Honey.. THANKS!

honey_blossom0: nuclear bomb morning
honey_blossom0: lol
Kyuzo: :D
honey_blossom0: lol
honey_blossom0: mad
Kyuzo: me?
honey_blossom0: whoelse
Kyuzo: hahah thanks!

When your heart...

When your heart's in someone else's hands
Monkey see and monkey do
Their wish is your command
You're not to blame
Everyone's the same

All you do is love and love is all you do
I should know by now, the way I fought for you
You're not to blame
Everyone's the same


Cowboys and Angels by George Micheal

The Longest Day..

21st June is the longest day of the year for the Northern Hemisphere. It is the day of the summer solstice.

On that day I became aware of this:

"she talks of you as if you have gone for work and will be back in the evening"

This is what living away from family feels like. Being in UK is my longest day at work. I come home for rest only once a year (for a month). There is great celebration at my arrival. My departure is likewise greatly mourned.

I achieve success through sacrifice. Success for my mother. Success for my close friends.

Coming home in the 'evening' (usually around December every year) is the most amazing feeling. I can't sleep. I can't rest. I hurt badly when I am home. I fall ill. I die. But I love it! It makes me realise I am a human being after all!

Being away from home. In UK. A different part of me comes alive. Part wolf, part human. My most basic instincts come alive. Those instincts go to sleep when I am in India in the comfort of my home. Where I don't have to fight.

Here in UK, I lie in my 6 by 2 bed (feels like a coffin) and be at peace. That is why I call UK a comfortable grave. The universal cure.

This reminds me of the following lines from 'Zombie' by the Cranberries:

Another head hangs lowly,
Child is slowly taken.
---
But you see, it's not me, it's not my family.
In your head, in your head they are fighting,

Chocolate milkshake...

Today something really amazing happened...

I was at my neighbourhood chip shop waiting for my food when I saw this sign advertising fresh milkshakes. I decided, on an impulse, to go and get a chocolate milkshake.

As I was waiting at the counter for the shake I saw a small baby girl (could make out from the colour of her clothes) lying in a pram. After a quick glance I went back to waiting for the shake. As I started looking around I noticed that she was looking at me. No wait. Not just looking but staring at me. As I started back with a stupid smile on my face (I am never really sure what to do when facing a baby) she slowly started to smile. It was like watching a flower bloom.

She game me the most amazing smile I have ever seen. Her eyes seemed so gentle. It was as if she was saying 'I know you!'

And whenever I would look back and smile she would again give me that same slow smile.

I guess anyone who has experienced something like this before (or experience it regularly) will know what I am talking about. It was the first experience of this kind that I have had.

Types of mornings...

I am usually not a morning person. So getting up is difficult for me! :D I love my sleep and my BED!

Therefore I started thinking what are the different kinds of mornings that one can have (in my experience).

1) Scratchy Lazy Morning: These are the kind of mornings when you are content to just sit in your bed (after waking up) and scratch yourself all over the place (like an ape) for the whole day if necessary. Such mornings usually happen over the weekend or after a very good nights sleep. It takes a while for your brain to kick into action.

2) Groaning Morning: Mornings that you wake up with a painful groan. The kind of groan which, as a kid, would have compelled your mother to check you for fever or ask you if you have a stomach ache. These mornings happen when you don't really want to wake up (usually during a working week!) or after a night of heavy drinking. On days like these you just want the world to leave you alone!

3) Screaming Morning: Mornings that you wake up screaming because you have a big day ahead, you slept for just 2 hours last night, your head is fuzzy, you feel like shit and you feel as confident as an earthworm.

4) Master Chief Morning: These are the mornings you feel full of confidence. You feel like you can cut through a million strong army of aliens (like in Halo) all on your own. You LEAP out of bed and go charging out into the world like a one man army!

5) In-bed Morning: This kind of morning is spent in bed (in an awake state) doing stuff. This is only possible if your desk and PC are right next to your bed and you have nothing major planned for the day (which includes everything that requires getting out of bed). These morning are quite common in winters especially when the room is as cold as a crypt and you are snug-as-a-bug in your bed. Such morning only end around 4-5pm when the sun sets and you start feeling hungry!

6) Nuclear Bomb Morning: These are the morning when your cell phone goes off next to your ear like a nuclear bomb, waking you from that amazing dream. Depending on the person who called, either you want them to call you like this every day (so that you can wake up with a smile!) or you pray to God that next time you will have enough sense to keep your cell on silent mode (no vibrations also!) before you sleep!

