Over adjusting?

Seven were already inside the auto rickshaw. There are always many of these autos at an auto stand, but somehow not many to hop in. An auto stand is more of a central area of a busy roundabout; it can be any area where the auto-wala feels comfortable to park his ride, sometimes even allowing other vehicles to use the road! Anyhow, being the eighth wonder inside the auto. Back seat loaded (better, overloaded) with four mammoth sized and bull shaped arguing aunties and the elegant front seat occupied by the country’s foremost luminaries, and founders of the Utopian societies.

I’ll tell you this with my two years’ experience in the auto, as I used to go to my coaching (!) classes while I apparently prepared for engineering entrance exams.  There’s no better place to listen to the political rumors than the front auto seats. The views of the people, in almost all cases involving the auto driver are worth listening to. They are just ludicrous! And yes, incessantly complaining of the government, sometimes even unsure what they are complaining about.

But that’s the thing I appreciate about them: they complain, they talk about the corruption, abuse the system and most importantly know more than well-educated young people listening to their i-pods. This is what our society, among various other major elements, greatly lacks. We have stopped discussing the social problems, we have stopped complaining the setup and we have stopped resisting. We have just taken everything for granted, like we pop up a crocin whenever we feel like without even consulting. All the inconveniences and problems we face are a part of our life.

People have started ignoring even front page headings, and the memory is getting short lived. From acts of terror to simpler scandals, we have developed a tendency to ignore it. The twin blast in Hyderabad went past, and so did the myriad of rape cases before the Delhi case. Crime is as easily neglected as common cold.

Political agendas are no more discussed upon. The down-the-sewer education system, or the construction of three dams by china recently. The nuclear project controversy, or the chopper scam. No discussions. I don’t consider the debates (as if they are) on the news channels as discussions; they are heated arguments in an uncontrolled environment, which moves very quickly from ‘what is to be done’ to ‘what the opponent hasn't done’. The only discussions that make it to the minds of people are of Raghu’s slaughter of the auditioners in roadies, and the useless likes.

We have moved ourselves so comfortably into the bubble of comfort, revolving around the concept of not thinking of that what’s happening around. On the issue of the Delhi rape case, a deep analysis was done by a psychological expert. It revealed that most women feel that they won’t be raped because they don’t want to imagine it that way. In a similar manner, you will never imagine your city under bomb threats, unless it is. I can’t imagine a bomb kept at the big bazaar at Ranchi! (Many of us might not know this but one was found at that very shopping mall. Wonder why every big marketing complex in Ranchi has detectors now?)

Just recall how many times in the last ten years have you heard ‘Irom’? No, I haven’t misspelt the name of a metal here (by the way this one is stronger than the metal!) This woman has spent her last ten years on fast, without food or water! And she has a purpose, a very strong one. But people just supported her when she had started her fast. After a few months, the news of the fast was past. People forgot her, but she kept the fast. People outside the seven states kept ignoring the gravity of the situation AFSPA created, and the repercussions it brought along.

Recently, giving up hope on people who had seem to completely forget the person spending ten precious years of her life on fighting for them, Irom Sharmila broke her fast. It was coming. What would have been if nobody would have attended the speeches freedom fighters used to deliver? What would happen if you ignore the person trying hard to help you? The person will eventually stop helping. In this country we have rare few souls trying real hard to help. And the way we encourage these souls, we are going to lose them too.

So why is it that we ignore the daily dose of anti-social and immoral acts around us? Overdose? Yes, the media- print or cacophonic (otherwise called electronic media) has thrown to us reports of infinitely many unwanted events. So much, that even before you ponder and stretch your mind on one, another fresh report comes in. Take a month, like this current month and see how many scams, how many murders and how much corruption captured the screens. In case of scams, it’s like back to back blockbusters I used to listen to when I last saw television (and that was long ago!). 2G scam, 3G scam, Swiss bank scam, Commonwealth games, Tatra trucks, Chopper scam and the list goes on, with money involved chronologically increasing! Many more scams have been overwritten in my memory, again due to overdose!

