Damn this freakin heat!

It's killing me! My little gadget here tells me it's 37 degree Centigrade with 12% humidity right now. It's almost 7:30 PM, and the power's out, I'm home alone in the dark, and I have about 1 hour and 40 minutes of laptop battery time. I will not light a candle, lord knows I don't need any extra source of heat. What I need is electricity.

I'm in bed, melting, really, really melting. Precious water oozing out of every pore, I am melting. I am bored and melting. I know the human body comprises of a hell lot of water, but this much?! I'm afraid at this rate, I will shrivel up and die. I perspire faster than I can drink. When my laptop dies, I will lie still and try to slow down the melting process. But I will not be surprised if when the roomies get home, they find only a puddle of water in my room where I now lie.

This is why I am writing this now - to bid all you good people adieu, in case I melt into nothingness. Oh almost forgot to mention, I have a raging cold. Yes, in this heat. A darned-raging-runny-nose-bleary-eyed cold. And I lit candles. I had to. The house is big and dark and way too quiet and my head is fresh with ghost stories that I listened to weeks ago and I'm scared like a kid. The Gods are indeed cruel!

Lazy Sunday ramblings

Sunday evening, and I'm sitting here with nothing to do, and I love it. I had two tickets for today's cricket match - Deccan Chargers and the Bangalore whatevers. I gave them to Kal-El, the Superman boyfriend - "Here, take this and take your buddy and enjoy yourselves," I said and even meant it. And you know two tickets means Rs 2000 - not a trivial amount.

Don't you think I'm like the best girlfriend ever, and that Kal-El is one hell of a lucky guy. I mean, think about it. How many girls would give their boyfriends free tickets for a cricket game on a Sunday evening for him and his buddies? Because this means giving up your only chance of spending some time with him after working your butt off all week.

Most girls would hog their boyfriends on a Sunday, put up a sky-high fortress between him and his buddies, then coerce them to do things they don't even like doing - like stay in and watch 'Friends' on TV and cuddle, or get them to take them out for an expensive candlelit dinner, or even worse, get them to take them shopping.

But look at me! I am so selfless I amaze myself sometimes (or is it just stupidity?). Kal-El headed off to the matches with his best buddy, with not a thought of me in mind, while I headed off to the church instead like a good girl with my girlfriends.

Really, there's just no denying that I'm this super user-friendly, easy maintenance girlfriend. I'm not clingy, demanding, or unreasonably jealous, I don't really fancy being wined and dined, and to top it all off, I am uncomfortable with men buying me things, especially if it's something expensive. I'm delighted enough with the occasional flowers. See? Easy maintenance.

And that is why Kal-El treats me like a queen when he can, and thinks I'm a saint, he thinks I'm the most selfless and giving person ever and wants to be my slave. Forever. :-)

I'm kidding. He knows I got those tickets for free, and that I wouldn't watch the stupid match if they paid me, and that I keep Sunday evenings for myself, that there is absolutely no sacrifice on my part. But he appreciates it anyway. He appreciates the fact that I thought of him first when I got my hands on those tickets, just like the way he appreciates the fact that I do my own laundry. Even though that's got nothing to do with him.

But I want to be appreciated for the right things, and sometimes I think Kal-El gets pretty close. And all I care about is knowing what his Kryptonite is, which is me. My only purpose is to weaken him. :-)

Abandoning happy subjects, and on to darker things - I fear my hearing may be deteriorating. And I blame Apple. It's their iPod and iTunes that are responsible. On any regular day, I wake up, take 30 minutes to get ready, then plug in my earphones till I reach the office, where I simply switch to headphones and wear them all day, taking it off only for meetings and lunch breaks. Then switch back to the iPod earphones again as soon as I leave till I switch off my lights to sleep, and waking up very often with the earphone cable strangling me half to death. And listening to heavy metal full volume that amount of time..I don't know...I wish I wouldn't have to, but I suspect music. Can I sue Apple if my hearing really is affected by their products?

Anyway, it's time for a shower. Sunday evenings may be for myself, but nights are a different story altogether! :P

For Chaltlang-lians

Unaunu Unreal te leh unau dang ho tan, leh Chaltlang mi ho VL-a hre ve tan pawh ni tho.
VL-a an dan hi, a namai lo, a mak tawp heti em em a mihring leh cartoon character han in an theih. (Horton Hears A Who ami)

How many peacocks can you spot?

I counted five when I was taking the second picture, now I see only two.

It's hot and long walks in the park can no longer be frequent. The few times that I do get out there, I see scary numbers of peacocks. I had a nightmare about peacocks once and I've been a tad afraid of them ever since. But isn't the heat supposed to make them retreat further into the woods, not make them wander out soaking up the sun...?