My God - What a Friday!

What do you do when your day starts with your house-mate coming into your room and asking you 'are you in the toilet' (and you are sitting in your bed trying to decide whether to get confused at the question or to laugh!).

Last night at 2am (Friday) I felt like eating cornflakes. A friend found that weird. Couldn't figure out why anyone would want to eat cornflakes!

The sleep was good. For the first time in days could sleep without thinking about..

Then I got out of bed (after the funny start) and started thinking what to do with the day ahead.

And thought the best thing to waste the day away would be to write this blog entry! :P

For the special people...

My promise to you in form of a song (Umbrella by Rihanna):

When the sun shines, we’ll shine together
Told you I'll be here forever
Said I'll always be a friend
Took an oath I'ma stick it out till the end
Now that it's raining more than ever
Know that we'll still have each other
You can stand under my umbrella
You can stand under my umbrella

These lyrics define the service level agreement of our friendship! ;)

Yesterday a friend made me realise something. Relationships are not about individual happiness. Its about being together. Its not about 'my' happiness or 'your' happiness... but 'our' happiness.

Thank you for that!

My world...

Sometimes life can feel like the above picture. Also blocked in and closed with a hint of freedom.
Yet the block is not all stone and cement. There are windows. There are openings through which you can either allow light or darkness.

The choice is yours!

Female Logic..

Firstly I am NOT trying to say that women can be totally dumb and illogical sometimes.

What I am trying to say is that female logic is different. That is what makes it interesting. It is most fascinating to watch two women talking to each other in different situations.

Three interesting things I will point out here which I find are unique to women interacting with women...

1) Sniping... this is the situation when in a group of women one woman is the focus of all the attention and one woman is jealous. Often one will find a non-obvious verbal war going on between the two. Nothing will be said openly or clearly. Everything is hidden behind a veil of words. If you can identify this sniping then its really fascinating to see the two women dominating for supremacy. Oh and if you think the other women in the group are not aware of it... you are wrong! They are already taking sides.

2) Friendships... have you ever noticed how women seem to become friends with each other for no apparent reason (that is unless a sniping situation develops)? I think there is something unique about this phenomenon. Its almost as if two women recognise they are part of some secret club or society and that bonds them together?

3) Questions and Thoughts... women think SO differently. It is mind numbingly difficult for me to even try and think like that! Today I asked a lady a question about girls (related to sniping) she asked me in return that don't you have a girlfriend otherwise you would never have asked this question! I replied that when two women talk and I am the third person there, I switch off my brain and start praying to God (seems the safest option to me!).
If I don't know the women (lucky me!) then I like to listen like a fly on the wall. I observe very carefully how questions and various supporting gestures are carried out. I think in women thoughts are totally different from questions they ask which are totally different from the information conveyed by their body language.


In fact being evaluated by two women simultaneously (say by your girlfriend and her best friend who you just met 10 minutes ago) is the most difficult situation for some. I find such situations quite revealing.

The one advantage we men have is that women get fooled with words! Say the right words at the right time and you get a 10 out of 10! You can have your cake and eat it too.

For all my female friends and readers... before you launch multiple sub-kiloton nuclear warheads towards me... the above does not mean that I try and make a fool of you! You are an important part of my life so I would never like fooling around with you (in other words I BEG FOR MERCY)!

;)

The most depressing thing on Earth...

Recently my blog was called 'the most depressing thing on Earth' by one of my friends. This made me strangely happy!

I wanted to create a garden, all I ended up with was a desert.
Yet the desert has its own beauty, it changes, new patterns, new trails.
A garden, while pretty, remains the same.

I wonder why do people get depressed reading things which should inspire them to fight pain and sadness. If I can stand here and talk about some of the things that go on in my life then why can't people do the same especially with the ones they trust and love? Why do people prefer to live on without hope and happiness rather than just letting it all out?

This post is not about pain. Pain is but a resultant. What scars our psyche is the pain, yet the pain is only the resultant. The true source is the incident or the happening which caused the pain. This post is about dealing with the true source of the pain and getting to live a new life.

The whole process of pain is bit like flooding. The pain is the water, the cause might be heavy rains, broken water mains or a burst dam. Once the flood retreats we can see the actual damage. The same way the true effect of the pain is seen once the pain is gone.

If we extend this analogy the repair of damage is the healing process.

