Vertigo

He was wearing that typical Che Guevara T-shirt that has never left him since he joined college. That was the one of the most convenient ways of recognizing him in a crowd of similar dumbs.

“hey, whats up with your Che Tee? “ I said slapping him on his back as he sat there in the dingiest of bars in Banaras. He was sipping on his AC Black with a small filtered Win fulfilling the smoke cravings. I had just returned from an internship in Mumbai with one of the leading Investment Banks to complete my final year in college and then get placed in an even bigger firm. I had developed quite a penchant for the high class pubs and wandering hippie girls with long hair and their liberal notions and tendencies. And in his presence I certainly felt devoid of my insecurities, elevated from his lowly life and so much more hip

He gave his usual lop sided grin, “I thought it looked cool”. He lacked an apparent irony, and no matter how innocent his reply was, I was already feeling bad. I felt intellectually hurt. I wanted him to give him a lecture about Che and what he did to the world that results in every Tom, Dick and Harry wearing one of those Viva La Revolucion T-Shirts. But then I restrained myself, he wouldn’t have understood anyways.

“hmm, seems like you are pretty cool, dude. The t-shirt matches your personality too”. There was no way even a bimbo was going to miss the sarcasm in my voice but somehow it just flew over his head.

“This is cool fashion man, something like banging head and smoking up”. That summed up his understanding of the world and spirituality brought upon by nationalist feelings of Guevara

He was one of the most confused and dumb person I had ever met in my life. The only thing that related us was that we played in the same band, and he somehow, despite being incredibly obtuse, was a gifted guitar player. Perhaps the best I have ever seen. But as it happened in due course, my ambitions started to take a toll on my recently grown passions and I had to divert from drums practice during third year of my college. Most of our band mates had dispersed, getting good internships somewhere, with him the only one left behind in college doing a project with a proff as he couldn’t score an internship. He kept creating music, smoking up and living in his cell.

And every time I met him, he would rave about some defunct heavy metal band from the 80s or some obscure 70s progressive band like Uriah Heep. During the free time during summers, he managed to gather a band of his own, which was an achievement as he was perhaps most unpopular of all the lot in a place where being in a rock band was like being part of an Oscar winning movie starring against Bonham Carter and playing Hannibal Lecter. So his newly assembled group of headbangers did the cover of Santana's Black Magic Woman each and every night. Sometimes they played it twice or thrice in a single day. And when it was not Santana, they would play, No woman No cry. I cried almost everytime out of boredom and their too small a set list.

He would pity me every now and then. “Bro, I see potential in you, you’d make up a great drummer. Just pick up the sticks and join us in the garage” He strummed a riff from Satisfaction

“But you don’t have a garage, do you? You guys practice in the common room of our hostel. And the drum kit is shabby, and moreover I have things to do friend!!”

“yeah, I mean you can practice with us as long as you are hanging around, you look a natural” I almost took offence at this as I considered him the worst judge of a person, in fact worst judge of everything. But I somehow didn’t feel like saying no to him as I wasn’t up to much anyways.

One day he took me to meet another group of Jammers who were practicing some pretty hardcore metal stuff. They all looked like descending directly from hell with their weird hairstyles and awkward jargons. Their room smelled of pot. And then one of them asked “Hey Bro, can I borrow your crybaby, your wah-wah? And the drummer handed him the foot-pedal. They told me, that following Nirvana was cool, Pink Floyd was cooler but the killer following was of Jim Morrison, it was coolest. I laughed at all their notions. It was all so kiddish and wannabe. I hated this bunch of kids with instruments in their hands, toking up and crying to change the world.

And that’s where it all started.

“Dude, I am going to play in the youth fest, we won the inter university championship and now they are calling us to Gangtok to take part in the National youth Fest. It’s going to be awsome”

I felt a bit jealous of his joy. I had never felt so happy ever in my life, but then again he was happy everytime. He was such a moron that he could not control his hormones to shed tears in sorrow and smile in joy. He was always happy in the end.

“yeah that’s cool, so when are you guys leaving?”

