Protected:

This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below:

Password:

Animals

I’m just a soul whose intentions are good. Oh lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood.

This idiot is like the destroyer in the creator-preserver-destroyer trinity. I’m the creator. The problem is that there is no preserver.

Shell

I can’t get over whatever it is. Its been a long long time since I went into my shell so completely. Its been a long time since I wrote something philosophical. And its been a bloody long time since I’ve had the chance and will to be anonymous.

I think philosophy’s a defense mechanism as well. An outlet for all the cynicism. No, not an outlet. An attempt to rationalise all the cynicism which tends to grow inside one like weeds on a nutrient laden field. Yesterday, I wrote on freedom. And how futile the idea was. But, thankfully, there was an open door. In Free Will. I was in a drug-induced state of soporoficity while writing this piece out. I haven’t read it again. But I think it is pretty rational, from what I remember of it.

I have a swollen right eyelid. Which is irritating. And an impediment. I don’t have clothes to wear because our washerman is just not able to gimme back my washed ones because one of our washing machines isn’t working and because people here have started bathing with alarming regularity, just when they announced that Mumbai’d be facing record water cuts this season. I have an assignment which I have no intention of completing. Maybe I’ll do something shifty for a couple of hours and hand it in, just to end the agony. I was to go to watch this play called Equus. Now I can’t. I have this presentation to make for tomorrow evening. I have a dirty and unorganised room which has been this way for the last three weeks because I haven’t had the time or the energy or the inclination to clean it up.

I want to debate again. I love speaking. I love making sense. I love taming that chaos of thoughts and unrelated facts that swirl around in my head and throw them out in an astonishingly sensible structure which elegantly elaborates and buttresses a premise. I love listening to people and then tailoring their retorts in my replies while going on to the most rational of points. I love structure. I love listening to myself, especially when I’m in full flow and making sense. I love not having to bother about anyone or anything else. I love being sure of myself to a point where I’d trust a seven minute speech with my life.

What is it then that scares me? For one, crowds. Two, the loss of anonymity. I know, I’m not supposed to be scared of anyone and anything. What is this fear then? My worst speech would be where all those people who I hold in high esteem and who I think highly of…would be privy to this speech of mine wherein I’d be totally unsure of myself, pausing after every couple of sentences and making no sense at all. I’ve got to dare to lose. Otherwise I would never experiment. And I’d never get ahead of things. I have to be willing to lose again. I’ve got to let it all go. I’ve got to let the speech itself be it. And chuck the rest out of my head.

Sore loser

I’m a bad loser. Bad Bad loser. I don’t take losses well. I can’t accept the fact that there’s someone better than me easily. This is what happened with the US today. And probably with Ninad. I mean, I still can’t accept it. He’s a bullshitter. He’s an idiot. He can’t do shit in the name of lobbying. He can’t write working papers. He can’t do shit with resolutions. And this was his seventh fucking MUN.

I feel pissed at Ninad because he doesn’t have basic funde in life. And because I’m always hard on my teammates. Which is a problem I have to have to get over. I need to start building relationships with teammates nice and early. And not scream at them for their stupidities or anything else for that matter. I’ve got to be a lot more tolerant and accommodating. The US team worked brilliantly. Arpan and Avinash, I could learn so much from them. They didn’t look like friends, but they had good coordination. And they had good communication. They kept each other informed. Its not about lording over your team. Like I did at IITD. It worked out there because I had two relatively inexperienced characters with me. But it doesn’t work when you are on with good people. People who’re equal to you or even better than you.

It happened with K. It happened with Prabha. And it threatened to overpower me w.r.t. the US team here. How does it play out typically? I go into my shell and brood. And then come out with this defence mechanism wherein I start looking at them as adversaries. While somewhere inside I want to beat them black and blue. And I stop loving the game.

Loving the game. I loved the game on day one. Sometime in the middle of day two I lost track of things. And then it started getting frustrating. Urvi telling me that I was good got to my head. And Arpan doing his polt with Naasha. Crap re. How’d I let it get to me?

But then, compliments galore. I’m supposed to be a God-lobbyist. Everyone tells me I did fantastically well for a first timer. So much so that no one knew before I told them that I was a first timer.

