31st December 2016

I had no intentions of staying alone this new years Eve again. So despite it being a working day I managed to sneak out early from work to be able to make it to Jaipur, I still hope I reach there before it strikes 12! 😓

As usual indian roadways, railways, airways stand apart from their clients, in their inability to communicate. Reaching the purani dilli railway station was no less than a nightmare. With these add-on delays, the sprawling crowd at Rajiv chowk metro station was all ready to crush me in a stampede as the train arrived after a 15 minutes delay. When I finally made it to the chandni chowk station, the railway station platform was another good stretch of walk. Once at the platform, reaching the AC coach, which was at the other end of the platform was like a race, considering the display board said the train departs on time at 3:20 pm, and I had to run with my luggage in that crowded platform in some 7-8 minutes. Only to find that the doors of all AC coaches were locked. What seemed like an impatiently long hour, hoping the door would fly open in another 10 minutes every 2 minutes, as soon the cleaning is done, it was quite a giggly affair with the fellow passengers getting mad and stomping on the door, threatening the sweepers that they would complain against them, and looking at the audacity of the young sweeper to reply back- 'Kar do complain, abhi darwaza nahi khulega' was hilarious.

When my feet gave up on bearing the weight of my torso, I finally landed on top of my suitcase. A bit awkward that it was, I managed not to slip and fall, only to gather the attention of my mocking fellow co-travellers who were busy enjoying those aunties still cursing the railways and fearing that the train would leave without taking them on board.

The doors finally flung open to everyone's relief. I immediately settled in my chosen upper berth with all my bedding neatly done. A quick nap and then I was all geared up to get to some pending tasks all on my phone. Dozing a bit in between, chatting with people at other times, I couldn't pay much attention to this novel I had by my side. Too much distracted to focus, honestly.

All of a sudden I heard someone singing 'Humma Humma' close by. Ignoring it at my best, which is a basic survival instinct for we girls, I continued googling around on my phone. From what was singing, it turned to loud munching noises, only to follow the song playing loudly on that weird uncle's phone who lay on the berth right in front of me. I still found myself a little less distracted when the song stopped and his snoring began. It was a stink that now rose my nostrils. The uncle next to me had those smelly socks pointing towards my side. *Smells* I have an overly sensitive sense of smell (good to be compared to that of a sniffing dog). And fetid smells is something I can do nothing to stand.. So that made me leave my zone of still-some-comfort, to climb down my berth and sit with my neighbors in that compartment, a lil girl who kept referring to me as 'aunty', another uncle whose earphones spread all the sound outside his ears listening to all dhinchak songs, and another group of highly intelligent men discussing "Modi ji" ki new year's speech. And me, holding my head in my hands, trying to get away from the nausea, hunger, sleep! Just when I couldn't find a solution to it, I thought of penning it all down. And guess what, I just arrived, Jaipur it is..! 😊
Another hour maybe to get some food and see some familiar faces.. And then another hour to start 2017.. Sounds like a happy new year to me..
Happy New Year 2017!!

The Epilogue - Inferno

[Sienna’s hands were shaking as she continued. “In Bertrand’s letter to me, he sounded quite proud, saying he considered Inferno to be a very elegant and humane resolution of the problem.” Fresh tears formed in her eyes, and she wiped them away. “Compared to the virulence of the Black Death, I admit there is some compassion in this approach. There will be no hospitals overflowing with the sick and dying, no bodies rotting in the streets, and no anguished survivors enduring the death of loved ones. Humans will simply stop having so many babies. Our planet will experience a steady reduction in our birth rate until the population curve actually inverts, and our total numbers begin to decrease.” She paused. “The result will be far more potent than the plague, which only briefly curbed our numbers, creating a temporary dip in the graph of human expansion. With Inferno, Bertrand created a long-term solution, a permanent solution … a Transhumanist solution. He was a germ-line genetic engineer. He solved problems at the root level.”]- An excerpt from Inferno, Chapter 99.

