Sanitary sense: a missing link?

India is undeniably a country of filth and dirt, but as always, my cribbing won't change it. So, this time, I've decided to curb my cynicism and speak in a rather calm and chilled out fashion, something that doesn't come naturally to me. As an average Indian, my listening skills fall way short of what is allowed as per an 'international' decorum of things. Anyway, as always, I don't think I'm making much sense, so lets just start afresh.

Okay; the other day, my school held some sort of function in which financial backing was provided to a few short-listed research topics selected by students of the school. By research topics, I don't mean a full-blown scientific research or behavioural research, that's too technical for high schoolers. What students were supposed to choose were 'social research' topics. Many of the students did come up with very innovative and potent subjects on which they chose to conduct their study. Some chose 'Women Empowerment', some 'Politics and Transparency', and others did 'Say No to Drugs', or something like that. The study branch that thrilled me the most, however, was 'Sanitation and Cleanliness' (again, my memory is not the most reliable thing in the world, so my apologies to my fellow students if I named their topics wrong). This was perhaps because I had more strong feelings on this particular topic than on the others.

The students came up with their demonstration and explained to the raptly attentive listener in me, all the activities that they held during their research. They had went to a rural neighbourhood to hold a seminar of sorts, handing out pamphlets about maintaining a basic civic and social sense of hygiene. They also detested the filthy habit of indifferent people who shamelessly, and maybe out of helplessness, excrete on the streets without restraints. This proved to be the premise of the topic I deal with in the coming paragraphs.

Campaigns of 'Safe Sex' or 'Prevention of HIV Aids', which have been, of late, a sort of taboo for people in our country, especially in the areas which we are focusing on in this discussion, have ignited in me a somewhat radical idea for which people have still not opened up completely. The idea which I propose is not a new innovation or discovery; its just that I feel, we in India are alienated to such a thought process. What I put forward is the free and unrestrained usage of adult diaper in the masses of our nation.

Now, for anyone who's been trained and groomed in the 'Indian' style of growing up, will most probably laugh this thing off, or get offended by it. I can't help the latter demarcation of people, because someone who seriously gets offended by the line won't read a word after this, implication being that their offence is, well, genuine. Anyhow, when you're done laughing or smirking or sighing at my childish thought, please have the kindness and regard to look at it in a rather practical light.

We have a very dire need of teaching our people basic civic sense, and I guess everybody would agree with me on that. People, not only villagers, but educated and urban people, on long drives and lazy sunday road trips, stop their SUVs midway to step out on highways and attend to nature's call in overlooking lush green fields. Now the best alternative to prevent such shameless acts of selfishness and indifference, can be of creating free, hygienic, toilets by the highways at intervals of, say, every 30 kilometers.

If even this is also an 'infrastructural drawback' for the government, the next best thing would be easily accessible and affordably cheap adult diapers.

Why not? If only we leave out the awkwardness and apprehension felt by people, and a sign of low self-control among your social circle of acquaintanceships, this is the perfect way out for such a dodgy and general civic problem. If we simply ignore the nasty social remarks and taunts poked at us, then maybe one day a clean, hygienic world can be imagined of. If each and every individual successfully and completely detaches themselves from the society, the society itself will prosper and be a better social milieu.

The advantages of defecating at the very moment of discomfort are innumerable. It, most importantly, increases the output and production value of humans manifolds. By and large, it eliminates bondages of frequent visits to wash rooms and prevents causing dissolution of focus and break concentration at the designated task. In a nutshell, if talking on a very productive and evaluative level, these garments would help humans deliver their best to their chosen fields of work.

To end this, I advocate people to open themselves to this filth crisis of sorts, and spread awareness about what all can be /should not be done regarding the matter.

Mass mis-communication

I need not remind you, but Indian media is, to say it in a rather undressed manner, pornographic. It derives a somewhat sadistic pleasure out of blowing trivial occurrences out of proportions. Its based wholly on guilty pleasures, to put it more aptly.

Conventionally, a particular happening creates a media ripple, and subsequently forces the people to think about it. But here in India, we can see media as catalysts of events that subsequently change the way people think! My point is, is media really that important?

News channels should confine themselves to just express a particular event in the most neutral fashion possible, and let the people decide what's right and what's not. They should function on a very unemotional and, let's say, robotic level. If you do want to shower your opinion on people, do it in editorial sections or weblog posts, why corrupt the prime-time slot with your incessant and irrelevant ramblings, or endless astrological bullshit? I don't want to know what to eat for breakfast so as to keep my luck ticking. I don't want to visit the gateway to the heavens! (would you believe that last one?!)

Why can't we guys censor news channels instead of cutting off vital chunks from unsuspecting films and DVD features? Why do sensible acts in movies get scissored off under the pretext of 'vulgarity' and 'profanity' and 'excessive violence', when news channels don't get prosecuted for their insanely stupid and half-baked notions? There should be a parameter for censorship, just like vulgarity, under which films and TV programs must be prosecuted, and that is, retardation. Yes, that would be the angelic solution to chuck off the rubbish that we face through Aaj Tak and India TV, etcetera, every single day!

