Competition

Iam convinced that I have none to compete against..
I say so because I can always find out more about the competitor and thus find no reason to compete..
But I must compete against myself since I know very less about myself..SO I must compete only against myself..If I finally know who really "I"am then thats the day competition and the desire to achieve ends..Finally a rational reason to this point..GR8


:)

Lara THE MAN

Cricket has been my passion for about 10 years now..And Lara is one person who has remained an enigma even in cricketing senses for me...Before one can admonish me for not watching enough of a cricketing lord like Lara I just want to tell them that it has never worked for me with Lara..I have always wanted to watch a full innings of his live but that has not happened for various reasons like
1).He has lost his wicket early when I watch him
2).Power cuts
3)stupid rain interruptions..
But inspite of this fact I have managed to follow his career via highlights and papers..I have always been awestruck by his genius..He is one person who makes cricket seem as easy as washing dishes in a dishwasher..The sheer variety of strokes he's got when matched with that unending desire to dominate.. some old watchers say its the Carribbean blood that he shares with the original master blaster Viv "GOD" Richards has a role too.But another feature people sometimes forget when they watch Lara in full flow is the amount of hard work that has gone into his batting..Genius can dwarf most attributes that exists around including one's perseverance...The way he fought within himself to emerge from that historic slump of form at the turn of the millenium showed that his strength of character is amazing..I know other cricketers who had slumps but none have had it as bad as Lara and none have come back with such force(400 in an innings is the stats testimonial)..
Iam writing this as Lara is pounding the wits out of the Pakis at Multan with yet another gem and ..
Iam not watching that live either..
PV

A Reason To Live

When He Knew He Was to Die


He Found Deep Desire and Reason to Live!!

Relocation Part I

It has been a month since I arrived in Hamilton,ON Canada. A truly exhilarating experience for me. Everything about this phase of my life is worth remembering.I guess if I put stuff down it will help. Right from the start when I took out own desi Airbus from Chennai to Mumbai to eating out at Himalya Indian Restaurant at Stoney Creek,it has been one hell of a roller coaster.
First things first. The "packing tension" one feels before emabarking on a faarin trip is immense. You really cant priortize for periods of the order of years i.e If ure going to be out of home for more than a year or so you will find that everything you can think of will be useful at some point and it is hard to drop some things from your luggage.However airlines have an obvious limit which means you drop 100s of pages of Journal Papers and A4 sheets which you wanted to carry hours before your flight.It is even more irritating to be reprimanded by the bugging Indian Airlines official regarding the weight limit and that you may get fined. Finally the guy relents to incessant pleading about grad students being poor and cost of living in faarin being high and all.He adds a warning that the other official mite not be as generous as him. That turned out to be true but in a quite opposite sense. No other official through my journey raised a finger about luggage rules. The supposedly serious security check also turned out to be simple with people getting to take cabbin baggage quite contrary to rules of the time. But everything was not fine. Had a major scare at Frankfurt where the officials of my connecting flight to Toronto told me that my ticket on Air Canada was not confirmed and that I had to wait till 10 mins before departure to find out if I had a seat or not... That shocked me out of my wits and I started cursing my Travel Agent.But luck and The BIG G's grace was around and I got a seat afterwards.
Thats all reagrding the air trip.Was over joyed to find Prof.Bhaduri waiting for us(was travelling with Arindam/Arindan) at Toronto airport.What a fabulous human being he is.. More on My first month at Hamilton in the next post..

i can see my jaw bone !!

This is just going to hurt a little bit

One thing I like less than most things is sitting in a dentist chair with
my mouth wide open.
And that I will never have to do it again is a hope that I am against hope hopen.

Because some tortures are physical and some are mental,
But the one that is both is dental.
It is hard to be self-possessed
With your jaw digging into your chest.

So hard to retain your calm
When your fingernails are making serious alterations in your life line
or love line or some other important line in your palm;

So hard to give your usual effect of cheery benignity
When you know your position is one of the two or three in life
most lacking in dignity.

And your mouth is like a section of road that is being worked on.
And it is all cluttered up with stone crushers and concrete mixers and
drills and steam rollers and there isn't a nerve in your head that
you aren't being irked on.

Oh, some people are unfortunate enough to be strung up by thumbs.
And others have things done to their gums,
And your teeth are supposed to be being polished,
But you have reason to believe they are being demolished.
And the circumstance that adds most to your terror
Is that it's all done with a mirror,
Because the dentist may be a bear, or as the Romans used to say, only
they were referring to a feminine bear when they said it, an ursa,
But all the same how can you be sure when he takes his crowbar in one
hand and mirror in the other he won't get mixed up, the way you
do when you try to tie a bow tie with the aid of a mirror, and forget
that left is right and vice versa?

And then at last he says That will be all; but it isn't because he then
coats your mouth from cellar to roof
With something that I suspect is generally used to put a shine on a
horse's hoof.

And you totter to your feet and think. Well it's all over now and after
all it was only this once.
And he says come back in three monce.
And this, O Fate, is I think the most vicious circle that thou ever sentest, That Man has to go continually to the dentist to keep his teeth in good
condition when the chief reason he wants his teeth in good condition
is so that he won't have to go to the dentist.

