Sandeep's blog

The movie I put off the most…..

The first time I started watching this movie was when I was in Engineering 3^rd year and it was Animesh’s Computer. I could go as far as 20 mins that time and till today I have started this movie more than 10 times and never did I pass that 20 minutes watch. There is too much hype about this movie, considered it one of the best romantic sequels of all time. Yesterday I wanted to watch a movie and it was 11:30pm, so I didn’t dare watching another Telugu or Hindi movies. I didn’t want to start friends coz I start it for one episode and I end up watching it till 3 am.

So I was browsing through movies and suddenly I have come across this 90 mins flick of which I already watched 20mins – Before Sunrise. I finished it. It didn’t look like the great movie they said it was. I felt it was a onetime watch. Characters were too forced on each other and it was not practical. I was an average film. Since the next part was of just 80 mins, I thought I should finish it today. I started the movie – Before Sunset.

There is a charisma about this movie from the moment go. Set 9 years apart, narration was so simple and deep. My only problem was that it ended. If the earlier movie was every youngster perfect love story, then the sequel is the aftermath of that perfection. Every single line rings true, believable and moving. I don’t know if Jesse really was there on that December and If Celine is really dating someone, at least this is what they tell each other.

In the scene where Jesse tells that he may have seen Celine on their wedding day, the expressions afterwards were pure artistic. The world of relationships, It is touching but unsentimental. The climax is standout. They walk up the stairs in silence after the honest confessions in car and the tension in air. Then the song, the expressions, the feelings..!! It is just a perfect ending. At least for me, Before Sunset gave a lot of meaning to Before Sunrise!!

Last dialogue - Celine: “Baby, you are gonna miss that plane”. Jesse: “I know”

“You can never replace anyone because everyone is made up of such beautiful specific details”

“Memories are wonderful things, if you don't have to deal with the past”

 

And the feeling still lingers!!

Today I was having my standard lunch with my usual friends at our usual place in the usual manner. The difference is that we had a guy with us who doesn’t know that we were from IIM. So eventually, in spite of whatever we spoke the IIM topic came in. He asked all the common questions and the studs of my batch started answering in a way that IIM is nothing, it is all hype and we have done a big mistake joining it!! While pointing the fact that I like the life a lot and I get very excited when I talk about IIM.

I didn’t say anything but I kept on thinking about it. Why do they hate the place so much when I love each and every part of the two years I have spent there? Why I am still writing a blog about my college life even after 2 years. And come to think of it, I never loved the place alone!! I love the life of college. It never mattered to me if that was NIT JSR or IIM Kozhikode. I just enjoyed my life and I don’t have any complaints. What is the best thing about that life?? Why it is very hard for people like me to forget about it? Hmm.. let me see…

Of all first, I miss the simplicity of the college life. In this world where lives are complicated with relationships, jobs and future, I miss my ignorance, naivety and stupidity. Now I am worldly wise and it just isn't as much fun!

I miss my group of friends whom I can completely trust and walk through any problem, share any stupid idea and laugh with like there is no thought about tomorrow. I miss the entire experience.

I miss the exams. Not that I liked them at that time but I miss the 3 or 4 days when I used to sit with my group and discuss syllabus. The mid discussion breaks, the laughs, from jumping one topic to another and losing track of the whole discussion, going to canteen at 4am in the morning, asking roommate to wake me up after 10 mins or 20mins. I miss it all.

I miss the canteen. No matter how much I crib about the food, I miss the hours spent in canteen the most. I miss the Random conversations over one hot and steamy maggi at 12 in night or t to manage / escape the next assignments. The view from the canteen only made it a better experience for me but I guess it wouldn’t have mattered at all.

I miss all outing I went with my friends. The fights we had or the random plans we made, the craziness for cool pics or the laziness of getting up. The late night bike racing or the midnight beach walks, eating at 4 different places in one night! When will you experience if you didn’t go to college.

Today, in this crazy life, the drenching in rain or lazy morning nap or the parties or the moment of pause to think about lifestyle or look into the mirror like that on campus seems like a distant Dream!!

Yet life goes on!! Let us see where it will go!!

Euthanasia

“Euthanasia as wiki defines, refers to the practice of ending a life in a manner which relieves pain and suffering”.

The “pain” described in the definition is nothing but - the unbearable pain of a disease, the pain of a bed ridden life, the pain of a non curable disease, the pain of endless needles, the pain of carrying an incurable disease and finally the mental fatigue of the long lasting suffering.

This is just one side of the pain. The other side is the trauma and the emotional turmoil, the family goes through. They cry with the patient, always be there with the patient, scarifies part of their own life to assist the sufferer. They go to an extent where while assisting the patient, they become a sufferer of the situations. By moving along with the dearer, they don’t realize that their life is becoming stagnant. And once the nature takes its call, all the family is left with a deep void which can never be filled by any means. It let them live with a lifelong pain.