Gypsy soul?

Even though I made it sound like it was all freedom and fun in Goa, it was not. The first time I went for a dip in the ocean middle of the night, I stood there for a long time analysing my environment.

Is it safe? Am I putting myself at risk? Am I in danger of attack from man, animal, or mineral? Scanned the horizons to see if there was anyone around, what would be the shortest distance from point A to point B if something happened and I had to run?

Scanned the waters - what can be in the water that might possibly harm me? Ruled out jellyfishes and sharks and Puffer fishes (we don't have them in this part of the world I think?). Weirdly, I never think about snakes, I know there are lots of venomous water snakes even in our Indian waters. But I always skip over them.

I have an extreme fear of the Stonefish, and no matter where, as long as I'm in the ocean, there's always a vague fear that I might step on one. But because it's a constant fear, I'm used to it and therefore always dismiss it. If I don't, I would never know the pleasure of being in the water.

After such intense scrutiny, what initially was just the moonlight on the water took on the form of florescent plankton in my mind. I ran back and told my friend. She tsked and shook her head disapprovingly. "Jerusha, that's called a moonlit beach and shimmering waters. Go and put plankton out of your mind and enjoy it" she said.

Our first day there over breakfast, I suggested going home a day early. She asked me why. I told her I was worried Daniel would call.

"Who in the world is Daniel??"

"A client." I saw the look on her face and quickly added "A very important client, BIG agency!" It didn't save me.

"Jerusha!!!"

This one was an explosion :-) I felt she was really losing her temper. She told me to stop thinking about Daniel or Shadrak or Mishak or Abednego. Drawing my attention to a fisherman nearby who had been unfruitfully casting his net again and again in the low tide, she said "Don't you wish you can walk up to him and tell him to cast his net to the right, and see him haul up so much fish that his net breaks?"

But yeah, I finally let myself go. And went walking for hours on the dark empty beach, went for a swim in the middle of the night. This is a little embarrassing but I'll say it anyway. It was so beautiful I cried endlessly - standing there in the water, and the moon and the stars above you. And the foam shining white under the moonlight . I don't even know what I cried about, I wasn't sad, I wasn't unhappy or depressed. But the feeling of it all was so intense the tears came and came and refused to stop.

Being back is good. Here where the bathroom is spotless and sparkling and smells beautiful. But last night, there was a pretty moon out, and I looked out at it through the bars in my window. I walked out to the balcony and looked at it from through the bars. Bars and walls and locked doors. Safe and clean.

I felt like a prisoner.

Happiness & Sunshine & Butterflies :-)

I just got a new promotion! My 3rd promotion in 2 years and a half in this company, and damn, it feels better and better each time! :)

Hard work is so rewarding and satisfying. But what's more satisfying is having your prayers listened to despite being a worthless human being that sins over and over again, having my prayers answered, and receiving blessings I do not even remotely deserve. And I have never asked God for a promotion. Especially this time, I haven't been asking for anything much at all. Just forgiveness.

There's nothing much in this pitiful life that's worth giving to God. But this one is for God. Whatever good is in this, whatever's worth giving, if there's any nobility and a shred of beauty in this, I want God to have it all. There's nothing else me, a sinner, can give.

[Called mom and told her, "Again??" she said. She then handed the phone to my aunt who was with her, who said "Again??" :-). "I'm beginning to suspect that it is really easy to get promotions in that company you work for" she said. That's about the only downside of it getting regular rewards, you work your ass off but after a while, it ceases to impress people unless you work yourself to death!

When they asked me what my new designation is, and I told them, my mom was like "Sartezi??" (Strategist). My aunt just said "Bawihte, a va khirh thei ve awww!" Yet all this endears them to me so much more!]

Wanderlusting

Work's been hectic, and I and Macavity were feeling more frazzled than normal last week,. By Thursday, we were only idly dreaming of running, off to the sea for at least a few days. Friday morning, she called me and asked if I was serious about escaping, and when I replied in the affirmative, we both decided to leave that night. I threw in some clothes, my Bible, my journal, and my favorite book of poetry and I was set.

I will boast that we have fantastic facilities like the best travel agents and the best concierge service in the office, yet nobody could get us tickets to Goa. 'Overbooked for the next several days' they said. We called I don't remember how many travel agents, who all said the same thing. "No buses, no trains." And Macavity's leaving for Sydney in a few weeks and saving money for the trip, so she refused to spend money on air tickets.

