Looking Back - Part 2

As my school life before my 5th standard is not much interesting. But I had this whole other life that made my life go on. School was just 8 hours of pain I had to endure after that my world quite opened up. I was with people who I know could trust and would blindly follow me and look up to me for inspiration. As every coin as two sides, I had too. But before I go into my gang, there is a little bit of story to follow up.

My great grand father was a visionary. He had done lots to the community and widely respected man. Our house was supposedly the only tiled house of the time and it was considered a luxurious house, so my father was a hero to every other boy in the neighborhood. Therefore he had a huge group and they would organize festivals and stuff within our street and he was their leader. Therefore when it came to the next generation, I, as the son of the leader was the natural choice and it was my duty to take on the responsibility.

My gang was not much, there was only one other boy who was my same age. All others were small kids who were obedient in doing everything we bid. The other boy was my lieutenant. It was the time when we made money, so I got all the toys I wanted. I mostly wanted only cars(hot wheels, my father used to get me every time we went to this shopping plaza called Chamundi super market, the only one in our town at that time, built on the concept of spencer plaza. I would get at least 2 a week and had this huge track set and a small car track set with batteries. Believe it people, it would cause awe to everyone at that time) and machine guns(toy guns, which make a sound). This further enhanced my status as the leader. The leader had everything when the others didn't.

I was also a snob. I never shared my toys with others. I was selfish. But hey come on, show me one kid who will want to share toys to everyone. Besides these toys made up my whole other world which nobody except me lived in. Anyway with the whole history and the facts established, let me proceed. I can remember playing Military where you had to shoot down the enemies. And we would run down the street with gun trying to kill imaginary enemy soldiers. We would play in the mud, build sand towers.

The boy, who was my same age, was also my best friend. We used to play all together. But he had this respect for me, which sometime made it a little awkward. But, I kinda enjoyed it. I would get an overdose of that in my coming years. But, I think it was he who started the trend. There was also this two boys from a 2 story house opposite to ours. Theirs was a big family and close to my grandfather. So they would come to our house or I would go to theirs to play.

One interesting story I remember about those two boys is how we used to play hide and seek in their big house. Once we were playing hide and seek and one guy, he was the smallest and me were hiding in their grand mother's bedroom. There was this big plate of mutton briyani and that boy and me ate almost half with pickles before we got caught. I was a non briyani eater before the incident, but my mom used this opportunity to make me eat briyani. It may not sound funny but it is just another thing that changed in my life, however small it maybe.

I wish I could have stayed in that neighborhood for a couple more years as I would have got a chance to organize festival and stuff and do all that big boys did. But family situation forced us to sell the house and we had to move to a different neighborhood and I missed the chance to lead as my father had. This has been my hidden side for years now. Nobody is willing to trust my leadership at first, but I strongly believe that I can lead any team to victory and have proved it in a vast number of occasions. But there are people who believe that if you are to lead some one or some thing you have to be tough. But you do not have to be. My father, for example, is very good friends with his employees but gets the job done at the same time. He is not a tough person. He is actually very nice to be around and all his employees with agree with me.

It does not stop here. There is a lots of things that I remember about this neighborhood, including my first hate feelings for a girl. But, that has to wait for another day. That was a pretty interesting incident and I would love to talk lots about it.

Looking back - Part 1

Ok. So now I am in the city of angels like a week now. I have gone out only to the nearby Cerritos mall and nowhere else and my plans for today's museum row visit gets canceled by incessant drizzling and to make matters worse, it was hot and sunny in the evening. So much for the rains. So this is when I thought I could write something about it. As obviously, I have been nostalgic for some time now. I thought I could write about some persons from the past who have helped me cross the obstacles I faced and who have changed me for good. This is not about family. Because family is going to be there whatever you are. This is just about the people who shaped me for good.

Whenever I think about school, the first person who comes to my mind is my first real friend and caretaker. It was in my fifth standard or grade, whatever you may call it. But, I still remember the fair girl who just walked suddenly into class one day. And who with no friends and a reputation as a foreigner got into the hearts of all the people in my class. I can still remember her for she was my first competitor in school and was the niece of my aunt's best friend.

I was a really shy young fellow and was bullied by the bullies in my class. So I really had no friends at all in school. I was either bullied in the free time or was too shy to really have friends. I did have another side though. I was the leader of the group of children in my street, where we used to play and do stuff together. I still have a mental picture of me running the streets in the name of reading for a P.E. exam and playing in the mud of a nearby construction site with my gang.

