Facepack

"Memories can be painful. To forget might be a blessing!" - Kung Fu Hustle Movi
Well, not really! I did not quite remember my last experience and let Anjali
talk me right into it. I was back in the "chair" and had faint recollections of a guy speaking to me in a soft voice
".. sir, a little more above the ear.... how about the bald patch on the forehead.... a square or rounded neck...is that enough medium-short...this twirl looks good"!

It was déjà vu all over again but with a little more class!
The last time I was in an average-class salon was about 6 years back. The salon was new and my meager paycheck came with a bonus I think. So, at the end of the hair-cut which cost me Rs.30 I let the barber talk me into taking one of their "packages".
"sir, iss cream se aapka face soft ho jayega...". Nice! Picture of one of the may film stars in the salon floated in front my closed eyes and I would wonder who among them had a soft skin like this cream promised to give.. SRK, Abhisek, Jonh...wow!
"sir, iss cream se aapke dark pimples kam ho nikal jayenge..." clear skin.... aftab shivdasani...again the floating pictures..
"sir, iss cream se aapke chereh pe shine aa jayega...'.. yeah! bright lights, the annual function is just around the corner.. I could use some 'extra' "shine" on my face.. so what if I don't even remotely shine in anything else that I do?
At the end of the session, I put my spectacles back on eager to look at a soft, shiny, pimple-free me. Not that I expected someone from the poster to stare back at me from the mirror but nothing could have prepared me for "me".
I was bruised, oily and looking as though I had just completed a two day un-reserved compartment journey. I had endured all kinds of weird sensations on my face, uncomfortable proximity to a complete stranger for 1 hour, strong odors (rajnigandha included), somehow fought of a panic-attack (I am genetically claustrophobic!) and learnt all about the barbers extended family. Rs.250 (inclusive of haircut) for all of this.
Today, a similar experience cost me Rs.550 which included an additional 'bleach' to make me 'fair'. I use bleach in my bathroom!
Well, so that was it; at the end of the show I put on my spectacles found me smiling at me and walked out.

Dreams

This is my dream diary.

Bury the past -
I see a large rectangular building and realize that people (mostly children) in there are harassed.
I immediately report this to someone. That person ignores it. I am surprised. I look at the building again; I can still see that it is occupied by a lot of people who are unhappy.
I walk to a white building with a narrow staircase. On the top floor is a single room with a small window.
I can see a lady who appears to be a policewoman. I tell her about the building with its unhappy occupants.
She dismisses it and says that no such thing exists. I am hurt and angry because no one believes me.
I go to the building and check it out once again. It has changed and I cannot see any longer signs of torture or harassment. I am surprised.
I realize that the building was my school and I was actually referring to events that had occurred in my past.
Hence, no one believed me and merely dismissed my complaints. The events were not occurring in the present.



Dream 1.5 - I am asleep. I am slightly awakened when the maid knocks the door. Someone opens it. I wake up to realize that the room is clean.I go back to sleep.
I am exercising in front of a mirror, to get my technique right. I am wearing black shorts and a baniyan. I am jumping and strectching. Exhausted I fall asleep.
I am in small office. My colleague walks in wearing a ankle length skirt that I particularly like.
Another colleague hands me a pamphlet of the Guinness book of world records. I fall asleep reading it.
I am in my house in Chennai, looking out my parents room window. I can see the garden I used to, sometimes, play in. I can see a blue car. Tired, I sleep.
I am trying to find a book mark. I see that the book has pictures of a guy, in a suit, with a group of campers, with a group of racers, at a festival and a lot more. The guy is always in a suit, wearing specs that are photo-chromatic. I can see that I am that guy and it is me who is turning the pages. I realize that it is a very old book and those pictures were taken a very long time ago.
I wake up in my bed. Someone is still knocking the door. I open it and my maid enters.
I wake up and open the door.
I wake up.