I am almost beginning to sound like the stereotypical angry-young-man, but its actually we guys who are to blame. We watch these channels for the fun of it, for the sheer lunacy of it.We are the breeding ground for these news channels. Our attitude should be of indifference. The more we talk about it, the more we unintentionally popularise it. So, my appeal would be, to ignore what you just read, and keep mum. It was a mistake on my part to even write this, but now that realisation hit me a bit late, and the fact that I am a selfish loser, I'm not deleting this post.

Let's just keep the media to themselves. For pleasure or comedy, go watch Great Indian Laughter Challenge, or CID, for its lunacy and unintentional comedy. Don't poke fun at the news channels, leave them alone. Let the TRPs drop and see the change sweep its way in. Till then, I'd prefer CNN-ibn or NDTV.

The blinfold

[FOREWORD: after a long, long void of a few months, I come back with a bang with my first love, story-writing. Yes guys, here's presenting you with my second short story, which is really more like an article, mainly due to its very short length. Its also a "spontaneous overflow of powerful emotions", as Mr. Woodsworth would put it for me, and rightly so. I smell some hard-boiled criticism guys! On to work now...]

 The city was engulfed in emotions, as the winds brew invitingly, and brought in the monsoon clouds. Even the Gods had been overcome by a strong feeling of excitement, as the giant water-drops of precipitation falling euphorically on the earth suggested. The once-sunny day had now took a turn for the wetter and the clouds were being ripped apart by lustrous streaks of lightning strikes. New Delhi was in for a hell of a day.

The semi-wet earth smelt delicious, almost edible, as the zany motorcycles zipped their way through heavy traffic, water-puddles, and hordes of on-footers. Horns honking, and people chatting away, were the most prominent sounds that morning. Every one seemed engrossed in their designated job, not waiting a jiffy to appreciate the seductive beauty that nature had to offer.

But the rains cared not if its seductions found few takers. Quite the contrary, the rain symbolized selfless submission in the service and entertainment of earthlings. Somewhere in the forest, a peacock was at least acknowledging the presence of the down-pour by using it as an assistance to woo her girl  its love. But the humans, they were unmoved by the music of the monsoon, inept and incapable of being able to feel any deep emotions other than envy, greed, and competition. The great human blindfold was doing its work flawlessly, suppressing any human desire for real love and compassion for fellow beings, let alone inanimate bodies.

An old, frail woman of 88 years, blinded partially by age and erosion, struggled to cross the road with only her walking stick to guide her, which almost looked as ancient as herself. The speeding vehicles dodged her and zipped away, but none stopped their machines and stepped out to ferry her across the road safely. In fact, they completely ignored her very presence, and continued on with their daily chores, blinded by the great blindfold. The blindfold was unavoidable, and only the fewest of the few had been successful in getting rid of it. One of those few was a young, energetic lass who stood on the street overlooking the road where the old woman tried in vain to cross the inferno of the road crossing.

The young woman looked at the woman out of pure concern, doing so because she was yet to be corrupted by the blidfold of indifference, she was yet to be qualified a human. Her eyes showed a genuine urge to help her out, but the indifferent gaze of everyone on the street wavered he reflexive actions. As the old, ailing woman struggled helplessly to get to the other side, fighting off cars, bikes, buses and what-nots, the young, unnamed woman took one small step and broke away momentarily from the blindfold. But the blindfold was not giving up. A radio lay by the street in a pan shop, which chucked out random garbage meant to tighten the knot of the blindfold around the listeners eyes, a blindfold not only of indifference, but that of idiocy and lethargy too.

Suddenly, the instant that the young woman protruded her toes to walk towards the old woman-in-distress, the national anthem of India started playing on the radio. Ah, the final blow! The woman stopped in her tracks, having been transfixed by the hypnotism of the beautiful chant. She took her step back, and all her attention diverted from the struggling woman to the melodious verses of the anthem. Even the rains seem to be momentarily taken in by the blindfold, even they seemed to slow down and salute the song. She stood in full attention position, eyes closed religiously (or maybe out of respect), and fingers tucked in tightly by the waist. The blindfold of indifference engulfed her too, this time in the disguise of patriotism. She lost her conscience, her indulgence, he concern, her every emotion. All that remained was indifference. She finally became human.

The conflicting woman wandered aimlessly on the road, waiting to be guided. A bus, driven by another blind man, tied down with the blindfold, raced down the street at an insanely high speed, not even honking the horn to warn the woman. As the song bellowed on the radio, and the woman, grew increasingly hypnotized by the fake patriotism, the bus hit the old piece of human tissue and organ squarely in the chest, and the frail old body was lunged across the road, with intestines sprawled all over the path. A sprinkle of blood landed on the woman's face, but it created no effect on her, and it seemed to her no different than falling water-drops. All patriotism drained out of her by now, she could very well be an epitome of indifference, but no, as per the code, she had dutifully respected the holy anthem of a great nation. So what if someone has lost their already-miserable life due to her inaction? She had obeyed the national guidelines, that's all. The blidfold was wound around her tightly, and when the song ended, she shrugged the blood droplets off her face, and joined the crowd, literally as well as figuratively.