Ogden Nash

Aah this was just amazing. Had been to the dentist yesterday. Had my right wisdom tooth extricated. It had a horrible cavity and had to be removed. The whole procedure was simple except for a brief period in the start when the doc had to stick a needle up my jaw into the nerve for the anasthesia(btw anasthesia is a very beautiful sounding word isnt it espescially when it is injected). Here the doc had a trouble with finding the correct spot to inject so he tried it at couple of places before getting the right spot. At that time he told me something about the girth of my jaw bone etc. The worst part was all through the process he was talking and trying to make me comfortable but I guess one cant respond to questions like "is it paining?" with a crowbar or a needle up your jaw. So I just kept making arbit noises which got interpreted :)

Finally the tooth was removed and relief all over. But today morning I found a off-white patch on the area where the wisdom tooth existed. Initially was flabber gasted coz I assumed the doctor had'nt removed tooth properly but later remembered seeing my tooth's root after removal. Finally understood that was my jaw-bone. This is stupendous. I Have heard stories of ppl seeing their bone after a gr8 accident and all but I can see it without undergoing much pain. Ofcourse dentistry has come a long way since Ogden Nash's time. Its no more a gruesome affair as Nash describes. Though most people are still afraid of the dentist !!

Its Over

The flight of fantasy
when one deceives oneself
One doesnt see reality
Reality shows up
when he isnt quite ready
So I get up
Dust my ass
Shrug shoulders
Shake Hands
And Trip on
To find another
Another flight Of fantasy
For
Everyone loves to be loved
:)

Sky

As I sat on the Terrace Last Evening I saw something

The Sky Opened Her Wardrobe For Me
She Let Me through to See What She had
The Wardrobe Had Only One Dress
The One Which Was Blue
Dissapointed I closed My Eyes
But When I Opened My Eyes
The Colour Changed
It WAS Orange,Red And So Many Other Colours
Colours Which You Can See and Feel
But Are Too Beautiful To Be Written About

my first story

The cold winter breeze struck his face with fury through the windows of the s6 compartment.the day marked 12 years since he lived through the death of four people who meant more to him than anybody else.he had moved on or so he thought.in denial,in sorrows,in tears,in retribution,in self depreciation he felt them.he had moved on or so he thought.in semi sleep he went back .

* * * * * *

December 6 1992 and the days that followed changed the lives of millions of people forever.krishnakant upadhyay was one of them.doing his final year of undergraduation and looking forward to a bright future he never anticipated what was to happen.

At around 8 pm on december 8 krishna and his roomamte salil chowdary were getting ready to go to the mess and have their dinner.both had earlier in the day taken part in a protest meeting and prayer for communal harmony in their college and had been unequivocal in their condemnation of the 'demolition' and the riots that followed.as they were going to the mess the pune informed krishna about the fateful phonecall from his hometown.an inspector talked to him and verified his parents' identity and then delivered the news.his parents had been attacked and killed in the riots.the police were organising the funeral since private funerals were close to impossible in such an situation.

As soon as the line was cut Krishna went numb.his had been a normal life filled with simple largely predictable and happy events .his mind was just refusing to react.When the mess workers served him his favourite food for dinner,he heard it

“Beta kitne patla ho gaye ho.Toda aur lelo naa” followed by a more masculine

“Lelo naa.jab teri maa kuch kehti hai to maan na padtha hai”

And he broke down.He wept without any inhibition in the open mess hall like a child whose chord with the mother had just been cut off.Sorrow is infectious it spreads faster than light.And that day Salil joined Krishna in his grief.

As they came back to their room Krishna, still deep in his sorrow ,took stock of the situation. He had to go to his town.but the riots had paralysed the entire country.the buses were not running and the next train was only in the morning.If he could just cross this one night he could reach his place and see his beloved ma and pa 's mortal remains,just once but

will the police wait till he reaches his town. he remebered that the police had mentioned the word funeral in his conversation.this bought to his mind the shocking images of his ma and pa's corpses lined in a large heap with others and being pulled up by the municipality workers for the mass funeral .this added even more pain to his volatile mind.

His hostel was in a predominantly hindu locality which meant the muslim occupants had left.but Salil wouldnt budge even when others called him.He thought that it was his duty to be with his only friend Krishna at this hour. Krishna did not know what to say.He only wished Salim got away to be safe ,away from the mobs .......... and Krishna.

***********************************

There was commotion outside the room around midnight.Salil immediately hid all his belongings and removed his locket and kept it inside his pocket.hoping against hope that he may not be identified.little did he know that his nemesis was not far away.

The commotion was followed first by knock and then a violent bang on their door.four men with saffron bands on their head forced their way into the room.As soon as they saw Krishna's sacred thread hanging loose below his shirt their robust manner softened into one of respectful indulgence.The leader of the mob asked Krishna “panditji kya woh hamare saat hai?”

* * * * *

Was it Salil?Was he alive?He seemed to be talking , folding his hands and begging to every passenger on the train.He smiled at Krishna and started walking towards him.Krishna ran towards the toilet.He shut himself and cried in true repentance.Could he have saved Salil?

* * * * *

“Panditji kya who hamare saat hai?”

At that moment Krishna felt the death of two men almost at the same time.Victims of violence perpetrated by extraneous factors and from within.The greatest success of the fundamentalists is not in the malicious killing of innocents who are always the prime victims of aggression but they kill rational minds,they polarize the educated ,uncivilize the civilized.On that cold december night Krisnakant Upadhyay allowed his mind to die and killed his friend just by a nod of his head.And Salil smiled at him.This smile was to torment Krishna more than his parents' death.This smile ,after which everything blacked out on that day (and for many more days to come),said “if u can avenge for your loss in this way SO BE IT”

* * * * *

He washed his face and came out of the toilet.An old,blind muslim beggar was crossing him.Krishna stopped him and gave him a hundred rupee note which brought a smile on the old beggar's face.the same smile.Salil was back ........