Thursday, April 29, 2004
How big is that yawn in the window?
They say that you need a particular time to blog. A particular frame of mind, in that you sit down on your high-backed chair, which may be plush or not, leather-backed or foamed, revolving or not, and let your fingers touch the keyboard. A particular sight that greets your eye, so that as you write, you can evoke all the sensory perceptions available to you at that moment and course through them before you on the screen. A particular idea that lights you up maybe with a smile, maybe with bewilderment, or sadness, or disbelief, or enchantment. And you begin to type.
I say: Necessity is the mother of all invention.
I have nothing more to do with F&O figures. I've mailed everybody who hasn't got a restraining order out on me. I'm bored.
Ergo, I blog.
If I were Descartes returned to torment a whole new generation of hapless souls with terribly complex mathematical proofs, I would grin smugly and pronounce 'I blog, therefore I am.' How sad is that!
Never mind the answer.
Wednesday, April 28, 2004
Mellow Me
In a way, the novelty of Delhi and moneycontrol is on its way to wearing out. I'm not sure how much more eloquent (!) I could get on this teeming city, or on the gruelling sessions atop Videocon Towers. I make myself sound like a Roman galley slave - way too much melodrama for one damn job.
On the topic of melodrama then, how about
- ballerina all in pink fluff, dancing on tippy toes to her lover.... the fat woman behind the curtain screeching her lungs out in an Italian opera my ears cannot discern for loss of feeling...
- big baboon astride Videocon Towers with damsel-in-distress in one hand and a bunch of genetically mutated super-bananas in the other - it's an ad for vitamin (whatever, A,B,C,...Z) bananas are meant to have... get the right kind of banana and you get the whiny babe.
- Master and Commander sailing the seven seas till he finds LAND! LAND! LAND! So who cares if it's the West Indies and not the East ones...?
- Hero dies at mommy's foot and is reincarnated as her golden retriever to guide old lady when she becomes blind and infirm... I'm not one for the sympathy treatment, am ?
- coquetish Southern belle goes AIYOO RAMA at the sight of big mustachioed highway-man and the two live happily ever after, robbing people.
- guy saves gal by defeating a hundred agents of Codename: DR EVIL in death-defying kick-boxing stunts and machette-manhandling, all as a result of some intense mind-exercises with Dr Choo Choo at the Beijing Open University of Death-defying Kick-boxing Stunts and Machette-manhandling. Codename: DR EVIL never had a chance - he went in for the economy two-day workshop instead of the whole week course.
Did I specify that I would make sense in this entry?
Tuesday, April 27, 2004
Just another Manic ... um,... Tuesday
If Celine dion were here, she'd probably croon over my shoulder how A New Day has Begun... and I would probably give a rejoinder of... I don't know, something like Gettin' Jiggy With It (?)... ouch!
Welcome to just another Tuesday at the portal, c/o Moneycontrol Inc... SCRIPtease Inc if I had my way, but then we'll let that stay for some time now. Waiting with bated (?) breath for the markets to open, ready to key in an opening report with lightning (?) speed, anticipating the heaped praises (?) from boss lady... After a while in this place, you begin to treasure your dreams all the more... sigh.
College mode still hasn't worn out completely... still day dreaming a bit about the 'good ole days', still logging onto the acjournos group now and then to smile at the messages. Still grumbling about working hours and waking hours, still haggling with auto drivers (though methinks we have finally got the rates right, or is that a vain hope?)... gosh, this sounds too much like an earlier mail.
I can imagine Celine shaking me hard and yelling: GROW UP! Hell, no, Sharon did that to me yesterday... thanks, babe.
Monday, April 26, 2004
Much ado about nothing
I feel like a harpooner, waiting for a frikkin huge whale at the moment... moby dick, be damned! Waiting, waiting, waiting... Never thought in my wildest dreams earlier that my life would be so intricately woven with the goings-on at the stock market... that tells you a lot about never expecting what you want in life, and wanting what you never expected.
Aaaaa... philosophy, be damned.
Among the things I brought over to Delhi from Chennai,
1. a laugh that people say reminds them of hyena-giggles during mating time.
2. DA! DA! DA! And no, that's not Russian.
3. a singular affinity for auto rickshaws and cut throat auto drivers.
4. may be a dose of idealism, and then may be not even that.
5. a thirst for vodka and sprite... hic!
I didn't bring much, did I? Not even a harpoon.
Friday, April 23, 2004
No song to sing
I feel like humming a song, but the problem is there are too many songs in my head. I'm a walking, talking, singing schizo - glad to meet you.
Now where on earth was I going with that opening line? I have not the faintest clue. The best thing about having a blog is that you don't have to have a clue, like a private watering hole for nonsensical thoughts. Unless, of course, you're trying to be profound - in which case, you can again keep on rambling and everybody will think youre bloody frikking clever!
I don't feel so clever now, though.
It rained beautifully last night in delhi. The first time the city ever looked so gorgeous to me... So far, there are two sights of the city that have proved memorable to me. One, the maze of pillared porticos and verandahs of Lutyen's Connaught Place. Bloody difficult to navigate through, but the romantic in me revels in it... Two, the seemingly infinite row of pillars for the incomplete Delhi Metro overhead train lining Jhandewala and Patel nagar... I was telling Sharon this morning how it all reminded me of that scene from the Jesus movie... old road, lined with Roman pillars.... that dusty zone, where the crosses of martyrs stood tall....
I must stay away from Smally... I think I touched on a bit of his melancholia.