“well, what? Aren’t you coming along?” – He was shocked that I was not being a part of his stupid plan

“Well Dude, I got to get back to my internship in Mumbai, I just took a week’s break to come home, I have to go back in a day or two. But yeah, good luck to you and your endeavors. “

And then it happened. I came to know from my college friends that he never came back after the youth fest. It almost became a folklore in our campus about the most stupid student who ever came to our college, who turned out to be the best guitarist it had seen and who never returned back from the mystic Far East.

After doing a lot of research I found out the truth about what exactly happened while he went to the fest in Sikkim.

His performance was at prime of its beauty, the town was dancing to his songs. He played Freebird, Roadhouse Blues, Communication breakdown and Comfortably Numb there. He was the overnight superhero of the place. The band won the competition and he was awarded the best musician award. All of a sudden he was feeling light, he had money, he could do things that he wanted to.

He even planned upon buying another Che Tee and Adidas Shoes, that always eluded him because of his low pocket money; There was so much he could do now.

“So dude, how do you plan to spend this money?”

“Well! I thought over it. I am gonna travel with the money. Will try saving some if I can and will be back in a month”

“But what about those Adi Shoes? And what about college? This is final year mate, you are going to get placed”

“Well I thought about that as well. I don’t really need shoes right now, these sneakers are doing well and moreover College has been over for me long time back. I am not going to pass anyways, leave apart getting a job. My college is over”

He emphasized on the word ‘over’. He wanted his emotions felt.

“So where are you planning to go? Have you thought anything?”

“nah, haven’t planned, but yeah will be hitch hiking mostly. Will travel on foot and will explore Indo-Tibet regions of North East mostly”

“well, then cya soon mate, you really ROCKED”

And that was the last conversation anyone ever had with him. After he set on his travels, he never returned, although he became a legend in college as “the ultimate traveler” and a several other names.

Time kept flying and hence changed things. I got a big job and started a family in Seattle. His disappearance became a lost strand of thought in some distant memory. And then one good day, I drove out of my workplace into a highway jammed with cars. The noise was unbearable making my insides feel hollow. I had an unfamiliar feeling of déjà vu. I felt lost in place and time. There was a thunderstorm arriving from far east, and it made my heart ache. It reminded me of him, the one who got lost. I suppressed a sudden desire to turn my car and try and follow the source of the storm. It felt impossible to extricate myself from the turbulence surrounding me.

“honey, it’s me. Hey listen I got something to tell you. There was this friend of mine”….and I explained everything to her. And then I told her my hopeless quest to find him. She was aghast at the idea but then later on she felt the desire, the unrest that I had been going through and reluctantly agreed. I told her that if I don’t find him in a week, I will return back to the so called Normal Life I was leading.

The thing called Internet which was just a myth five years back had reached a new level of penetration among general population and we the tech savvy, well informed generation knew how to use it.

And then there was a thing called Google. It was modern Day version of God, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Omniscient. It knew everything. I tried different searches regarding story of a college guy who got lost in the jungle and after 3-4 tries, there he was, distinctively recognizable. He hadn’t changed a bit in last 5 years, he looked the same with his stupid grin of his. But what struck me, and struck me hard was that he was some Lama in a Sikkimese Monastery. From what I knew about Lamas was that they were people very high up the hierarchy among Buddhist Monks, perhaps highest.

2 days later, I was riding down a dense forest lane when the truck suddenly slowed down. I looked at the driver, old and ornery, he started to inspect the rear tires.

“well, you do have a spare one, don’t you?”

He glowered at me and then went to the side of the truck and squatted there. Deliberately, he took out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and started to smoke.

I realized after quarter of an hour that he was not going to move so I decided to cover the remaining distance on feet unless off course I could find another lift.

And then I shaded my eyes and looked at the horizon. Far off, I could see a colorful flutter of flags of a monastery. My curiosity was reaching a climax, it was almost unbearable to quench my desire to know. I didn’t know what exactly I was seeking, I had just been running, felt like I had even lost interest in meeting an old friend, the one who got lost. How ironical it was, the one who got lost was the one who knew it all and here I was apparently having everything and still so lost.

