What You Laughing At???

It was thanks to my friend Gowri that I was reminded of this. So I would like to Thank her for her love, support, guidance, comical insults, being a platypus and being a Drunk Don when we were in dire need for one. So thank you Gowri for all of the above!

Coming to the point. Text books!

They can either make a Student or break a student or make an Awesome Bon fire around which I can do the Rain Dance or make the Rain Gods point and laugh and not grant me rain.

Text books have always been a bane to a student except on the eve of the exam. But it is partly because of the text book that our creativity is given a kick in the butt and arrested for giving us a little fun and happiness in the dreary lives of being a student. The text book does not allow us to think... it clips our wings in terms of imagination! but has always provided us with the most beautiful and dreamy sleep.

Now when you get those emails titled as 'funny answers' and the like, we point and laugh at the wrongness behind the answers and one definitely knows that the person who has supplied the paper with such answers has never even looked at a text book let alone opened and read it. But as criticising has been the way of life and is a quality that comes along with being human, have we ever appreciated those answers!? Seen the creativity and originality behind it or even the ingenuity and creativity behind it instead of ridiculing and finding the flaws behind the answers?!

I feel these people should be applauded! 'Cause these people actually think! They think laterally, out of the box, keeping their creativity alive and buzzing and in the process never letting the child in them die. How many of us would have actually answered that 'x' is here with an arrow pointing to the location of 'x' in the figure to the question find 'x'????? How many of us would have thought of it that way?? We find 'x' in a certain way, 'cause we've been instructed (more like threatened) to do so in that specific manner!

While these guys actually think and apply their minds during an exam *which is the sole purpose of education* to find a solution, we follow a book that gives us step by step instructions of what to do and how. Basically we mug, puke all the contents during an exam and well since we (usually) don't again eat what we regurgitate, we completely forget everything and the point of 'learning' something is lost to an extent where you read the same thing the following week and you'd never know that you've actually read it! Whereas these guys will remember exactly what they've written 'cause they came up with the answers themselves!

So all I'm trying to say is that, I've completely forgotten why I thanked Gowri in the beginning and that our concept of educating ourselves is wrong! Our future is not written in a text book and neither is a step by step instruction manual on how to live every minute of our lives.

Next time you see an answer that seems insanely wrong and out of place and at the same time superbly funny and yet in some random unconnected way connected to the question given, stop and think would you have been able to sum up the guts to write something you thought of all by yourself, would you have had the presence of mind to think of it that unconventional, un-textbook-y way??

And if you can't, then stop laughing, and if you're in a stupid mood to laugh then go in front of a mirror, point at it and laugh.

Because if you thought that you could think like that, you would not be laughing at it, you'd be marveling at the craftsmanship of such an amazing answer.

Childhood Inhibitions

It's funny how they say that you grow out of things that used to creep you out. Just give it time.

My question is really, do you???

I started to ponder over this, when I realised I'm not super comfortable in the dark when I'm alone, except when I'm knocked out cold. Well it's a belief that one grows out of kiddy inhibitions. And I don't believe it!

My inhibitions date back to the mid 1990's, when I was a little girl. The adults generally scared the crap out of kids just to make sure the little brats don't get out of hand. Well, I was a brat, and my parents believed in treating all brats equally. So I, too was subjected to inhumane 'scaring the crap out of kids' treatment. Gone were the days of partiality, I say.

The conventional 'Boogieman's gonna get you' worked wonders with me. And as I aged from a 4 year old to that of 5, the dark descriptions grew worse.

Slowly the concept of Ghosts eerily crept in as well. Yep, those evil fiends didn't spare anything. The haunted stories oozed out, with an abandoned house that was all dark and the friendly neighbourhood cemetery, surrounded by the dying trees with dried leaves that rustled in the dead of the night, the wind howling breaking the silence and calling out to the dead.

Thats all I needed. I have a pretty wild imagination. All one has to do is set the foundation and there you have a tormented girl whose too chicken to get out of bed in the middle of the night to take a pee!

And even worse is when I have to go from one room to another, crossing the creepy dark corridor. I can't even keep my eyes closed and do that cos when I tried that, I slammed into the wall and missed the entrance by just that much! And I looked like Rudolf in pain for about a week or so.

Then comes that age where you want to watch these horror/ thriller flicks cos you want to go with the flow but something inside goes against that idea. In my case, I was just stupid for not listening to that vibe. I think we went for this movie 'Deep Blue Sea'. Took the night show and saw it on big screen. Little girl watching Big Sharks devour people as soon as they touched any surface even close to water, does not give the best sense of security. Not only did I not sleep for many nights to come, I didn't enter a swimming pool for a long long time. And at that time, by swimming pool I mean drowning in a tiled container with a depth of 2 feet.

I thought I was totally over my little phobia with water and sharks. But all that changed when I went on vacation to Tioman Islands not too long ago. We went snorkeling and the water was absolutely beautiful. It was an infinite expanse of blue, blue and more blue with fish of such brilliance just surrounding you. I couldn't help but feel like Ariel from The Little Mermaid *sheepish grin*.