My dear uncle - (I had this dream more than a year after my uncle's death)
My uncle, his wife and his son visit my house in Coimbatore. They are all well dressed to attend a wedding. My family is also all dressed up. We head to nearby temple. It is an old temple with a thatched roof. There is a small oil lamp burning near the idol. Someone asks me to go to the from and sing a few bhajans. Everyone sits cross-legged on the floor while I go ahead and sit in the front opposite to the idol. There is a dead body wrapped in white sheets. It is my uncle. I look back he is seated wearing a grey suit and tie. I notice that no one know has noticed him. I am the only one able to see him.


Durga -
I am in my home in Coimbatore. I am alone in the house. I feel a little suffocated for some reason. I find myself outside my home. I am still suffocating and I realize my face is hurting. I try to turn my head to see what it is but am unable to do so. The sun is behind me. I look in front and realize that I am in a large shadow. I can identify the form with multiple hands and weapons. It is Durga. I am Her Lion's mouth. He is not hurting me but has picked me up.


The body - (I had this dream soon after my parents left after short stay with me)
I am asleep in my bed. I wake up. It's very early in the morning and still dark.
On the floor, next to my bed, I see a body wrapped, from head to toe, in a white cloth. I sit up and am a little scared. I look at the time. Its almost dawn. I tell myself that there is no point in getting scared and since nothing can be done now, I decide to go back to sleep with the body next to me on the floor. The tube light is still on.


The lady -
I am in a bed with some woman. The bed sheets are all white and the room is white. It's very bright. The bed is also white. The sheet are white, the bed is white and everything around me is white. I sheets are long and I am lost in them. As I try to make my way towards the woman for the final act, I hear a voice. It leads me away from the bed. The voice asks me "is this what you want?". The voice says "look carefully". I get lost in the sheets but am unable to find the woman there. There is nothing.


In the flat - (all characters in this dream are my Wipro PM Academy's batchmates)
A lot of people have gathered in my house.
My house is an exact mirror image of where I live; everything is placed like a reflection.
Lots of girls and guys are sitting in a circle and chatting.
Usha is in the balcony looking out. I also notice that my house is on a very high floor.
Nitin walks in with a bag of groceries, red radishes, many bundles of methi and coriander.
Pratik suddenly bursts from a boyz group totally drunk. he is swinging and had two bottles in hand.
Hari is screaming, "I told you not to drink so much"
I get worried that my roomie will notice that the expensive alcohol has disappeared.
I look around and see Guna standing in a corner; cream colored dress. her hands are in front of her. She appears to be smiling but i am not sure when I hear Rajkumars voice - "actually, the liquor bottles are not that different from before only about so much has reduced". WHAT?!!
Nitin tells me to keep all the groceries in the fridge.

Cafe Coffee Day

I knew it was over the moment I said Cafe Coffee Day.

It was just the beginning of the painful bride hunting process. My mom and sister had short listed this girl from Nagpur and she was also willing to meet me. Later, she would tell me that she wanted to see me because I was an artiste.

My mom and sister liked her when she came over to our house, in Nagpur, to have a chat. She was coming down to Pune for some work and was willing to see me there. After exchanging addresses via sms it was decided that I would go over to her uncle's place where she was staying and meet up. I reached on time and the family was very welcoming. She was all set to head out after a while and that is exactly what we did. We headed out without a clue as to where we were going. After a small walk she said we could sit for a while in CCD if there was one around. I had never been to CCD before and was rather unsure of it and hence preferred the security of the outdoors. I started that CCD stuff is overpriced, frozen food types, unhealthy, no value for (hard-earned) money and was simply a place for rich kids to splurge. She was taken aback by my sudden expression and strong opinion. Nevertheless she probably liked the fact that I was realistic. Probably.

We walked around for some more time in the cold November air and then it happened talking about non essential stuff like rebirth and I told her how I believed that I was a German and a researcher, at the Cavendish Lab, in my past life. We were almost running out of small talk when destiny and biology kicked in. I needed to take a piss. I held on for quite a while and also considered asking her to wait while I took a piss in a dark alley. But there was no dark alley and for all my urgency I could not imagine asking of her something like that.