I believe in imperfection

“No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a part of the continent, a part of the man.”

-John Donne

Perfection is an enticing pay-off, which we as humans always hope, and strive to work for. Nevertheless, a not-so-very profound observation will be enough to tell us that practically, perfection is something that cannot be achieved at all. To some, my words would seem dejecting and discouraging, but a pragmatist might be able to relate with what I say.

Therefore, if we hope for a perfect society, or a perfect, corruption-free country, it will bring us nothing but disappointment. However, as artists, we have the liberty to venture out from practicality, and talk of a theoretical society, that acts for us as an ideal situation by exemplifying perfection itself!

In such a society, or to put it more aptly, in an artist’s impression of such a perfect society, humanity is no longer humanity as we know it. People are indistinguishable from machines. That is because, in the pursuit of the so-called ‘distilled society’, we are mere clones of each other. Everyone works on a predefined protocol and our actions are cold and calculated. An individual’s specified work-field solely decides their personality. ‘To each his own’ is the mantra with which people live and die by.

I might be able to express myself better with the universal example of an anthill. Ants dwell in a perfectly synchronized milieu, with each individual containing only fragmented intelligence of the whole society. If we take up a single ant specimen, we will find its intelligence to be subpar and its actions, mechanical. However, an anthill as a whole acts as an individual too. It works, grows, excretes, and even shelters itself. This tells us that even though a unit of the anthill, that is, the ant, has no understanding of the ‘bigger picture’, it does constitute to the overall intelligence of the anthill.

If there is to be a perfect human society, chances are that it will resemble an anthill. The society will work, not individuals. People will be merely a tool, and the society will build itself. There will be no space for emotions, relations, and individual greatness or heroics. Just plain society. My question is, are we ready for this kind of perfection? Don’t you think some things are best left imperfect?

Random chakallas: films, career, and chemical locha

I just finished watching this beautiful film called 'Luck By Chance'. Though flimsily titled, the film carries enough power to set one pondering. In my case, more than it moved me with its self-hilarity and endearing characterisation, it inspired me. It fuelled and supported my gradually subsiding fire of pursuing a career in film-direction and script-writing. Now, I'm not going to trespass any further on the plot, lest it spoils your own experience of watching he film.

What I realised was, when the film ended, my mother, with whom I was watching the film, though having been touched by the film, stood up and went about on her day-today work, without even waiting for the credits to start rolling in. This put another useless but engrossing thought in my mind: How can a movie, a good, meaningful movie, not scintillate you enough to chain you down till atleast we have the credits? I know that some guys would waste no time to point out that in my very last post, I had proclaimed that those who take films seriously, are fools. And now I'm saying the exact opposite of that! My answer is, I don't want you to take a movie seriously, but something must be in a good film, that made you feel a part of it, that enabled you to escape your already boring life and belong to the universe of the film. At least that very success of the film is worthy of some kind of acknowledgement.

With me, a good film, or even a fairly good one for that matter, does make me think as to what the film-maker had in mind. I tend to be over-analytical, and still, at the end of all my analysis and thought-process, I end up with nothing but the face value of the film.

I also tend to stay in the film for days, months even, if I find it good, but for my parents, my family, and my friends, films are just films. There is a sort of casualness and non-seriousness attached to even the best of movies. 'Its good, its great, but lets face it, it is just a movie. It brings not a hair-width of a difference to your life' they say. And hell, they are right. Maybe I am wrong, not the people. And this is how I learnt about humility and tolerance in various tastes and habits.

In our country, there are just too many stereotypes. That's because 90% of our population is still grappling with a chronic disease called mediocrity. In the midst of all the mediocre people whom we tolerate and deal with every other day, there are some few honest guys who work their arses up to earn a square meal for themselves, but eventually fall trap to these stereotypes. One such big stereotype is the famous 'nerd'. Yes, I am referring to guys who get admitted like herds of goats every bloody year in prestigious institutes like IIT, SRCC, and what-not.

Interestingly, some of these guys are actually those who romance with subjects like Physics or Economics, who derive passion out of their studies. Volumes of thick books written on droopy subjects actually are a drug for them. Their motivation is more than just a heavy paycheck and a coveted position in the society, but genuine interest. And these few people appear as nerdy muggers to laymen like me and millions of others. Maybe, for these irrational and genuine guys, people like me, who are inclined towards obscure, non-conventional and insecure interests, might seem like bunch of fags (please forgive me for my increasingly blasphemous writing). But the crux of the matter is, no profession in its pure form is bad. I know I am stating the obvious, but the obvious is true in this case!

What I want to justify in this post is the reason why I get so immersed in films, I get so carried away with cinema. That is because of my own unique chemical locha, or faulty brain wiring, that made me a film-fanatic and a gullible guy at the same time. We humans are unique because of these irregular interests which, at the first glance, might seem unrelated, but form an interesting combo which add up to our personality. That is the very essence of being human. You are, even if you don't have any apparent talent, one in a zillion.

