Of Intonations

According to me, speech is more effective a form of communication than writing. Particularly amusing are the intonations. So for a professor who drones his way into eternity, when i say- ‘_What a talker!’ you un mistakenly assume the sarcasm in the tone. But there are always the some who give back a befuddled look and ask- ‘Oh! you think he is good?’

(While the above question isn’t grammatically correct, it works its way through the colloquial language usage.)

You do not want to betray the frayed temper, so you just decide to ask back the same question. Here is a possible listing of the ways in which you could do that -

1. Do _you think he is good?

2. Do you _think he is good?

3. Do you think _he is good?

4. Do you think he _is good?

(While this might not so much fit into the above context, but with the relevance of the situation this too would work.)

5. Do you think he is _good?

Combinations work too!

6. Do _you think _he is good?

7. Do _you think he is _good?

There are a few other…

Ideally, my choice would be 2/6, but depending upon how polite I would want to sound, I will relevantly choose.

But there are still cases, were the person looks up defiantly and says- But you said he is a good talker!

You wonder who to laugh at- the person or yourself!

You just change the topic to ask – What’s for snacks today? =P

I am sorry

You ask me what’s wrong with the world,

I tell you the truth.

I am estranged, the world befriended.

You want me to lie…

I am sorry.

PS1: Name of the blog changed from ‘Memoirs’ to ‘In my opinion’ because well, it’s my opinion after all =P

Quiet

<the head is a little fuzzy. coherence amiss. but meaning conveyed. >

it’s quiet

despite the noise

the rambling the banter

not so much the quietness of calm

but a disturbed quiet

A little here a little there

but just as yet quite nowhere

you look around

you recognize faces

there was no peace

but a disturbed quiet

Can you harbor a feeling

you’d never admit

would you call yourself a hypocrite

or

would you be a speechless brave

am I a mere human

or

am i a human

what’s the difference you ask

it’s a disturbed quiet

The Bernoulli’s Principle

A huge truck swished past me and the familiar feeling returned.

*Yawns*

What feeling?

*raises the brow*

How poor are they who have not patience! What wound did ever heal but by degrees.

-Shakespeare, Othello.

Ha!

Not so long ago, when I was in my ninth grade, I used to ride back from school on my bicycle.

School was in close proximity from home(of course!).

Route was not a high-way.

It was not even a galli.

Something in between.

*sniggers at the lack*

(@reader: do fill me in with the word, if thee knows)

Okay. So where was I?

Yeah, there were times when heavier vehicles would drive by and I, who was on the bicycle, would get the feeling of being sucked into them.

To be more explicit, it felt like I would fall between the tyres (or simply side-crash into the vehicle) only to have my head crushed by the rear(which will be the derivable consequence of the fall =P ).

I think the morbidity can be traced back to the time when I was six years old and had chanced upon a freshly crushed skull with the contents all spilled over the road. The image is pretty clear in the head.

It happened for more than a couple of times and the itch rose.

So I went up to my brother, to inquire about it, secretly hoping that it would be some siblings-sharing psychological paranoia.

My eyes had brightened up after knowing about the “Bernoulli’s Principle”, a science phenomenon at practical demonstration.

So goes the principle,

“as the speed of a moving fluid increases, the pressure within the fluid decreases.”

So when you drive a two-wheeler, and a vehicle passes by; the velocity of air(the fluid) in between increases thereby reducing the pressure.

Hence the feeling.

I was also told that that is the reason why the doors and windows closed with gushes of wind.

I was exhilarated.

1. It was a science.

2. Everyone felt that way.

1 and 2 implied it wasn’t a psychological disorder.

*relief*

As the idea sunk in, a new realization that ran a chill down my spine dawned.

It was ‘feeling’ in the physical sense of the word!

The suction was real!

*panic mode activated*

Consequently,

1. I try not to drive slow.

2. I do not mind putting on a few extra pounds. =D

3. I prefer to have someone sitting behind me! =)

Generally one must sequence points in a climax or anticlimax fashion. But yeah, whatever!

PS1: I think I should catch some sleep, because my head is pretty blank at this point in time and that generally is not the case!

PS2: It is so not fair to have parents on the internet! They look up the most embarrassing of the dances that you have done(BTW who the bally hell put up our felicity 07 dance on Youtube!), keep updated about what is going on in the college and question you about it: at which you are like- Oh!Is my college doing a joint project with Yahoo on cloud computing? and most importantly- read this! So you have to learn to say- FISH!