Further extending this analogy, if a water pipe has burst the resulting damage can be fixed by the house-owners on their own. If a river has broken its banks then the repairs can be carried out by the local community. But if a dam breaks or there are heavy rains over a large area then external help is required since usually all support services of the affected region are crippled.

Similarly, sometimes the resulting damage (from a slightly painful experience) to our thought process can be repaired just by clearing our head. Go watch a movie, listen to some music and your mind is clear and fresh. The pain is no longer there. But in case the damage is more then we may need the support of our family and trusted friends. For example when one is going through a breakup the support of close friends is most important in making the person feel positive.

There are few incidents, which are so powerful in themselves that they have the power of changing your life, thoughts and destiny within seconds. I call such an incident a 'Stamp of God' on your thought process. Many people may find that they are overwhelmed by the incident. People just collapse. Life doesn't seem worth living. That is when they may need external support. Maybe psychiatric help.

It is also quite true that the only way you can help yourself sometimes is by helping others. Sometimes when you connect with others trying to repair the damage and help them with the rebuilding, you yourself find yourself healing.

There is a big problem with deep psychological damage: it is difficult to repair. It requires taking big steps and often people have trust issues with allowing others (especially psychiatrist) to help them take those steps. They say 'how can I talk to a stranger about this' or 'I don't want this to spread' or 'I don't want so and so to get into trouble because of this'. A statement which I have come across quite often is 'I just don't want to talk about it'.

If you have heard such statements then I can feel your frustration for not being able to help those who you love and care about. But you must remember that while your support is ALWAYS important for them yet everyone deals with the damage differently. Don't let your frustration remove the support that you give to them.

While they may not explicitly show that you are helping them dealing with the damage, your support does mean a lot to them!


Remember... everything changes. While damage due to pain might be extensive... the human nature ensures that it can be repaired fully.

Birth of Happiness and Death of Pain....

Yesterday was a very pleasant day for me. One of my best friends had a baby girl. This is the second time I have been to the Maternity Ward of the local hospital (Southmead, Bristol). First time for a boy, second time for a girl.

As I was standing there thinking about life and how it must feel wonderful to be a father a beautiful thought came to my head (thanks for the beautiful thought Sahara Samay! ;)) I thought that as the new baby girl has come into this world, she has bought happiness to the people around her. She bought a smile to my heart. It was like a bright light illuminating a bombed out house.

My head was full of thoughts after that. I did seem a little lost.

Having studied pain of all kinds over the years, I just feel sometimes that there are few things in the world which can get rid of it. However deep it is, however difficult to bear it may be.

My friend's words ring in my ears as I write this... he said this soon after his son was born: 'even though I have sleepless nights because of the feeding times and then I have to go and work, one look at my sons face after a long and tiring day is enough to bring a smile to my face'.

A child who is without wicked thoughts and with a clean heart is surely more than enough to remove any pain from the system.

I really don't know why I wrote this post. I cannot conclude it. I don't know where it is heading.
This post is supposed to say something.. but I cannot figure out what.

About Sahara Samay (for the curious reader) it is a news channel. This particular news channel makes sure I smile n laugh every time I watch it! So concerned it is, that I smile. :)

For the Anonymous Comment Poster!

I have been trying to figure out for last few days, who this comment poster could be.

There is just one thing I would like to state here... I don't know who you are but I know I am a very open and approachable person.

I will assume you are a decent person with my welfare partly motivating you to write the comments thus as a friend I will give you two pieces of advice:

1) Approach as a friend and not as anonymous (a question of trust!).

2) Establish a friendship and understand the person before trying to help them.

Hope this helps you out in deciding what to do next.

:)

Tears, Emotions and Ants

I am weak
But I am strong
I can use my tears to
Bring you home

Milk by Garbage

These lines move me every time I hear them sung by Shirley Manson. The mental image that I get from these lines is of happiness through sorrow. Coming 'home' is a topic close to my heart. But I wonder can 'tears' truly have the power of bringing one back? In this day and age of the Internet and the Ipod do we make such big decisions based on emotions only? Do emotions come into our daily life at all? Or does 'work' or 'job' form the bottom line for everything?

This shattering of emotions on the hard cold practicalities of modern life is not a good sign. Some people say that what separates humans from animals is the fact that we experience so called 'higher emotions'. These emotions therefore make us human. When we get rid of them for work or some other equally compelling reason, do we reduce ourselves to the level of animals? Kind of like ants who go around building and maintaining their nest, each ant objectively doing its assigned job?