But of course this was my second life and the school bullies won't have this qualification to stop bullying me. Then came a star in my life. As I was too shy to talk with even people I know, I didn't even look at her direction. School went on as usual but soon, I can't remember how, but I learnt that she was the niece of my aunt's friend. I also have a faint recollection of she coming to my house or me going over to her aunt's house and seeing her there with her brother. But it is so faint. But the thing with such connections outside school is what makes one feel comfortable with the other person around.

She used to get 2nd rank or 3rd rank depending on mine. Yup, we were neck to neck when it came to studies. Either I got the 2nd rank or she got it. so we kinda kept juggling the second and third position in class. I think one time she reached the 1st rank with me on the second rank ( the only time I got the first rank was in my tenth standard in a midterm in a really ugly battle for the first place). And this was enough to just break my shell. So I let her inside my very closed circle(I was not a loser, I had a whole lot of friends, but they simply weren't in my school). I have a recollection of us studying together for exam and she fighting for me with a bully to keep me from harm's way. She took care of me and thus becoming my very best and close friend.

But wait, I have this jinx cast upon me. I don't know whether it is a blessing or curse, but whenever I get a girl as a friend, the maximum period the friendship is going to last is 2 years. After that, lots change quickly that either they disappear without any trace from my life or they have their life to live so they kinda become disconnected however close they had been or as recently I found out, they fight and become your 'un-friends'. This girl was the start of the jinx. After breaking into my closed world, She disappeared one day without a trace. Poof!!!! She was gone. I did not know about it and was expecting her for nearly a week after the school opened as I assumed she has left the country and since overseas travel took a lots of time she will come, but weeks became a month and that was when I had to accept that she is not coming back. But I wouldn't accept it for 3 more years until I got into a different activity time.

It was very hard to accept. Just look at this at the point of view of a 6th standard boy. You wait the whole 2 months of summer, impatient to get to your one and only new best friend, to show her your new uniform, your new shoes, your new pencil and pencil boxes. You get there and find she is not there at class. You wait impatiently until the first period hoping she is just late. But she does not turn up and the school that day turns into nightmare. You have the same thing happening for a week. then you get the same the next week. Each week making you hope more that she will be there the next week, until your expectations does not work and you are hugely disappointed. The fall was really hard, but hey life has to go on even for a sixth grade boy.

I never moved on from my buddy. After her, my other friends who were girls were unfairly compared to her by me. So she kinda set the bar for all the other girls I was to meet in my life. But that is not the only thing she did. She kinda opened my world for others to enter. If you are alone, you can stay alone forever as you are used to it, but when you have had company and now want to be alone again, it is not easy to be. So now I had to open my world for others to come and that's what I did. And I found some friends after this incident. But my world will never be the same again.

footnote :- I found her again nearly 11 years of searching through various channels. Finally, it was orkut and two or three girls of her same name later, I found her through one of my school friends. I got a chance to meet her a year after I found her. When I was going to meet her I almost expected her to be the small girl that I met in my life, but turns out she too has grown with me and is no more a small girl. She still remembered me and is my friend again, thought not like old times. We are occasionally chatting, but she does not know the impact of her presence in my life. She once wore a 'Angel' dress to a fancy dress competition. it was very symbolic. She was the angel sent by god to bring some life to my life and she most certainly did.

Bullshit tales - The Bull, The lion and the Matador

Once upon a time, there was a matador in Spain. He was the strongest and the greatest matador ever. Once, he had to face a bull. It was huge with red eyes and panting ready to tear men apart if they stand in its way. The matador gets into the arena. He waves the red cloth and the bull charges towards him.

The matador holds the bull by its horns. It throws him away. Undaunted, he again went and caught its horns and this time, took a sword and passed it through the bull's head killing it instantly. The crowd in the arena cheered.

Time went on and the matador went to africa for a vacation. There was this lion. he was huge with red eyes and was growling ready to tear mean apart if they stand in its way. The matador waves his red cloth by habit, the lion charges towards him and kills him instantly with his paw.


Moral of the Story : You can catch a bull by its horn, But a lion does not have a horn.

Random Musings - A Random World

On this day, I was thinking about the random musings. Seems, I am not the only one who has random thoughts here. There are lots of things that are too random to describe. The world as it exists now, for one example.

