Within Peace

Date: 24.02.2009
Time: 8:03 p.m.

I’ve been rather accident prone of late. From accidental cuts, fever, scratches and a finger injury to various bruises which I don’t even remember acquiring, it has been quite an adventurous time for me. The funny thing is that I’ve been rather full, mainly in the sense that nothing seems to affect me much. I’ve actually stopped caring about so many things that I’m more at peace than I have been in a long time.

Yet, there is that quiet chill that makes me wonder if all of this is another stage of being ‘comfortably numb’. No, I haven’t been low. And there have been things which have made me genuinely happy. But it just isn’t like me to not react to annoyances such as taunts or disappointments. What is more surprising is that I am genuinely not giving a rat’s carcass about how I am being treated by most people. Or that I haven’t been able to keep in touch as much as I’d like with those who do understand and accept me. Or that there are very few people who I can truly be comfortable with without having to keep a certain distance. Whatever it is, I do hope that I don’t tire of it. Maybe I’m healthy now for a change, mentally, that is, and need to get used to a shade of normalcy.

The one thing which I am not particularly fond of at the moment is my workload this semester. I mean, it is rather pathetic to switch on the comp and log in to the Net only to download and study lectures. Add to that an extremely tiring schedule and you lose any energy you’d think you’d have to sit in the evening to write. I need some sort of inspiration. Education and related matters don’t quite fit the bill. Neither do fat, potentially pregnant lizards which invade the tiny bathroom attached to my room late at night to leave me entering the bathroom singing and running out screaming.

Domestic matters remain unresolved and I don’t think they ever will be sorted out. The people involved are much too old to change and I am too fed up to be ever-so-forgiving. Even then, strangely, I am living out each day without the dark clouds that used to perpetually linger around me not so long ago.

Perhaps this is how life is supposed to be. Whatever it is, I hope it doesn’t make me too tired, or too fulfilled to write, as it seems to be doing.

End: 8:22 p.m.

Loony Ladies of the Last Row

Date: 09.02.2009
Time: 1:45 p.m.

LD: (Looking extremely disgruntled in class while observing the Professor) Look, she’s acting as though she’s teaching little children in elementary school.

DM is sitting on LD’s left.

DM: (Keeping a straight face while looking at the Professor) Yes, she’s showing us pictures.

LD: Is that how you hold a book, Ma’am? (turning towards DM) Look! She’s tainting the sanctity of the book!

DM gives LD a characteristic look which says that LD is being randomly weird again.

LD: (continuing and ignoring DM’s “look”) She’s raping the purity of the book — She’s putting creases where no creases were before!

DM: …

LD: (quite agitated by now) She’s marking her territory in places where she has to right to!

DM: (very matter-of-factly) Um, that just reminds me of dogs marking their territory by peeing.


2:00 p.m.

Class: (imploringly at the Professor who refuses to stop teaching even if Time itself were to come to an end bringing about Ultimate Doom) Ma’am! It’s time… we have another class now.

Professor: (looking at us after coming out of her picture-book-induced reverie) Ummmnh? What? Bell rang? Hmmm?

Class: Yes Ma’am, we heard the bell. It rang just now.

Professor: Oh so your ears are tuned to the bell however silent it is.

LD: (turning to DM again) So is that a bad thing? (Looks disgustedly at the Professor) We are punctual people, unlike you.


2:05 p.m.

Miss Minnie Mouse, had hitherto been to LD’s right, “holding it in” and also under the false impression that the next class was to be in another room, (an assumption probably pee-induced).

MMM: (to LD) Listen. I need to go to the toilet. Take my bag with you.

LD: Um, I’d like to go with you. (Pausing) I mean, till the outside and then go in once you’re done and you come out.

PB: (another classmate, sitting next to MMM, laughing) That was very specific.

LD: Yes, just to clear the air.


Honestly, the fact that a conversation gets posted after ages shows just how scarce humour has been in these recession-hit times. And I suppose the fact that I found out that today is “Chocolate Day” according to card-companies who want to make money to beat the recession blues after I reached college and also that my classmates were in the final stages of their insatiable craving for the said chocolate also helped. And I didn’t get any chocolate today. *BIG SNEEEEF* Which obviously is totally irrelevant in this context.

Oh well, we’re all back to hilarity now and toilet humour, of course. Can’t leave that out!

Something to Think About

On some days a thought coming from an unexpected source can just strike you gently and leave you with a raised eyebrow and a smile. Today, while returning home from college, I was waiting inside an auto when I happened to become the silent observer of a rather interesting conversation between the auto-wallas.

One of them was trying to get some money out of the person driving the auto I was in, however, he replied saying that he had none to dish out as he had just paid his daughter's school fees. Another auto-walla soon joined the conversation and asked him if his daughter was in an English medium school. When the man replied in the negative, the latter told him that he should put his children in English medium schools if they are to make something of themselves. His spoke with great conviction when he said that it filled him with pride to hear his child speak in English when he himself could not.

Now I found the thought extremely heartening, not because I feel that fluency in English alone is enough for success... Frankly, I know plenty of people who speak incorrect English with much fluency and confidence and get away with murder (figuratively speaking, of course). And neither do I believe that those who study in institutions where English is not the teaching medium are any less capable than English-speakers. However, I'd rather like to think of it as a parent wanting to ensure that the next generation receives the benefit of a good education and all the advantages that it can provide even if the previous one hadn't. And it is a very encouraging sign that people who haven't had certain opportunities in life want their children, and this includes their daughters, to be educated so that they have a better life.

One of the gravest problems apart from poverty that plagues the country is ignorance. And this very ignorance leads to so much more poverty and exploitation. I would have to continue considerably if I were to talk about how these are inter-related. The saddest part is that so many are resistant to any changes that would look towards ameliorating this. Now if there are indeed people who are willing to take steps that would, in whatever small way, lead to the light, then it is to be taken as a beacon of hope. And yes, I'd like to hope that there are more people out there who are willing to take positive and progressive steps towards betterment and those who see their sons and daughters in the same light, something that is still lacking even amongst the educated.