PS3: Darn! I am hungry!

Get a life!

I do not know when that particular ability of mine went to the dogs.

As far as I can recollect, back in school,

I had an an incredible capacity of listening to the most

insipid,

drab,

nonsensical,

(you get the point ) lectures ever!

Come IIIT, things slowly started to change.

Hence forth me1 is the sensible me and me2 is the-’Get a life!’ me.

(Ah and no, I do not suffer from the split-personality disorder. The two mes co-exist with ideological clashes only )

me1- What the hell is wrong with you! Can you make it through a single class without for once drifting away?

me2- What else do you expect out of a ONE AND A HALF HOUR lecture! It is torture.

me1-  Uh! There are people who listen. I am sure they find something of interest! At least the questions they ask seem intelligent!

me2-What is the whole point? You will anyway burn the mid-night oil before the exams! Save the effort of listening!

me1- How about staying conscious through one class of her’s(ahem no indications what-so-ever made), just for the record’s sake?

*throws hands and legs in air, shrugs and finally relents*

me2- okay.

-next day-

me1- Listen… carefully.

-half an hour passes-

me2- How much time more!?

me1- Just keep to it.

-forty five minutes pass-

me1- Stay put! you are losing touch!

me2- This is how it feels when you listen to an alien language! Words fall on your ear-drums, generate some signals that your processor is unable to dechipher! So all you can hear is – blah blah blah blah!

me1- FOCUS!

*takes a deep breath, strains to listen for another minute. The restlessness spreads and just as it is about to plunge into a full-fledged mutiny*

me1- Okay! Take a break.

*sigh of relief*

*goes horse riding, drinks a fanta-apple, watches dragons fly, breathe fire and then comes back*

*looks at the watch*

me2- ONLY TEN MINUTES SINCE!!

*Someone is found reading a novel. Novel confiscated. More words thrown, of which you only gather ‘discipline’. *

*Immediately thereafter someone is found sleeping. Woken up. Asked to go get married!*

*Enter mode nostalgia*

me2- Remember how as kids when ma tried to push in that extra morsel, you’d make those loud retching noises to which she’d say - koi baat nahi beta, chod do.

me2- No one pronounced you ‘Undisciplined’!

*sighs*

*Exit mode nostalgia*

*draws a few circles and squares. (After all  _something should adorn the empty pages!)*

*looks at the watch- 20 minutes left*

me2- Remember having read about how they used to torture people by hanging them by their thumbs? Or by tickling them with feather with their hands and legs tied up? Or by making them drink copious amounts of water?

Times have changed.

Make a person sit for a one-and-a-half-hour lecture depriving him of novels, sleep, texting, talking, drawing and speak what they all generally speak. There! You’ve hit upon pure torture.

*10 minutes left*

*hears something about assignment*

me1- Dhyaan se sun!

*And lo! As the final verdict- You are supposed to submit 5 codes by the next class~*

me2- Who would not learn to swear!

*5 minutes left*

*professor just remembers the one little portion that is yet to be covered*

*At this point in time, you could smack anyone right in their faces. But you are made to do with clenching the corners of the table*

-one and a half hour over-

*professor still has something to say*

*Attendance!*

*Class over*

*Walks out. Freedom at last*

*Wonders- Is this what heaven feels like?*

Fellow student- ‘Tujhe iska matlab samjha kya?‘

me2- I am human! What are you!

me1(aloud)-‘Nahi yaar, Thik se nahi samjhaya tha yeh!’

PS1: Here is what I did to keep up in one of my classes-

Wrote with my left hand, then wrote mirror image with my left hand. And guess what! I can write mirror image with both by hands While writing I realized that it is more natural to write English with right hand. Considering the direction of the strokes, they are rightward. That got me to thinking that the strokes in Arabic are leftward. Which could mean that there are more left-handed people in all those regions. I did not go to verify, but probably( since the inception of scripts at least) we were more level-headed-left-hemisphere-working people while they were the artistic-right-hemisphere-working people. But then it struck, Chinese-Japanese-Koreans et al were a step ahead. Because they had both leftward and rightward strokes  and wrote from top to bottom! (Ah relax, I still think Indians are the smartest of them lot )

PS2:  I am so looking forward to meet my folks!  

