You must think I get irrationally angry at times. And I do. But you're never going to figure out why I hate you, you blind fool.
You are always... so prepared to let pride come in the way of conscience. To let your stupid arguments take their toll on you. Just rushing headfirst into destruction, ignoring all warnings, and then passing on the blame so you don't have to face up to it.
Call me a sadist, I don't care, I'm a masochist already. Blame me. But I'll be gone soon enough, and I'm never letting myself come between you and the hole you have dug for yourself. I don't care if I get hurt, but I hate watching you destroy yourself, because there's nothing I can do to stop you- I don't get to decide what kind of person you are, and it enrages me.
It's sick actually. A punch in gut wouldn't make a difference, but watching you go hungry hurts. And you know it, thats why you do it.
And what do you do? You decide that I want you to be unhappy, for whatever reason that appeals to your twisted skull.
Over-reacting? Who do I think I am?
To be honest, it's a bad sign if you can't put life in perspective anyway. If you want proof, Rolf, all you have to do is wait. But I won't be around to say 'I told you so'.
Make your decisions now. I've tried and failed for too long. You never listen to what I say, you are incapable, it seems, of understanding the people closest to you.
So understand me clearly now. I will not clean your mess or cover for you. The choices before you are simple. You can understand the nature of three human beings you should have learnt of a long time ago, or you can keep living in the same kind of paranoia and become an ignorant victim of your own foolish pride before long. Why can't you be logical? Just- fucking understand when people tell you the truth to your face.
Soon enough, you won't have me to blame. Who are you going to point the finger at then?
Of course, you'll think that I'm lying. Because you are a fool, and for no other reason. What can I do about that? Nothing. It's unfair to expect you to grow a pair of eyes, isn't it?
It's a cruel joke that plays out.
Do I have to explain that as well? Probably, since you would choose not to figure it out if given half the chance.
You live in fear of deceivers and enemies, and monsters and ghosts, but the thing that will come closest to destroying you is the monster of your own making.
I'm not your worst enemy, I'm a distant second. The first is inside you. If you have decided to become that blind, self-serving creature, then I shall simply leave. But the day I stop fighting what I consider the worst in you will be the day I stop caring about you as a person, don't be too eager to rush to that conclusion.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Friday, July 10, 2009
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Mocked by the Mockingbird: A Fight Over Ice-Water
This story takes place about a year and a half ago.
I was in the eleventh grade.
It was November, I believe.I had been selected after a written exam to qualify for the second round of the prestigious Kishore Vaigyanik Protsahan Yojana- the KVPY Scholarship exam.
The scholarship was worth several times amount I was getting from my old scholarship - the NTSE, and being the pragmatic sort of person I am- I was raring to have a go at this.
I think about 300-600 students from all over the country were called for an interview. I didn't know how many would be selected.The same week our school was taking part in an essay writing competition. A review of To Kill a Mockingbird. The first prize was two thousand pounds or ten thousand rupees or something. Once again, being the money-minded person I am- and also because I hadn't written anything decent for 8 months, I wanted to enter.
So I borrowed the 'classic' and read it. The thing that annoyed me about the book was the mockingbird on the cover, the absence of it in the story.
Killing a mockingbird is supposed to have meaning- what's the point if the story is NOTHING ABOUT IT.
Might as well have gone with "Justice Denied: The Atticus Finch Story"- it's more catchy.So anyway... I had been worrying about the day with the essay, I have fairly high expectations of myself.
One thing I DON'T like to do is fill up the pages with garbage.
(Teachers seem to like my garbage though- they'd smile and nod wisely when they come across what I consider the Dung of literature, then scoff somewhat at the knives and forks and engines of my writing.)
And as with every other time my passion is stirred, fate dropped in to deliver, yes, you know what I'm talking about.The day of the Essay Writing managed to conveniently coincide with the day of the scholarship interview.
It was a little painful, but I controlled my emotions. Yes, I was going to miss a writing competition with a ten thousand rupee monetary prize. I love writing, competition, and I'd really love ten thousand rupees. But my education is more important. If I got the scholarship, it would amount to much more than ten thousand bucks.
This decision was also tempered by a rather simple fact.
All real writers get their message across in their work. They don't need morons like us trying to devalue their work by using it as basis to impress our egoes onto some judges.
How would you explain the story beyond what is obvious? You will either use flamboyant, obtuse and eclectic language, not say what can be said in simple words, or derive so much from the story by reading between the lines that you forget the content of the words themselves, be so obsessed with forging a new perspective that you forget what is obvious, or, like I may have, simply stated that which needed no real explanation and render my own self completely obsolete, unoriginal.
And so instead of writing something redundant.
I went to buy clothes for the interview.A Brown pant. Shoes. Cream Shirt. Lessons from my dad on how to handle interviews. An idiotic tweed coat. What?
A little tense but more or less calm. I went to sleep early the day before the interview.I woke up early the next morning. At 4 AM, burning up and with a massive headache. Howling, then moaning I got to my feet.
Managed to get a thermometer in my mouth, and waited. Looks like Fate wasn't done with me yet.103 degrees farenheit.
All of the confidence I'd built up over the last few days went to hell.I felt like crying, really. But I didn't. It was a one off incident. It happens to everyone.It was illogical to think that it would ever happen to me again. (Until it did, right before IITJEE 2009, yay. Fuck YOU, Fate.)
There was still some hope. Just enough time before the interview for antipyretics to take effect. And so I took a few pills with a glass of water and tried to rest. I had to try. A few hours passed, the fever subsided but left me drained and lethargic. Even so, I had to focus. Just focus.
The interview was at JNU's science department. At some specified time we arrived at registered. I remember feeling like a damn fool in the tweed coat. Why the hell do I take his advice at all? One of my school-mates was at the registration. Akshat Agarwal (sp?). He was carrying around a massive copy of Resnick/Haliday back when I didn't know what it was, and reading about Semiconductors when I had been struggling with mechanics.
Sure R/H isn't a big deal, but back then, it sure as hell was intimidating to see the guy revising next year's syllabus right before the interview when I could barely think.
My dad talked with the authorities to tell them about my condition and tried to make them get me in to get interviewed first. I wanted to wait damnit, hoping that my head cleared up. But I let him do as he wished. They moved me up the line, heh.
All the interviewers would now know that I was ill. Fucking fantastic. The retard who moved himself up the line for his own convenience.I hate it when my father tries to make things easy for me, when he tries to ensure that I'm treated differently. It undervalues my effort, my preparation- my willpower. I hate it, and even then, its not a good enough reason to fight over.
Finally time for my Out Of Turn. I entered the interview room. There was a woman, an asshole (you can tell from the face), a guy who was never going to say anything throughout the interview, and a man I'd seen earlier, a smartly dressed oldish guy wearing sunglasses and with a shock of silver hair (Later I was told that he was someone important, like a Dean or something).
The interview began.
Except, of course, it was not an interview, more like a timed quiz.
First question, how do you tell apart stars and planets from the moon. I suggested spectroscopy. They wanted to know how ancient humans would have done it. Annoying. I asked what human-kind knew in the ancient time I was working in-> Did they know about the planet's rotation? Or not?
I tried to come up with some logic about how planets and stars followed different trajectories in the night sky along with the refraction 'twinkling' effect being a method of comparing distance. "The stars could be turning on and off." said Asshole. "If we don't know about fucking refraction, you just how much do you expect us to know about space?" I wanted to say.