Of course sitting in front seats of auto won’t help. And sitting in the back seat and arguing definitely won’t. It’s not that if something bad happens regularly, it becomes ‘less’ bad. We were born with a choice of volition but the social environment made us forget this. The government isn't there to take away your choices; it was made to take choices for you. Raise your voices. Heat up debates. Place your demands for a better peaceful society. Or did we forget that we can have a better society?

We have the power in us to change. Lord hanuman was cursed to forget his powers. Of course it’s a story, but it was written to learn from. We all very well know what he achieved when he realized his strength.

In the future not very distant

The headline read “Prime Minister Rahul Gandhi requests Pakistan to relinquish Kashmir and Punjab”. I sighed and kept the fifty rupees newspaper aside. It used to cost five in 2013, a ten times rise in six years. I proceeded towards the university where I studied (?) once. Around fifteen thousand students crossed me as I made my way through the campus to its central area. I sat on the roof of a hostel, trying to imagine myself sitting on the grass where now this hostel stands. Few more inmates were lying around, some smoking weed, others with tablets. I was listening to their conversation. One of them was a tech geek, who didn’t know programming. Another was like an ‘every other student’, emaciated, just like I used to be.

The geek spoke. No, speaking is something to be mentioned. They were rarely talking, mostly chatting. So the geek spoke “hey this IRCTC is a damned site, I logged in like-yesterday and the page is still loading!”

After typing a long chat on his tablet to distant friend, the other person thought it obliging to reply. “Yeah, you are lucky, because when I logged in before the winter vacation, I could access the page after the vacation was over! What do you expect from this government! All govt. sites are like this.  (Btw IRCTC is a private website) Railways is just anyhow continuing.”

“Who owns this railways?”

“Nobody owns railways! It belongs to a group of powerful people. I saw it on YouTube”

And then they started castigating the government, and then the discussion moved to the university. Every system they were a part of was corrupt, and their talk revealed that they were of the purest forms to ever walk the earth.

I received a call just then. It was my mother. She informed me that my aunt had given birth to an engineer (i.e. a boy). He was enrolled in FIITJEE's extensive congenital training programme. He would be shown colorful sketches of thermodynamic concepts and structure of polyethylene-m-tetra-chloro-phosphate. I went to her house, pointed to his head and told her he’ll crack it! But instead she heard he’ll crack IIT as this is what the prestigious coaching institute had been telling her all day.

Next morning, failing to pay for the newspaper, I was surfing the net and came upon a survey that presented another grim picture. It said “china crushes Indian economy by overtaking her in the service sector, the only sector left after agricultural sector committed suicide owing to heavy debts. It is worth noting that industrial sector never existed in India. As a result IT companies have closed their recruitment gates, which used to absorb a large chunk of the teeming number of graduates manufactured each year. Joblessness is back on the streets.”

It was hot in there. And I needed water for bathing. I went to the market and after booking my number for water, I continued reading from my laptop (yes, reading in the market from a laptop) there was this chotu from the nearby tea shop calculating his earnings from an app in his smartphone. I asked him “do you read or write?” He gave the expected answer. “But I can count my money in this touch phone”, he continued, with special emphasis on the word touch. I adjusted my ‘keypad-ed’ cellphone inside my trousers. One of the last such sets. Vintage.

Feeling like a black and white character in a glittering world, I continued reading the newsfeeds. At least I could read. “USA intimidated by the aggressive market domination policy of the Chinese. On the other hand, the US president tried unsuccessfully to avoid suspicions surrounding its involvement in the unrest in central Asia, lured by the last drops of the precious fuel petroleum.” I couldn’t take any more of this negativity. Enervated by the vegetative state of affairs of the country, I was about to close the browser when in noticed a minuscule text at the bottom of the page, reading “paid news”. Now this was too much!