The chat at CCD was not a lesser disaster. I shared my perceptions of people; their dress sense, their hairstyles, etc and how it affected and spoke volumes of their personalities. It was interesting enough until all the negative conclusions of the personality types somehow applied to her father, brother and almost every adult male in her immediate and distant family. I had already given up the whole thing the moment I had suggested CCD and also because she was rather unsure of marriage; I was the third "artist" she was seeing.

Bangalore - Coimbatore

Monday evening. My allergic condition was not subsiding even after a couple of anti-allergic tablets, ayurvedic meds and oils and an IV injection. The rate at which the allergy was spreading from my torso to extremities, I would soon look like spiderman, red all over, and join the Itchy & Scratchy show. I was very irritable due to the allergy but none of my colleagues noticed it as unusual. [They say I am Hari Sadu in the making!]

Anti-allergy meds are sleep inducing and I was to take one on Monday night. If I took the meds it would mean sleep till late Tuesday morning and I would have to start late in the day. Riding thro the rain would be enough trouble not to mention the constant updates I'd have to give my parents. One has to be free to enjoy the ride. And you cannot be free when there is someone waiting for you.

For the past two weeks, the rain was following a pattern over Bangalore and Coimbatore and I imagine all the places in between. It would begin raining in the afternoons and continue till late evening. Which meant that the only time there was a sort of a, kind of a, remote chance, that it would not rain was at night!!

I had done it before when I rode from Pune to Nagpur and this was only half that distance. The difference here was I had worked for a whole day in office, was allergic and was on sleep inducing drugs! Nevertheless, I took it as a sigh from God when it did not rain in the evening.

The skies were in fact clearing up when I started at 10.30-10.45pm. It was slightly chilly but I did not bother with an extra jacket since I figured that once I get beyond Thoppur and closer to Salem it would not be as much. I was wrong. Traffic was not heavy nor light and I could cruise comfortably at 90 kmph. I took my first break a little before 12.00 midnight. I had covered 90kms in 1.5 hours which was good since it takes longer at city exits and entries. After 15 min and a short walk/stretches, I restarted.

This was the fun part. I was now looking to cross Salem which would be my PNR (Point of No Return). Salem is 180km from my place in Bangalore and marks the mid point of my journey. I planned for a second break at Salem, but since no tea stalls were open I continued.

It was past 1.30am now and traffic was sparse. I wondered why wasn't I sleepy. I also wondered why was I not imagining a ghost like I did in my previous night ride. Was I too sleepy to even imagine something?! Hmm... I decided to break.

I took my second break at 2.40am. I had ridden non-stop for more than 2.5 hours and had covered 175kms in the second leg of my journey.

After a 10min break I decided to resume and discovered that my glove was missing. I spent 10 min looking for it on and around the bike but somehow it had simply vanished from the face of the earth. Now, a chill ran down my spine! Perhaps a spirit was indeed in my vicinity and had taken my glove. It is known that spirits inhabit places where they left their mortal bodies. I quickly looked around to see for any accident prone spot sign boards but there were none. Also there was no noticeable water-body where anyone could have committed suicide, or worse, been murdered. So here I was alone in the the middle of, pretty much, nowhere and was imagining the supernatural phantom that might have taken my glove. I thought this one was one hell of a travelling spirit. Then it dawned on me that it might have been a rider who lost his life because his hand was too cold to apply the disc break just as he was about to ram into a truck. It was a scary thought; I had lost my right glove and was putting myself exactly in the same situation of the ghost-rider. Perhaps I was making my destiny.

I tried to put the thought out of my head and restarted. I was colder than when I started and now, I was without a right glove. The next 20-25 kms were good and then the bad patch started.