The questions came thick and fast. Mostly from Asshole. I was asked a new question before the gears of my rusty brain had finished processing the last. Mathematics on how to calculate the moon's size, derive other facts from it- How can you prove that the moon is closer to the earth than the stars? I said something related to my trajectory .
The Deanguy laughed heartily, "Have you even seen a star pass in front of the Moon?"
Asshole laughed too, only derisively.I clenched my fist. Heart and head pounding in front of the black-board on which I'd been writing my equations. Fuck it. They were tricking me.
Any other day... any other day I'd have been able to see through that trick. But today... today, when it took all I had to make my brain accelerate along a straight line, it was a dirty trick.
A stuttering tired fool with a red face. Screwed up the easiest part of the first composite question. What a great first impression.
I won't get another question wrong.
Asshole continued. First some opening line about oceans and the ecosystem.
Then asked-"What is better for sustaining life? Seawater or Freshwater?"I knew this."Freshwater."
Maybe I should have thought a little. "Why?" He asked.
I don't know, I just knew that seawater was a much harsher environment.I started with sunlight and plankton and how less depth led to milder conditions. They didn't seem to buy it. Then about how there was less oxygen in seawater. "Why?" again.
Damnit, what was the point of getting a question right anyway? Something more about the ratio of the surface area to depth and how after a certain distance light did not penetrate into the ocean. Plankton concentration would reduce, and so, oxygen. They didn't buy it.What else? Rivers churn more, the kinetic energy of the churning allows oxygen to dissolve in them? I know now that surface area has little to do with dissolved gas, in theory. The key is 'IN THEORY', I will bet you that if you take oxygen readings near the surface of the ocean and a mile beneath it- the concentrations will be visibly different.Then about how Seawater was a more saturated solution, about how the salinity made survival harder.
I was pretty desperate. The concentration of salts should not affect the concentration of oxygen dissolved. (*cough* IN THEORY) In the end, they stopped this line of questioning. They didn't tell me the answer. Damn well couldn't. I mean I'd said so much, there was nothing left.After a few more questions. A simple one. "What is the temperature of the human body?" asked Asshole."37 degrees centigrade" Almost incredulously, had they thrown me this as a bone?
Asshole laughed. I cringed, what the hell?
"You're way off, It's 32." said Asshole.
"It's 37."
"32" Said Asshole again. He knew as well as everyone else in the room that the answer is thirty seven, but he was going to keep playing this stupid fucking game.
It was at this moment, that I decided that I hated this guy. (Although I didn't mind the others, they didn't go out of their way to piss me off like this dickhead.)
It's 37 you retard. The average temperature of the human body is thirty seven degrees celsius, ninety eight point six degrees fahrenheit. Thirty two degrees celsius is common to extremely large mammals, elephants, hippopotamii and rhinoceroses (sp?), my temperature this morning was forty degrees celsius, which is about normal for owls and rabbits, you fucking retard, and thats where you got this question from. The fact that you choose to mock me by telling me that I am five degrees cooler than I am, and that you insult my intelligence at the same time by doing so, is something I don't appreciate.
What I said was "Sir. I've been reading this my entire life, seen it on thermometers and read it in scientific journals. Not all parts have the same temperature, but the average temperature of the human body is thirty seven degrees celsius."I commended myself for managing to say it with so much respect."You're way off. It's thirty two degrees. I don't know what bullshit you've been reading."
Something small snapped. Like a switch at the back of my head.I smiled. What is this joke? Do you expect me to beg you to accept something that every child knows. Leaning back into the chair, I sighed, a release that could have been mistaken for one due to the strain and post-fever, but probably wasn't.
"Of course sir. You must know better than I. You are a professor in a college. I'm just an eleventh grader. I must be wrong, you must be right. Could you please tell me how and when this new figure was reached?"
This time, I didn't bother to cleanse my voice of the soft mocking tone it carried. It was either this or yelling into his face that he was a moron.
Asshole, A little irritated-"It isn't my job to help you, find out on your own."
Of course, no such research existed. Because he was full of shit.
Next question.
“What is the average pH of the human body?”
What?
“What part of the human body? Blood is slightly alkaline, stomach acid is acidic… between the 4 and 5 range. They probably balance out.”
Asshole snorted. “I want the average.”
Without an answer, I racked my brain. “I think… a 7.4”
Asshole laughed. “That’s way off!”
Again. (He was right though, it’s a 7.2)
Next question.
Deanguy said a bit about how he did exercise to lose wait, then a friend of his stopped him and told him that instead of doing exercise, he should drink cold water instead.
Why?
I buzzed a little. An interdisciplinary question. Finally, all those years of the Discovery channel talking about metabolisms would work.
Of course, he was asking a guy with a fever to defend drinking icewater.
But whatever.
I had a different take on the matter.
“Drinking ice-water cannot be a viable method to lose weight.”
“Why?”
“Sir, any energy required in absorbing the water into the system of the human body will be offset by the possible impact to one’s health.”
“How so?”
“First of all sir, water is zero calorie food, but it will use up some amount of energy when you drink it. However, this energy will be negligible. If you drink a glass of icy water you’ll first gain 250 grams!”
“Ah, but that is merely a temporary increase and will be compensated for.”
“But sir, you are considering a quarter kilogram negligible- while the amount of energy lost is negligible even compared to that.”
“Think, how can drinking ice water make you lose weight.”
“I can’t sir. There’s no way this could work without serious health issues.” It’s common sense.
“In low quantities, the water would have a negligible effect, to show an appreciable effect, the ice water must be consumed in extremely large quantities. If that is the case…
Ice water might actually slow down the metabolism- reduce body temperature, and if that happens, it would actually cause the reverse effect… human beings can die if their core temperature drops by two degrees, which would be more than possible if someone tried this method. It’s dangerous. There are much more effective ways of losing weight, this can’t hold a candle to running and swimming.”
The water will be absorbed almost instantaneously through the walls of the stomach and added to the blood. At 0 degrees! Any more than a few glasses in a row and your body will start giving way- it won’t be able to heat the water as quickly as it is absorbed. Doing that to your body to burn a few extra calories- it’s madness!
Asshole was cracking up.
The woman spoke now. “You aren’t a doctor though, son, you are a scientist. You should think in those terms. Is your body an adiabatic system or an isothermal one? Open or closed.”
“Isothermal and open. But the exchange isn’t ‘free’ it’s not a perfect-”
“There is free exchange or air and water. The body is an isothermal system with the temperature maintained at 37 degrees. Water is added at 0 degrees. What is work-?”
“Thirty two degrees.”
“Huh?”
“He just said that the temperature of the body was thirty two degrees.”
Everyone seemed a little confused. Fuck that Asshole.
“‘M.C.ΔT’”
I don’t remember if it was me who said it, or one of the professors.
A simple equation. I don’t know how, but I knew the interview was over now. I stood up and thanked them.
DeanGuy threw another question my way as I made my way out- “What would you do to reduce the temperature of your body?”
Another question from my illness?
“I’d use an icepack.”
I laughed. I was tired, a little angry, mostly relieved that I wouldn't have to get any more questions wrong, and if there was a better answer than that out there- I didn’t give a shit. I tried to sound not-bitter, maybe it worked.
Certain that I was safely out of consideration for the scholarship, I made my way out. The interview had been a bit tougher than I’d thought.