I got into the queue for water, as my turn came up. An elderly man was behind me. He started speaking (the elderly talk, frequently). “You see that nerd there?” The nerd in concern was with ear buds in his head, which was banging like a rock-less punk. “Yeah, I do”. The elder continued “kids like this are going to run the hell-heading country tomorrow. I asked him who was the second last president of US and he replied Bob Marley. They are ridiculous, this generation, ignorant and arrogant.”

I sighed. The youth feel that the elders as a spent force and the elders think of the young as un-enlightened and ignorant fools. Everyone blames others. I realized I am doing the same, blaming these two generations.

Anyways. Delhi and other such underdeveloped cities now have no traces women. Legit. It is only filled with money centered people, and power centered people. Mumbai has crumbled under its own crime lords’ empires. Bangalore looks like as if an apocalyptic effect has swept through, creating the new center of joblessness.

But it’s not all bad. People still believe that some miracle will occur which will alleviate their problems. It’s good to keep faith and do nothing else. Let the problems continue, there’s no need to solve it. Someone like Gandhi will come out splitting his grave, wave his ‘lathi’ and everything will improve. Corruption will melt away and will flow down the sewers, right where it came from.

My negligible salaried job has a good incentive. It helps in getting visas. I have got my visa ready to leave this country in its mess. There’s no scope for any optimism here. I hope that corruption itself goes corrupt, as I proceed towards my apartment with water to bath. The Independence Day program is to be broadcasted a few hours from now, with a special documentary on how freedom fighters fought hard to achieve the precious independence which we now so indulgently enjoy.

ILL-LITERATES

If you enjoy the privilege of a better memory than mine, you might be able to recall that there was one solution that was common to all problems we studied about in the wonderful school years, be it poverty, hygiene, environmental degradation or calamities. This one solution was awareness, or education. And India has achieved great heights in the field of education (hope you know I’m being sarcastic as usual). I thank the mentality of people for this, a problem which again roots back to education.

The Indian society in general has a very strange air about it. Education is considered as the most important asset to be acquired by our society, yet it’s the very thing that it so unfortunately lacks. It however, is laced with qualifications and degrees. Doctors (!) and engineers (!!!), managers and clerks, and nothing else. How frequently have you heard of people starting their own business? Students opting for athletics after high school? (No wonder a country with one-fifth of the world’s population isn't able to win every 5^th medal in the Olympics!) How many have taken up research? Facts tell two out of a 1000 M.Tech students do a PhD.

After being ‘educated’, you get to work under industries and companies. For some or the other person. If not educated, you get to work as farmers, laborers and the likes. You can now imagine why India is one of the world’s few countries which switched directly from being agriculture based economy to being service based, without crossing the manufacturing stage. The repercussions are evident and more will be evident soon. The very few other people who received little or no schooling, but got educated in the true sense, are the people at the top. Industrialists, artists, sportsperson, entrepreneurs, and the like. Even the illiterate politicians are far above the class of literates. The root of the problem lies in understanding the true meaning of education.

Education is taken as another word for academics and quantified as number of degrees one acquired. It’s not about throwing away your life into the books whether or not you like it. It’s taking decisions, making choices about the field you want to take up your career in, and pursuing it with full fervor and labor. USA might not be the best example to state for education quality, (it’s degrading like anything in the past years) but clearly it provides a huge variety of options to choose as your career; real options.

Here in incredible !ndia, we have science, commerce or arts after tenth grade. In science we have only maths or biology (these are apparently the only two subjects that constitute science!). And maths means engineering, while bio means medical science! At the end of engineering, you get to choose from either CAT or GATE, as if they are the only two criteria to be declared human. Actually, it was meant to be business administration or m.tech, but the meaning has changed. Because its qualification that matters, not knowledge.

Take cities and then villages. Compare the voting percentages. See where people help each other more. Observe where neighbors are friends. Look up where crime is abundant. See where people are healthier (setting aside access to health). See where people are happier. And city people are expected to be more educated!

The situation that came up after the Delhi gang rape showed what education gives to literates. On the day the incident occurred, no one- not a single person stopped to help the victims. Next day you find the same shameless people (with a few of those who genuinely felt sorry) protesting. Once the police showed signs of aggression, they all vanished. Reading recently a case of the rape of a three year old girl which received no attention whatsoever, you can see the protest was a sham. And a shame.