PS3: Changed my theme. That you can see .

PS4: There! I am done

Will you marry me?

Ah no! I am not asking you that question.(I am glad I am nowhere close to hearing those sigh of relief(s) )

And it sure need not be as dramatic as I am trying to make it sound, but yeah -modest expectations I do have.  For starters,  Guys only please! Oh and I’ll leave it at that because I had a decent dinner today.

So for my first three times, a girl asks me to marry her! Wait! Before you raise that suspicious brow, let me tell you that it was all part of the game. Only I did not manage to remember that I had to ask the very same question to the guy next to me! So none of my objections were considered. Oh and am talking about JAM. This was my second time.  The first time I participated,  I  could not hit the buzzer even once. By that standard, my improvement’s good.

Oh and just for curiosity’s sake- The topics were-

I do not remember

PS1: I had to write a post, to get into the flow

PS2: \m/ <- for Felicity ‘09.

PS3: We have a throwball tournament tomorrow, and our team is not yet ready

PS4: Hope to see you soon!

A web story

I will not spout about my intermittent posts that seem to only hint at the fact that the blog still breathes!

If the post title interests you, then you might probably not find anything interesting in here per se. I would be (more than ) proud of myself if I ever put some technical stuff down here that could fascinate, me first, then you.

I did not see how it started, but I did see the end.

On the window-sill there was a big black ant. A spider, approximately 3 times smaller, moved in close circles around the ant, spinning a web. The ant had already been grounded, so all it did was- attempted to sting the spider. As the spider started gaining, the stinging endeavors reduced. There were times when the ant would stay still and then with all it’s force try and sting again, missing each time. Eventually it gave up. The spider continued to weave.

Why did I not help the ant?( like in the old story of the dove and the ant…)

The only thought that did come was – Haven’t we interfered enough?

PS1: I have so been dying to write this one- As toddlers we were taught ABC… As grown-ups?

CDE ??(@sravanthi: )

PS2: Another ‘A’

aaaahhhh!

Dusk it was. After a satisfactory throw-ball win(yeah yeah I know I could have done without mentioning this, but we won in two straight sets! Don’t bother to ask against whom ), when I opened my room door, I saw something on my bed move towards the window. Something big! As big as a mouse!

What did I do? – Scream. (whatelse!)

Priyanshu came running though the corridor to inquire about the shout out, while the mouse dived into my cupboard. She fetched a long broom, and both of us jumped over my bed. I tried to prod the mouse with the broom. It attempted to move out of the cupboard,

What did I do? Scream. (Priyanshu didn’t!)

It went in again. It wasn’t our cup of tea. We knew. we had to call someone. Charvi stood miles away from the hallway yelling something that sounded like-I am not going to come to your room now! …(Mine happens to be the second last room ).

Indupriya’s name was suggested. She showed up almost instantly. Must admit – The girl’s got some guts! While she tried poking the mouse out of my room, I kept jumping frantically on my bed screaming even louder everytime I saw the tiny creature move around. When it went inside the bathroom we decided upon removing the file-holder and the stand out of my room. When I knocked on my neighbour’s door she simply wouldn’t let me in! She thought that the mouse was inside the holder and that I was trying to force my way into her room to let it loose!(Why,Why would i do that!) .

Finally, after all the poking and prodding the mouse scuttled out of my room into the dustbin near corner of the hallway. We couldn’t leave it there. Two more nudges and it jumped on to the window grills. Sunanda was all game for pushing it out!(Murderous instincts Apparently the mouse had shown up in her room as well ). As the mouse moved to the other side of the window, someone(Don’t remember who) closed the window. Peace!

Now after all this, I know you wouldn’t believe if I told you that I was the one to shoo away a mouse from Charvi’s room. But I have my justifications! In her room it was a small innocent mouse that did not perform aerobatics like this one! Seriously!

PS0: All this on the third floor! I wonder what the situation on the other floors is.

PS1: I initially thought of naming the post  ‘The Mouse hunt! . But all my posts, so far, begin with an ‘a’ . This one in league with them.

PS2: When we were discussing the thing over dinner Ankita said that she did hear me scream but thought that I was doing it for just for fun! (Why,why would I do that!)

PS3:I am not going to take these personality quizzes on face-book. Keeps giving results that say I am a nerd and my choices are nerdy!

PS4: If rats belonged to a party, Congress specifically then what would they be called? congrats?