But still, despite all that, this is where I was for the past few days :-) (Yeah yeah - I will admit, in such a difficult situation, besides Divine intervention, only a will like mine will get you here! hehe)
Macavity had given up, and making consolidatory party plans for the night. But I refused to listen and dragged her to the government bus station as soon as work was over, asked for a bus to Goa, I was told the last bus to Goa left at 2 PM. I asked for the nearest town to Goa. They sold us tickets to Belgaum. From there, we were directed to Panjim. From Panjim to Margau, amd from Margau finally the beach of our destination - lovely, empty, serene Palolem with its fine white sands!This is Belgaum in the morning when we "landed" in the morning :) Pretty town, lovely weather, clean and clear air -It was almost 24 hours of traveling, but god, it was so good. And all that in non-AC buses, torn seats hard as rocks, no sort of luxury at all. Yet I felt alive, invigorated, rejuvenated, happy, it was good and worth every sore muscle in my butt!

We loved the adventure of it so much that we decided not to book return tickets either and do the random wandering again. This time we went from the beach to Margau, from Margau to some town in the middle of nowhere called Bonda -
Bonda - Belgaum, Belgaum - Hyderabad. This is the bus from Bonda - Belgaum, which took 4 hours. A very long 4 hours! Bus this crammed, full of people who seem to find our epidermal pores so fascinating they stared at us unflinchingly during the entire trip. And people reeking of cheap alcohol. And sweat. And old men with colorful turbans and shawls, with noble, callused hands and dignified mos.

The best thing about this trip is that uit was spontaneous and yet so do-able, and cheap as dirt. Just to show how easy it was, I will give a detailed description of fares and rates below -

Hyderabad - Belgaum = Rs 440/-
Belgaum - Panjim = Rs 85/-

Here, we were exhausted, and decided to stop traveling in buses, and looked for taxis, rick shaws, and motorbikes to take us to Palolem. They all asked for Rs 1000 to Rs 1500. So we looked around, and guess how much we paid when we decided to take the bus -

Panjim - Margao = Rs 19/-
Margao - Palolem = Rs 20/-

And when you get to the beach, there are tons of pretty little shacks along the beach, all you have to do is kick off your shoes and walk along and just pick one that suits your fancy. But since it was just me and Macavity, we decided to play it safe and got a hotel with concrete walls with AC for Rs 900/- a night.

I will always love Maharashtra! Wada Pavs and Shankar Balis and Marathi Hindi - the Hindi I understand and like! And funny incidents, like this one where we stopped to eat a meal, it was kind of dirty and we were both afraid of getting sick from the food but were too hungry to not eat. After the meal was over, we asked one of the waiters where the bathroom was, he said "Just go out to the back into the fields." Food poisoning loomed large in my thoughts for several hours after that.

But we built castles in the sand, went for a dip in the ocean in the middle of the night under the moon and stars, and even got to see a couple of shooting stars, went for long walks, read poetry to each other and cried over the sad ones.....
I would do it all again in a heartbeat.

Beautiful people

I'm not an American Idol fan, I haven't even watched one complete show this season, quick glances when the roomies are watching, one performance on youtube if a friend raves about it. But I was heartbroken to learn that Jason Castro was out, he's such a beautiful human being and he smiles so beautifully and he's got those beautiful, genuine eyes and who'd care if he cackles like a witch! Gime me those eyes and that smile and anything would sound good.
Anyway, I just hope we continue to see him around.

Next - Tom Waits. Sexy, beautiful Tom Waits. I like his music, I've cried over his songs many times, and now I've learned that Scarlett Johansson is making an album of Tom Waits covers. Maybe she sings okay, but I wish she wouldn't, I just have a bad feeling about this. Not that I'm planning on buying the Johansson album, or listen to any of it.

I also found this picture of Marilyn and I love it to bits because she's got such a pretty face and it really shows here..
Plus her thighs are bigger than mine and she still looks great :P

Cock Robin

(*warning* - Zahmawh content)
This is slightly different, you're told the answer, and you guess the question. The question-that-is-the-answer is just a few lines below, but you can try to let your honest side, if you have any, win and try to answer it without looking at the answer, and tell me what your answers were.

So the answer is ---- 'Cock Robin.'

Sohna's first answer was 'Who killed some bird or the other?,' she then changed it to 'Cock Robin is the one that died?' referring to this nursery rhyme. Shirley's one and only answer was 'What was the name of Jack Robinson's chicken?'

Anyway, without further ado, the question is - "What's that you put in my mouth, Batman?!"

:-)

Generally, this should resolve the 'Is Robin/Batman gay?' debate. Forever. (Ref - the last comment on this old post of mine.)

Look what I found!

I've been in a learning mood this past couple of weeks, that mood and the internet makes the perfect combination. I've found so many interesting things so I think I'll share the more interesting stuff I've learned with you all here. Since these were found from random searches and momentary sparks of interest, I'm not going to bother with sources because I don't even remember where I read most of them -

1. P.B Shelley had a doppelgänger. He saw his own doppelgänger on a terrace (spooky!), and it said to him "How long do you mean to be content?" (extremely chilling).