And of course the babas in our society. Literates adore people like asaaram, nirmal baba (he asks you to eat samosas if you say that you have a bad stomach), and follow their instructions to the word. Once I went to a recharge shop, and was looking around. I found no pictures or idols of god. Just when I was about to mentally appreciate this fact; I saw a picture on the wall, incense sticks below it and quite evidently a symbol of devotion. It was nirmal babas. This man worshipped that fraudster!

It is not just the shopkeeper. Most of them are like him. Marriages are based on kundalis and manglik crap. They wear rings to avoid non-existent evil forces. Animals are killed in temples in the name of sacrifice. Sacrifice doesn’t mean killing someone else, it means giving up something you don’t like to part with. The word is sacrifice, for English’s sake!

So, we have an awesome education system, sometimes lead by next-to-god-legends like kapil sibal. I am proud to be an Indian. An educated Indian.

The Right to CHANGE

Once my young cousin asked me, “All politicians are corrupt, aren’t they?” When I asked him if he knew exactly how a politician is elected, the reply was as expected from a standard six kid, no. he had the notion of politicians being corrupt even before knowing who the politicians are. To him, it meant a bad someone who dresses in white, is least educated and takes away people’s money. And it is not his fault; he says what he listens around. I am myself no expert in civics, but I know that my vote selects him, just like yours.

Anywhere you go, travelling in train, in a tea shop, outside a shopping mall or in college hostels, you’ll always find heated discussions on politics, which quickly moves on to a discussion on politicians. This is the only example of discussions that are both one-sided and heated. I haven’t ever heard discussions on whether or not a particular debatable bill should be passed or not, but I have certainly heard discussions on which politician did what, who is more corrupt, who got arrested, and got away. And it really gets interesting with new faces on the controversial front every day, and new jaw dropping scams every other.

When the proposals of important bills are put forward, there isn’t much debate and opposition. And just bring forth an issue like Ram Setu or installation of nuclear power plants, which should be allowed without hype, the political and social machinery comes alive. I had expected much more debate and discussions on the FDI bill, but there wasn’t much. Especially in the youth. Students’ discussions are like “who is better, SRK or Sallu?” ever heard “should the cap on number of LPG cylinders be raised?” Last involvement of youth in political matters before the Delhi gang rape case was when reservation bill was passed, and that was long ago.

We shout hard if there’s any violation of any of our fundamental rights. We even run to help someone else with ‘right’ problems. That’s good, but what happens when it comes to our fundamental duties? We know and exercise our rights, but do we remember our duties? Do we complain of someone deviating from his duties, let alone ourselves be responsible? We don’t commit to simple, small  but important duties like voting. And we expect full rights. Do you expect an invitation to your friend’s party after you have thrashed and abused him? As a friend you ‘had’ the right, no more now.

There are serious misinterpretations of our constitution and civil governance amongst our generation. The whole system is rotten, we say. We forget that our constitution was written by the greatest minds and think tanks that could have written it. And it was written predicting every possibly future condition. Provisions in the constitution are such that our democracy is infallible. It is the longest constitution of the world, because it is also the best (a globally and widely accepted fact) and it almost caters to the fundamental rights of each and every individual of our infinitely diverse country.

You might say and I will agree that many of the culprits live an easy jail life, because of the provisions in the constitution. But is the news regarding arrest of innocent people common? No. the provisions were made to guarantee true justice and not just a fast one. Obviously, the courts are sometimes even slower than that, but the case of Ajmal Kasab is an example that true justice was served, following every constitutional rules in a small time. In his case, life sentence was announced within three years of the conviction, including the time devoted solely to extracting important details form him regarding terrorist activities, which accounted for a huge chunk of that time. And regarding harsh corporal punishments, three years isn’t a very long time.