In the car I recounted a few bits of the tale to my father. “Didn’t you know that ice-water helped lose weight? It’s in all the diet magazines.” He said.
Gah.
I was in the eleventh grade.
It was November, I believe.I had been selected after a written exam to qualify for the second round of the prestigious Kishore Vaigyanik Protsahan Yojana- the KVPY Scholarship exam.
The scholarship was worth several times amount I was getting from my old scholarship - the NTSE, and being the pragmatic sort of person I am- I was raring to have a go at this.
I think about 300-600 students from all over the country were called for an interview. I didn't know how many would be selected.The same week our school was taking part in an essay writing competition. A review of To Kill a Mockingbird. The first prize was two thousand pounds or ten thousand rupees or something. Once again, being the money-minded person I am- and also because I hadn't written anything decent for 8 months, I wanted to enter.
So I borrowed the 'classic' and read it. The thing that annoyed me about the book was the mockingbird on the cover, the absence of it in the story.
Killing a mockingbird is supposed to have meaning- what's the point if the story is NOTHING ABOUT IT.
Might as well have gone with "Justice Denied: The Atticus Finch Story"- it's more catchy.So anyway... I had been worrying about the day with the essay, I have fairly high expectations of myself.
One thing I DON'T like to do is fill up the pages with garbage.
(Teachers seem to like my garbage though- they'd smile and nod wisely when they come across what I consider the Dung of literature, then scoff somewhat at the knives and forks and engines of my writing.)
And as with every other time my passion is stirred, fate dropped in to deliver, yes, you know what I'm talking about.The day of the Essay Writing managed to conveniently coincide with the day of the scholarship interview.
It was a little painful, but I controlled my emotions. Yes, I was going to miss a writing competition with a ten thousand rupee monetary prize. I love writing, competition, and I'd really love ten thousand rupees. But my education is more important. If I got the scholarship, it would amount to much more than ten thousand bucks.
This decision was also tempered by a rather simple fact.
All real writers get their message across in their work. They don't need morons like us trying to devalue their work by using it as basis to impress our egoes onto some judges.
How would you explain the story beyond what is obvious? You will either use flamboyant, obtuse and eclectic language, not say what can be said in simple words, or derive so much from the story by reading between the lines that you forget the content of the words themselves, be so obsessed with forging a new perspective that you forget what is obvious, or, like I may have, simply stated that which needed no real explanation and render my own self completely obsolete, unoriginal.
And so instead of writing something redundant.
I went to buy clothes for the interview.A Brown pant. Shoes. Cream Shirt. Lessons from my dad on how to handle interviews. An idiotic tweed coat. What?
A little tense but more or less calm. I went to sleep early the day before the interview.I woke up early the next morning. At 4 AM, burning up and with a massive headache. Howling, then moaning I got to my feet.
Managed to get a thermometer in my mouth, and waited. Looks like Fate wasn't done with me yet.103 degrees farenheit.
All of the confidence I'd built up over the last few days went to hell.I felt like crying, really. But I didn't. It was a one off incident. It happens to everyone.It was illogical to think that it would ever happen to me again. (Until it did, right before IITJEE 2009, yay. Fuck YOU, Fate.)
There was still some hope. Just enough time before the interview for antipyretics to take effect. And so I took a few pills with a glass of water and tried to rest. I had to try. A few hours passed, the fever subsided but left me drained and lethargic. Even so, I had to focus. Just focus.
The interview was at JNU's science department. At some specified time we arrived at registered. I remember feeling like a damn fool in the tweed coat. Why the hell do I take his advice at all? One of my school-mates was at the registration. Akshat Agarwal (sp?). He was carrying around a massive copy of Resnick/Haliday back when I didn't know what it was, and reading about Semiconductors when I had been struggling with mechanics.
Sure R/H isn't a big deal, but back then, it sure as hell was intimidating to see the guy revising next year's syllabus right before the interview when I could barely think.
My dad talked with the authorities to tell them about my condition and tried to make them get me in to get interviewed first. I wanted to wait damnit, hoping that my head cleared up. But I let him do as he wished. They moved me up the line, heh.
All the interviewers would now know that I was ill. Fucking fantastic. The retard who moved himself up the line for his own convenience.I hate it when my father tries to make things easy for me, when he tries to ensure that I'm treated differently. It undervalues my effort, my preparation- my willpower. I hate it, and even then, its not a good enough reason to fight over.
Finally time for my Out Of Turn. I entered the interview room. There was a woman, an asshole (you can tell from the face), a guy who was never going to say anything throughout the interview, and a man I'd seen earlier, a smartly dressed oldish guy wearing sunglasses and with a shock of silver hair (Later I was told that he was someone important, like a Dean or something).
The interview began.
Except, of course, it was not an interview, more like a timed quiz.
First question, how do you tell apart stars and planets from the moon. I suggested spectroscopy. They wanted to know how ancient humans would have done it. Annoying. I asked what human-kind knew in the ancient time I was working in-> Did they know about the planet's rotation? Or not?
I tried to come up with some logic about how planets and stars followed different trajectories in the night sky along with the refraction 'twinkling' effect being a method of comparing distance. "The stars could be turning on and off." said Asshole. "If we don't know about fucking refraction, you just how much do you expect us to know about space?" I wanted to say.
The questions came thick and fast. Mostly from Asshole. I was asked a new question before the gears of my rusty brain had finished processing the last. Mathematics on how to calculate the moon's size, derive other facts from it- How can you prove that the moon is closer to the earth than the stars? I said something related to my trajectory .
The Deanguy laughed heartily, "Have you even seen a star pass in front of the Moon?"
Asshole laughed too, only derisively.I clenched my fist. Heart and head pounding in front of the black-board on which I'd been writing my equations. Fuck it. They were tricking me.
Any other day... any other day I'd have been able to see through that trick. But today... today, when it took all I had to make my brain accelerate along a straight line, it was a dirty trick.
A stuttering tired fool with a red face. Screwed up the easiest part of the first composite question. What a great first impression.
I won't get another question wrong.
Asshole continued. First some opening line about oceans and the ecosystem.
Then asked-"What is better for sustaining life? Seawater or Freshwater?"I knew this."Freshwater."
Maybe I should have thought a little. "Why?" He asked.
I don't know, I just knew that seawater was a much harsher environment.I started with sunlight and plankton and how less depth led to milder conditions. They didn't seem to buy it. Then about how there was less oxygen in seawater. "Why?" again.
Damnit, what was the point of getting a question right anyway? Something more about the ratio of the surface area to depth and how after a certain distance light did not penetrate into the ocean. Plankton concentration would reduce, and so, oxygen. They didn't buy it.What else? Rivers churn more, the kinetic energy of the churning allows oxygen to dissolve in them? I know now that surface area has little to do with dissolved gas, in theory. The key is 'IN THEORY', I will bet you that if you take oxygen readings near the surface of the ocean and a mile beneath it- the concentrations will be visibly different.Then about how Seawater was a more saturated solution, about how the salinity made survival harder.
I was pretty desperate. The concentration of salts should not affect the concentration of oxygen dissolved. (*cough* IN THEORY) In the end, they stopped this line of questioning. They didn't tell me the answer. Damn well couldn't. I mean I'd said so much, there was nothing left.After a few more questions. A simple one. "What is the temperature of the human body?" asked Asshole."37 degrees centigrade" Almost incredulously, had they thrown me this as a bone?