2. Yukio Mishima had his first masturbatory ejaculation while looking at this picture of St. Sebastian.

3. My interest in Yukio Mishima led to an interest in Seppuku - a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. It's gory, but I still find it kind of **something** (the word escapes me), romantic maybe.

Part of the samurai honor code, seppuku has been used both voluntarily by samurai to die with honor rather than fall into the hands of their enemies... With his selected attendant (kaishakunin, his second) standing by, he would open his kimono, take up his tanto (knife) and plunge it into his abdomen, making a left-to-right cut. The kaishakunin would then perform daki-kubi, a cut in which the warrior was all but decapitated (a slight band of flesh is left attaching the head to the body). - wiki

Mishima, a three time Novel Prize nominee for literature, in modern time, performed Seppuku. You can see the decapitated head of Mishima here if you're not weak of heart or stomach (it's actually okay, I find it interesting that after performing such an act, there is no expression of pain on his handsome face, in fact, he almost looks happy.) You can watch a staged presentation of how a ritual Seppuku is performed here - again, not gory.

4. According to Gnostic beliefs, and their text the Second Treatise of the Great Seth, Jesus never died on the cross, it was Simon the Cyrene, the guy who helped Jesus carry the cross. Incidentally, Simon has always been one of my favorite characters from the Bible. Simon, and Dimas (the thief on the cross) - I've always thought they're both so lucky.

5. When St. Francis of Assisi died, he thanked his donkey for carrying him during his life, and his donkey cried.

6. In the Quran, the arhcangel Gabriel is called Jibril, and Satan's Islamic equivalent is Iblis.

7. The patron saint of alcoholics is Saint John of God (San Juan de Dios). I guess that would mean he is my friend Macavity's patron saint :-)

8. This bush has been identified by monastic traditions as Moses' burning bush, still alive and green, but no longer burning.

9. Richard the Lionheart, contrary to most young women's imaginations, (I'm 99.9% certain) was not handsome - disappointingly. However, Saladin was, most likely.

10. Magdalena de la Cruz, a Fransican nun, who for many years exhibited stigmatas and was honored as a saint, confessed to faking it when she fell ill, ascribing most of the marvels to the action of demons by which she was possessed - wiki. I have my own doubts about stigmatas in general, but this IS REALLY creepy!

I have a lot more that I want to write about, but it's lunch time and I'm hungry.

Anyway, it's been fun reading up on these things, so once again, thank God for the internet! You understand how once one's attention pounces on something, one is doomed to a state of eternal distraction unless one follows up on it to one's heart's content.

It can be great fun, and sometimes we also like to throw in lies here and there to make it more fun. One time, we dedicated an entire day to reading up on John the Baptist, I started earlier than Shirley did, and all she was thinking about was how handsome she believes John must have been. So I caught her unawares and asked -

"Shirley, did you know that Napolean witnessed John's beheading?"

"Bonaparte??"

"Yeah"

"Wow, really? I never knew that, I wonder why my mom never told me about that!"

All the internet's wiki and info and papers
Could not put Macavity's brains together again :-)

.

To be human

I think the reason I get bad dreams all the time is because I'm a sinner and my guilt bothers me. I more often than not feel ashamed to read my Bible and pray, and so I don't.

But Jesus didn't condemn the bad woman who people wanted to stone to death. And then there were those two praying men, "And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, this man went down to his house justified.." I feel like I know what that man was feeling when he was praying like that.

Maybe God will listen to my prayers too and understand me, the way He listened and forgave that man in the story. And like Coventry Patmore wrote -

Ah, when at last we lie with trancèd breath,
Not vexing Thee in death,
And Thou rememberest of what toys
We made our joys,
How weakly understood
Thy great commanded good,
Then, fatherly not less
Than I whom Thou hast moulded from the clay,
Thou'lt leave Thy wrath, and say,
'I will be sorry for their childishness.'

Introducing the Hmar-am

It's ethnic-dress day today, and after debating over a sari and my Mizo Hmaram for a while, I finally decided to go with my Hmaram. Funnily enough, this is not something I would ever, on my own choice, chose to wear in Mizoram itself. But out here, one always feels like one is judged a little less harshly, you can get away with a not-a-perfect-10 figure.

And I also want to be the first ever to walk these halls in a Hmar-am :-) I almost wished for a real Vakiria head-dress, and walk around flamboyantly and make everyone wonder if this crazy chick's finally lost it.

