... I like my reading to be light or scientific (either one of the two). But sometimes, some people write stuff just like I like to read it... short, sweet and to the point... like this one by Philip Larkin. I can't believe he's a poet. Here's a poem by him called "This be the verse" (my apologies Vrigo):

This Be The Verse

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.

and that about summarizes exactly how I feel about kids... or rather my kids... or rather
'never going to have them' kids... I can always spoil other people's ;).

Staring at the sun... Ain't it close?

Isn't this a beautiful snap? Its my desktop wallpaper right now, and I'm proud to say that I clicked it. I'm actually thinking of naming it... How about "Icarus"? Hmm I like that.

Excuse Me

Life is a drink… or that photograph on the Goa beaches… or it is feeling the wind in your hair after a fresh hair-cut… Or maybe… just maybe… is it your designer nightmare?

Did life ever give you an alibi?  Did it ever let you have any other way out?

Find it!

Live it!

There’s always an alibi…

Am I a beggar?

I’d once given a beggar-boy ten rupees… He was ecstatic. The most I’ve ever given a beggar is fifty rupees… That old fellow thought I was drunk!!!

In the three weeks that I’ve been in Oakland, I’ve been asked for cigarettes 5 times… In the 9 other years that I’ve been in India, no stranger has ever asked me for cigarettes! The other time this old man asked me for $2 for a bagel (can any of the Indians imagine?) and I opened my wallet and the least change I had was $5. I gave it to him…. It took me a few seconds to realize that I’d just given more money to a beggar just then than I’d ever given before!

What would he have if done I’d given him the equivalent of 2rupees (200/45 =~5cents)? Thrown it back at me? Have you ever had a beggar throw 50p back at you? I’ve had.

I’m debating the scales by which one measures the money one earns… I know lots of people (~5 :D ) who’d be delighted to move to the US for 50K a year… They’d live an Indian life in the US… would it be worth it?

Who am I to complain? If I go to the US I’d go just to earn the money. My wife’s doing an MBA in Finance, but I don’t think I’d understand why it is sooooo much more comfortable living in India than in the US. Somehow buying power doesn’t follow inflation rates… I can always get my RKM (roti kapda makan) cheaper in India than I’d get in the US…

So the question comes down to this… Who _is_ the beggar who asked me for ninety rupees for a bagel? Is he poor? Or is he just handicapped?

Am I a beggar?

Where have all the flowers gone?

And then there was the time when a flower bloomed. Life finally came into spring and the tiny tendrils in the brain were suddenly alive and the synaptic gaps there started firing. Its a very curious feeling... being in love... You want to _be_ there not be there... But I couldn't... And I couldn't... and I couldn't... and yet I should, I wanted to you know... but could my fragile emotional subsystem really sustain another?

If not for anything else, I liked the Matrix for that one quote that the Oracle makes to Neo (and I do like it for a whole lot of other things, I'm quoting this one from memory)... "Being The One is like being in love... you don't think you are... you know you are". The movie goes on to explain how Neo comes to _Know_ that he's The One...

And that kind of puts things into perspective... My fragile emotional subsystem would sustain a thousand more... and it still does... because I _knew_ I loved this woman... and I'll make a thousand changes (not sacrifices) in myself to show that I do... because she _is_.

I think that it was Sartre (and correct me if I'm wrong) who said that loving someone is not about _making_ a commitment... but instead, making it, and then, going through each day of your life, examining it, evaluating it and reinstating that promise... _every_ _single_ _day_ _of_ _your_ _lives_ _together_.

In which case where does love itself stand? The answer is right there... Love doesn't stand... Love simply is... But it needs a lot of support to continue existence... It will dissolve away the moment that you let go of that slim, thin, weak line that feeds it every day... and you have to feed it... all the time

And though it might look like it is not there anymore... you need to keep feeding it... It exists... You have to know it exists... The flowers are still there... _know_ that and the synapses will fire again.

Are they people too?

I still fly :) :D.... As you've no doubt gathered by my earlier blogs... I love my bike... I drive a car but my eyes are for the bike... I wish that California would allow me to ride with 100000kms under my belt rather than let me drive with 20000kms. Bureaucracy zindabad... I'd be a better _Rider_ than the folks here imagine...