Asshole laughed. I cringed, what the hell?
"You're way off, It's 32." said Asshole.
"It's 37."
"32" Said Asshole again. He knew as well as everyone else in the room that the answer is thirty seven, but he was going to keep playing this stupid fucking game.
It was at this moment, that I decided that I hated this guy. (Although I didn't mind the others, they didn't go out of their way to piss me off like this dickhead.)
It's 37 you retard. The average temperature of the human body is thirty seven degrees celsius, ninety eight point six degrees fahrenheit. Thirty two degrees celsius is common to extremely large mammals, elephants, hippopotamii and rhinoceroses (sp?), my temperature this morning was forty degrees celsius, which is about normal for owls and rabbits, you fucking retard, and thats where you got this question from. The fact that you choose to mock me by telling me that I am five degrees cooler than I am, and that you insult my intelligence at the same time by doing so, is something I don't appreciate.
What I said was "Sir. I've been reading this my entire life, seen it on thermometers and read it in scientific journals. Not all parts have the same temperature, but the average temperature of the human body is thirty seven degrees celsius."I commended myself for managing to say it with so much respect."You're way off. It's thirty two degrees. I don't know what bullshit you've been reading."
Something small snapped. Like a switch at the back of my head.I smiled. What is this joke? Do you expect me to beg you to accept something that every child knows. Leaning back into the chair, I sighed, a release that could have been mistaken for one due to the strain and post-fever, but probably wasn't.
"Of course sir. You must know better than I. You are a professor in a college. I'm just an eleventh grader. I must be wrong, you must be right. Could you please tell me how and when this new figure was reached?"
This time, I didn't bother to cleanse my voice of the soft mocking tone it carried. It was either this or yelling into his face that he was a moron.
Asshole, A little irritated-"It isn't my job to help you, find out on your own."
Of course, no such research existed. Because he was full of shit.
Next question.
“What is the average pH of the human body?”
What?
“What part of the human body? Blood is slightly alkaline, stomach acid is acidic… between the 4 and 5 range. They probably balance out.”
Asshole snorted. “I want the average.”
Without an answer, I racked my brain. “I think… a 7.4”
Asshole laughed. “That’s way off!”
Again. (He was right though, it’s a 7.2)
Next question.
Deanguy said a bit about how he did exercise to lose wait, then a friend of his stopped him and told him that instead of doing exercise, he should drink cold water instead.
Why?
I buzzed a little. An interdisciplinary question. Finally, all those years of the Discovery channel talking about metabolisms would work.
Of course, he was asking a guy with a fever to defend drinking icewater.
But whatever.
I had a different take on the matter.
“Drinking ice-water cannot be a viable method to lose weight.”
“Why?”
“Sir, any energy required in absorbing the water into the system of the human body will be offset by the possible impact to one’s health.”
“How so?”
“First of all sir, water is zero calorie food, but it will use up some amount of energy when you drink it. However, this energy will be negligible. If you drink a glass of icy water you’ll first gain 250 grams!”
“Ah, but that is merely a temporary increase and will be compensated for.”
“But sir, you are considering a quarter kilogram negligible- while the amount of energy lost is negligible even compared to that.”
“Think, how can drinking ice water make you lose weight.”
“I can’t sir. There’s no way this could work without serious health issues.” It’s common sense.
“In low quantities, the water would have a negligible effect, to show an appreciable effect, the ice water must be consumed in extremely large quantities. If that is the case…
Ice water might actually slow down the metabolism- reduce body temperature, and if that happens, it would actually cause the reverse effect… human beings can die if their core temperature drops by two degrees, which would be more than possible if someone tried this method. It’s dangerous. There are much more effective ways of losing weight, this can’t hold a candle to running and swimming.”
The water will be absorbed almost instantaneously through the walls of the stomach and added to the blood. At 0 degrees! Any more than a few glasses in a row and your body will start giving way- it won’t be able to heat the water as quickly as it is absorbed. Doing that to your body to burn a few extra calories- it’s madness!
Asshole was cracking up.
The woman spoke now. “You aren’t a doctor though, son, you are a scientist. You should think in those terms. Is your body an adiabatic system or an isothermal one? Open or closed.”
“Isothermal and open. But the exchange isn’t ‘free’ it’s not a perfect-”
“There is free exchange or air and water. The body is an isothermal system with the temperature maintained at 37 degrees. Water is added at 0 degrees. What is work-?”
“Thirty two degrees.”
“Huh?”
“He just said that the temperature of the body was thirty two degrees.”
Everyone seemed a little confused. Fuck that Asshole.
“‘M.C.ΔT’”
I don’t remember if it was me who said it, or one of the professors.
A simple equation. I don’t know how, but I knew the interview was over now. I stood up and thanked them.
DeanGuy threw another question my way as I made my way out- “What would you do to reduce the temperature of your body?”
Another question from my illness?
“I’d use an icepack.”
I laughed. I was tired, a little angry, mostly relieved that I wouldn't have to get any more questions wrong, and if there was a better answer than that out there- I didn’t give a shit. I tried to sound not-bitter, maybe it worked.
Certain that I was safely out of consideration for the scholarship, I made my way out. The interview had been a bit tougher than I’d thought.
In the car I recounted a few bits of the tale to my father. “Didn’t you know that ice-water helped lose weight? It’s in all the diet magazines.” He said.
Gah.
Still a little pissed off that I couldn't come up with a simple answer like that... I was unwilling to accept that the best argument that even my handicapped brain could produce, was completely and utterly wrong. I had arrived at it using logic, yes, one that had more to do with biology than chemistry, but still logic.
---------------------------------------------------------
Later I logged onto the net to find the truth.
http://www.chow.com/stories/10877
^That is about the gist of the scientific/health aspect that I could find, everything else was pro-ana websites and retarded teeny-boppers giving advice on yahoo! answers.
The math is simple.
The best method to lose weight is at a rate of 1 or 2 pounds (half or one kilogram respectively) a week. Any slower and it won’t last, and faster and it’s bad for your health.
To lose that amount, you need a calorie deficit of 3500 calories in a week.
Using the M.C.dT formula, one glass of chilled water will burn about 7 or 8 calories over a period of an hour (according to research, drinking a glass of cold water activates your body to use 3% more energy for an hour). That’s 500 glasses a week. 70 glasses of water a day where eight is the prescribed norm (seventy is bound to be unhealthy- no?)/
That’s 17.5 KILOGRAMS of icy water per day over a week, to lose less than 1 kilo at the end of week.
Has anyone heard of water poisoning? Electrolyte balance disruption? Screw it all- do I even need a doctor to tell you this?
The body is an isothermal system, however- it is not perfect. Perfect isotherms are systems in which changes occur at infinitesimally slow rates. Whenever a quick reaction occurs, it has an adiabatic character.
For the layman’s terms- if you drink water at 0 degrees, your body won’t magically make it 37. It’ll take a while to release that energy. You can’t drink more and more and expect the body to function as a perfect isotherm, especially since the physical absorption of water is fairly fast (and everything fast behaves adiabatic)
So what if drinking cold water burns 7-8 calories. So does being alive. 1600/24 = 66, make it 80 while awake, 40 while asleep- You burn those calories doing NOTHING. I might as well recommend you go out in the nude in winter or bathe twice a day as a means of weight loss- they’ll have greater effect. Or maybe… light exercise for a maybe… a minute? In the entire day? A centimetre off the top of the milk you had in the morning would suffice.
