Coke studio - no words sheer joy...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjaH2iuoYWE

i hereby confess... i did it!

the usual fights and you end up completely engrossed into your smart phone... Even you know that you can't do much about bringing the situation back to normal...Even if its her mistake...She will never accept it...For her you will remain the harbinger of bad mood and colloquially speaking 'dimaag ko traaaassss'... Isiliye to kisne kyaa khoob kaha hai..."Ye ishq nahi aasaan bas itna samajh lijiye...ik aag ka dariyaa hai aur doob ke jaana hai"...

So the next thing all of a sudden out of the blue/out of context she asks "Do you tweet?!" And i was like "What?" - Aren't we like fighting fighting over a not so big issue... What happened suddenly... Anyways... Always remember - Whenever its the gals fault she will willingly change the topic #fokatgyaan

Well i had a twitter account which was like the LIC policy document which is lying God knows where untill it matures... my twitter a/c, a namesake, was created when Aishwariya Rai was still fit(2007), Not a fat aunty(2011)...

The conversation ended with me answering in the negative...

That night i actually went and logged into my Twitter account...And since that day i have never looked back.....

Its a different world all together. Not just the celebrities, but even commoners who are like you and me, have set up thier own world...a cosy world with the comforts as they want...A world which they can augment and create and change(delete) as and when they want...

i have managed to meet some characters(no pun intended), who initially were a name/display picture for me...You like somebody's tweets, you follow them...aur sometimes you instinctively decide not to follow someone, even if known in real life... Just to give you a vivid picture...

-a girl who blames the society for whatever happens to her-even if it is something like a fly sitting on her nose;its a conspiracy against her by i don't know who...
-a boy who is intelligently complimenting a chic on her DP, we all know what game is up here...
-a celebrity who is nobody else but a news reader-tweets all news feeds-thanks to him i come to know the current political theatre around us...
-an obsessive female who is SO IN LOVE WITH HER OWNSELF- that a snob will be put to shame...
-another character who keeps shuffling her DPs every 3 hours...
-a bot who replies as and when you type some key word...


amongst all this naatak(drama), where i am a mere spectator on the road, seeing all the tamasha, seeing share of slang, abuses, love, kisses, farts and wat not...ya ya even "LOLs"...

But to tell you frankly somewhere they all have become a part of my life...It feels good when some crack-pot chic is happy to get her new pink shoes or when a celeb tweets about things around us... All because now its all about a 'Known Stranger'...Probably even if i happen to see that person on the street i may not recognize him/her... Follow Follow & Follow

not naming anybody here, but somewhere over a period of time it has all lead to a more involving activity for me, than i thought...

so you can sum this up by saying - "confessions of a twitter-holic"

Speechless

a poem which came to me as a part of my course curriculum in school... At that time it meant to learn it and recite it to secure marks out of 10. So without any real understanding, i parroted the poem and probably scored decent marks... Today after almost 15 yrs i realise this poem is so so true and relevant to me and people around me...more so now when i have started working...running from pillar to post for getting a job done...Monday to Friday...every year... Yes i am talking about William Henry Davies' poem - Leisure... SPEECHLESS!!!

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.
No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.
A poor life this if, full of care,We have no time to stand and stare. 

          - W.H.Davies

noisy city!!!

after long list of friends who ditched me for this movie, i finally made it with an old acquaintance who could empathise with me as she had faced the same...Well thats life, you do not generally get what you desire, but Life manages to surprise you always, that to when you least expect the same...


Now talking about the movie....
Amazing movie from Balaji's stable... Looked as a refurbished shootout at Lokhandwala to me initially, but that was a false assumption... Various facets of the city, or lets call it a sentiment called Mumbai. Mumbai which is not only a land mass, but its the uniquely blended elements it carries with itself....
Whether its a newbie in the town or an investment banker from Singapore or a dabbawaala, each have thier unique contribution to the city... And the city is an immaculate example of what we in youth today count as the most 'in-thing' - MOVE ON...


Yes the city moves on and never looks back... A celebration of victory of the Cricket world cup or mourning for the Japan catastrophe, it does all of it and is the first one to MOVE ON... that too with the grace and elegance of almost as a Royal lady...


The movie, apart from the story and characters, left some different impact and set me thinking on these lines...
Inspite of the noisy and chaotic situations of daily life the city shimmers and is never ever set aback... manages to show-off the queen's necklace it wears backed by the corporate high rise of South Mumbai and reflecting the true spirit of Mumbai in the slums of Dharavi...


Mumbai meri jaan... Whatever we do, think, aspire, ask, get, etc etc - Mumbai is hearing and responds accordingly.... and the best part is - It does not discriminate...It only loves you back...

Open letter to the MANIPULATOR

Dear Manipulator,

This is going to hurt just a little bit!

"Yes it was for you! Do I have to be more blatant to explain that it was for you!!!"

My earlier post 'You are being Manipulated' incited quite a few churning comments and responses - online and offline~ most of them were questions like "Who is this post targeting?!"... I am sure you have my answer by now...