Of course, despite its greatness, out constitution needs amendments, and very helpful provisions were made even for that, but the amendments would only work if politicians table a bill, and pass it by majority. This is where, everyone agrees, the problem stands. Not in framing the constitution, but in execution. Taking a few steps back, and taking a look on the big picture, it’s clearly visible where the actual problem lies. If the MP’s and the MLA are bad considering they are not bringing forth the required bills, or voting in its favor, then who elected them in the first place? How are they there? And why are ‘they’ there and not us?

It’s in our mentality to just sit back and blame the politics for everything happening. And click ‘like’ on the pictures of some honest politician such as Arvind Kejriwal or put a black dot in the profile picture to protest something. As if blaming and black ‘dotting’ will bring any change. Instead, real change is needed. And that doesn’t require a revolution, or a fast, or a digital anarchy. In times like this, where almost no political party is willing to bring a change, stand up, and bring it yourself. Easier said, but seeing a stand, many and many of the people needing just an initiative will stand up with you, and a few against.

As the Mahatma said, be the change you want to see.

(Some even stood against Gandhi, and his stand on truth, the biggest weapon against corruption today which he foresaw. Can you find those protestors today?)

God…and the illogical logic behind

It was ‘Dhanteras’ that day and an article in the newspaper said that if you buy something this day, the goddess of wealth, ‘Lakshmi’ (as if she exists!) will bestow her generosity upon you. Logically, if you buy something, you’ll have to pay for it and you can only get a little poorer! If buying something can make a person richer (nonsense, but still let us somehow assume), the rich who can buy will be richer and the poor, poorer. So god is the one (actually he isn’t one-there are 360,000 in Hinduism alone) directly responsible for the divide between haves and have not’s! God!

God is no good, and people know it. The difficult part is accepting it. Had god been good, would there have been natural calamities, where thousands die, irrespective whether they are saints or terrorists? Would there have been criminal tendencies in people’s mind-for crime, corruption and dishonesty? Would there have been disease and illness like cancer and AIDS, wiping off lakhs off the planet? Any explanation? Still believing that god exists, and that too he is ‘good’ is like believing that earth is flat and sun revolves around it!

If you see a mother crying her child’s dead body or a terminal stage cancer patient being consoled by his relatives that it will be all right despite knowing that it won’t, or a handicapped child trying to stand up and fall instead and you still believe in god being good, you need to consult a doctor. A mental one. Urgently.

All that’s there is nature, and its creator, who is up to no other good than ensuring continuation of survival of species. Survival of the fittest, not the ‘best’. On this very context, you can’t call a tiger sinful for killing a deer, despite the emotional strings attached to it. (Animals have emotions too, remember? Sometimes better than mankind.)

Doing good won’t get you anywhere. This concept that doing ‘good’ is indeed good was made only so that there isn’t a total anarchy (to keep people from slitting each other’s throat and ending up alone). Believe me when I say evil will make you more prosperous than by doing good. Pick up any famous personality, successful businessman, each has an evil story behind him. And once you achieve success, no one cares about your sins. So there are only two types of people on earth: the rich and the good. Choose one.

Anyway, getting back, all of us have come across the supernormal devotion (?) people have for god. Unnecessary is a better word. They pick up bells and that metal plates and bang it at the top-decibel ranges, in a hope that god will hear them directly from heaven. Like you can shout your voice to your relative in Delhi, while sitting in Ranchi. Instead first confirm whether a relative exists at all in Delhi. Even if after knowing there isn’t, if you need to contact this non-existent being, try the cellphone. Same way, you can close your eyes and feel closer to god, then you can talk in a normal tone to him, if need be. No need of carrier waves.

I once quoted the example of a temple in my state, and I state it again. There, in a room about 10 feet by 10 feet, about five dozen people pray together at a time, many not even getting to touch the holy ‘stone’. How can you concentrate on connecting to god when you are in a suffocating room, with your soul desperate to leave your body and hence the room? It is far better a pray, if you do that from your home, in front of His pic. And if they are so much bent on believing in god, why don’t they let him rest peacefully, instead of banging bells and shouting hymns day and night long.