An escapist's fixation: cinema post-mortem

Like with all things close to one's heart, I too do not seem to remember the exact moment in my life that I started to get inclined towards films. But yeah, keeping in view my rather strange abstract indulgences, this too did not come as a surprise to those close to me (don't you think my recent articles tend to talk minimally about me, but more of those close and near to me, mentally or physically?). Just like my few other apparently harmless addictions (?) like chocolate, Hide and Seek cookies (no, its not a paid advert), Hitman games, and a bunch of similarly useless and time-killing, pleasure inducing stuff, watching movies has, over a period of 14 years of my fruitful existence, also achieved a somewhat fanatical value for me.

As I have famously stated on my Orkut and Facebook page, movies act as a sort of 'portal' for me to escape into a parallel universe full of stuff that is not affected by this world we dwell, and if used potently, has the potential to affect our present world in a most effective and reformatory manner. As clichéd as it maybe, but films are utterly useless for those who take them seriously. I mean, yes, I agree that some films are serious in their sensitive premise or treatment, but they show only the tip of the iceberg. Let me express myself more soundly with the help of a few examples.

Lets study one of my all-time favourite films, the best psychological thriller of all-time,Memento, to strengthen my view point. Its psychological approach might sound really incredible to a film-junkie or a wannabe like me, even if it takes itself very seriously. And yes, it pitches out some awesome topics that one can debate hours on. But the point is, to a psychology guru, or someone who is an expert in that field, it might sound as a gimmick that is being blown out of proportions. Though to the average person it could garner a hell lot of psychological interest, butif this 'average person' would really have been interested in playing it forward, he would go to a specialist, not the cinema-hall to watch Memento.

In summation, great movies are those which talk of high-fi topics in layman's terms. Which are insightful on film-making as an art in itself, and not specialised technical themes like medical sciences, engineering, psychology, etc. For example, the highlight of Memento, was not the pseudo-psychological babble, but the other film-making technicalities like a taut screenplay, amazing editing, near-perfect direction and a deeply-involved storytelling. Of course, the psychological angle was intiguing, but that did not attribute to the greatness of the film.

Another illuminating example on the subject at hand would be the parallels I have drawn between two very critically-acclaimed films in modern Indian cinema, both on a somewhat (mind the 'somewhat') similar topic: Aamir, starring television starlet Rajeev Khandelwal, and A Wednesday, starring theatre maestro Naseeruddin Shah. Many would prefer watching the latter than the former, largely because of its in-your-face treatment and the no-nonsense direction. But if you ask me, I'd anyday rate Aamir higher than Wednesday in terms of pure film-making (mind the italics, they're there for a reason). Again, you guys would allege me of going with the less popular choice just to be different and make this post 'unique'. That's right guys, there might be some of it that's actually valid to some extent. However, first just hear me out and then judge my ingenuity of thought.

I saw Wednesday and my mind started racing. The message was clear, thought out, and vented out in the simplest way possible (don't replace 'simplest' with 'best'). Nevertheless, I though, heck man, had I seen this film on paper, I mean if I had read the script of the film rather than watching it, it would have created more or less a similar effect on my psyche. It would have moved me just as much as a novel with a same storyline would. It didn't harness the power of cinema, did not redeem the full magnitude and potential of moving images. It failed to create the thump, the goosebumps that only a film can give. It was way too spoon-fed, atleast too much for my liking.

However, on the other side of the table, was this neat little film Aamir, which I felt, was right at all the places Wednesday was wrong, and went awry at those where Wednesday was spot on. Unlike Wednesday, it didn't have that much a clear message, and was much abstract in its solution. Its core was very confused and entangled around a couple of other side-messages that the ambitious director wanted to eke in (actually, that's my kind of storytelling, there's not much attention of discipline as compared to substance). However, the film came out victorious because of its subtlety and its profound and vivid use of 'moving images'. Had I read the film instead of watching it, as I did with Wednesday, it would easily be successful in putting me to sleep. But no, the director had 'vision up his butts' (dialogue copied from School of Rock), and the power of cinema transformed the storyline into an amazingly watchable experience.

Well, that's enough dissecting films for awhile. Its just that anyone in my place would have done the same due to the inherently boring life of mine. Anyway, this post is a tribute to the cinema that I've grown up with (and still am), and my bizarre way of paying homage to the greats of film-making as seen through the eyes of a 21st centurion.

Catching me in an introspective mood...