Man… Maybe it’s time to make my blog public now.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Another Dream of Dying
Drive back fear and revulsion. I won’t live and let you fall. A weak hand closes around hers as we go over edge. With strength that I never had in my life, I heave, to push her back to safety.
Who is she? I don’t know. Faceless. A plot-device.
Newton’s third pushes me into the air.
The edge rises up behind me and disappears swiftly into the distance. I am weightless. Unburdened... what an incredible fear.
There is no time for me to savour my victory; it has only ensured that I will be alone for this. The ground approaches, a blur that fills the world. I have no hope of survival. And within the hysterical, insane fear-
Should I turn and try to land on my feet to give myself a few extra moments? or go headfirst and make it almost instantaneous?
I sincerely hope this is a dream.
Who is she? I don’t know. Faceless. A plot-device.
Newton’s third pushes me into the air.
The edge rises up behind me and disappears swiftly into the distance. I am weightless. Unburdened... what an incredible fear.
There is no time for me to savour my victory; it has only ensured that I will be alone for this. The ground approaches, a blur that fills the world. I have no hope of survival. And within the hysterical, insane fear-
Should I turn and try to land on my feet to give myself a few extra moments? or go headfirst and make it almost instantaneous?
I sincerely hope this is a dream.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Legacy
Recently it had become difficult for me to reconcile with my most probable career- (Becoming some big/small shot working for some company doing some shit that anyone could do if they understood it, or something no-one can do but someone actually has to not do before the idea can be scrapped)
In either case- a profession without morals, in which worth is measured empirically. Distasteful.
This... idealism, that I have, is always in conflict with the equally strong rationalist in me. I've always chalked it down to naivety (naivete...? o_-?), and thought that at some point I would become disillusioned with it and lose it all- choose wealth and greed over the betterment of the self, sex over love, deception over truth, intoxication over clarity. But does the world really need what I become when I stop caring? Life itself ceases to matter, suicide becomes... a desperate option that must be rationally countered... and not downright sin perpetrated against the self and all of mankind. Cold. Logical. Cruel.
I'd rather keep the idealism. They can call me childish as they go about their foolish pursuits, we are all merely human, and whether my goals are legitimate will be vindicated or discarded by time alone.
A while ago, I wondered it out loud. Will I just turn... into a machine? Thoughtless, futile, working hard but for no end. We were in the middle of a walk in the Lodi Gardens and my Dad was ignoring me while I spoke incessantly. This time, though- he spoke, and the few words he said were enough to erase my insecurities. "You really take after your Grandfather, you know."
And I knew what he was about to say. "If you think that a career will erode your ideals, just look at your Baba..." My Baba is probably one of the principled men I know, and in a way that one scarcely notices this quality of his while taking it for granted.
If I have imbibed this quality of mine from him, then I am thankful for that.
Growing up, the one think that struck me was how Baba treated me like I was a much older person. He wanted me to be involved in current affairs and be aware of my responsibilities as an individual. Somehow, the fact that I was a three and a half year old who couldn't wash himself after going to the toilet didn't make much of a difference.
The maturity that he ascribed to me as toddler (Holy Shit I Was A Toddler) was something that I didn't earn for many, many years. Most adults can learn a thing or two from the way he deals with children. A few years ago Baba was staying over with us, and our cable operator decided to cut our favourite channel (Animax).
That day, a vein at the back of my neck began to twitch, my little sister, who was at that point enthralled by Shoujo anime like Ultra Maniac, went Berserk (pun intended :P) Baba did not watch anime.
He's mostly concerned with Hindi soaps. Even so he took a keen interest in the war his grandchildren proposed to wage on the cable operators, and chose to play the role of mediator and messenger. Let's just say that the cable operators didn't forget the ensuing ordeal until the predatory race called Set Top Boxes wiped them out.
Sometimes it's hard to imagine that this man was once a firebrand, fiercer than I'm supposed to be. He is peaceful, amiable and civil even in the face of extreme discourtesy. The worst 'insult', or 'word with negative connotation', to be more particular, he used was 'Vichitr'- unusual. I remember the time my father and I were accompanying him to the train- we reached his seat only to find that it had been usurped by a politician and his family. They sat comfortably on their seat on the train.
Their royal luggage, stacked three stories high, occupied the seat that was my grandfather's. The 50 something MLA tried to assert his authority over the older gentleman, not knowing that he was dealing with a man who had worked his way past petty politician throughout his career, and had the opportunity to witness great men like Nehru and Patel in his youth, while MLA sahib was rolling around in his diapers.
A man who had in the past used Members of Parliament as personal messengers for his sons' documents. According to a few relatives, Baba's temper was explosive. If ever there was a reason to be furious, it was having a pompous idiot hijack your seat, have his goons stand around you and give you a lecture as if you were retarded. But Baba managed to smile and asked them to remove their luggage at their own convenience. The battles of the youth must lose lustre when you are wizened enough to know the futility of their outcomes. Even so, I was certain that his polite demeanor would be mistaken for weakness if we left him to his own devices. My father began to open up a dialogue, but the MLA, possibly emboldened by Baba's apparent meekness, began to speak down to the three of us. A funny scenario, now that I think about it- lecturing three generations of firebrands (albeit one who had cooled down) in a single go.
In either case- a profession without morals, in which worth is measured empirically. Distasteful.
This... idealism, that I have, is always in conflict with the equally strong rationalist in me. I've always chalked it down to naivety (naivete...? o_-?), and thought that at some point I would become disillusioned with it and lose it all- choose wealth and greed over the betterment of the self, sex over love, deception over truth, intoxication over clarity. But does the world really need what I become when I stop caring? Life itself ceases to matter, suicide becomes... a desperate option that must be rationally countered... and not downright sin perpetrated against the self and all of mankind. Cold. Logical. Cruel.
I'd rather keep the idealism. They can call me childish as they go about their foolish pursuits, we are all merely human, and whether my goals are legitimate will be vindicated or discarded by time alone.
A while ago, I wondered it out loud. Will I just turn... into a machine? Thoughtless, futile, working hard but for no end. We were in the middle of a walk in the Lodi Gardens and my Dad was ignoring me while I spoke incessantly. This time, though- he spoke, and the few words he said were enough to erase my insecurities. "You really take after your Grandfather, you know."
And I knew what he was about to say. "If you think that a career will erode your ideals, just look at your Baba..." My Baba is probably one of the principled men I know, and in a way that one scarcely notices this quality of his while taking it for granted.
If I have imbibed this quality of mine from him, then I am thankful for that.
Growing up, the one think that struck me was how Baba treated me like I was a much older person. He wanted me to be involved in current affairs and be aware of my responsibilities as an individual. Somehow, the fact that I was a three and a half year old who couldn't wash himself after going to the toilet didn't make much of a difference.
The maturity that he ascribed to me as toddler (Holy Shit I Was A Toddler) was something that I didn't earn for many, many years. Most adults can learn a thing or two from the way he deals with children. A few years ago Baba was staying over with us, and our cable operator decided to cut our favourite channel (Animax).
That day, a vein at the back of my neck began to twitch, my little sister, who was at that point enthralled by Shoujo anime like Ultra Maniac, went Berserk (pun intended :P) Baba did not watch anime.