But that doesn’t take anything away from the real story. We had a chance on day one. But on day one, I was out to have fun. And that was probably half the reason why we had a real chance. We screwed it up on day two because I started taking it too seriously. And day three was a total bore.

Also, I’m such a whore when it comes to public adulation. Seriously, I’m disappointed.

I’m pissed at myself more than anything else. I let myself get lost today. I let Nina’s stupidity get to me. Fuck. I totally failed the test today. I was supposed to retain more composure. And author a working paper. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. No, the fact that this is my first MUN is of least importance. Its a standard easy to understand format and contrary to most people’s injunctions, I find it hard to believe that such simple formalities would be hard to understand. Everything is common sense. Everything is sensible. Except for Nina, on many occasions. And me, when I start focusing on such issues and not on the debate.

I needed to be more focused. I fucking missed it. Now tomorrow would have been a long long shot if I were to try for victory. I needed to research stuff well and co-author the draft resolution. But I’ve decided I’m getting bored. And so I’ll sleep and have fun.

What worries me, though, is that this could just be another one of those instances where I ditch work. Short term pleasure over long term one. I dunno re. I honestly dunno. Maybe it is. But sometimes things get too frustrating. Aish, Nina….why the fuck do I get such teammates!? Maybe it has something to do with the overpowering working style I have as well, which leaves little scope for anyone else to express opinions because either I put them out there(and trash them) beforehand, or I don’t pay heed to them(irrational dismissal on my part).

Bullshit, I’m going off to sleep.

I don’t feel like working at all. There’s a lot of work that can be done today. There’s a whole lot of reading work for the MUN tomorrow. There’s a whole lot of planning and task-assigning I should be doing today so that things work well even in my absence. There’s PAF. All I feel like doing is sleeping.

Do you still remember December’s foggy freeze? When the ice that clung on to your beard is screaming agony

Systems

To achieve anything in life which doesn’t have a structure set in place by someone before you, and hence isn’t something a lot many people have pursued seriously, you need systems. You need to set in place ways and means and stadardise approaches to things. On your own. And you need to love and believe in your ideas. And you need to work hard. And you can never ever take anything for granted. All that is there today, at this very moment, might be gone the very next.

Trains

I love the song. And I’m addicted to it. Also, last evening I realised how big a fan of Ricky Martin I still am!

The Sea

This was my first experience of the sea. I’ve been to Marine Drive but that’s a different thing. I’ve been to Juhu but that’s nothing at all. This beach(Kashid) was a real beach. With real white sand. Sand which was neither warm nor cool on its surface, but had that touch of coldness right below it. Sand which your feet urge you to walk on. A surface your body actually yearns for. I guess early men must’ve all lived by the sea…There’s no other way to explain how there could be something which is so awesomely in tune with your system, inspite of never having been a part of any conditioning programme.

By the sea, playing soccer, barefoot, on those long stretches of white sand…extending from a small hillock to the right to a far far place somewhere to your left…..with the sea fighting to come up to our makeshift goals and dying on the edges of our playing boundary….I found peace. The peace that a mind can find when it has fallen in love. Unconditionally. Inconsiderately. Totally. I love football. I love beach football that is. My feet have never felt so alive. I’ve always known that I can be deft and nimble…today I saw exactly how far I could take things.

The presence of the others was kinda irritating at times. But then, in the end, they added a lot to my experience today. And they made me realise quite a few things.

The theme for thought today was on basic processes. There’s this idea I’ve been mulling over for quite a few days. It all started with that article in Overdrive which I happened to chance upon at my dentist’s. It said-our cars aren’t designed for today. Our cars are basically extensions of horse drawn carts. That design worked well in the 20’s. To get over our problems today, we need to rethink the basic philosophy behind the car. Why is it that a man going to work takes out a vehicle of four?

Okay, I’ve screwed up the original line and added too many of my own observations. But you’ll get the basic idea from this. Its a fantastic line of thought. One which’d instantly place you at the top of any field of work, if that is what your motivation is. Me? I just love watching my ideas shake things up. I don’t like taking credit for things. I just like putting ideas out there.