That was all lovely until I was pushed by the tide into a rather isolated portion of the island. All of a sudden I felt silence like I was the only living soul on earth and when I looked straight into the water I couldn't help feel that something big and bad was heading my way and with absolute silence under the water surface there was nothing to distract me from that train of thought. I felt some of my worst nightmares being resurrected from the burial ground of dead dreams!

GAH! That just sent shivers down my spine.

So, I really doubt that our childhood inhibitions and scares really do die away or whether they're just repressed to such an extent that you seem to believe you've overcome them, only to find them just waiting for your most vulnerable moment to strike; lurking in the darkest crevices of your mind waiting...

Days To Follow

A sleepy start to a morning with a cloudy sun is my typical college morning during the confused season of a chilly, warm monsoon. Getting to college on time is a challenge but when I reach there half an hour late and find that I'm way more punctual than my teacher just makes me question if I'm the lame one or her.

But moving on with my life, it's always awesome to be greeted by girlfriends early in the morning with a warm hug and a peck on the cheek. Today was one such day, like almost every other day, with a similar greeting and knowing that you have sleep deprived comrades gives you a good feeling that your not alone in the world.

And then starts our mad ways of life, once the group comes together with a strain or two of weirdness from us all! We're a pretty diverse bunch that hit it off like we were meant to be. Basically, we're like a perfect blend of vodka, whiskey, scotch, wine, beer and fruit punch with a little cheese. What more could we ask for? Once in a while we can throw in small amounts of weed.

It's nearly the end of the semester, no classes but still it's highly irritating to sit in class. But it doesn't take us long to start entertaining ourselves. Sitting behind a row of girls who thought they were ALL THAT was just hilarious - shamelessly exhibiting an extremely bitchy side to us. Then we had Adi (with a sprained wrist and a twisted mind) teaching us all the 'Song of Life', Tan found her soul mate in her bottle, Es and Shen having a few artistic moments and ending the hour with a brilliant photo session courtesy Vish - the hour was quite a productive one, wouldn't you agree?

We bunked the next two hours and left for Destination 22/1 Code Es where we spent the next 3 hours with girl talk. Rhodes, Shen, Vish, Tan, Es and I bonded over a couple of beers, amazing Chinese food and a soulful session of bitching with her 3 dogs constantly by our side! It was catalytic!

Returning to college, Es and I found ourselves locked out of class. We took the opportunity to sit like people who had lost all hope in life and decided to rest our eyes, but I took this opportunity a bit too seriously and drifted off, quite deeply embedded in a chamber of drowsiness only to wake up and find 5 faces staring at me right in the face with stupid grins and soon I joined them in the stupidity. With a bit of Grape ice candy from Krithika, it was the sugar rush that significantly altered my behaviour, from super sleepy to unusual and extreme happiness. My friends were pretty sure I was over the top, and my laughing at the stupidest of things did not add credibility to my denial.

After returning home and consuming a second lunch, I closed my eyes and fell into dreamless slumber for the next 5 and a half hours, which convinced me as well that maybe I was just slightly over the top.

Sitting with a nice mug of hot, strong, sugarless coffee at 4:00 in the morning, lost in thought reminiscing my day, I can't help but smile at the hope of having more days like this to follow to add to the College Archives.

Death At A Wing's Distance

Flying way up in the air!! Moving at the speed of wind!

Squinting at the noon day sun, they all looked up and said, "Oh My God! It's a Bird! It's a Plane! Oh, umm no.. it's a Bird"

They were so checking me out! What more could one do than stand rooted and admire my pure awesomeness? And what more could I do than show off the aura of awesomeness i emitted? After all everybody wanted to be ME.

Well thats what i was thinking, while being absorbed at the thought of people hitting on me, I hit a branch! like *WHAM* Everything went BLACK!

I felt all weird, and my head hurt pretty badly too and I felt it throbbing as well. When I opened my eyes I knew something was out of place.Because when I looked up I saw the ground and looked down I saw the sky and I was pretty sure I wasn't perched on a branch either. oh crap, I was upside down! That explained the throbbing, with all the blood rushing to my bird brain. And I was hanging mid-air. I was caught to a twig of a branch!

I tried so hard to free myself. I flapped my wings with all the gusto that I could muster. And being upside down didn't help the situation either. After sometime, my wings grew tired and just slumped lifelessly due to the numbness. It was only now that I took notice of my surroundings. I was caught in a Huge tree, in a campus filled with humans! Hoards of them and most of them or all of them females. I pretty much got a bird's eye view of all that was going on below me. Some were eating, some were talking, some were eating and talking, some seemed to have anti-social tendencies and some with hyper-active, sugar rush tendencies.

