Another place, another time, another world

 If I could choose a different world, a different place and a different era to spend my life in, I would unhesitatingly choose to live in any animated world.

In the world of animation there are no bounds on imagination. Anything can happen to anyone. Carpets can fly, animals can talk, the simple housemaid can turn into a beautiful princess and caterpillars can smoke letters from their pipes. There are the good folks and the bad ones, the clumsy friends and the rabbits in waistcoats and then there are fairy godmothers. Even the most evil villains can be endearing in some way. The best part is that the good folks get to live happily ever after and the bad guys always get punished- many times in funny ways.

Even a fantasy world like Harry potter where you get to eat loads of chocolate to get well is not anywhere near. That’s because the villains there like the death eaters, dementors and of course Lord Voldemort are as cruel, evil or worse than the ‘villains’ we have in our lives in this era and world. Moreover, they are a bit too much like us in the current world.

 

So I would have all the innocent adventures that the inhabitants of animated worlds have, fight the crafty witches and the evil sorcerers and maybe sit on the hill with my pinned up tail and a pink bow secure in the knowledge that we will live happily ever after-because I am one of the good folks!

What is a wall?

A dear friend introduced me to this game and I am so liking it!

It goes something like:

Friend: What is a table?

Me: A table is a piece of furniture which one uses to write on and to put things on.

Friend: No what can a table represent?

Me (after a longish pause): A table represents support.

And that how I see everyday objects now

What is a door?

A door is an option or a choice. It lets you decide whether you want something in or out of your life.

What is a choice?

Many of us may confuse choice with freedom. But a choice actually binds you. It defines your limitations. You can either do this or you can do that.

A choice defines the limits you are allowed to go to, masked as freedom.  The biggest delusion possibly. 

What is a photo frame?

It is a window to a different point in time which you can look into from time to time.

What is a shed?

A shed represents what is temporary. It might give you respite from the sun and the rain for some time but it cannot give you the permanent protection that walls with a roof provide.

What is a closet?

A closet is a place for secret. It will let you hide your thoughts, your secrets and protect them from the harsh glare of society’s judgement.

Further interpretations are welcome and there’s more to come...

If only you walk long enough.....

The auto I tried hailing this morning, unsuccessfully of course, was going to Andheri. The neighbours are going to Thailand this summer. The guy in the cubicle next to me is going to get a promotion next year. And I am definitely going to the end of the world in 2015. Maybe you will too one day. In a nutshell, all of us are going somewhere or the other-in space or in time.
Why? Why do we bother to move at all?
As a friend of mine put it, what is the purpose of it all?
Not wanting to appear blank I quickly replied, ‘Because of the need to see tomorrow.’
Not letting it go, my friend persevered, ‘Where is the need?’
The need arises from the knowledge or the hope that there will be a tomorrow. If I knew I had one month to live, I’ll call in dead (my office), sign up for the space program going to Mars, get Robert Downey Jr. to take me out (or at least try to) and of course take out a large loan and buy an island. But because I know that I am going to see tomorrow I refrain from all this and instead I prepare. I prepare because I want to have some control over my future. I want to know where I will be tomorrow, next month, next year. I forget that control is what I don’t have and never had.
We, the world, the whole universe are like that ball in the bowling alley that someone has set in motion and is now rolling towards the pins. Only I don’t know what those pins are that we are hurtling towards. Maybe death is not the end. Maybe it is true that the soul lives on even when the body dies and continues on its journey in through different bodies towards that grand finale. People get tired and want out so they strive for ‘moksh’ or ‘nirvana’.
Why they want ‘out’ I am not sure. Maybe I’ll muse on that next time!
As Lewis Carroll put it
“Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
The Cheshire Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cheshire Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.
Alice: ...So long as I get somewhere.
The Cheshire Cat: Oh, you're sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.”

Close your eyes for a moment..