I mean, who would have thought that the dinosaurs would be killed before the man was created. It was so random. Why would the large piece of land be splintered into 5 continents and left floating in a giant ball of water. And, the giant ball of water happens to be full of salt and is not fit to drink or do anything as a matter of fact. And again, there are over 9 planets in the solar system, why would only one of them be populated and that too with various kinds of people, different races, cultures, understandings. Everything seems so random to judge.

Is it ever possible for us to understand this kind of random behavior that is happening around us. Its so mind boggling. We may try to break everything down to a simple scientific term. But, it is not always possible. It is exactly this, that has driven man into fear of changing things. But again, the question arises, is all the changes good. This is more of a moral question or dilemma rather than a question.

For one thing, IMO, there is nothing called a good change or a bad change. There is change, its consequences. It is the way we interpret things makes it a good or bad one. And again, there is another moral dilemma in the things we describe as good or bad. How do you describe good things and bad things? The fact remains that these good things or bad things are actually subjected to a great scrutiny.

The freedom struggle for India was a good thing for Indian people or that is what the public perception was. But, it was bad from the British point of view. Whose opinion should we take? Ultimately, again it is the winner's side that won. if the british had won the battle and India still under British rule, we would be bashing Gandhi and Co for trying to disrupt the integrity of the empire and undermining the power of the queen.

Random!!! Random!!! Random!!!

p.s. I think this is a nice piece about why my title is Random Musings :)

Random Musings - Religion

Seems day my random musings gets very random. Today I was wondering about the world that was shaped by the religions that we seem today. Even if we accept it or not, It remains a fact that all the terrorist bombings these days are carried out in the name of the almighty. It wants to rethink about the definition of god. Not that I am an atheist, which I am definitely not. I just want to define god from a neutral perspective. But first of all, it is necessary to look at all the gods around and the situation on which the gods were created or atleast some hypothesis about the situtations.

Lets look at the Hinduism first. This is what I belong to or atleast I think so. But Hinduism is not just a religion. It is a celebration of life and the victors in life. This is the basic principle of Hinduism. Celebrate life and live it fully If anyone does it, regardless of caste, creed or religion, he is an true Hindu. Many of us may think that I am just randomly talking something and that Hinduism is more than life and it is larger than life. Well, its their wish. This is Hinduism according to me and this is what I follow.

But, it is not without any basis. Just look at the Hindu festivals. Sankaranti is celebrated to thank the sun for his rays without which production of rice or wheat would not have been possible. It worships cows, which give protein rich milk and the infinite number of by products which come out of the milk. Look at each of the festival and you will be able to see the religion celebrates the natural causes that simulated the event to occur. This is the basic essence of Hinduism.

Lets look at Islam. It is not an easy thing to live in the harsh desert. Think about a life in a hot place with endless sand dunes. This is the background that Islam was created. The harsh desert life needed for harsh discipline for anyone to survive and that's exactly what Islam did. It laid out conditions for its followers to live disciplined. It said, follow these rules, not only you survive, you help others too. I mean, which other religion calls for a month of fasting to understand the needs of poor. But one of my personal opinion about Islam is, the conditions since the religion was created has changed a lot and there can be some few major changes to keep up with the modern times we are living in.

Christianity, the religion of masses during the roman period. The similarities between Christianity and Islam are mind boggling, but we should not forget the fact that the Romans had strong trade ties with Arabs and this could have influenced the religion largely due to these ties. But according to my view point, both are brotherhood religions which fight over each other for supremacy, even though both of them advocate the same thing. "There is only one god". And the blood and gory of the crusades and the medieval period of the Europe makes it mind boggling. but being the youngest religion, it should be applauded for holding out and making it through troubled times and still kicking.

There are numerous minor religions all over the world. The funny thing is that many of these religions have changed track and now have left their meaning altogether, they are not the way it was. And that changes this world into a mess which it is not. Maybe a minor side effect of global warming. Anyway, when a knife is in the hand's of a chef, it produces the most amazing cuisine in the world, but the same knife in the hand's of a murderer makes the world a mess. Religion is exactly that.


p.s. These are entirely my opinions and just random musings. No offense intended for any person of any faith, race , caste or creed.

Random Musings - Equality among people

I believe that, I can change the world from what it is to a more secular, lovable society and I realize that to achieve this, there is a lots of things to be done. But, change should come within and not from outside as many of use expect it to come from. We have to change ourselves for the better of things to become a better society. This post is just about me and my random thinking about equality, change and a better future.