I wanted a little color, but I left my more colorful and more preferred Puanchei in Delhi. But I luckily found my colorful Mizo necklace somewhere in the bottom of my jewelry box. That helped give it the colorful tribal touch I wanted. Now I feel all nostalgic, it makes me feel like running around a bit and dance some Sarlamkai.

I had a terrible, terrible dream last night. I dreamt my sister was dead, and I was crying so much that when I woke up I still felt like crying. And now I'm feeling a little sad, remnants of the bad dream I guess.

Typical, sucky, crappy Monday!

(Leh mai mai, Tribal Power OPa hia a lo va zai thiam tak em! Ka lo ngaihsak vak ngai lo a, mahse hotupa Zorun zarah, hei ka ngaithla mek a, ka lung a van leng tak em tunah tak hian! A phuahtu te hian an lo van phuah thiam tak em...

Lianchhiari lunglenna tlang ngei saw, kei ka suihlung tileng tu
Ka dawn changin tuan leh ka nuam ngei e...

huiss)

Putting people in their places

In my mind -

this is what hot, lazy summer afternoons look like -

this is what real gourmet food looks like -

this is what a real Mizo nula mawng looks like :-) (Mizo nula mawng fual in ti maw? Tihsan a har lo em! :P)

this is what love looks like -
this is what the act of real 'kuhva rah phel' looks like -

this is what serenity looks like -

this is what a real man's hand looks like -

and this is what lunglen looks like -

And in closing, let me share this quote by Gustave Flaubert, there seem to be some truth in it -

"To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost."

Touched by the Spirits

Third month in new apartment, but Tina's only just recently got back from Sydney. So her room which was kept locked and untouched was unlocked, dusted, windows, wardrobes and cupboards thrown open, with the exception of one small section in one of her wardrobes. None of the keys seemed to work on this one, so it remained locked for a few days after even after her return. However, driven by extreme need for more space, she one day somehow managed to open the mysterious closet, and guess what it contained!

ta-dah! The secret treasure that our eyes did behold, was this -
Whiskey & Rum. None of us are drinkers of either, and we didn't really know what to do it, so we just reverently closed the closet again. 'Chivas Regal is supposed to be expensive, maybe we should sell them' suggested one.

I know little about whiskey or rum. Whiskey, the first things I can think of - scotch on the rocks, the whiskey lullabye song. Rum - Old Monk, and the 'drinking rum and coca cola song'. Drinkin' rum and Coca-Cola..make every day like New Year's Eve..workin' for the Yankee dollaarrr.. :-)

Had they been white wine, I can assure you that at least a bottle would have given up its spirit by midnight :P

UFOs, devil kids, & mutants

Quick update. I've been busy and I'm afraid, going crazy as well. I've been doing headless chicken again where I go on and on convincing myself that one good night's sleep and popping several vitamin pills a day supplies a weeks' worth of energy refill to run around on. But time wears on and I will find out for the 100th time that I'm wrong. You get bloodshot eyes, bad headaches, rubber-like limbs, jelly-like joints, and general uselessness if you keep it up for too long. But the worst is always the way sleep deprivation and lack of proper rest wreaks havoc on one's mind...

Like this one instance some nights back, I was in bed almost asleep, all the lights switched off. I was lying on my side, facing towards the window, when suddenly, I 'felt' this bright light on my face, you know the way you can always tell with bright lights even with your eyes closed.

I immediately panicked, and why? Because for the first few seconds, I was convinced that it was an alien spaceship, with multi-color lights flashing, hovering around my 3rd floor window, on a mission to abduct me so they can perform all kinds of weird surgical procedures on me. What a relief it was to finally open my eyes and see it was only fireworks!

Another night, I was alone in the house when I heard a noise on the balcony. I went out to check what it was, and I saw something move. I won't say I thought it was him, but the first thing that came to my mind when I saw the thing move in the dark was Nightcrawler :P I didn't think it was him of course, I may have thought it could have been him, only may have :-) Anyway, it was just a cat. But what in the world made me think of Kurt?!

The most shameful one happened last night. It was still early, around 6:30 PM and I had just reached home, tired and sleepy. I had been sleeping all the way home, I think I was only still half-awake when I got out of the car. In that extremely muddled state, I, for some strange reason, decided to take the stairs instead of the lift.

As I reached the first floor, I saw these two little kids playing - a girl and a boy. The girl had a dupatta wrapped all over her, and when she saw me, she playfully threw one end of her dupatta on me. I smiled and just shook it off, but as the dupatta fell from my face and I looked at the little kid looking up at me with her now suddenly expressionless face, and big blank, unblinking eyes, some kind of cold horror crept up my spine...