When I entered the meditation hall, it was covered in saffron and gold. And there he was, surrounded by a big entourage. I had to suppress a desire to laugh when people started rustling and bowing around him.

“Lets talk about life”

And all the whispers died down instantaneously. There was a serene calm about the way he spoke.

And then he kept speaking. I felt embarrassed by the simplicity of his ideas. I just wondered, what would I have been doing had I been at home, probably checking stock quotes, having a beer, watching a life sucking sitcom, a movie, football… everything just felt apart by his ideas. I had felt so complete in my assurance, about my own superiority. In intellectual as well as material sense and particularly in comparison to the least intelligent person I had ever met in my life.

And then he spoke

“Compassion is something intrinsic to all sentient beings” and everything around us dissolved. And that was when I started feeling awe and shame. Compassion was the word….

Vertigo

And then clarity.

I decided to meet him after the session and discuss how has life been…

I thought it would be a good life now, good enough!!!!

ViRiLiTy

Her conflicts of wanting and non wanting
Her desire
To hold on
Or let go
Afraid of bizarre seductions
Tired of giving in
And putting efforts
Being left with
Her feminism undone
And craving

Her appreciation for pure
Love for beautiful and strong
Her hatred for failings
Fear of love
An amalgation of cold and spite

And then in the mist
Her eyes meet the master’s
“oh, he is the best creation of God
But there is no God
The world will ruin him, so I should destroy him before”
She surrenders, succumbs
She invites his virality
He invades her singularity
He was a master in
Possession of her slave

The rape of pride
Virility’s victory ride

Not a word spoken

Master! You’re not the rapist anymore
You are now the victim
You are slave to my passion
You have been tricked
And now you cannot resist me

Your virility is now your servility

the pursuit

Our pursuit of happiness is the soul driving factor in our lives. Its mere presence makes it worthwhile waking up everyday, dressing ourselves to the occasion,wearing our masks and be presentable. Its perpetual hunt for our realisation that deep down keeps us ticking and even the most cynical and nihilistic of individuals end up craving for it. By the way, coming to wearing our masks so that we are fit for any occasion what so ever it may be is the most important part of our lives. But it also ends up in making us prone to the world’s naïve accusations. As one of my friend quoted once ‘wear the mask cos people don’t really want to see who we are inside, they love the face we show them; but again don’t wear the mask cos the moment they realise you’re wearing it, they’ll lose every bit of faith in you’. But despite the misgivings it breeds, we always wear a mask. And so did Alpha. All his life he believed he lived by his own rules, he chose his life rather than being thrown into the alley and left to fight. Every morning he woke up, he used to admire himself for being himself. He felt as if the sun, the moon and the rain were all for him. He felt happy without really looking beneath the surface. He felt supreme, someone who could take the world for a ride, then he would dress up to the occasion and prepare for his workplace. He was living a life where there was no pursuit of happiness. He knew he was happy and that his chase has ended with him driving his life around. In his office, he felt even more powerful as if the sense of self importance dawned over him. In his office he was an important man, much more important than at home. He liked his work and felt like the ‘el capitano’ working with people who he considered much inferior to himself. He could make them feel timid, he could impress his bosses at will without caring for the steps taken in the deal. He felt as if he was working with a bunch of unintelligent apes who were all working to make him feel better. This was his narcissism. This was his playground and he made people play according to his rules.

And then it happened one day. He was ill, decidedly! He was so well forever! He was feverish, horribly feverish, or rather in a state of feverish enervation, which made his mind suffer as much as his body. He had woken up from a violent dream and his insides felt hollow. He could not remember what was the dream but he knew nothing could have been a worse nightmare. He was sweating heavily, his pulse was high, eyes dilated and nerves highly strung

But somehow he managed to regain his conscious and tried to sleep. Within minutes his sense of self overpowered the bad dream and he was snoring loudly again