On a different note: I wonder why we don't see some ants just lounging around doing nothing.

I can COOK!

I just realised... cooking is such a powerful ability. The power to feed yourself.
The only thing more powerful is actually growing your own foodstuff and cooking it for yourself!

Whether I am good at it or not, I do not know. Here is an image of mutton, as cooked by me:

Images..

This post is dedicated to special friends... one whom I, probably, gave a sleepless night and another who, I pray to God, never gets another sleepless night in this life.

This post is about images. Few posts ago a friend commented that one of the photos which I had taken and posted on the blog was really amazing.
This followed a discussion with my friend (who got the sleepless night, I think) about how sometimes what is said to you can bring up powerful images in your head.

I started thinking and I realised that while a picture speaks a thousand word, a mental picture is much more powerful. While paintings, photographs and other visual representations of the world have the power to move us a mental image has the power to shake us.

A mental image can haunt us like no other photograph or painting. Often mental images are associated with so many powerful emotions (both good and bad) that they end up sticking with us for life. This is specially difficult for people who can visualise very easily. When they are hearing things about other peoples lives they can draw up mental images as the conversation unfolds.

These images have a power to give us peace as well. Imagine the mental image that comes into your mind when you hear your sweethearts voice coming through a telephone. When that voice is happy you imagine their smiling face. As you imagine that smiling face, you start to smile.
When that voice has pain, you imagine them in pain and you start to feel sad.

Imagine the mental images within a true love story. Imagine the mental images within a true war story. Can you feel your heart going crazy and the smell of smoke in the air?

The power of mental images of course depends on your imagination (as stated before). If you are highly imaginative then you will create powerful mental images. This ability can be an asset as well as a curse.

A few days ago, I was left with such a powerful mental image created out of a phrase... a powerful yet confusing mental image. The image had a lot of pain (Anonymous.. here you go again!) thus it was powerful. But I was confused because the pain was so great that even I couldn't imagine the associated emotions of the person. I couldn't complete the picture. My brain couldn't process how a person would feel under that kind of pain.

That is why I wrote this post. As a tribute to the person who gave me the image and to the person who originally gave that person the image. Confused? Good.

In the end I just knew one thing... It is easier to forget that you have stopped.. than to start moving again.

This is what came to my mind and I posted in then and there. I am repeating it here. I hope people understand what it means. To keep moving is the only way out of the maze of pain in my personal experience.

Another Personal Quote...

It is easier to forget that you have stopped.. than to start moving again.

Would you ever want to move from a place like this?
Taken at Williamstown, Melbourne using my Sony P100.

Me + Girls = Questions

Me + Girls = Questions


Whenever I am talking with people and I am in a normal, relaxed mood, I am full of questions. Curious as a cat I am.

But this habit of mine really comes out when I am with a girl.
Many girls (from REAL close friends to casual acquaintances) have told me I ask a lot of questions.

After a proper analysis I have created a four stage process through which girls progress as they spend more time with me.

Stage 1 - 'Isn't it cute, he asks questions, he is interested in me'

Stage 2 - 'Why does he ask SO many questions?'

Stage 3 - Usage of expressions of frustration and CAPITAL LETTERS (if chatting/emailing).

Stage 4 - 'DUDE STOP ASKING SO MANY F****** QUESTIONS! IT IS DRIVING ME CRAZY!'


Most girls stop at Stage 2. Few move on to Stage 3 and 4. That is when they become my best friends. That is when I stop asking so many questions and they realise I mean no harm!

I am sure many of my friends will have things to say about this post.... especially the ones who have reached Stage 4.

:D

A Quote.. from me to you Mr/Miss/Ms Anonymous

Happiness of today will be burnt to ashes tomorrow.

Think about it.

This picture was taken by me while travelling on the Great Ocean Road, using my Sony P100 camera. The atmosphere of this picture speaks of mystery and great depth.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light!

Do not go gentle into that good night by Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.


Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.


Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.


And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Transmission Anthem...

When you never look back to see the light of tomorrow.. it is time for you to reflect, to loose control.

These are not my words. These are words taken from a song (named in the title). How true they are, if you can understand what they mean.

On a different note, does hope always bring expectations? I seem to think so. Then is it not better to be without hope and thus be happy? Where nothing can break the grave like peace/pace of life?

:)

I for one am always hopeful of a peaceful existence and end.