He's mostly concerned with Hindi soaps. Even so he took a keen interest in the war his grandchildren proposed to wage on the cable operators, and chose to play the role of mediator and messenger. Let's just say that the cable operators didn't forget the ensuing ordeal until the predatory race called Set Top Boxes wiped them out.
Sometimes it's hard to imagine that this man was once a firebrand, fiercer than I'm supposed to be. He is peaceful, amiable and civil even in the face of extreme discourtesy. The worst 'insult', or 'word with negative connotation', to be more particular, he used was 'Vichitr'- unusual. I remember the time my father and I were accompanying him to the train- we reached his seat only to find that it had been usurped by a politician and his family. They sat comfortably on their seat on the train.
Their royal luggage, stacked three stories high, occupied the seat that was my grandfather's. The 50 something MLA tried to assert his authority over the older gentleman, not knowing that he was dealing with a man who had worked his way past petty politician throughout his career, and had the opportunity to witness great men like Nehru and Patel in his youth, while MLA sahib was rolling around in his diapers.
A man who had in the past used Members of Parliament as personal messengers for his sons' documents. According to a few relatives, Baba's temper was explosive. If ever there was a reason to be furious, it was having a pompous idiot hijack your seat, have his goons stand around you and give you a lecture as if you were retarded. But Baba managed to smile and asked them to remove their luggage at their own convenience. The battles of the youth must lose lustre when you are wizened enough to know the futility of their outcomes. Even so, I was certain that his polite demeanor would be mistaken for weakness if we left him to his own devices. My father began to open up a dialogue, but the MLA, possibly emboldened by Baba's apparent meekness, began to speak down to the three of us. A funny scenario, now that I think about it- lecturing three generations of firebrands (albeit one who had cooled down) in a single go.
Talking about how he was a very important person with contacts in the 'President's House' was starting to get annoying when his wife decided to put us down a little more harshly, switching to the Queen's Language as she spoke. "Don't you dare switch to English as you talk to me." My father growled, his enunciation better than snob madam's- "Do you people have no civic sense?!" Dad was in the home minstry then. Incredibly hard work, and an important post, one that ensured a large following of policemen, who were just making their way to the carriage.
The MLA could only sit with his mouth open as Dad proceeded to give him a verbal beatdown. His thugs were hardly intimidating in front of cops. Baba must have been annoyed by all this, but he just kept calm, like listening to the radio. By the time my father finished (and I was giving people the evil-eye throughout this time) the MLA's thugs were carrying the luggage out of the carriage and MLA sahib was profusely apologizing to my grandfather.
I've heard Baba's story many times, but each time it seems as close to a dream as the last. Baba's father was a farmer, his elder brothers never completed their education. As a kid, he walked seven kilometres to school, and then back. But the fire to succeed never left him, as it did in almost all others around him. After school he enrolled for a B.Sc. in Physics at a time when science was not taught in schools. We take a lot of what we learn for granted. Imagine knowing nearly nothing about physics, having only an introduction to mathematics, and learning everything we have about science in twelve years, and then proceeding to college level stuff. I can't, it seems impossible.
Baba joined the Bihar state government, in the administrative service, but, perhaps because of how he had managed to radically change his life by educating himself, switched to the educational service. As a young firebrand, his bosses laughed at him when he introduced a 'over-ambitious' proposal to set a target of ensuring that atleast ten percent of the students enrolled in schools were female. The idea was ridiculous to them. In our hindsight, their foresight was roughly equivalent to a blind rat staring at a wall. Eventually, Baba became the director of education.
His rather intense policies won both supporters and dissidents. My father claims that many a time he was assigned a personal invigilator as he gave his exams- someone desperate to find a way to attack Baba by 'exposing' his son's cheating. I'm missing most of the details... due to, y'know, not existing even in a speck of someone's hazy vision of the future.
That's why I listen closely.
I listened closely when he took a map of eastern India and spoke of every single district he'd been to (i.e. All of them) , and the work he did in it. I listened, on the phone, the other day, when he told me how he had learnt to drive by practically blackmailing his employees, and gave me a few pointers here and there.
Ethough I didn't know the fiery Director of Education of the years gone past, indirectly responsible for schooling thousands, I know the soft spoken, patient grandfather who taught me maths and science, and made me read newspapers along with him to make sure that I did not grow up to be an ignorant *******. It helped, too.
The algorithm for approximating square roots of integral numbers that he taught a much stupider version of me in seventh grade- was one I used in my engineering college entrances to solve a few questions on Limits and Derivatives.
Dadi. I will always remember dadi as the principal of a girls' school. Guess I learnt to be a teacher's pet early in life. Dadi was the one responsible for doting on me in my toddler-hood. And since I stopped liking being doted on when I turned two, this posed problems. If I had to choose one quality I have inherited from Dadi, it's her stubborn determination and penchant for argument.
Her gravest threat was- "I'll start teaching you." whenever she wanted me to catch up on my school-work. She had taught practically all subjects up to the high-school level. I think she's the only one of my grandparents still willing to fight her grandkids over mundane issues. We'd all be sheep without that kind of fighting spirit, though.
Nana. For a long time, I did not hear Nana's story, or at least the complete version of it.
Maybe it was a little more grim, more gritty than a child was meant to hear. The way people describe Nana has a lot in common with the way they described Baba. Quick to temper, volatile. The difference is that while Baba has mellowed, Nana is still headstrong in his grouchy way. The story begins with Nana going to borrow a watch from his richer best friend, so that he could time himself during his final exams.
As he asked for it, his friend's father thought it fit to subject my grandfather to his taunts- "You, a postmaster's son, what can you possibly do with a college education? It's useless for you."
I can imagine that Nana must have seethed with rage then. I would have. And yet, he needed the watch.
If he was anything like me, it was his anger that motivated him in his work. He went on to become a Gold Medallist of Allahabad University. They say his name is still etched in the college, last they checked. As he completed his B.A. in History, he began to study for the UPSC- to become an IAS officer.
Sometime before his exam, Nana was in close proximity to the Kumbh mela. Lakhs had gathered and the crowds were almost uncontrollable. Some politicians decided to use the occasion to gain a little mileage, and showed up in the mela, diverting all security forces to take care of 'VIPs' instead of maintaining order in the crowd. The chaos reached boiling point and spilled over into a large scale stampede. Policemen, rather than trying to stop the stampede, hurried to protect the politicians.
Over a hundred people died a terrible death, as policemen merely watched from the sidelines.
Nana blamed the politicians that had caused the asymmetry of police distribution. The memory of this event did not leave his mind, and he was not willing to forgive those self-serving rats. The date of the UPSC exam arrived. Nana cleared the written exam with flying colours, ranking amongst the top few of the nation. Becoming an IAS officer was guaranteed. All that was left was the formality of the interview. The marks wouldn't really matter, all he had to do was pass. Things did not go according to plan. At some point during the interview, the topic of the Kumbh Stampede came up. Perhaps one of the interviewers asked what measures should have been taken to ensure the safety of the crowd. Nana answered bluntly, putting the blame squarely on the politcians and their servile policemen. The interviewers were rattled. Perhaps they had hoped for a little sycophancy- but Nana had been there when it happened, such an event does not leave you so easily.
They failed him, giving him slightly less than the minimum marks required to qualify the interview.