Last century saw the rise and fall of a very powerful theology. The theology itself was very wrongly understood and was condemned by the whole of the world. Perhaps, its not the world that should be blamed but the rulers of the countries that followed these theology that should be blamed. The theology is called Communism. Communism as a theory holds that all the men are equal. They are not different by race or culture or language or religion. In fact, that was why religion was banned in communism. Because, they bring in differences between people. But, somewhere in the late 1980's the world started to accept communism as a whole.

Its hard to believe, but all the anti discriminatory laws, the propaganda for treatment of all human beings as the same is what communism wanted and it has been achieved to a certain extent by the western countries. Though, it is still not accepted in the east, particularly the Asian countries. We have lots of arguments against equality among humans. The very basic being, men and women are not the same. Now, I am not a feminist nor a radical. But, i am a very basic human being, who finds it hard to see another human being as a different one, even though, there is a change in the sexuality here.

I mean come on, they have proved their mettle everywhere. Right from the battlefields of Israel to the International Space Station. They have left a foot print everywhere but still we can find lot of discrimination against women. Again more so in the east than in the west. Now, everyone has to change for a better beginning. But here is where I find a lots of road blocks. I see people who are against it. They say, that women are too dumb to do some duties and they should stay at home. They have to change.

But we also have to consider the different types of people also. To force something down some people is the sure way for some purpose to be defeated. We cannot force anyone or anything for that matter. But, will the change come. Yes, It will. When will it come, maybe another 150 or 200 years. Or maybe at a much accelerated pace, 50 to 100 years. But, yes it will come. But we have to wait for it.

Until then, You have to change yourself. Treat your opposite sex with the utmost respect. That is the very first thing you should do. Then make it your own way. As for me, I have changed a lot from where I was in the past three years. It may not be a lot. But it is better than nothing. I hope to be a completely transformed man, when I graduate. Will it happen, Only time will tell it. Until then, I will change.

My time in US of A - part 2 : Culture Shocked

The second part of any migration process is the culture shock. If you are not familiar with culture shock, I recommend you go over, Geert Hoefsted in his book , Cultures and Organizations : Software of the mind. To put it in short, you get shocked by the changes around you like someone not peeing in the corner street and not littering the roads. Sarcasm apart, this part was a big shock to me. One thing, I didn't experience any such sensation ( If you count out the spine tingling, the moment the plane landed on the US soil, but it is more of a mental sensation rather than a culture shock). This could be due to the fact that, there were more Indians in the airport lounge than there were americans and because, the people who picked me up from the college were also Indians. You could tell that Culture Shock decided to shock me with a non cultural shock instead.

Really, you don't feel that you are in foreign land here in UHCL. There are a lots of Indians around anytime. Infact, the classes have utmost 10 americans and rest of all, from India and Vietnam. There is an inside joke in the university that they are going to change the university name to University of Hyderabad instead. Jokes apart. Life was not tough to start with. The guys I stay with are all from around Tamilnadu and surprisingly, most of them are from the same university. And my stay begins in Houston, with no culture shock, which is itself a shock to me.

Life in the US is not exactly as you could imagine back in India. If you are a L1 or a H1 visa holder, you have got a SSN which makes your life a lot easier than the F1 guys. Man, life is one tough son of a bitch for us. You dont havea SSN, hence, you are cut off from all the facilities US has to offer. There is also another thing called credit history, which is a very important thing for all the financial transactions in the states. And the amount of time, the guys have for their business and private life is also amazing. They are generally very well organized than most in India.

One another thing about US of America is the no culture perception. But, one should realize that US has not just one culture but a confluence of cultures brought to it by its immigrants. US is actually culturally rich. The next time you go on and say about how US has no culture, think again. You are welcome to practice any culture you see befit unless it causes widespread destruction. But generally, the immigrant groups follow their own within themselves.

For Indian people coming to the US. You have lots of other Indian people here. Atleast in Texas. Particularly Houston hosts the 3rd biggest Indian population in the United States. So there are lots of Indian restaurants here. You can get everything you get in India here. All I can tell you is that you won't be getting homesick anytime in a while. The only thing you will miss is your family, if you are away from it. But, that's ok with the technology available today, even that is eliminated by video conferencing and blah blah blah.

So, that brings me to the end of this, hopefully, I will be writing about my college experiences soon.