Just imagine yourself smeared with all that milk, sticky honey, leaves, inhaling incense smoke 24x7, people singing the same song to you in a terrible voice (most religious agents have a croaky voice, like mine) throughout the year, no time to sleep, waking up at daybreak, with people cutting goats at your feet, offering you the most delicious food but you are not able to eat it (have you ever seen god eating the ‘Prasad’ you offer?)….and the list goes on. Students are a step ahead in disturbing god’s peace, the last bits of what’s left of it. We wake him up a three in the night, praying to get better marks in the exam the following morning. This is the reason, I decipher for my meager marks. It’s a revenge god takes for disturbing his peace.  Why don’t we just let him be?

Why’s the need to give this ‘godly’ treatment to someone who hasn’t given you anything? To get it straight, whatever little or phenomenal achievement you have, it’s all because of you and you deserved it. No one can take it away from you. If you’ll be successful, you won’t start giving a heavenly treatment to the first stranger you meet on the road for your success, despite having no contribution in your it, apart from being the fortunate stranger to cross you on the road.

Just do good for yourself, your family and well-wishers, obviously without causing anyone else any discomfort, including the almighty, and good will happen. If you shift your focus on god, obviously you’ll lose focus on the job at hand. So don’t lose your focus to god (yeah He is a distraction, and a good one at it). Work, learn, earn, enjoy.

Those understanding that they have what they deserve don’t need god. It’s for those who don’t. For them, it’s just a symbol to blame, to ask strength from. I said good is god. But the good don’t need god.

The city of Joy

Kolkata is a city (I bet you knew that!)  by the people, certainly for the people and undoubtedly full of people! Being there with some of my friends this puja, it proved why it’s worth a visit, and why it’s nicknamed such.

A yellow ambassador with ‘taxi’ written on it passing you with a huge metal suspension bridge in the backdrop tells you Kolkata is near. Before even entering the city, I found three ‘pandals’ in the same patch of land, combinely almost covering the whole area (by the way combinely is no word). I wondered and am still wondering on the need of three in the same place! Now as I stepped out of my train onto the platform, I was almost thrown back in by a swarming and near-stampeding crowd. Thin as I am, I made my way out to find my friends waiting. Can’t tell you how good it is to see a familiar face in a teeming crowd!

It is the fifth time I was there, and each time the city throws something new for me, and meanwhile preserving what I loved the most, its classic British culture. It’s where you can almost see the times of British raj, with sahibs living in vintage homes, served by many helping hands. The future is also here, from the sky high Newtown and South city mall to the regal estates piercing the city’s skyline.

And you can’t find a city with more means of transportation. Auto-rickshaw, rickshaw, hand pulled rickshaw (that’s just three types of rickshaw), taxi, buses, tram, metro and local trains (that’s again three types of railways). I hope one day I’ll find motorcycles used to taxi people around the city, going by the crowd and the jams.

It also a rags to riches city. Not that you’ll get richer here, but this is because I saw a stunning BMW car overtake a maruti 800, the day I got there. There are shops selling 100 a piece shirts in front of branded showrooms where you can’t get to even try a shirt unless you have a 1000 in your wallet. (It’s a different point that both of the products are actually the same, but more on that later). As one of my friends very correctly observed that people were ready to pay 50 for an unworthy coffee in café for the fools nicked CCD, they didn’t had a penny to spare on the feeble old man sitting outside the same. (I myself couldn’t spare my sandwich I was having to a supposedly begging kid, saying that I was equally hungry as him… … but he was wearing a nice new t shirt and jeans, wasn’t a beggar by any means!)

The women here are beyond compare. Almost all of them would find it easier to push their way through the crowds using their elbows, instead of going for the clear path nearby. It has been quite difficult to understand their intentions. And the gushing crowd induces fears of pickpocketing and what not in your mind. And there’s only one way to avoid it. Keep your hands on your assets (monetary assets, to be particular, if you are thinking otherwise). But this is still a problem while travelling in buses, where your hands are too busy gripping the supports, preventing you being thrown out of the bus. And the number of people in the bus ensures that you have to struggle for a space to hold for support. Some unfortunate ones stick their palms to the ceiling of the bus, like lizards.