Some NHAI project is underway on a very long stretch of the highway and they are building a ton of flyovers. To that end, the authorities have duly built a couple of pillars of each flyover and thats that! This model disturbs the entire stretch of the highway without adding any advantage. Why not just complete one flyover and then move on to the next? That way at any given point only a very short part is affected. Anyway, the 40km patch was the toughest to negotiate specially since I had a near bald rear tyre. I did not notice a a large pot-hole and the rear tyre took a hit due to which the chain loosened and started making strange noises at times. I prayed.

It was 4.00am when I reached the Coimbatore bye-pass. The last stretch of 30kms was tougher since it had begun to drizzle and the weather had turned foggy. I reached home at 4.30am.

I love my wife

I like to meet people. That is not to say that I like to make a lot of friends, but I like to meet new people, have a chat, and if possible stay associated.

A self proclaimed loner that I am, this may seem to be a bit off the usual loner-ish behavior, but it's not company that I seek when I meet people. Rather I am looking for patterns and trying to fit people into boxes of personalities. Stereotyping, basically! :)

Mother Teresa had said that "If you judge people, you won't have time to love them", and rightly so. It works out for me since I certainly don't wish to fall in love which is why I take the easier (and left over) option of judging them.

Most of my friends are married and those that aren't are well on their way of giving into a life of commitment (and repentance). Interacting with those that are married gives my learning algorithms additional data and thus its able to predict better matches. The clustering and machine learning goes on and on and I keep regrouping them into "personality-boxes".

One such category is "I love my wife"-types.

They can't wait to tell people around them how much they love their wife and that how she means the world to them; how marriage was the best thing that happened to them and some such.These are also the guys who seem to be the foremost proponents of the institution of marriage.

If girls were to wish for the perfect husband the "I love my wife"-types would be the answer to their prayers, or so it would seem until you either had a really frank chat with a wife or had exceptional people reading skills like I do.

Most guys in the above group eventually come across as being very self centered, self-loving and dominating. The only people they actually love and care about are themselves.
Which is why they spent a good deal of time in finding and marrying a timid girl who would not interfere with their romance with themselves. The girl puts up with everything the guys have to dole which is why he loves her so much in the first place. The girl goes out when he wants to, dresses up the way he wants to and so on. The more she does according to what he wants, the more his expressions of love

His love knows no limits when the girl is also able to put up with his parents. When he means to say "she does not complaint about my parents!" you would most likely hear "we were made for each other. I love my wife."

.... to be continued.

The Ganglion

No, this is not a post about a superhero from the fifth dimension who saves Earthlings caught in the cross fire of an interplanetary war.

This is a post about my ganglion. A ganglion is a particular type of lump which shows up next to a joint or tendon; most commonly at the wrist.

A self proclaimed fitness freak that I am, I used to do about ten push-ups whenever I felt like I needed to pump up. If you are smirking let me tell you that I am blessed with a terrific set of genes such that I require to work out very rarely to stay in terrific shape.(well that is now after having done some serious power-lifting for two years during college.)

Back when I was in my undergraduate program I really used to do about 25 push-ups everyday, until a sharp pain in my wrist prevented me from bending them. I had to switch to finger push-ups but that too was a only for a very short time until I started learning Tabla.

I guessed that the pain was because of some smallish injury. Soon the pain would appear even when I only bent my wrist. The doc told me that these were the signs of a ganglion. There was no physical evidence of any kind of growth but the pain continued. After a couple of months I could notice a small lump, the size of a pea, when I bent my wrist forward and looked really hard.

A year after sapping my body of essential nutrition the ganglion, about the size of a walnut now, was clearly visible. Besides being a source of some embarrassment the ganglion was immensely

painful.

I was not able to practice the Tabla for more than 20 minutes at a time before the pain got unbearable. I later learnt that excessive use of wrists actually fuels the ganglion's growth.

On someday's I would tie a piece of cloth very tightly over my wrist and try and practice. This restricted the movement but would numb the pain. I was unable to play sports like badminton or cricket or even ride a scooter comfortably.

The doctors I had consulted with were reluctant to operate on it because of some nerve related problem. I lived with my ganglion for two years before I decided to go ahead and get it operated.