I quickly lost my smile and decided to walk a little faster. She followed me, which freaked me out, and when I looked back and saw her looking at me with the same expressionless stare, I lost it completely and bolted, running with wild panic up the stairs, cursing myself for not taking the lift.

I was thinking of the devil kids that chased Judas into the desert in 'The Passion of the Christ'. I was thinking children of the corn.

I ran up the stairs as fast as I could, lugging my heavy laptop bag and my gym bag (believe me, even gym bags and gym clothes can be extremely heavy at the wrong time). Of course, no small child can really overrun a full grown adult and I easily left her behind, but I could still hear her little feet running up the stairs after me, which was almost worse than actually seeing her.

I was completely paranoid by then, and tried to take several stairs with a single bound, which resulted in me losing my balance and unceremoniously dumping myself in a heap on the ground. Only saving grace = there was no one around to witness this divine comedy :-)

I picked myself up pretty quick, gathered my bags and continued running, grabbing my keys ready to unlock the door and let myself in into the safety of my room. Horror of horrors! Our flat was locked from the inside. No one was supposed to be home. Nevertheless, I rang the bell and waited, but couldn't take it when I heard the kid's laughter ringing up the stairs and banged frantically on the door and was about to scream when Orpi opened the door in her bathrobe.

I had apparently frightened her out of the shower. Seeing me standing there panting and wheezing, she asked me what was wrong, and as I started telling her, the absurdness of the whole thing struck me and I started laughing. I told her the entire story in between the crazy laughing, and we both collapsed on the floor doubling up with laughter.

Well, it was good because it ended well and it made us laugh. But it sure wasn't funny at the time. It's not funny when in the middle of the night, all the image search results from your search on keywords like 'beheading' (mine) and 'dog eat' (Macavity's) keep popping up in your head so vividly the only solution is to sleep with your music on full volume, headphones plugged in extra deep in your ears.

And I wonder how normal it is for a normal, sane human being to panic and take flight at the sight of little kids, or be plagued by thoughts of UFO's and scary looking, albeit friendly, mutants. And it makes me wish that I could really count my marbles, because I sometimes fear I may have lost some.

a little love...

GIVE me hunger,
O you gods that sit and give
The world its orders.
Give me hunger, pain and want,
Shut me out with shame and failure
From your doors of gold and fame,
Give me your shabbiest, weariest hunger!

But leave me a little love,
A voice to speak to me in the day end,
A hand to touch me in the dark room
Breaking the long loneliness.
In the dusk of day-shapes
Blurring the sunset,
One little wandering, western star
Thrust out from the changing shores of shadow.
Let me go to the window,
Watch there the day-shapes of dusk
And wait and know the coming
Of a little love.

(At A Window - Carl Sandburg)

Technology from the future

There suck I! (Not necessarily where the bee sucks :)

I was working on my WinDVD capturing pictures from some of my DVDs some nights back. It was a humbling experience, looking at pictures that remind me that yes, I actually do suck, and *BAD*, at certain things :P Things I suck at, things I lack, there are tons of them but two that stand out most on my mind -

One, my aquatic grace and skills - or the lack thereof :) One thing I am absolutely sure of is that no matter how confident I may be on land and air, I am an absolute clown in the water. I float when I try to sink, and sink when I try to float.

I spent a lot of time on the ocean trying to learn how to float. My expert, state-level swimmer friends did everything they could, they taught me all the tricks they knew, like 'You have to create two little islands in the water!' :P Cute but it didn't help. I just got like 10 shades darker.

Despite all this, I paid a lot of good money for a boat to take me out to the middle of the ocean and do scary things in the water. So they took us to the Great Barrier Reef, where my instructors and my guides had to sit and talk with me for quite a while before I could be convinced to jump into the water. It took them about 15 minutes to convince me to snorkel and almost an hour to dive.

I bravely donned my heavy diving gear, with which I could barely walk because it was so heavy, I closed my eyes and jumped into the water, pretty sure I would immediately sink like a stone, and will have to be shamefully rescued, in front of a boat full of people. I floated.

So here I am bravely jumping into the water, that's me with the pink flippers. So far so good - I didn't sink :D
It was only when everyone I dived with had gone under, and I was the only one still floating like a cork, that I started to suspect that something was not quite right.

When I finally did sink, I knew I was only barely underwater so I was still unafraid. I was, however, the only one to keep complaining that she had water in her mask, or had trouble with the regulator, or that her flippers were coming off. Our instructor would start descending, and we'd follow, then I'd stop and signal furiously that there was something wrong, and he'd come back and check my gear. This is a demeaning feeling, knowing that you're being tended to while you just flail around helplessly, makes you feel like an invalid.

Here he is during one of my false alarms.