He stayed alone in a big house with no one to bother. His girlfriend, who he used to mock often in front of his friends, wanted to move in with him but he wouldn’t let that happen lest it should interfere with his life and may tamper his happiness. He was perfect being in his own groove and didn’t want to disrupt the utopia he had managed in his life. His friends knew him and hence they also didn’t care much to intrude and be a part of his life. He made them all believe that he was happy and slowly they believed him. So during their conversations it was him who had no problems and he used to consult people about their lives. He used to tell his friends a million things they should change in themselves to be happy, to be like him

And finally this mask became his flesh

Without realizing it, the individual composes his life according to the laws of beauty even in times of greatest distress

And so his life reflected love, antipathy, charity, or malice without him even knowing it. Here we must also understand that our sense of importance is also the product of the world making itself vulnerable and small. And so Alpha was a result of the misfortune of the world and his awareness of the beauty that he was

Mondays were never good for him as he had to go to office after his crisp weekends; but this Monday wasn’t particularly encouraging. In fact the same thing continued on Tuesday and Wednesday. Somehow he had lost grip at office. People were not that apprehensive and when he tried asking his colleague for a coffee, she had the firmness enough to say no to him. His perception of things and people suffered a blow.

Reality exists independent of consciousness

Rand’s definition of objectivism points to the realisation of a philosophy for living on earth. As she mentions in Atlas Shrugged - My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute

The next thing that happened was his girlfriend ditching him calling him a loser. The word loser ripped him apart. He always though others as being losers, much more inferior or to be precise ‘humane’ than him. It seemed as if the whhole world was focussed upon making him feel done. Nothing was going right for him or nothing was going the way he predicted or preferred.

An atheist, who always believed in making the world a place fit for him, himself, had been shaken. His conscious, existence and identity all came under scrutiny. No matter how hard he tried, things kept getting worse. In the end he had to revert back to the priests to overcome his pain. But none of them could come up with a satisfactory explanation for his life to be undone within days for which he nourished himself so long.

And one day returning from work, when he had almost decided that he was going to end the life that he could not control, he saw him. He was light, he was Shiva, he was desire, he was delirium. He was everything that Neil Gaiman mentions in Endless Nights - Destiny, Death, Dream, Destruction, Despair, Desire and Delirium- He was everything that a man needed to forget survival and start living. He was LIFE

Alpha started following him. He wasn’t even sure whether it existed or not. Whether he was hallucinating under the influence of the drug given by one of the chemists or whether it was the coke like material given by the priest. But somewhere in his head he knew that this man was going to be his destiny. So he kept following. He didn’t know how much time elapsed. The man was not stopping and nor was he. He did not eat, he started losing his clothes in the way as well. He didn’t care whether the world was looking at him and laughing. He just knew that nothing mattered at all except following the man. Slowly the man was changing shape and then he became a large bird. It started flying towards the hills and its speed also increased in the way. He had hard time keeping a track and to follow it. They had been travelling for many days. He had lost track of time, hunger, greed, animosity , everything. He felt pure from inside but his only desire remained to follow the bird that was now changing shape and became a shape he didn’t recognise. It was something from his dream. It was his dream that had woken him up violently one night. It was the dream

The bird finally changed to dream, and he knew he had to follow the dream. His insides felf like heaven. He knew he had been purified. All his desires had left him. He was conscious of everything now

He felt like he could control the elements of nature, he could neutralise the effects of evil influences and the antagonistic dark forces of the nature. He could nullify destiny for there was no destiny. He was the IMMORTAL SELF

And then the dream vanished into nothingness

In front of him was the peak, taller than any other thing the nature ever created and he could see a dim light at the top of the peak. He always knew what he had to do and he set off for his never ending journey

When you lose small mind
You free your life

XYZ & ABC

XYZ is anything, a book, a movie, a person, a notion, you or me

several of my friends among ABC meet/read/watch/feel XYZ and here are the several responses