It was then that I noticed a small commotion taking place and a few of them looking up and pointing in my direction! 'Ah! They noticed me!' I began to flap my wings with the little energy I had left. I felt like a Piñata, dangling from the branch. But nothing happened. Occasionally some would stop and stare and then continue with their lives. My hopes began to diminish at a constant rate with the passage of time. To make the omen seem truer, two crows perched on branches flanking me, giving me starved, sinister looks of the omnivorous scavengers that they were, hovering around me like a couple grim reapers who were given the pink slip. I could just imagine those slimes saying in Spanish accents " Your time is almost up! Gahahahahahaha".

After a while I saw some humans gather below, with hope rekindled I moved a little to show I was alive. I could see a ladder and people gathering to see whether they could get me down or free. I thought this was great and i could see myself back up in the sky, and feel the wind in my feathers - I could nearly taste freedom.

But the Fates were against me. The ladder wasn't tall enough to reach up to where I was. At that moment all my hopes came crashing down as I saw that human get down each wrung of the ladder. And it completely died when his feet hit the ground.

As the hours passed I could feel my life fade away slipping through my feathers and all I could do now was wait for the end. No more attempts were made to get me out of my situation.

I was after all just another Pigeon among a thousand others. All I could do now was dangle and wait.

As evening approached, a heavy blanket of darkness crept over me like that which seeped over the sky, encompassing my world and the rest with darkness. With my lifeless body swaying like a pendulum as the evening breeze blew, there I hung in eternal slumber.

The Looking Glass

In my eyes, a bespectacled person is one who i see as responsible, nerdy, always caught up on notes and super quiet in class.

Yea, Yea - the first question that pops into your mind is "Woman, haven't you had any friends with specs..blah blah". Yah! I Have! Like DUH.. but preconceived notions die hard!

So here I am running along the years of my life like a really fat heart patient on a treadmill, when one fateful day a Stupendous event took place that may be engraved on my tomb stone once my time on these barren, overly mowed pastured ended!

That episodic day I named ' The Day I Got Bespectacled!' *Intake of Breath* *GASP**Music*!

Yes! I crossed over to the 'People who get migraine' side

With a whopping power of 0.25!

My family cried and moaned the death of my eye-sight and thought I crossed over to 'The Blind Side'!

*Da Da Da Da*

Oh! The Trauma I was put through!

For nearly a month my main course was a carrot every hour! And I was subjected to the usual Soda - 4 eyes joke and the famous "how many fingers am I holding up??' dialogue - we're still talking about family here!

But honestly speaking, I thought I looked nerdily cute, still do, and whenever I stand in front of the mirror and put on my specs, at that very moment I don the avatar of a Responsible , Study Oriented wannabe who fails miserably at being academically oriented and ummm uhhh... Responsible. Well, most of the time the question in my case is whether I'm mentally competent at all??? As you see, I'm a Special Child in some ways.

Now when the Doc said I was Photosensitive, he could not have been more right or more cute! *Buggers like them are hard to find in these days of drought i say*

You can take my Photosensitivity in 2 ways:

1. Photosensitive: sensitive to light

2. Photo-sensitive: Sensitive to when a photo's being taken (automatic response - a nice 100 watt Grin thats bound to change my features temporarily from Indian to Mongoloid and at the same time make me look like a Total dumbfuck)

Being a Specsy has its Kedi sides too. Sometimes stuff works out in your favour. During my 12th grade Physics Practical Exam, I had one such moment. I had no idea what shit I had written for the procedure of my experiment -> I was lucky enough to figure out it had something to do with circuits. But the specs came to the rescue and to add to the effect, neatly combed hair tied back and an ever so Paavam expression, like a studious puppy dog look {sans the pout} (cos the external examiner was a Lady - yup, had it all figured out). Buuuut she fell for it nice and hard and with Ravi, (not my Golden retriever) but the Lab attender on my side connecting the circuit on the sly, it was a guaranteed 10 outta 10. I felt so Kedi, it made me proud!

Now coming to a weird misconception I've noticed through my short journey of being a sexy specsy:

You give a pair of spectacles to a guy and tell him its got X-ray viewing properties - they fall for it *IRRESPECTIVE OF AGE!

Even better! When they put it on, their heads automatically snap up in the direction of a chic and they get this Imbecilic Expression with a 'DOH' *Homer Simpson Style* accompanied with *drool*.

So just to get the air cleared on a few things..

1) If spectacles have X-ray viewing properties, you'll see the bone structure and not the hill structure of a person ( with reference to all women and few men too)

2) If you think that its working, SNAP out of it, that's just your Testosterone levels going off balance and setting you up on a 'Booby Trap'.

*Further warning, if you continue staring, you'll get something against your face and its not gonna be soft, membranous mountains, instead probably hard ridged ones which is the result of a clenched fist.

On a concluding note, specs can make you White&Nerdy or Simply Specsy - It's the way you look at it! I always thought i was a Spectacle.

And to the world without the looking glass, If we wear specs that does NOT mean we're Blind!

Lastly, wearing specs does not qualify as being a Visionary.