The risk was that some nerve in my wrist area would be affected and that I might experience some kinda numbness in my fingers. I voted for numbness against excruciating pain.

On the d-day I was wheeled into the OT all dressed up in a green gown and a shower cap.

The surgeon and anesthesiologist decided to anesthetize my entire right arm.

This was done by shooting two huge syringe-full of colorless liquid into my arm pit.

I know that some people consider an armpit an erogenous zone but I was screaming in pain rather than pleasure when the injections were administered. Soon the liquid had its intended effect and I was not able to feel anything in my right arm. Well almost, because when the surgeon made the first cut and reached into the wrist to get to the ganglion I screamed out again in pain!!! "He He!! I guess you need some more of the colorless liquid" was all the anesthesiologist had to say. After another shot in the arm pit and 10 minutes the surgeon was back to doing what he thought he was good at: going after my ganglion.

The surgeon tried to talk me into looking at "the other side" when he made his cuts, probably because he assumed that I, with my cute face and all, would not be able stand the sight of my wrist all open and bloody. I quietly told him that I had voluntarily watched a post-mortem (autopsy) and was ok even with blood all over the floor!! No more.

He soon found what he was looking for and the mean little bas@#rd was bigger than expected.

The surgeon cut out several lumps of white jelly like substance from my wrist.

That was how my me and my ganglion were physically separated. But I was not done yet.

I believe in one thing - No matter how high you go up in life(I haven't made it anywhere yet, but I still believe) , don't forget where you started.

In this case my achievement was getting rid of the pain I had experienced for almost two years.

I have had sleepless nights, missed Tabla classes, and huge difficulties in writing lengthy exam papers because of the pain. I used to sit simply holding my right hand with my left just to numb the pain. In two years I had used more than four wrist bands, because they used to get worn out and loose. Was I going to let the ganglion simply walk away(rather drain away) now?

You bet I wasn't.

I requested the surgeon that I wanted to keep it with me. After the autopsy thing, he did not ask me anything like "why in the world?" or "what would you do with it?" stuff.

He quietly put the ganglion in a transparent bottle of formaldehyde, sealed it and handed it to me.

Given that we take our life for granted, I could not remember the last time my right hand was free from any kind of pain. After the dust settled I realized that in the battle against "the enemy within"(pun intended) I had compromised the smooth movement of my ring and middle finger.

A constant numbness exists in the area between the fingers right from the wrist to the base of the fingers.

So did the ganglion have the last laugh? No he did not, 'cause his final resting place in a bottle stacked away in my drawer and I will make sure it stays that way.

The Realist

An optimist a pessimist and a realist are sitting in a room.

They notice a glass placed on a table in the center of the room.

The room is not very large, but spacious enough so that the three do not invade each others space.

The optimist says "the glass is half full".

The pessimist says "the glass is half empty". We know that already, don`t we?!

The realist says "... not so fast."

First she asks if we are talking about the same glass. We give her a "duh" look but she is least bothered. She demands to know. Once we are thro with that, she demands to know the necessity for an answer? Ah ha! So the realist is not so smart after all.

We spend some time explaining to her the importance of not only knowing the right answer but also how the answer determines our outlook towards life.

She seems convinced and her next question is; what happens to the glass after we have her opinion on the glass.

Now that is something that we never thought of, did we? What happens to our hero after he rides off into the sunset, having conquered his arch enemy?

Now that is a question which, in the coming years, would replace the "glass with the water" question. I my opinion this one would give us, the seekers of truth, better insights into about ourselves.

Back to the realist. We admit that we have no idea about the fate of the glass once she has answered "the" question.

She does not press us for an answer: maybe she knows it or perhaps she does not care.

Upon hearing her answer to the seemingly simple question, the pessimist and the optimist quietly get up and leave the room. They know that they have just been, shall we say, "Terminated". Well "terminated" is a very strong term so why not just say "replaced". Or better still "your services are no longer required, thank you".

So what did the realist say?

"The glass is leaking."