The impact of what she had just read left her perturbed. She got up from her irksome position and kept the book aside inverted on the bedstand. She removed her glasses and gulped down water hastily. It was half past two at night and she had already protracted her bedtime to reach this very page. How she couldn't wait to know what exactly the virus did if it did not cause any immediate obvious effects. She had assured her mom that she would go to sleep as soon as the mystery gets disclosed. But had she known the aftermath of this revelation, she would have wanted to adjourn it right away.

Perplexed with what she had read, indisposition left her stark awake. She started pacing around her room with a ceaseless string of questions. 'What if Bertrand was right? If we are actually less than a second away from the extinction of human race!' She had a loop of ifs and buts playing in her head. And the contention was pretty obvious ,as a part of her completely agreed with him. From all that she came across everyday, she believed that the issues raised by Bertrand were befitting. The population expansion being witnessed by the world right now is at the brim of collapse. She had always given much thought to things going haywire around. The cities bustling with people. Clearly the human population is exploding. But then she started thinking about other species too; 'How is it that their numbers never rose to such alarming levels, so as to raise concern and become a threat?  Maybe nature has its own way to keep things in check', she talked to herself. 'Perhaps the same applies to human race as well, the course of nature might eventually lead to extinction of humans also! So should we really be worried about it?' Her mental turmoil nudged her to resort to Google. She searched for answers to get to the root of this population crisis. 'What really defines overpopulation? Are we already there yet?' But to her surprise, what she found was quite contradictory.

Long back, somebody had presented the idea of overpopulation and the world just stepped foot forth to rehash it. The concept of overpopulation is apparently scary, but has also been labelled as a myth. What really would be consequential is the availability and utilization of resources to be able to sustain the growing needs of this ever-growing population. In the early nineteenth century it was prophesied by Thomas Malthus, that soon the world would run short of food to cater to the entire population, and it would lead to famines and eventually doom. That certainly did not happen, and even though the prognostication continues, new dates for Doomsday(s) keep coming up, none of them have so far befallen upon us [Refer].

Certainly the environment is at stake. The natural harmony is hampered. Technology and medical advancements have helped us defy the laws of nature in several ways. Be it humans versus animals, rural versus urban, affluent versus impoverished, industries versus forests, the graphs are all skewed. We are creating havoc in our planet, which is making us question its sustainability for our own selves, let alone the following generations.
The population crisis might hold true in the years to come. But what we are actually facing is urban overcrowding, leading to consequential desolation of some areas and mass afflictions in the overpopulated befouled cosmopolitans.

'Yes, It is a matter of paramount concern for each one of us. But how can someone just decide to take such atrocious actions themselves to alter the natural course of events?' she intrigued. 'A mastermind that Bertrand was, to have looked through these dainty events, who gave him the leverage to wreck the lives of millions of innocent people worldwide?'  The search for solutions to innumerable plights of the present world breed prodigies like Bertrand, and our minds might also give in to his nasty yet solicitous ideas every so often. But his blatantly apathetic approach comes as a rude awakening. 

She convinced herself that, 'Maybe, It isn't too late to act even now. Perhaps we could all do our bit in an attempt to let the world live, and let us continue to habitate it.'  
Inaya (yes, I decided to name her so!), watched the fluttering curtains at her room's window and walked towards it. She stood still, gazing at the dark sky, feeling the breeze get past her, breathing quietly, benumbed, while she continued to ponder over and analyze the permutations of the idea behind Inferno. Her musings were then interrupted by the morning alarm!

Breaking News.. Blithe or Blues!

Ever since I can take my mind back to, there has always been a set routine for people of all sorts that I have been with. They all tend to have some crisp habits which are so dear to them. Reading newspaper! It is certainly one such common thing that I have seen people follow as a ritual early in the morning. From my grandpa to my pa, and from mum to badi-mom at home, it has been continuing with the hostel warden, to some professor or senior at work. And although I always kept telling all these people, 'Now that times have changed you don't really have to dedicate an hour or half on reading such dramatic headlines, instead you can just keep updated via notifications on your mobile's apps; I never knew I too would soon be duped into it. 