A little deeper, and here you can see I'm starting to panic a little and floundering. My friends looked like they were floating on air, and I was starting to seriously thrash around already :P My body just refused to move in the direction I wanted it to.
Because I was holding them up, my instructor took my friends down, and left me, in the mercy of the water :( If they made a movie of the things that went through my head that time, it would make a very interesting movie. Lots of blood and gore, giant sharks, giant squids, and giant blood-sucking nematodes. Being left behind, in the middle of an ocean, only a slippery rope for company, unable to swim, jellyfish and burst capillaries and blocked regulators in your head - not the most pleasant thing in the world. He came back for me later, but hanging there waiting....**shudder** I swear I'm scarred for life.

Anyway, somewhere on our way down, my instructor asked me to change my regulator. I violently shook my head 'NO! Don't take my life support out!!' He signaled me to change it again, I kept shaking my head. So he came and took it out of my mouth. Changed it to the other one. But I couldn't breathe anymore. He saw the fear in my eyes and calmed me down. For like 3 seconds.

Then that was it, I freaked and tried to scramble up, he held me down, which resulted in an all-out fist fight, mostly my fist. I was kicking him and scratching madly at him with everything I had, and he had to let me go.

I don't even remember how in the world I got up to the surface, but I did, and in my panic had forgotten all about my oxygen tank and my regulator. My lungs were bursting, and I broke through the surface, felt air (very good!), and gulped (very bad!). The sea water took that chance to gladly surge into my gaping mouth and down my gutless gut.

I was glad to be alive, but I saw the boat, and the people on it, looking at me. A failure. Scaredy cat. And I felt like such a loser that I wanted to just dive right in again. But I was dragged out of the water and made to eat. I'm sure it was good food, but food just doesn't taste good when you've just helped yourself to generous helpings of water from the Coral Sea.

But anyway, the corals were sure pretty.
And if there's a next time, I will just stick to snorkeling.

Now for my second grudge against God, my height. How many times have I heard the word 'tiny' being used to describe me? I'm okay with my height in India, but once you step out of India and on to the land of giants, is when you start to really hate the words 'tiny', 'small', 'petite' and worst of all, 'short'.

I was the only adult on that boat that day that wore kid flippers. None of the adult ones fitted me. Oh, the shame, the agony! My suits hung loose, my instructor thought I should get a better fitting one, but admitted that he couldn't find anything smaller.

Look at my instructor's massive white flippers. Then look at my pink *ugh* tiny ones. I never thought flippers, of ALL things in the world, would ever conspire against me and be objects that cause me shame!
The skydiving trip also found me trying on a whole range of different suits to find one that would make me look good. In vain.
Look at how snugly and nicely my instructor's black suit weaves around his wrist. And look at my red suit, and my sleeves, and I would like to tell you to also look at my wrists, but you simply can't see wrists. However, if I look closely enough, I think I can see the tips of my fingers. And you wear something like that, and jump from a plane, then you'll feel like you've sprouted wings from the way everything flaps so crazily about and around you. I was wearing my jeans, and two full-sleeved T-shirts under that suit. And still I flapped :(

But I'm not complaining. I would if either my general clumsiness in the water, or my height, had stopped me from doing the things I did. But they didn't. And for that, I am grateful. But, I will continue to date only tall men. Some sort of insurance for my kids if I ever decide to get married :-)

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Aggravated Vocabulary Battery

I am not a fancier of big words, like I've mentioned a sickening amount of times before. For me, communication is all about getting the message across, the best way it can be done. Even if it means using simple, common words and impressing no one.

Don't get me wrong, I agree there are times when pretty words and obscure sentences are not only welcome, but necessary. If you're writing poetry, for example, or a song in some cases, simplicity doesn't always work. In fact, I love poetry so much I think it should always be beautiful, and that it's better to not write one at all if one can't do a good job of it, or write it, but don't publish it or push it in people's faces.

Crap poetry is more painful than a toothache, and the practice of writing them should be vehemently discouraged. In the same way, people who write nursery-rhyme-type songs that rhyme like, well, nursery rhymes should be strongly persuaded to stop writing and take up some other hobby. Like knitting. Or cross-stitch.

This song (courtesy of BW) is a good example of bad song writing. Apologies to all fans, but I think it's an uninteresting, extremely banal song. I, of course, also know that I can't do any better, but that is precisely why I'm not writing any, going around fancying myself a poet or a song writer.

Conversely, simplicity, even though it's hard to go wrong with it, also can be disastrous sometimes. Like this message I got from someone I know, whose identity will not be revealed, which makes it okay to use the person's message as an example here - he said "dear, no one waste time, in waste thing."

