Another memory...

A reunion of college friends… Nothing like it in the entire world !!

The euphoria of just being back with “the gang”… The obvious as well as the subtle changes in people… The things that are still the same… The walk down the memory lane… The pure exhilaration of laughing my head off over the smallest of things… The connections being made between the past and the present… The new stories and experiences… The new idiosyncrasies… The new set of photographs… The gradually increasing decibel levels… The vivaciousness of conversations… The numerous cross-links… The bittersweet jokes and the banter… The sadness when parting, against wishes, with the promise to meet again as and when possible…

The best part - The smile on my face even hours later...

When life screws you, you need to screw someone else. Hence the need for venting systems - animate or inanimate.

The forced holidays are finally ending. At the start, I used to worry as to how would I spend so much time doing practically nothing… Each day seemed like 24 endless hours… but now looking back, I have absolutely no clue as to where did the 4 months vanish…!

I could have done a million things in this time span, which I will probably not get again, atleast not for some years… I could have travelled, but I don’t like to travel alone… I could have taken up a few activities, but I started with 2, one after the other, and left them soon enough… So what did I do all this while…?

Hmmm… loads of sleeping; became a couch potato and saw movies, soccer, F1 and just about everything but i was totally fixated by cartoons esp. with those on Animax; read 2 newspapers each day cover-to-cover; read a few books – fiction as well as non-fiction, should have read more…

I got selected in MnM and spent 2 weeks just contemplating whether to join it or not… Ofcourse this was a perfect opportunity for anyone and everyone to advise me, whether asked for or not, and so I got to hear some worthwhile views, some practical but absurd, some I just couldn’t deny no matter how much I wanted to, and some outlandish as well… but as someone said, it temporarily ended the boredom, though not in the desired manner…!

Could have taken up a part-time job maybe, but instead decided to do some voluntary work… enjoyed doing it, even if for a span of barely a month and a half… now I wish I had done more of such things…

Out of necessity had to undertake the task of shopping… its an unfamiliar territory and just seemed endless…

I had a great time catching up with some of my favourite people (obviously the ones who treat me royally ;) ! )… Though I had planned to catch up with all of them, but then things didn’t go the intended way…
I saw all my friends starting with their respective jobs, heard their stories and had my share of fun at their expense…

So to summarise these 4 months: sleeping, dreaming, getting big-time bored, meeting people, reading, TV and an overdose of lethargy !

Now I am finally on my way to do something I’ve been waiting for, for a long time…

The problem is…

quite a few people, some of my closest friends and some relatives, treat me royally. It makes me feel really magnificent. But it also makes me wish that the others treat me the same. And when that doesn’t happen…

A tale of 2 articles…

I read two articles today…
The first, an editorial in The Hindu, was about how the attempt to decongest major cities by constructing new satellite townships hasn’t really served its purpose almost anywhere in the world. People always kept going back to the base cities for a plethora of reasons ranging from work, family, and facilities to poor connectivity of satellite townships to the main cities. Also, a lot of semi-urban areas were being developed as private luxurious estates for the rich and mighty.
The second, from SETI, was that to accommodate the ever-increasing population of the planet, we must look at options like colonising other planets or free-floating cities in outer space irrespective of the numerous challenges the task poses.

Reading the two together, my interpretation would be: even if we do manage to build habitats in space, they probably wont really take off as expected. What will happen then…? We won’t be able to cohabit this planet and the outer space won’t be utilised to its required and expected potential. What kind of solution can there be…? How about exploring the depths of water bodies, notwithstanding the denser medium and hence the relatively obscure concerns…?

types of love...??

The other day I was watching useless stuff on the idiot box. I saw this serial which was talking about the situation when a brother – sister duo happen to get involved in a man – woman relationship as they were “in love” with each other. My first reaction was of utmost disgust. Its not unheard of but even the thought makes me want to throw up.

But then I got thinking… if we forget the physical intimacy aspect of the relationship, then how different is the love between a brother – sister and a husband – wife…? I think except the love a parent, though even that is subject to the individual but more often than not, has for their child, all other relationships have almost the same love. So there aren’t really any types of love… there’s only love.

height of intolerance

At the Royal Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, a GOLDFISH underwent an eye surgery after visitors said it looked ugly.
(Reported by Hindustan Times on 14th Sept'06)

And I thought the world would be a much better place if people were atleast tolerant enough, if not completely accepting, of the differences prevalent in the world. But the present scenario says be-like-us-or-we-make-you-like-us-else-you-can’t-exist.

first flight...

Yeah it has all been said before an infinite number of times, but I grasped the true intent of all those words only when I experienced it myself... my first flight.

People are generally scared of the take-off. But for me, that’s the most exciting part of the journey. The thrill of just letting go of earth is immense. And the next best happens when the plane turns in mid-air.

Up here, the sky is so blue that the only word that comes to mind is “Purity”, the only association I can make. Looking at this blue, I can’t comprehend something like air pollution. It simply seems unacceptable. I’ve never seen so many shades of blue at any given instant.

Clouds above me, clouds below me... Those above are nothing but wafting mist, enabling me to “see” air. But those below me seem to be as solid as they can be. I feel like walking out on the wing and just stepping onto the clouds & experience terra firma in sky. I’ve been through them and now I want to walk on them.
The white of the clouds is like no white I’ve seen before. It has a radiance of its own.
Every cloud is casting its shadow on ground thus seeming like a feature of the earth itself. The blend is amazing.

From above, the water bodies look anything but blue. They are actually green… I mean really green in various shades of the same. The dried and encroached upon rivers are a reality, which can be understood from here.

Sitting in the comforts of the craft, the outside temperature of –46 degree C is unimaginable.

From above an entire city looks like the tip of a finger. The roads are so visible that they literally do look like the veins running through a body acting as the lifeline. You can fly over as many cities and countries you want, but from above all that’s visible is undivided earth. Sad that’s not how it actually is on land.

There’s a lot of talk about air traffic, but I didn’t spot a single plane, even as far away as the horizon. Ofcourse, I am assuming it would have been visible.
I saw these islands, which looked like a fish blowing bubbles. It was a nice reversal for me to make out shapes from land masses instead of clouds !

Till now I had just been contemplating it, but now I definitely want to go parachuting.