It was strange that one of the toppers of the written exam failed to make the final cut. Nana took up a job as a lecturer of History in his university.
The next year he gave the exam again, scoring even higher than before. He reached the interview hall again, only to find the same faces that had sabotaged his efforts the year before.
There really was no reason to waste more time thinking about it. Nana refused to budge from his stand. They failed him again. News began to spread of a Gold Medallist who had topped the written exam twice only to be shafted during the interview.
A few people, including some ministers, became suspicious- it was strange that a few men seemed to have absolute power over a person's candidacy.
The true reason was supressed, of course, but they argued that the interview- while still important in deciding the outcome of a person's candidacy-should not have Veto power regarding the same.
The official reason must have been that it was to ensure that no discrimination based on caste or creed took place.
The testing system was ammended in Nana's third attempt, so that one could still pass, even if they failed the inteview. I think the written exam had a weightage of 800 marks, the interview 200. For the third time running, Nana performed exceptionally in the written exam, ranking third in the nation and outdoing his previous two attempts.
For the third time he entered the interviewing room. Many familiar faces, once again. I wonder if they even talked to each other this time... it was almost a formality. In my mind's eye, I can imagine Nana simply sitting down and greeting those who had tormented him, and waiting in near silence till it was time to leave. Any illusion of impartiality that the interviewers had tried to maintain in past years disappeared.
They awarded Nana a princely 4 marks out of 200 (ridiculously low, even compared to his interview scores in the previous years), hoping the shortfall would put him out of the running.
And with over 100 marks as his handicap, Nana became an IAS Officer.
Soon after this feat, Nana received a marriage proposal from his rich friend's father, the same man who had mocked him years ago when he had decided to pursue higher education, asking him to marry his daughter.
And Nana politely refused, saying "Yeh toh meri behen jaisi hai."
Man, that MUST HAVE BEEN SARCASM.
If Baba has taught me the virtue of compromise, Nana has taught me the power of an unyielding spirit. I wish he was a little more passionate these days. It's difficult to motivate him. But a few things always work. Cars, for example. Nana loves cars, I think he buys a new one every year, or twice a year!
Maybe he's gullible and falls for every marketing trick. More than that, I think, he just loves to test every new model that's released, considering there were perhaps, 3 models of motorized vehicle available for much of his life. It's not exactly healthy for the wallet (even after selling his old car), and it needs to be tempered.
But I think it's kinda awesome.
A few years ago, me and Nana went to the auto expo. We were wandering around the Skoda pavillion. I don't really like Skodas so I was getting bored, but Nana suddenly, seriously, asked one of the sales reps how he could go about purchasing the high end model on display. I don't know whether Nana didn't realize the car was out of his price range, or that he was just being serious like he's always serious, seeking the information just for the sake of it. In any case, the crowd was brushed aside as Nana was given VIP treatment, sitting in the driver's seat and examining every nook and cranny of the vehicle.
The 'regular' visitors tried to protest but were held back by security personnel. The rep had (wrongly) assumed that the guy was loaded and looking to buy. Of course, Nana DID look like it wouldn't be a big deal for him to make the purchase. That's a pretty great ability, I think, to carry an aura that commands respect, even in an advanced age. I found it a little difficult even to switch from middleclass kid-scrooge to spoilt richspawn.
When he left the Octavia I told the manager in my most authoritative tone- "We'll consider this vehicle, but not before checking the mercedes and BMW pavillions." I met Nana not too long ago. He's learning the internet right now. It's a little slow because he can't quite grasp the limitlessness of the net.
I have to guide him every now and then and make sure he does not give away important passcodes to strangers, but he's become quite fluent. The other day I found him a bunch of ancient black & white cinema songs on youtube and taught him how to look for more.
After cricket and cars, it was only vintage cinema that managed to draw a pure grin from Nana. I hope I get to go back soon and help him find more things to do online.
Nani is ill a lot recently. In the hospital right now... I have to go see her as soon as I can... tomorrow... When she gets well again, I'll ask her to teach me how to paint. She started to teach me and my sister when we were four, but it's been on hiatus ever since.
Strange enough, I started to draw as the first part of her lessons, so I that I would paint over it. I've spent a lot more time with the pencil than the brush since then. It's time that I finish what I started. And I'll make it work.
I'll help her with her own paintings. Or try, at least.
Even though it has always been my desire to break free from the shackles of the past- within them lies a legacy that I am proud to carry. You might see it crush me into the ground, but it'll make a great story someday.
The MLA could only sit with his mouth open as Dad proceeded to give him a verbal beatdown. His thugs were hardly intimidating in front of cops. Baba must have been annoyed by all this, but he just kept calm, like listening to the radio. By the time my father finished (and I was giving people the evil-eye throughout this time) the MLA's thugs were carrying the luggage out of the carriage and MLA sahib was profusely apologizing to my grandfather.
I've heard Baba's story many times, but each time it seems as close to a dream as the last. Baba's father was a farmer, his elder brothers never completed their education. As a kid, he walked seven kilometres to school, and then back. But the fire to succeed never left him, as it did in almost all others around him. After school he enrolled for a B.Sc. in Physics at a time when science was not taught in schools. We take a lot of what we learn for granted. Imagine knowing nearly nothing about physics, having only an introduction to mathematics, and learning everything we have about science in twelve years, and then proceeding to college level stuff. I can't, it seems impossible.
Baba joined the Bihar state government, in the administrative service, but, perhaps because of how he had managed to radically change his life by educating himself, switched to the educational service. As a young firebrand, his bosses laughed at him when he introduced a 'over-ambitious' proposal to set a target of ensuring that atleast ten percent of the students enrolled in schools were female. The idea was ridiculous to them. In our hindsight, their foresight was roughly equivalent to a blind rat staring at a wall. Eventually, Baba became the director of education.
His rather intense policies won both supporters and dissidents. My father claims that many a time he was assigned a personal invigilator as he gave his exams- someone desperate to find a way to attack Baba by 'exposing' his son's cheating. I'm missing most of the details... due to, y'know, not existing even in a speck of someone's hazy vision of the future.
That's why I listen closely.
I listened closely when he took a map of eastern India and spoke of every single district he'd been to (i.e. All of them) , and the work he did in it. I listened, on the phone, the other day, when he told me how he had learnt to drive by practically blackmailing his employees, and gave me a few pointers here and there.
Ethough I didn't know the fiery Director of Education of the years gone past, indirectly responsible for schooling thousands, I know the soft spoken, patient grandfather who taught me maths and science, and made me read newspapers along with him to make sure that I did not grow up to be an ignorant *******. It helped, too.
The algorithm for approximating square roots of integral numbers that he taught a much stupider version of me in seventh grade- was one I used in my engineering college entrances to solve a few questions on Limits and Derivatives.
Dadi. I will always remember dadi as the principal of a girls' school. Guess I learnt to be a teacher's pet early in life. Dadi was the one responsible for doting on me in my toddler-hood. And since I stopped liking being doted on when I turned two, this posed problems. If I had to choose one quality I have inherited from Dadi, it's her stubborn determination and penchant for argument.
Her gravest threat was- "I'll start teaching you." whenever she wanted me to catch up on my school-work. She had taught practically all subjects up to the high-school level. I think she's the only one of my grandparents still willing to fight her grandkids over mundane issues. We'd all be sheep without that kind of fighting spirit, though.