There's a break right now from work. Actually, don't think will be doing much work any more tonight. There's my first weekend in Delhi coming up and I have absolutey no idea what to do with it. Where to go, whom to meet, what to do, why at all.... I think, other than WHY, I covered all the 'five Ws' crap that they taught us at ACJ!
Hmmm..... From reporter extraordinaire (let me remain a deluged schizo, please!) to stenographer beyond compare to new age stockbroker?
Here's lookin' at you, kid.
Wednesday, April 21, 2004
Taking Stock
Started writing an entry, but then the warden showed up... Koreel, our mentor here at moneycontrol. Nice sort, really, and all that stock maket jazz isn't as weird as I thought it would be - at least on the compehension front. Loads more to bear and miles more to trudge on the report-writing front though... just gotta see Vidya or Koreel micro-examine a report to confirm that!
I'll cross that mountain, though! Should be fun doing that! (and hopefully, won't make anymore silly 'mountain' snaps - makes me sound like Nun Maria!!!)
Monday, April 19, 2004
Spiked drinks, hair and white shoes
I haven't come here in a long while - strange, considering that I was the one exhorting everyone else to carry on blogging. That sounds like one of those crappy Carry On movies - Carry on Camping, Carry on Doctor, Carry on Blogging - gawd knows, it has most of the silly gags! If my voice was as deep as Arnie's, I'd probably bellow 'I'm back!'
I'll just squeak it out for the meantime.
Delhi is soooooo hot and dusty. In spite of all that bitching Neyha did about Chennai, I think I actually prefer it to this place... so far. It's not the work - hell, the work hasn't even started as yet, and I feel strange saying that, since there are so many of the ACJ crowd working like hell in their internships... Nelly for instance - I do hope he gets thru TOI - I'm pretty sure he will!
I have a new roomie here, and I guess the entire rigmaraole will resume. I probably sound gay when I carry on about Nelly and I in 2B - and I bet somebody out there is probably smiling wickedly right now - but hell, that experience was simply great. I'm going to miss that tea he used to brew.... better than the strongest port wine Sharon ever brought from Goa! I thought about all those months again the other day, listening to 40 cent (whats the damn name of the damn bugger? ) rap to 'In da club', and I wonder what on earth is going to happen to my limited but highly problematic sense of hip hop now that Chennai is over... o, well, that unsound un-Surd is still here anyway... in spite of his idiotic white shoes, there may still be hope.
All the guys in Delhi here have a penchant, it seems, for either Red hair (of course that deserved caps! ) or spiky hair. The other day, I was listening to Pantu elaborating on Delhi's dhik-chik culture and we both agreed that thankfully, the Owner of the White Shoes (Lanuk, or whatever crap he likes to call himself) has finally graduated away from that class.
I'm thinking of getting my hair spiked. Purely for the shock value, of course - no silly puns about White Shoe Wisdom here!
Monday, April 12, 2004
I'm going to have Midas' Ears
The main thing on my mind right now is whether I made the right decision by opting for journalism. I'm not feeling greedy at this point of my life, but hell, what if I do? I found the idea of Nelly giving up his 30k job with Star for the mingy course at ACJ quite prepostrous - with that sort of an attitude how the hell am I going to last in this business?
I spoke yesterday with a close friend and I told him that the day I get greedy I'll pick up a CAT form on the way home from work. I'm in it for the money, honey. At least in the CAT race - that part is clear. What am I in the journo maze for? There are times when the answer to that seems so lucid, and there are times when I have to scratch my head and try to be a soothsayer. I feel proud about the damn website that we made; the investigative project that made me see the inside of a police station; the refugee dissertation that I busted my balls on; the food review at cornucopia that I pored through Guardian reviews for. I'm glad I did all that, and I feel proud because of all that. But will that be enough to live on?
Yes, I know the money's good to scrape by. I'll be happy, I can pay my bills. But how much will I save, really? What if I get married? What will I feed the little chemical brothers - peanuts? At that point, I guess Nelly and I can seriously make that Chimp Bros rap video!
Gawd! I'm being stupid and dumb and flippant.
And dumb again.
I'm going to give myself six years. I'm going to see where it gets me. I'm going to hope and pray that I am happy with my choice, that I can be financially independent with my choice. At the end of six years, if I'm greedy then I'm going to try for the MBA again.
Dammit - just how big were Midas' ass ears anyway?
Saturday, April 10, 2004
Live high and prosper
It's been ages since I last blogged - guilty as charged. What began as a sort of a funny exercise in ACJ has come to mean a lot to me - a kind of window into my friends, a kind of window into my self. Bear with me - first blog after leaving Chennai and all that, so this one is bound to be pretty sappy.
I'm finally back in Calcutta, and yet Chennai feels like an hour or so back. Seemed so soon that Nelly and Sanjaya helped me push my stuff into the call taxi. After that, it's a whirl - gald to have Nisha with me on the journey - her solid Maru sense made sure that we were not fleeced (overmuch) by the coolies. Read my book through most of the train journey, apart from melting habitually from the heat. Sent a coupla messages to Nelly and Sharon that were never replied to... I love you guys... there I said it... in true sobby Oscar-acceptance-speech style.
Read a blog entry from Deepa today - and realized how much ACJ helped me to grow... how much all the guys I met there helped me to grow. Somebody expressed regret that Delhi would turn out to be yet another ACJ, but hell, I wish that were even partly correct! I can't believe I'm gonna miss Sreekumar! Talk about sappy entries.
Anyway... more later, when I'm not blubbering. I have decided that I'm not going to abandon this blog just because the Chennai chapter of my life is closed... and I hope that none of you are going to stop blogging either. To you guys then - and to us - I hope all of us continue living high.