Just thinking post these set events...a large number of readers, including friends and critiques, clearly seemed to have resounded same concerns and comments... Well this may not be an analysis backed by hardcore data or sumptuous evidence, But the fact that each of them have faced manipulation more than once in thier life...either as a manipulator or as manipulated...

I really don't mind criticism, as it is the way we all are created. But lets just face it - WE ALL HAVE BEEN VICTIMS OF THIS. If not for this post, we always knew someone is manipulating our views. Not only that sometimes we readily allow people to come into our lives and let them play with it...So is there another part of the story???

So we are discussing a trivial but unthought of point here, that even when we know somebody is maipulating us, we readily accept it and let her/him play thier dirty tricks on us... what can be a rationalisation given by an average human being for this! Something like
"I did not know, that she was playing games with my mind"
"I loved her so much that it did not matter"
"How does it matter, she gave me what I wanted"    and so on...

if we try to read into all of these, they are kind of so called lame excuses for many  of us. But what it may mean is that Mr manipulator, i knew your games from day1. And i was actually watching you closely to see what you do next. At several occaisions I almost caught you with your fuck all game plan, but hey i chose to ignore...And why did I do something like that...Coz i was using you as a tissue paper probably, trying to learn a few tricks here and there so that i do not fall prey to such tricks again....So thank you dear manipulator, have learnt a great deal from you.

But hey look now who is the manipulator - You or ME???!

just keep guessing as I started by saying This is going to hurt just a little bit!

You're being manipulated

"A person should not be too honest. Straight trees are cut first in a forest and so is true with honest people" ( in short they are manipulated first) - Chanakya

Some great inspiring and insightful words by the famous Chanakya Pandit who lead Chandragupt maurya's rise as a king backed by sound political principals and ethics... 

We're all manipulators and victims of manipulation in different ways... We do it intentionally, or many a times sub-consciously without leaving a trace of evidence... whether it was for a chance for a date with the new girl who joined your class recently or for getting a good job... we all do it all the time without making a fuss around it.

Psychological manipulation is a type of social influence that aims to change the perception or behavior of others through underhanded, deceptive, or even abusive tactics. Social influence is not necessarily negative, For e.g. my so called good friend tried some such technique on me...So that i could forget the love of my life... Well she was successful in doing this... In hind sight I am happy she did that; but hello ultimately it meant using some tricks to alter emotional construct right!

but a fundamental doubt or contention which in such a situation is - isn't this whole thing against morality; or forget morality for the time being; isn't manipulation unethical! for all we know we all are actually playing with some-one's emotions and mental construct...

If you have ever found your self madly in love with someone that did not deserve it ... crying and sobbing but feeling that you cannot break free ... if you have ever found your self doing something that you never really wanted to do ...  only to keep doing it more often ... then chances are that you have been manipulated at least once in your life.


the manipulators, if yu ask them, would seldom agree whether they have a methodology behind this...in larger probability they would deny all of this... Or if they are honest with you(which is not true) they will say i don't take conscious efforts in this direction...


well let me tell you they are liers of the first order... A friend shared a link, so called forward, think its on purpose( see a friend trying to manipulate :D) {link attached below}... And when i saw it i realized this is just one such way of manipulation... There are so many others which would qualify for the same criteria...But as they say manipulation is not completely bad... But certainly check out the video... I am sure we all have come across such a person who has done this to us...Once or more number of times... A clear example of how people manipulate...

So now i assume that you have got an indication what is manipulation... the random video above is a testimony to the fact how we use manipulation for our benefit...


But kya karey yaar... i think we all are subject to this kind of manipulation(well not only the way shown is in the video)


now that i have managed to write all of this - DID YOU REALISE... i too have managed to attempt to manipulate your mind with my argument above...Din't you just think about the person who did something like this to you!

a road less treaded...


Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;


Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same

Robert frost's amazing composition - still quite fresh in my mind - Our English teacher telling the class then to imagine we were standing amidst a fork in the road... And were given an option to walk through, which one would we choose?... At that moment it all seemed a thriftless exercise... Probably i was thinking about my tiffin box...Certainly ignorance was bliss...That was time where you hardly faced such situations...Like max to max it was about choosing between water colours or crayons; or something like bunking classes and playing mario on my new videogame... I am sure they too were herculean in nature at that point in life...

But now if we fast forward it to 2011, i.e. school, college everything is left far behind... this fork in the road has become a recurrent situation. Well what is so unique and new thing which i am sharing with you?...Nothing... But i am sure we all experience this... As one my good friend and critique said... "Don't mind, but your blog sounds flimsy and trivial...There is no concrete thought behind what you write..."

So logically, if i seek feedback, i should try and incorporate it in future... Yes i am doing that by continuing to write and publish in the same manner... yes this is a blog which i have labelled as Notes to Self.. So i do appreciate my friend's feedback... My writing may not attract popular attention and applause...

But i choose to tread the road less traveled!