Every passing day sees me getting more and more personal towards this blog. I Jai Ganeshed it as a medium for me to post away some of my stories. However, I got slightly more involved in it in the coming days(thanks to my idleness), and my second post was an article which was written for the sole purpose of showing-off some intellectual crap. But down the line, I found myself incessantly absorbed into writing random garble just for the goddamn heck of it. What was I trying to prove? That I was some one-in-a-gazillion child-prodigy who knew just too much English to not belong to the crowd of students he studies and is growing up with? While I was at it, I realized that I was a victim of severe superiority complex. The other day, I was reading some column in the Times Life supplement of The Times of India, which, through a dozen of simple binary questions, claimed to determine the 'personality stereotype' of the answerer. One of the questions (infact, the only one my memory retains) was: 'Do you spend hours admiring yourself in the mirror?' My answer was a sure-shot yes. Later, when I was done with an array of similar questions, I turned to look at the answers, eager to see what the result had to say about me and my personality. I very convincingly belonged to the personality stereotype 'narcissistic'. I looked at the word as if it was Greek. It was the first time I had come across this word. I wiki-ed it, Googled it, and even Yahoo Answer-ed it, thus conducting my very own brief research on the topic. Though the details of the informative wikipedia article elude me, but I do recall the basic gist of it. Narcissism is essentially a personality-disorder in which a person is egotistical, self-centered and carries a very unsympathetic approach to anyone except their own self. I could not believe it. Was I just another cold, self-righteous and selfish bastard (mind you, no spelling mistakes!)? I had, till then been endlessly reminded by my dear ones that I very easy fell for others' influences and what opinion others had about me. My actions, (they said), were heavily affected and influenced by what people thought about me, and that I did care about what people opined regarding me, something which I myself preach strongly against, and work my very best to practice too in my life. In this case too, I was shocked by what my 'dear ones' said about me (Ironically, this only strengthened what they had said, that I easily get affected by others' opinions about me). Anyway, after reading the article on narcissism, I was conveniently reminded of the fact that I took opinions very hard on myself. The fact that my 'dear ones' had pointed out to me this drawback in my personality, actually eased me! I persuaded myself that it was just another feel-good newspaper crap, written by a struggling writer, who added the do-it-yourself personality test as a space-filler, in fear that his boss would fire him for not coming up with something creative in a deadline of a week. Nobody other than me was going to tell me that I was a narcissistic. All it took me was two seconds to rubbish the newspaper aside, close the wikipedia article tab, and shrug off the guilt. And thus, an hour of mine had peacefully and hedonistically passed, with me feeling better than ever. They are always right when they say that happiness comes in small packages. My moment of happiness had come in the form of an article, which could have proved to be the most depressing thing for the day for some people (including myself), but for me, it was a breath of fresh air, a refresher, another feather in my cap. And thus, after being proclaimed a narcissistic by the well-meant newspaper column, I ignorantly became one. I might not have given my personality a disorderly dimension. I would have peacefully remained myself, unique, before the society typecasted me forever (another of my narcissistic rantings).

Victims of Civilization

[In this post, I take a jump from story-writing to article-writing, because the latter involves lesser imagination and time that the former, and I feel too lazy to etch a story around the idea I wanted to convey, so...here goes!] What defines a particular individual? Can a person be measured on the basis of his intelligence? Then again, intelligence can have variable definitions, which may vary from person to person. What I think is that the ambiguity of intelligence, as a term, is its true essence. Its flexibility in itself is a thing one can ponder hours on. Is intelligence directly proportional to success? Or is it knowing what succeeds in the society that actually defines intelligence? In both the above instances, it won’t be wrong on my part to remind you that intelligence is flexible. Just as in the case of ‘truth’, intelligence is merely a conceptualisation of the society-weathered human mind. Truth be told, what I actually assert is that defining anything in this world is a crime. It kills imagination a slow, suffocating death. It mauls down the inquisitiveness and genius for which God has provided us with organs called brains! It binds our inborn wildness and free-thinking that actually contributes a sizeable chunk to our ‘humanness’. It is human nature to think of oneself as a ‘superior’ being than animals, and because of that, there is an ever-prevalent compulsion of setting things in complete order among us. Humans just can’t stand chaos. Their lives must be in complete balance and everything should be in perfect organisation. The need for such a symmetric setting has resulted in the so-called social etiquettes and code of conduct, which I personally treat as cow-dung. Anyone who does not follow these set of rules, however inventive or intelligent he may be, is disowned and rejected by the bulk that is society. Let me sum up the above paragraphs for you in three words. Intelligence consumes intelligence. Intelligence is basically stupidity in the most layered and disguised form. Sort of putting up a lot of make up to enhance one’s beauty. The senseless and most unproductive fixation to find logical explanations and stability in the most random and arbitrary of happenings is what can summed up as human nature. Why don’t we have the balls to just let go and let the randomness of nature prevail? This sort of reminds me of the classic scene from the cult hit Fight Club, where Edward Norton, on being persuasively sweet talked by Brad Pitt, slowly loosens his grip from the steering-wheel of the car he is driving, and simply lets it go. He literally loses control. Digressions apart, what really prevents us from giving up the order and control of our life is pride, the pride of having the privilege of being born a human. Pride is a sort of drug that hampers our thinking and persuades us into believing that we are the sole masters of the world. It constantly reminds us that we are, officially, the most intelligent beings in existence. A fitting synecdoche of man’s desperate attempt of segregation and complexification can be seen in our current educational system. Our leaders consider themselves so wise and authoritative, they actually believe that a set of antiquated laws and rules and regulations can impart education successfully on a whole generation of students, year after year after year! How can a committee of a hundred-something members decide how to mould the future of a goddamn country? However intelligent one maybe, no one can be held responsible for judging what’s right and what’s not for another individual, other than, of course, their guardians. In the ideal world that I have in my proposition, there is no ‘society’. There is no formal education (that’s because I am suffering from it today and it’s MY world!), no etiquettes, and no stereotypes. No one represents anyone on a huger stage. Equality is practiced staunchly in each and every bracket of the world. However, like everything else, this ideal world also comes with an expiry date. As soon as humans take over, they use their minds, their priceless ‘gifts from God’, and use it to degenerate and complexify themselves and the objects around themselves. And alas, the perfect world remains perfect no more. Humanity is a misguided missile: it has the energy and potential to work wonders, but its crosshair is set at the wrong target! So long as each and every individual does not pay heed to anything except himself and his own conscience, the world remains purposeful and relevant. As soon as this line is crossed, our existence becomes synonymous with ego and pride. Materialism is a guiding force for some. Not many people work their hearts out to create something new, without being lured by a distant award at the completion of the task. This is another of the attributes of humans. And I don’t believe this to be wrong, hell no! Who wouldn’t want to be rewarded at the conclusion of a gruelling and tiring day’s work? But once again, just like in other countless examples, this simple desire for being awarded for one’s ability and effort transforms gradually into lust: lust for money. Now the tables turn. Those who have, over a period of time, earned a considerably vast bulk of money, get overly possessive about it and develop a phobia of parting from it. Hence, innovation gets rusted and stagnancy erupts. Repetitive and formulaic thinking gets encouragement and imagination chokes. This article grumbles a lot, and tries to be pseudo-intellectual, one would complain. Many readers would question, “What the hell is the point of the article?” This article is an object of self-amusement and a result of utter boredom of the author. It might seem to be just a set of random garble pieced together that pretends to be very high-fi and intellectual to the majority of readers. And I don’t disagree. The world is as it is, and it will continue to be so. There would never be the dramatic reforms that I suggest. It’s just a case of grass being greener on the other side. It is simply a tantalizing view of a parallel universe where the proposed ‘ideal world’ exists. Had I been in that parallel world, I might have conceived an article that would complain about the non-existence of a civilized society, and provide a view of the very systematic and mechanical lives we lead today. The fact that this article brings not even a shred of change in the lives of the readers renders it completely useless. However, before you start dissing me for wasting your precious time, let me quote Oscar Wilde: “All Art is quite useless”. THE END