Nana. For a long time, I did not hear Nana's story, or at least the complete version of it.
Maybe it was a little more grim, more gritty than a child was meant to hear. The way people describe Nana has a lot in common with the way they described Baba. Quick to temper, volatile. The difference is that while Baba has mellowed, Nana is still headstrong in his grouchy way. The story begins with Nana going to borrow a watch from his richer best friend, so that he could time himself during his final exams.
As he asked for it, his friend's father thought it fit to subject my grandfather to his taunts- "You, a postmaster's son, what can you possibly do with a college education? It's useless for you."
I can imagine that Nana must have seethed with rage then. I would have. And yet, he needed the watch.
If he was anything like me, it was his anger that motivated him in his work. He went on to become a Gold Medallist of Allahabad University. They say his name is still etched in the college, last they checked. As he completed his B.A. in History, he began to study for the UPSC- to become an IAS officer.
Sometime before his exam, Nana was in close proximity to the Kumbh mela. Lakhs had gathered and the crowds were almost uncontrollable. Some politicians decided to use the occasion to gain a little mileage, and showed up in the mela, diverting all security forces to take care of 'VIPs' instead of maintaining order in the crowd. The chaos reached boiling point and spilled over into a large scale stampede. Policemen, rather than trying to stop the stampede, hurried to protect the politicians.
Over a hundred people died a terrible death, as policemen merely watched from the sidelines.
Nana blamed the politicians that had caused the asymmetry of police distribution. The memory of this event did not leave his mind, and he was not willing to forgive those self-serving rats. The date of the UPSC exam arrived. Nana cleared the written exam with flying colours, ranking amongst the top few of the nation. Becoming an IAS officer was guaranteed. All that was left was the formality of the interview. The marks wouldn't really matter, all he had to do was pass. Things did not go according to plan. At some point during the interview, the topic of the Kumbh Stampede came up. Perhaps one of the interviewers asked what measures should have been taken to ensure the safety of the crowd. Nana answered bluntly, putting the blame squarely on the politcians and their servile policemen. The interviewers were rattled. Perhaps they had hoped for a little sycophancy- but Nana had been there when it happened, such an event does not leave you so easily.
They failed him, giving him slightly less than the minimum marks required to qualify the interview.
It was strange that one of the toppers of the written exam failed to make the final cut. Nana took up a job as a lecturer of History in his university.
The next year he gave the exam again, scoring even higher than before. He reached the interview hall again, only to find the same faces that had sabotaged his efforts the year before.
There really was no reason to waste more time thinking about it. Nana refused to budge from his stand. They failed him again. News began to spread of a Gold Medallist who had topped the written exam twice only to be shafted during the interview.
A few people, including some ministers, became suspicious- it was strange that a few men seemed to have absolute power over a person's candidacy.
The true reason was supressed, of course, but they argued that the interview- while still important in deciding the outcome of a person's candidacy-should not have Veto power regarding the same.
The official reason must have been that it was to ensure that no discrimination based on caste or creed took place.
The testing system was ammended in Nana's third attempt, so that one could still pass, even if they failed the inteview. I think the written exam had a weightage of 800 marks, the interview 200. For the third time running, Nana performed exceptionally in the written exam, ranking third in the nation and outdoing his previous two attempts.
For the third time he entered the interviewing room. Many familiar faces, once again. I wonder if they even talked to each other this time... it was almost a formality. In my mind's eye, I can imagine Nana simply sitting down and greeting those who had tormented him, and waiting in near silence till it was time to leave. Any illusion of impartiality that the interviewers had tried to maintain in past years disappeared.
They awarded Nana a princely 4 marks out of 200 (ridiculously low, even compared to his interview scores in the previous years), hoping the shortfall would put him out of the running.
And with over 100 marks as his handicap, Nana became an IAS Officer.
Soon after this feat, Nana received a marriage proposal from his rich friend's father, the same man who had mocked him years ago when he had decided to pursue higher education, asking him to marry his daughter.
And Nana politely refused, saying "Yeh toh meri behen jaisi hai."
Man, that MUST HAVE BEEN SARCASM.
If Baba has taught me the virtue of compromise, Nana has taught me the power of an unyielding spirit. I wish he was a little more passionate these days. It's difficult to motivate him. But a few things always work. Cars, for example. Nana loves cars, I think he buys a new one every year, or twice a year!
Maybe he's gullible and falls for every marketing trick. More than that, I think, he just loves to test every new model that's released, considering there were perhaps, 3 models of motorized vehicle available for much of his life. It's not exactly healthy for the wallet (even after selling his old car), and it needs to be tempered.
But I think it's kinda awesome.
A few years ago, me and Nana went to the auto expo. We were wandering around the Skoda pavillion. I don't really like Skodas so I was getting bored, but Nana suddenly, seriously, asked one of the sales reps how he could go about purchasing the high end model on display. I don't know whether Nana didn't realize the car was out of his price range, or that he was just being serious like he's always serious, seeking the information just for the sake of it. In any case, the crowd was brushed aside as Nana was given VIP treatment, sitting in the driver's seat and examining every nook and cranny of the vehicle.
The 'regular' visitors tried to protest but were held back by security personnel. The rep had (wrongly) assumed that the guy was loaded and looking to buy. Of course, Nana DID look like it wouldn't be a big deal for him to make the purchase. That's a pretty great ability, I think, to carry an aura that commands respect, even in an advanced age. I found it a little difficult even to switch from middleclass kid-scrooge to spoilt richspawn.
When he left the Octavia I told the manager in my most authoritative tone- "We'll consider this vehicle, but not before checking the mercedes and BMW pavillions." I met Nana not too long ago. He's learning the internet right now. It's a little slow because he can't quite grasp the limitlessness of the net.
I have to guide him every now and then and make sure he does not give away important passcodes to strangers, but he's become quite fluent. The other day I found him a bunch of ancient black & white cinema songs on youtube and taught him how to look for more.
After cricket and cars, it was only vintage cinema that managed to draw a pure grin from Nana. I hope I get to go back soon and help him find more things to do online.
Nani is ill a lot recently. In the hospital right now... I have to go see her as soon as I can... tomorrow... When she gets well again, I'll ask her to teach me how to paint. She started to teach me and my sister when we were four, but it's been on hiatus ever since.
Strange enough, I started to draw as the first part of her lessons, so I that I would paint over it. I've spent a lot more time with the pencil than the brush since then. It's time that I finish what I started. And I'll make it work.
I'll help her with her own paintings. Or try, at least.
Even though it has always been my desire to break free from the shackles of the past- within them lies a legacy that I am proud to carry. You might see it crush me into the ground, but it'll make a great story someday.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
On seeing his College after two decades.
...
They paved paradise... and put up a parking lot.
"Those ugly girders in the main hall... I heard the staff had them installed after the Stephanian hostel boys attacked crossed the road one year and shattered all the window-panes."
"Those assholes!"
"Yeah. I mean, we used to smash up St. Stephens windows every year, but they never did anything like this."
They paved paradise... and put up a parking lot.
"Those ugly girders in the main hall... I heard the staff had them installed after the Stephanian hostel boys attacked crossed the road one year and shattered all the window-panes."
"Those assholes!"
"Yeah. I mean, we used to smash up St. Stephens windows every year, but they never did anything like this."
Thursday, June 11, 2009
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