All s crap

I know this is coming after a long, long time. Even I wondered as to when my next post would show up!

No seriously, It’s not that one runs out of stuff to write but when laziness takes it’s toll the consequences are evident. Hey but that’s not the only reason- Bah! I know I am writing crap!

But guess what? I am not the only one, and apparently I choose to do it on a much better platform. The orkut scrap all thing (yeah that’s where the post gets it’s name from) is so very annoying. Back then,(that is about a month ago) I would open my account to find at least 85% genuine correspondences. But now, (s)Crap rules!. As long as it stayed to wishing and sharing festivities I did not complain, though admittedly it had no personal touch to it.(Does that sound as complaining? I have barely begun!)

There was a time when I used to reply back to everyone who sent scraps that faked about orkut deleting accounts, or people being able to generate money out of scraps being forwarded or you breaking the coveted love chain and not finding love for the next decade(!), asking them to authenticate their sources before blindly using the ’scrap all’. I did get a few positive responses before someone replied back saying-” I was just following the trend, and I expect you to do the same.” What the hell! No, I did not remove the person from my account and no he was not a fan!What I did realize was people did not care. They(most of them) knew things like these did not work, yet clung on to that floating string of hope of-what if it did? What if a miracle just happened?(because of a mindless scrap just you sent!) Wake up people! And please stop sending scraps to everyone unless it is an unavoidable necessity.

PS0: And that is not all , we get multiple copies of the same scrap!

PS1: Our Graphics assignment got postponed.

PS2: Veg Extravaganza tastes yum with mushrooms .(this for all those who do not eat mushrooms because of it’s desi name. )

Amadeus and Hazaar chaurasi ki ma

If the two things sound completely unrelated ,then let me tell you that they are unrelated. And of all the things ,I do not even intend to relate them. Then why do they ’share’ the title space with a conjunction binding them? Well I guess it’s because these were the only recreations I had to contend with for the entire week (now is a :['(' + ')' ] , for the two of them! for well…can one really stop ranting and raving? )

Amadeus is the first theater I have ever been to and a thumbs up to the play. When Sravanthi came and asked me what the play was about I tried to put up as much as I could in words but I tell ya it was much more. The storyline was amazing and the acting was superb. The way Antonio got the fame ‘he’ craved for but still felt the hollow within (yes hollow is something I’ll come back to ) when he listened to Mozart’s compositions and the way he realized that he was being mocked at by God himself makes me marvel at such renditions by writers of all times. The emotions/feelings are so beautifully captured that they etch a space somewhere within. Literature can get people intoxicated! (Unlike os …i am not complaining ,or am i?)

Hazaar chaurasi ki ma . As one of the reviewers puts it-the film transcends your objective critical faculties and touches a rare chord of emotion. I was speechless after the movie. Jaya Bhaduri (okay Bacchan) and Nandita Das have done a great piece of work. The director …umm..Govind Nihalani(this is googled info ) and the writer Mahashweta Devi (again googled ) should be patted too. .

The movie also in a way highlights the shallowness of existence. How each day is passing in mere oblivion. At the end of each day if you look at yourself and ask -have I really done anything that could make any difference to my living or for that matter anyone else’s living? I talk to people each day .But what do I talk? ..How was the food/movie/class/shirt/exam ?Or have you done your assignment/project/…?(I am not a nerd but as a IIITian I do not really have a lot of choices ..but on a more serious note) What am I doing?

Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is matter of choice. Did I really choose all this? Put it like this – Do I really have a choice ? Wish I really knew what I wanted …But nonetheless I am searching for my purpose …And probably when I do find one I will be out of one long dream ….

P S0: Phew ….was that me?

PS1:My project (that deserved a post) has a lot of things to be added . I wonder why don’t people tell us all the things right in the first place so that when we show it to them it is all in place!

PS2:The theater is coming back next year and i hope i don’t miss out on anyone of them.

PS3: I read two reviews on the movie .The first one is what I really felt about the movie and the second one is a perfect example of what I would call a hollow piece of writing …though the reviewer intends to praise the movie it looks more like a formality to me. @the reviewer: no offense what-so-ever meant . For the curious ones here are the urls of the reviews I was talking about:

http://www.screenindia.com/nov28/review3.htm

http://hindimoviereviews.blogspot.com/2005/12/review-hazaar-chaurasi-ki-ma.html