So during my postings to another hospital once every 3-4 months, I eventually developed the knack of reading newspaper. With full allegiance I used to spend almost an hour of my free time to all the sections of the paper, including sports, which perhaps could never float my boat! The most catchy angle of picking up the paper used to be the front page of the Times, which made me wonder how could they perpetually dedicate it to one word advertisements of some online-mega-sales, and the following page describing the offers on the commodities and their flashy price tags; while they should actually have used it for putting up the breaking news stories! And thus followed my quest for more, which had me penned.

So what really comprises of our daily dose of masala-news? Gang-rapes, murders, road accidents, dacoits and thefts, the collapsing life of the city due to stagnant road traffics (The epic Gurugram fail!), either excessive rains causing floods and damage to crops or droughts which are again detrimental to the fields (We are just not prepared to handle any adversity!), rising number of dengue and chikungunia cases this monsoon (Dirty Delhi keeps breaking its own records!), ISIS and their endless Vandalism (Any and every other country I can possibly think of!), never-ending Hindu-Muslim debates, the Holy-Cow upliftment issues and Beef ban riots, the beyond-my-tolerarance-level political jest ( Modi-Kejriwal face-off!), reservation or ruckus, the occasionally Quaking earth, the collapsing bridges, floods and sloppy landslides, from hunger strikes to surgical strikes, from Indus to Cauvery, retweeted tweets, animal abuse,domestic violence, dowry deaths, filing for divorce and its newer clauses, corruptions and scams, the un-controllable pollution and the exponentially rising population, the wannabes at Page 3, the box-office dhamaals, glimpses into the phony private lives of bollywood celebs, and sportsman shaming (Why Dope when you still have hope! :P) ( *Sorry about the last one, couldn't resist that rhyme*). 

Whatever the news be, does it really make a reasonable difference in our lives knowing about these happenings? Or is it really just spiced up gossip in a large scale to feed our brains? I mean what could possibly happen if people lead their own lives without being updated about the breaking news? For one, there are certainly going to be awkward voids while conversing with people around. News serves as such a great filler that you can talk to random people from different professions, whom you have nothing in common with, just by discussing some gooey topic that's trending lately. So that is going to be one major miss I believe without keeping up with news!

But what if you choose the less travelled road, and go on talking about speculations on life .. Theirs and yours.. The petty little things that you think about while you are at work, or while on the road, and just keep them to yourself because you have no-one to talk to then.. We often tend to forget those things that we have no-one to talk about! Perhaps that could make a difference. You never know! Instead of the gruesome  disturbing content of the news headlines, you could fill in your mind with some instigating thought that you gather from someone else's perspective on life. Wouldn't that be worthy enough to occupy all the cache in your system,

instead of all the spamming that is done by our breaking news!?

However, what about the prejudiced flip-side? There might be consequential downsides to it as well. How badly could your lack of awareness affect your ADL (activities of daily living)? Not being updated could put you into monetary setbacks, could make you miss important events taking place around the city, raise concerns on the safety of your beloveds far-far away, leave you unprepared for a stormy evening or a day of water-cut due to maintenance, cost you more on the sudden overnight fuel price hikes, leave you out in the cold, oblivious to the latest methods being used to hack and traffic young girls and children from the day-lights of your city's streets, or how the burglars can now hijack locked houses and cars without being caught in a rundown, and it eventually might leave you exposed raw and naive to the unrelenting cacophonous realities of the outside world. 

That reminds me of how being good doesn't give you good in return; still you don't want to give-up your kidness. 

How  looking face-off to the world with your puppy-eyes doesn't make you less eyed-upon; even then you mustn't lose that innocence. 