She had come to see the flamingos. A cap protecting her eyes from the sun, a back pack slung across her shoulders –just like any other teenager who has just finished school. Only she had a Rs 25K camera in her hands and she was not accompanied by friends as is usual for girls of her age.
We got talking. I asked her what she wants to do now that her school was finished. “I want to be a photographer”, she replied,” but my parents are not happy with that, so I will do a course in computer hardware and keep photography as my side hobby. Everybody advises that.”
The innocence and naiveté in her reply has struck a chord with me. I haven’t stopped thinking about the power of dreams; especially dreams of a mind that is not yet shackled by the chains of practicality. A mind of that can dream doesn’t think of a degree in engineering-slash-medicine-management as the only gateway to a successful career (if at all it considers a career necessary). It doesn’t necessarily think of a fair-beautiful- educated- yet homely doll or a highly well qualified -working in an MNC with a fat salary package-pompous ass as a successful match (read catch). Come to it, it does not think that success is defined by being able to boast of how important you are to the organization; how much your work is appreciated; how successful and handsome/beautiful your spouse is or how your kids top in their classes. It doesn’t even think that success is important at all!!
A mind that can dream dreams of finding happiness instead of success; and of fulfilment instead of status. All of us have dreamt at some point in our lives. Yet, somewhere we lose our capacities to dream like a child who has no expectations to live up to.
It’s a part of growing up, I suppose. :-)

If art was in the cracks of a wall..

I am art.
I am a living being, I breathe, I smile, I strive, I tire and yet I hope. I am the ultimate creation because I am alive and I can feel it.
The swirls and loops in a piece of polished wood is art, the way light gets refracted by a diamond is art, the leaves on the tree outside my window are pieces of art, waves crashing on the golden sands are instances of art. Art is everywhere around me.

Art cannot be confined within a wooden frame and painted on a piece of paper with a few colours. Art cannot be bound in a volume printed as a string of words in black ink. Art cannot be imprisoned in a plaster of paris creation.
It is up to me what I choose to see as art. And I refuse to let art be confined, be a prisoner of ‘definitions’. Art is the abstract, the unfathomable, the familiar unknown something that everyone knows and understands in some form even though he doesn't realise it. Open your eyes to the world, to art!

Fight in your race..

He received a blushing crow, when he was told to take the next town drain as he had hissed his mystery lessons. He realized that he had just tasted a worm. When he gave his reasons he was told to keep his lack of pies to himself. And when his best friend, always ready as a stock also refused to tease his ears he had no option left but to pick up his well boiled icicle and go off to find a nosy little cook with a half warmed fish to hum a bad salad.
I haven’t gone crazy, folks! I have just discovered the delightful world of spoonerism!
A spoonerism is an error in speech or deliberate play on words in which corresponding consonants, vowels are switched. We owe this source of hilarious insanity to the Reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844–1930), Warden of New College, Oxford, who was notoriously prone to this tendency.
The starting paragraph untangles as follows:
“He received a crushing blow, when he was told to take the next down train as he had missed his history lessons. He realized that he had just wasted a term. When he gave his reasons he was told to keep his pack of lies to himself. And when his best friend, always steady as a rock also refused to ease his tears he had no option left but to pick up his well oiled bicycle and go off to find a cosy little nook with a half formed wish to hum a sad ballad.
The “dear old queen” can become the “queer old dean” and the glowing bride can lose all her gaiety when she hears “Is it kisstomary to cuss the bride?" instead of “Is it customary to kiss the bride”. Note, that cuss means curse!!
And the pun fart...oops I meant the fun part doesn’t end here! You can create your own spoonerisms and add to this collection. Also you can try figuring out some spoonerisms for fun (including the title of this blog!!)!!
Now since I have to mend some sails, and spoon some more, I’ll say eye ball!!

A lifetime of teachings..

Some people are mean, some are liars and some are helpless. Then there are those who can’t stop bragging and those who are desperate- desperate to be happy, desperate to be sad and desperate to be liked. On the other hand there are happy people and helpful people and dependable people.
When all is said and done there remain two kinds of human beings, the good ones and the bad ones.
I never thought that I would come across the bad ones.....just like no one likes to think that bad things have an equal probability of happening to them than the other person. But I did come across bad people and badder people (forgive the wrong English). These people made my life miserable...I kept wondering-how is it possible for someone to be so selfish, so mean, or so rude.
But my friend always considered meeting “bad” people a good thing because it taught my friend that the world is not such a good place after all and one has to learn to live with that fact.
There are many such lessons I learnt from my friend. I learnt to appreciate imperfections and make out the silver lining in every cloud. I learnt that anything and everything in this world can be justified, you just need to know how. Most importantly I learnt that people care. Human beings have a huge reservoir of affection and love which they bestow on others through their actions and words.
I have not used a pronoun to refer to my friend. This is because each time I refer to a person by a pronoun that person loses a little personality by being delegated to a mere pronoun “he” or “she” which can be used for anyone and everyone. So my friend is just that..My Friend!!
:-)