However, it’s certainly a heaven for food craving people. All roads have footpaths, and every footpath is dotted with street food and general stalls. The food is delicious and the best part that it isn’t costly at all. For the other stalls, you can bargain amazingly to get a 200 rupees commodity in just fifty. And obviously if the shopkeeper is selling it for fifty, he must still have a profit. Just evaluate the margin of profit!

The people here are very helpful (except a T.T.E. at the station who kept talking to an unknown force, all the while looking in the opposite direction). The neighborhood culture is far better than other megacities I have been to, especially Delhi. Of all things, the mentality of the people working here struck me best. Here people have the intentions of working hard and enjoying even harder, and that’s the best thing to do. The colorful city is indeed, the city of joy!

Times are Tough

Mind is the true ruler. The ruler of the body. Whichever great man said that was correct to every word. But sometimes, when the body fails to respond, the brain takes a back seat. Hence, this write-up.

This passing week was a test of patience for me, a god’s test to see what I do in such situations. I got fever. People who know me even half can tell me it is nothing new. I have had more paracetamols than mangoes, visited a doctor more than my relatives and used a thermometer more frequently than a pen. Thanks to my superb memory, a majority the only few remaining memories of my childhood are of sitting in a doctor’s waiting room, with a worried look on my parent’s face (as if I have shown them my report card), and a pathetic look on people looking at me.

I got a paracetamol from my roommate who was ill a day earlier. To my worst surprise, as if to intensify my pleasure in being sick, these words were etched on the tablet: “welcome”. What could you possibly deduce from such a phrase? It’s like ‘please have a seat’ written on the electrocution chair of a prison!

Now from the third day into the heated feverish days, I have a sore throat. Previous glorious experiences remind me of laryngitis. For those fortunately not acquainted with the horrific term, asking what in Madhu Koda’s name is this, it is an illness causing you an amplified sore throat and making your voice less of an audio signal and more of a noise signal. On top of it, it has added benefits.

So I was having a voice like the masked version of batman (when considering clarity), only n times worse. Last time I had the honor of having this disease, I fearfully recall, I used to sit near my laptop with notepad running, and font size 72 selected. The doctor had suggested total voice rest, and I wasn’t able to speak as it is, if I thought otherwise. This had lead to many misunderstandings when I tried to communicate with anyone sans words, further leading to epic frustration.

This coughing problem suddenly increases during the night, for reasons unknown. Thus, I spent (and am spending) sleepless nights, as no one can sleep coughing every 15 seconds. This incessant coughing has brought up another problem of stomach ache. Sleepless nights mean sleepy days. Sleeping during the day causes more sleepless nights.

As I was finding a way out of this vicious cycle, god, idling away his time, again bumped into me. Once again for his entertainment and much to my rebel, he gave me conjunctivitis. The most frustrating disease ever. Swollen, heated, irritated, blood red, dirty, itchy, reduced vision eyes.

Now, I was having fever, suffering from laryngitis and having conjunctivitis. It was like meningitis, elephantiasis, paralysis and hepatitis were on their way. It was in times like this that I revisited the status of god’s existence. More on that later. And in times like this I found out three ways to cure someone from any disease. First, tried and tested: visit a doctor (people staying in KiiT will realize that this option is invalid for them). Second: use your will power to think that you are well and ultimately get well (people with logically capable brains will realize the crap value of this). Third, the best way, is to not pay attention to the disease and act as you would have without it. No, I haven’t gone berserk with all the diseases ramming my body simultaneously, interfering with the rare normal functioning of my pea sized brain.

And who in ‘kaaladhan’s’ name said that: ‘when going gets tough, the tough gets going’. Anything that sounds beautiful isn’t true.  If tough got going, it means that going never got tough.

Really, times are tough!