Over A Cup of Coffee

“If triangles invented a God, they would make him three-sided.”

-Montesque

There was a sudden surge of pure white light and suddenly, everything went black. A crisp, clear whisper resonated, “Time to wake up.”  44 year-old Parth Sahay woke up with a start, sweating profusely. He reached out instinctively towards his left hand side to switch off his alarm clock, as was his ritual every morning. But as he tried to feel the time-piece with his hand, he was taken aback by its absence. As his vision gradually slid into focus after a few eye-rubs, he noticed that it was not morning as yet. Another fact that stuck him as abnormal was that his room was perfectly neat and tidied up. In fact even his bedside stool, which usually lay occupied with thick novels and bundles of loose paper, was exceptionally clean and empty.  As he jumped off his bed, hundreds of questions inflated inside him. What exactly had made him wake up in the dead of the night? What made him feel so tense? Had he experienced a nightmare? All he could remember was a violent blast of white light after which he found himself awake. And then there was always the uncanny cleanliness about his room which he had never bothered to maintain. A part of himself told him that he was still in some kind of a dream, and he should go back to his bed and forget it. But something inside him urged him to stay awake. After about a two-second thought, he decided in the favor of the latter. What harm would there be in having a glass of water before dozing off again?  He stood up, wore his slippers and left the room. As he crossed the drawing room to reach for the refrigerator, he froze with fear. There, on his dining-table, sat a middle-aged man, smiling at him in a know-all sort of manner. For a second, Parth was petrified with shock and bewilderment. Then, as he came back to his senses, he realised that he had seen the man somewhere, but could not recognize who he was. This thought calmed him down a bit. “I was beginning to get anxious about you. Have a seat,” said the man as he motioned towards the chair. His face still bore that slight smile. He was holding a cup of coffee in his hand, and another cup was kept on the table, beside a kettle full of coffee. He wore a formal white-shirt layered with a black coat.   “Wh-who are you?” stammered Parth, “and what are you doing here?” “Well…let’s say, my name is Yash Thapar. But that’s not the point. Firstly, would you like some coffee?” asked the man. Perplexed at being asked such a trivial question when he deserved some substantial answers, he merely gave a grunt that was more of a ‘no’ than a ‘yes’. Thapar ignored him and poured the contents of the kettle into the cup, and offered it to Parth to drink. He took it with trembling hands, and sipped at the coffee, which immediately relieved and calmed him down.  “So, what makes you come here in the middle of the night? A nice little chat?” he asked with a hint of sarcasm in his voice. “That’s what it is, I want to talk to you,” said the man. “Go on…” Parth said. “Well, for starters, you are dead,” declared the man in a cold voice.  Parth laughed at the absurdity of the statement, but when he saw that the man did not return the favor, he stopped it. “What do you mean by that, old man?” he asked in growing panic. “I mean just what I said: you are dead!” The man said simply. “Wou-would you care to elaborate that statement?” Parth asked him in a low voice, this time being even more anxious.  “Well, it means that you have ceased to exist, if that’s what you want to hear!” He smirked as he said so. Parth kept staring at the man in disbelief, as if waiting for an explanation. Then, almost telepathically, the man said, “Listen to me. I am not going to waste my breath persuading you to believe that you are dead. I can just make you understand. What is the last thing you remember before waking up here?” “That’s what I’m trying to--” Parth stopped midway through his answer, because he had a sudden realization of what he had been dreaming about. Strings of visions rushed before his eyes, curtaining him temporarily of sight.  He saw himself sitting leisurely in the back-seat of his Audi A6, giving orders to his driver. The car rushed past the glittering night-lights at 140 kilometers an hour. At a traffic crossing, he urged his driver to drive past the crossing before the lights turned red. The driver obliged, and pushed the accelerator to its full extent. Out of the blue, a car came from his side of the road at an equally high speed. It came straight towards his car, its head-lights emitting blinding white light. The car came within inches of his car, with him gaping at it helplessly. There was a sudden surge of pure white light and suddenly, everything went black. He came out of the vision as abruptly as he had entered it. The look on his face was of horror and utmost disbelief. He could not come to terms of his own death. What kind of gamble was that? “Now you understand,” the man said, bursting his bubble of thought. “Or do you?” For a few moments, Parth could only gasp and pant. After that period, he shouted, “This is nonsense! You are a madman!” The man, as always, kept on smiling. “You can believe what you want to believe, I can only show you the way…” he said as he sipped his coffee. “To hell with you and your goddamn theory! And eve—even if you are right in all this by any chance, where do you fit in?” “Now we’re getting somewhere…What I’m going to tell you now might be another shocker for you, but I am God.” This was too much for him and this time Parth gave a full-fledged laugh. It wasn’t the effect that “God” might have expected, but still he kept a straight face, patiently waiting for the outburst to subside. After the laugh had died out completely, the man said, “Again, I won’t waste my time to make you realize what’s true. I’m here to do my job, and I don’t have all day. Let’s get down to business.” He reached into his coat’s inner pocket and took out two folded sheets of paper, stapled carelessly to each other. He handed the parchment to Parth, who accepted it with trembling hands. He opened it along the creases and started reading it. The text, in a highly stylized font, read: “I address you, human, as the controller of your destiny, your environs, your thoughts and your emotions. It is hereby informed to you that you are officially dead (as of 12th June 2009). Attached to this paper is a list of all the deeds you have ever committed in your life after attaining the age of eighteen years, a sort of bio-data of yourself. On behalf of these deeds, you would be adjudged by me, on the basis of which you would be segregated into either Heaven, or Hell. Signed: God” Parth read and re-read it many times before he looked up. Looking at the scarred old man set his mind ticking. What sort of crazy scheme was this? This man, calling himself God, comes to him announcing that he is dead! The thing seemed ridiculous, but something told him it was not all false. For the second time that night, the old man interrupted his train of thought by snatching the paper out of his grasp. “I suppose you have read it by now,” he said, “and that should have been enough to convince you that you are dead. Now let’s save both of us time, and start your allotment process.” “What allotment?” asked Parth, in an unusually calm voice. “Your allotment into either heaven or hell.” He explained. This time, Parth did not retaliate, since he was surely convinced that he was in a nightmare. He repeated that thought again and again in his mind, but somehow he could not feel at ease. The man turned to the attached sheet and started reading it in a transformed official voice, “Name: Parth Sahay. Occupation: Author. Age (at time of death): 44 years. List of deeds from the age of adulthood is as follows: 1.    Bullying junior: Negative 2.    Cheating in exam: Negative 3.    Studying intently: Positive 4.    