And how much you try to find the benevolence in the happenings of your life, you cannot escape the murkiness of your nightmares; yet you hope to dream again.

'Life is really not fair, deal with it!' - Anonymous 

Vs

'Try to learn to let what is unfair teach you!'- David Foster Wallace

Blithe or Blues! 

To be or not to be..

When you feel you have been doing well, planning it all perfectly, setting benchmarks in your life's milestones, for leading that dream come true life in the future, don't you realize that you have been postponing on so many other little things that life has to offer in the present?

To be or not to be.. The perpetual dilemma..

We come across both these sayings every now and then. One goes about, 'Live in the present, you don't know what the future holds for you'. And the other says, 'To achieve certain things in life you must compromise and let go off some other things.

How does one attain a balance between the two? 

How do you prioritise on what is best at a particular point of time. 

I believe everyone has their own ways of listening to their heart and mind and go about their lives just right.. Or maybe, if not right, with some regrets on missing out a bunch of things, but still learning to be happy with the remainder that they have.

I have certainly not been good at this equipoise in my life. I mean, I have turned out fine FYI! But now when I look back into my school and college days, I have perhaps been the latter of the two. The overall activities and agendas were always lingering, chained to another milestone, and that spun out. Onlooking the big picture of how I need to live the present to have the future that I want. Still, somehow with my fair share of joys throughout, I am not disappointed in the life that I had, nor do I have any regrets of not living to the fullest back then. As I said, I seem have to turned out just fine..

But living now, gosh! It is so darn difficult. I am undoubtedly a cynical critique when comes to LIFE. It (Life) certainly has it all in one's share, the happy and the sad, the good and the bad; but the timing does the trick! You can never really proceed with the stability that all's good, nor can you really survive being scared about the next moment all the time. There has to to a balance.
Even our human body works by the same dictum. Our organs require an appropriate number and type of cells to function normally. When there is an unchecked growth of certain cells in any area, it leads to what we all know as cancers. When the organs fail to regenerate their cells, we land up into degenerative disorders. And when our own body fails to recognize its cells as self, it starts forming antibodies against them, that is when autoimmune disorders occur. And there seems to be no known trigger for any these events most of the times. What eventually takes over is the belief that it was all supposed to happen. The suffering was doomed. 

Similar is the chaos brought about in our lives. One day, all might seem good and pleasant. You never know what might come next and tear you apart. Be it physically, mentally or emotionally. You accept it without much ado, that it was in the cards. The dynamics are all similar, it is the sequale that has its impacts. There might be medication for some treatable ailments; causing growth of new cells, or killing the harmful germs. But the bug that gets into your head.. The way it forms tangles in you mind's circuitry, that might not just get back to normal.. I want to add 'Ever' at the end of this last sentence, but it might just be such a long time, and I don't know if time  really can heal wounds.! Or is it time alone that not everyone has.. Even if you are dragged till the age of 69, who knows if it would be worthwhile enough to live all those  moments then which you side-tracked now!? Maybe, you get the time, but not 'your' complete self to live that time fully. 

With the clock of life ticking ahead at this pace, I don't have the patience to linger on for better times and days to come.! I am all for Now.. I certainly can't stop dreaming, but I cannot muster the guts to wait for them to come true in the future.. I am finding a hard time trying to attain the acme.. The Balance.! Knowing, wanting, and doing now; yet procrastinating, dreaming, hoping and wishing some more for the times to come..

I haven't really been a huge fan of Karma either. What goes around may not always come back around to the same person. Someone else might have to repent for someone else's karma. (That is what happens with the family members of patients diagnosed with irreparable conditions, it becomes all of them's Karma together!) And that is what makes me cynical. Because the future is so bloody scary, that it has already begotten upon us now, to ruin our present. Now the thread lies in our hands to turn things about. To either live in the present and be happy momentarily, or to work your ass off now, with no time or desire for the present, in view of that speculative life of the future. 

To be, in the present, or not to be!