That, to me, is more baffling than 'phenomenological' or 'sesquipedalian septuagenarian.' I needed an interpreter, and who better than the Wise Macavity! Her explanation - "Ah! Profound. So the way I see it, you cannot waste time when you're wasting it on something that's to be wasted, it's like the angst of life, a wasted life. Therefore, what is time, in this spectrum of wasted life? Nothing! Therefore, not wasted."

I think that's a brilliant interpretation. But it's not right to have to need someone to interpret you when you're not even quoting poetry.

Maybe sometimes it's just our fault. For our lack of comprehension and inability to grasp things. Particularly words and sentences. We were googling a certain song writer when a convicted sexual offender from Tennessee by the same name came up in our searches. Which led us to the Tennessee Sexual Offender Registry site, which, to say the least, was of huge interest to us - looking at the offenders' pictures, wondering about their lives, and what crimes they committed, which in most cases was 'AGGRAVATED SEXUAL BATTERY.'

Macavity was as perplexed as I, we were not quite sure what exactly that felony involved. We deciphered that whatever it was, it involved the offender battering someone, in an aggravated manner, sexually. Which was not really sufficient.

We decided to do a search, and Wiki tells us that "Sexual battery may be defined as non-consensual touching of the intimate parts..." "As successor to the common law crime of mayhem, this is sometimes subsumed in the definition of aggravated assault."

Our first encounter with the word subsume. Oh glory! A new challenge! I didn't like the word, because it makes me think of the word 'exhume' and consequently, rotting human flesh. Macavity says it makes her think of Science and academics. But according to Dictionary.com, no rotting flesh or science or academics, subsume simply means "to consider or include (an idea, term, proposition, etc.) as part of a more comprehensive one."

This infuriated Macavity greatly. "Why cant they just say 'include'? Pompous, and full of themselves! They should be battered, and fried, like pancakes." she said. I agree with her.

Anyway, abandoning the subject of words, and on to sexual battery, if sexual battery means non-consensual touching of the intimate parts, do you realise it happens ALL the time in India? And the people who do it get away scot-free, no police to catch them, no sexual offenders site to put up their pictures on, for the world to see, to shame them?

I know for a fact that most women have had their breasts and butts rubbed, squeezed, pinched, poked at, innumerable times - while walking on the streets, in a crowded bus, or market area. They're everywhere. In all the places I've lived in or known well, the city with the most sexual offenders roaming the streets - Chandigarh, followed by Delhi, followed by Guwahati. Hyderabad is better than most cities I've lived in, but it does have its own ugly offenders.

I'd like to batter and fry them all. Starting with all the sexual offenders, followed by big word users. Then maybe we can go after the politicians next. Keeping in mind to do Mizoram politicians first.

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Life, Coincidences, & Dancing

Let's start with coincidences. Aren't good coincidences just sweet! I was interviewing a candidate some weeks back, and like I always do, I showed her my ID card so she could take a better look at my name, because I know people often have a hard time catching it when I just go and say 'Hey, I'm Jerusha.'

She said she was familiar with the name because one of her closest friends also has the same name. "But she's from Mizoram" she added. I was a little surprised, and told her that I'm from Mizoram too. "She's a Hmar" she said (pronouncing it correctly too!), and proceeded to explain to me what 'Hmar' means!!! I thought that was my job! :-)

I, in extremely unprofessional, un-interviewer-like behavior, squeaked in astonished glee! Same name, same town, same clan! How's that for coincidence! Well, I suppose I can be forgiven for my momentary lapse of professionalism. After all, how many times does one get to meet someone who knows someone that has the same weird, uncommon, ancient name as you do, from the same little small state as you, belonging to the same clan as you - especially in this big, overcrowded state so far away from home!

I started on the second coincidence I meant to write about, but it looked really stupid written down so I decided to scrap it, guess I'll have to just save that instead for the next dinner conversation.

Anyway, the main purpose of this post is to promote our new videos :P - Video 1 and Video 2 (below). It's a lot of goofy pictures and clips, and I know my mom would be scandalised if she saw :-) First of all, she thinks dancing is for bad girls. But I love dancing, and I really don't see anything wrong with it.

We all work hard during the week, and me and my roomies hardly get to see or talk to each other during the week because of the crazy shifts they do. But on normal, good weekends, we start dancing from the moment we get up to midnight and beyond, with slight changes in the venues where we dance, though the ladies washroom is one of our ultimate favorites any day! And the guys never understand why we take so long in the restroom.. :D

Karaoke nights and making a fool of yourself comes with little rewards sometimes - like these cute alphabet fridge magnets. I won them the other night for one of those Who-does-the-best-job-of-making-a-fool-of-themselves games which I was convinced into playing because the White Mischief people made it sound like I'd win a date with VJ Nikhil..