Slapping sibling…” And so he went on and on, never for once looking up at Parth. Parth just kept on listening raptly to him, and as he did so, long-forgotten memories came back to him, which formed a huge lump in his throat. He revisited his college days, and then gradually the time he spent with his parents, which finally made way for his married life. Memories that had been, till now, lying neglected at a far corner of his brain, confronted him as if they had happened only yesterday. Thapar shrewdly went through all of the list continuously and without pause, never for once realizing its importance for Parth.  When finally, after about 45 minutes, Thapar stopped reading the text, Parth saw himself crying his heart out. He finally realized that there was so much more he could have done in his lifetime except worrying about his job or earning money. He had taken the small things in life too much for granted, and he had realized this fact after his life had ended. “Calm down son, I know how you feel,” Thapar said in a soothing voice, handing him his coffee.  He instinctively gulped the coffee and felt warmth spread all over his body. This sudden relief bough him back once again to his usual self, and he jerked-off his tears and felt much better. “What now?” he asked in a rejuvenated voice, “Where do I belong? Heaven or hell?” Somehow, he had passed over the fact that he was dead, and was quite much at peace with himself.  “Well, you’ve got 11034 negatives, and, let me see…about 11030 positives.” He announced with an air of finality in his voice. He waited for any response from Parth, which he did not get. Then, after two minutes of vacuum between the both of them, he spoke, “Well, under normal circumstances I would have given you hell, but since you have been widely acclaimed to be one of the greatest thinkers of our age, and have contributed to society in every way possible, I might have to make an exception…” He again went into deep thought. “Very well then, congrats!” he said suddenly, emerging from his trance. “You are the few of those who belong to heaven!” He held out his fist for a formal shake-hand. All this while, Parth had had his face dug deep inside his hands. He was thinking and forming up his own theory to all the happenings of that night. He suddenly looked up, and his previously sullen look was replaced by feverish excitement, which almost made him look insane. “You, my friend, are not God, You just can’t be!” he declared sonorously.  “Come on now, don’t start again…”said the man irritably. “You see, this time I am neither joking, nor am I acting on impulse, and I am even not expressing any irony, I am very clear and rational this time. And I don’t think you’re god, that’s impossible…”he declared confidently. The man opened his mouth in protest, but stopped before speaking anything. For the first time that night, he had a look of dreaded astonishment on his face. For a few seconds he just gazed at Parth with an expression of utmost disbelief on his face, which made his facial scars even more prominent. It was half a minute later that he spoke, stammering as he did. “We-well, how did you know?”  “Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. However, you do owe me a hell lot of answers. So, who are you, if not God?” He asked. The man still looked at him with horror. He looked as if he was handpicking the right words for his answer. “Well, I don’t know how,” he said slowly, “but you have just found out what you weren’t supposed to. In fact, no living being, let alone human being, has ever questioned me the way you have. You have attained the level of realization not meant for human beings to attain. You know--” The rest of his words were drowned away because of Parth’s interruption. “Cut out the sensationalist jargon,” he snapped, “and answer my question.” “Ok.” He said as he shifted around uncomfortably in his chair, “what do you think happens to a particular individual when he dies?” “I don’t know. I have never given it any thought,” he replied. “Oh, really? Just pretend that you didn’t meet me here tonight. What would your thoughts about afterlife be?” asked the man. “I’d probably believe the Hell and Heaven theory. The theory that states that a person can either go to heaven or hell.” He replied. “Yes. Because your perception was so, that’s why it happened to you. It’s one’s opinion that matters. The mind makes real, what it thinks is real. It cannot do so in reality because the so-called ‘Laws of physics’ bind the actions of real life. However, when it escapes the world after death, it puts to practicality those ideas, about which it had been dreaming all throughout its life.” He looked as if he had a sudden gush of excitement. “The place where you are sitting is not bound by any laws. It’s the perfect playground for a fertile mind, a mind such as yours! Because in this place, there are no limits! The mind sees what it chooses to see! You get me?” Parth was listening to all this with the interest of an overly fascinated science student. “Yes, to some extent.” He responded thoughtfully. Thapar, unable to contain his enthusiasm, went on speaking. “It’s all a mind-trick. When you confidently refused to believe that I was god, your mind made it sure that I really wasn’t! And now I am somebody else!” he half-shouted with feverish excitement. “What place, according to you, are you at, presently? Your home? Hell, no! This is an image of your home as created by your brain. Doesn’t anything strike you as extraordinary here? Isn’t it a cut more clean that you ever kept it? It is because it’s not the house you lived in, but one which you aspired to live in. You always wanted to maintain this type of cleanliness in your house, but you couldn’t, owing to your busy schedule. Now there’s only one question that remains to be answered: where do I fit into all this?” He asked as he nipped his coffee. Parth was only listening, not replying. He was bombarded with so many different speculations at a time, that it was not possible for him to take part in a meaningful interaction. Thapar didn’t wait for him and answered his own question, “I am your alter-ego. Every man, whatever his opinion about afterlife maybe, from the time of consciousness, is divided into two parts: one, what he thinks, and two, what he does. All the life, his thoughts about certain things are different from what actions he takes against or for the things. These two divisions are in anonymity with each other until the man dies. After his death, these two parts are treated as two different individuals, because they are completely asymmetrical to each other. Both may or may not have different perspectives about death, so they may or may not be judged by similar means. So far, so good. In your case, throughout your life, you believed in the heaven-hell theory, but when I confronted you, you suddenly had some kind of brainwave, and almost entirely convinced your mind that I am not God. So the mind had nothing else to show you, because you had no alternate theory that explained death, so it reverted to what really happens after death. It presented your own alter- ego to you, in my form. We are part of the same person. You are his actions, and I am his thoughts. It seems his actions were much better than his thought, that’s why my face is full of scars and wrinkles, and you look normal. If the person we constitute to had done exactly how he felt, then we both would have been one single person. I have been made to meet you because you have obtained knowledge of the ultimate realization: death for a man, is as the man thinks it is. So, to make both of us come to terms with our death, we meet.” He gave a deep sigh and stopped, looking deeply satisfied. He drank away what was left of the coffee, and slumped back comfortably on the back-rest. A strange kind of completeness had taken over Parth too. It seemed as if his life was, in the truest sense of the word, absolute. He too drank the coffee to the last drop, and ultimate peace took over him. He wanted nothing else than to sink away into oblivion, just like that. His mind readily obliged, and played the last move of its existence. The next second, he was plunged into nothingness, just like that. THE END
Over A Cup of Coffee by Bharat Misra is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 India License.