That brings me to a very subtle point... why do people in the US stop when they come to a line where you want to cross on foot... it's pleasant but its uncanny and unnatural for someone who's come from the Indegenous...

Not that I'm complaining... The fact is that they're just not in so much of a hurry... The US establishment has taken the fun out of crossing a road... :(... It has given me my safety, but taken away my sense of adventure... think abt this... you can take any vehicle and reasonably expect to drive/ride ( leaving aside the oncoming traffic that'll kill you!)... these guys cannot... they'll have to get through several counselling sessions in order to tell them that it's their KARMA... ;)

I bet that the next time Manish comes around I'll kick his ass in an SUV :D

Love you all,
~Manjit

Free Bird

There are times that a song can affect your life... Really affect your life... Enormously...

Let me start at the preamle... ;)

There was a time not too long ago... that I was free and unencumbered... I didn't have physical weaknesses and I didn't have any doubt in my abilities whatsoever...

Then one day, I decided to ride... It didn't matter that I'd already done the trip on a lesser steed... I wanted to do my first long trip on my spirited one... And nothing you could think of would stop me... not even fate... so I thought...

It was just another day... but a decidedly different one... I'd decided, with Tum, to ride to the hills where we'd spent such happy times together not an year earlier.

Wham!!! My fault... Luckily my faithful steed could take a lot of punishment... so could Tum... I'd had a horrific accident... I'd twisted my foot all the way around so that it fractured...and dislocated... and tore my ligaments...

You don't know what that makes an ex-basketball-player feel like... looking at people walk... when you can only dream of it for a couple of months.... I'd slowly heal... but would I ever fly....

I remembered that I'd started jogging before I'd had that accident... I'd jogged every morning to the sounds of "Free Bird"...

Punish Me!

The Return

OK... One year later and a lot less hair... a lot has happened. I've switched jobs, I'm in the US for a 2.5 month training session and I'm missing my wife terribly :(. I actually spent Saturday evening cleaning and tidying up the apartment I'm living in. I don't mean to be male chauvinistic but I don't usually care about how my home looks... I only care about how my home looks to my wife... and my guess is that I'm just about fitting that bill.

Nikhil has been awfuly understanding and generous... He send the whole set of our Goa photographs at 1.5 KB/s (Kilo-_Bytes_ per second)... It took him 2 days... I love that guy. As soon as I get back again, I'm going to try and get a few people around me that I can trust to want to do that trip again...

Riding to Goa is a whole different experience from driving there (I'm not even going to acknowledge flying there or arriving there by bus or by train). Especially in a bike like mine. The time that I went, my bike was a 350cc 4 stroke 18.5bhp Royal Enfield Bullet Machismo, or simply called the bullet. My companion had a 220cc 4stroke 17PS Hero Honda Karizma. The bikes were well matched... in the same way a bull elephant is well matched with a... well plain bull... The plain bull is faster, both off the block and at all points in between, but the elephant commands respect. I can still feel that feeling of ~3 years back when Pungi told me that I better ride ahead, and we took on the trucks (travelling at around 80-90 kph) of the Indian highway at a decent 125-135kph consistently and all because I was in the lead. Now, I have to say this because I've a lot of respect for my plastic counterpart... The Karizma is an extremely fast vehicle... quite nimble, and very powerful... BUT IT STILL LOOKS LIKE A BOY'S TOY!!! No self respecting truck driver is going to give it way when it sees it in its rear view mirror...

The only bike to ride on the India highway is the Royal Enfield Bullet!

I have to give credence to Pungi... His bike is an extremely stable well tamed dalmation snake. Quick of the line, but very stable and lots of fun to ride... ITS JUST NOT BIG ENUF... He told me as much on the ride... It would be better if I rode in front of him because the truck driver wouldn't give him any way to overtake... In my wake we'd make our way as effortlessly as my exmanager through my credentials... EVERYONE MAKES WAY FOR A BULLET....

Forgive me if I sound pretentious... But maybe it'd have been different if he'd had a Eliminator... or more likely not... a bullet is a bullet... I wish to go there again... the only way is to go with other bulleteers...

I'll keep this blog updated.