1. Nani : Abe XYZ chutiya(p) hai
2. Pablo: Abe hehehe, XYZ kuchh nahi hota, bone, bone, bone!
3. Manuj: Abe sale XYZ frustu hai, par sala hum sabse jyada frustu hain
4. Prakhar_Ank: Shi ha bhi XYZ
5. Adarsh: XYZ is right, but in your perception, like 3 idiots
6. Nishant Singh the sinner: XYZ koi maal hai kya? detail me batao
7. Sanju Dada: XYZ to achha hai. are wo chhodo, IAS nikalo
8. Nandit : XYZ is over rated, startup idea no 4
9. Amarto: Saale XYZ dekh, tu bhoolega nahi ki maine recommend kiya tha
10.Pandey: Abe ro kya raha hai
11.Pushpendra: abe XYZ chhod, facebook par status me hi daal dete hain

Things girls told me about myself

1. I’ve smoked fatter joints than that. 2. Ahh, it’s cute. 3. Who circumcised you?
4. Why don’t we just cuddle? 5. You know they have surgery to fix that.
6. It’s more fun to look at. 7. Make it dance.
8. You know, there’s a tower in Italy like that. 9. Can I paint a smiley face on that?
10. It looks like a night crawler.
11. Wow, and your feet are so big.
12. My last boyfriend was 4” bigger. 13. It’s ok, we’ll work around it. 14. Is this a mild or a spicy Slim Jim?
15. Eww, there’s an inch worm on your thigh. 16. Will it squeak if I squeeze it?
17. Oh no, a flash headache.
18. (giggle and point)
19. Can I be honest with you?
20. My 8-year-old brother has one like that.
21. Let me go get my tweezers. 22. How sweet, you brought incense.
23. This explains your car.
24. You must be a growing boy.
25. Maybe if we water it, it’ll grow. 26. Thanks, I needed a toothpick.
27. Are you one of those pygmies?
28. Have you ever thought of working in a sideshow?
29. Every heard of clearasil?
30. All right, a treasure hunt!
31. I didn’t know they came that small. 32. Why is God punishing you?
33. At least this won’t take long. 34. I never saw one like that before.
35. What do you call this?
36. But it still works, right?
37. ####, I hate baby-sitting.
38. It looks so unused.
39. Do you take steroids? 40. I hear excessive masturbation shrinks it.
41. Maybe it looks better in natural light.
42. Why don’t we skip right to the cigarettes? 43. Oh, I didn’t know you were in an accident. 44. Did you date Lorena Bobbitt?
45. Aww, it’s hiding. 46. Are you cold?
47. If you get me real drunk first.
48. Is that an optical illusion?
49. What is that?
50. I’ll go get the ketchup for your french fry. 51. Were you neutered?
52. It’s a good thing you have so many other talents. 53. Does it come with an air pump?
54. So this is why you’re supposed to judge people on personality. 55. Where are the puppet strings?
56. Your big gun is more like a BB gun.
57. Look, it fits my Barbie clothes.
58. Never mind, why bother.
59. Is that a second belly button?
60. Where’s the rest of it?

hierarchy!!

vicious circle!!!

He was shaking and sobbing silently in a corner. His head revolving and his body crumpled up. he didn't even know why he had been feeling like crying, yelling at nothing in particular. The doorbell rang and he opened the door. his wife was standing there, smiling at him, purely and innocently. he thought of her again and again, felt like giving her all the love in the world. She came inside and kissed him on his lips. She even looked worried at him being overworked and tired.
She was the love of his life, and they have known each other for years, married hardly for a week though and it had become a routine for him to cry silently in her absence and he never had a reason.Although they had sex many a times before marriage, he hadnt been able to make love to her afterwards due to some invisible wall that had popped up between them.
She went to sleep in an hour and he was standing in the balcony staring into the nothingness, which he had so long thought as his own but now he could not find his solace rewarded. He was missing something, albeit everything had gone according to the plan. He had joined a big firm after college, had been earning sufficiently and married the girl he always wanted to. he had stayed 8 years in company of his friends, at college and at his place of work. he felt empty without them. he went over to the cupboard and took out the 12 years old Johnny Walker and drank a few sips and laid down on the floor half conscious and yelled
"motherfuckers ! where have you all been?"

and he stepped into a dream where he was with his friends with whisky in his hand and missing the love of his life.