So isn’t better to let the patient and the family take the call of whether they should endure the lifelong pain? As they say, don’t they have a right of “Death with Dignity?”

Now, we are in a highly modern society but over the years we have seen miracles taking place. We can’t deny the fact that, with the advancement of medical science, as long as patient lives there is always a hope of revival.

So now first, it is very difficult for family members to decide whether a person should live or not and then there will be a sense of guilty feeling as long as they live. If the medicine comes out at a later point of their lives, it will become impossible for them to live a peaceful life.

Second, Voluntary Euthanasia – what are we asking a patient here? Are we asking that – “Would like to live in this state and let your family suffer for life?” or “Would you die now and let them live?” is this looks like a call taken by a patient?

Will a mother ever let her child die, because of the state they are in? Can a Son let the terminally ill father make a call on should he pull the plug?

It may have been a one in a million case but miracles do happen. 

Quarter-life crisis :P

When I was in school, I used to hate all my teachers. Yes I like math a lot, but still hated the teacher. I hated the fact I had to wake up early in the morning for tuition. I hated to carry loads of books where ever I go. I wanted to have freedom of when to study and when not to study. I didn’t want that routine life, which was typically tuition in the morning, school in during day time again tuition in evening,  then come  back to home and sit and do home work. I wanted to grow up and enter college as early as possible.

Then I entered college, spent two years in a hostel, away from home. By end of one year, I realized that I’m in the middle of a rat race. School days were so good and there was plenty of time to study, play with no strings attached. Again the cribbing started. Started hating wardens and Profs again but at the same time started admiring some professors. Life became routine again. Wake up at 4am, follow the schedule throughout the day and sleep by 11pm. All I wanted then was to get a rank less than 1000 in EAMCET and join AU. Till then I was clear that in engineering I won’t be again going to be part of this rat race. Instead of AU, I joined NIT, JSR.

I know after 1^st year that this is the golden phase of life, and I have to enjoy it. I made some great friends over there. I was the 1^st one to sleep in my room, spent almost 1 whole year, as my frnds say, at relatives. Never tried to study. My motto was no pain no gain. But fortunately I gained a lot without much pain from NIT. Some of my batch mates feel that their mind was sharper before joining NIT. But I never thought in that direction. I liked it for many reasons. But yes, still wanted to get out of that place quickly because of power problems and crappy food.

Then I entered IIM. Against my normal will, I tried to study hard. Used to sit in Library for hours. I know I was studying very hard, more than cumulative 4 years in NIT. But 1^st term results came as a slap on my face. Realized what I was doing wrong. Brought back my funda of no pain no gain. Then life became normal and back on track. But here I realized that this is the only time left for me to enjoy life at its fullest. This became the only phase in life with no cribbing and rich memories. But as people say if all things are going smoothly then you are in a wrong lane, recession hit us. Now again cribbing started.

Now Job. Complete turnaround of event. I started trying to work hard. The more I tried the more I’m succeeding. But now, when performance appraisal is coming, I realized that my life turned on its head. Now it looks full of pain and not much gain. Again a routine life full of cribbing. But the thing is that cribbing continues all the time and you’ll learn that as age grows complexity increases. It is very important to live in present. Kal ko kisne dekha!!

After thought: After realizing all this, why the hell I still like to live in past and dream about future?? I guess everyone does this and no one has any answer to it!! J

Oh, this was so interesting...

Because of 3 Idiots movie, all four years of my engineering hass flashed in just couple of hours. One thing I did not experience is the fact that there was lot of work pressure on the students. No one from NIT Jamshedpur can really understand this. Engineering life is golden period for everyone and the fact that there is no pressure (Pressure is a big word) differentiates NIT JSR.

I studied hard for the mid sem in 1^st term. That was the only time in four years of engineering I studied. The question paper was nothing but what they taught us in class. Even the values in numerical were also same. Those mid terms enlightened our souls. From the next time onwards our work before exam was to collect notes from batch mates. We used to study only those 10 to 15 pages for exams. Some real engineers, who were lazy even to read those 15pages per exam, brought the concept of “Chutta” – mini Xerox of what prof taught us in class. These are some facts about NIT JSR which are undeniable which makes the whole exams and pressure irrelevant.

1.      Syllabus is never beyond 10 to 15 pages, what prof teaches in class

2.      If you have last year’s question paper, then you have this year question paper as well, coz both are same.

3.      If you couldn’t read those 10 pages before exam, you can always avail an option of “Chutta”

4.      The person who sits behind you and in front you are most important in 1^st two years

The biggest thing you discover in the 3^rd year is that,

5.      No prof corrects your exam papers – which make it hard for one to improve CGPA after 2^nd year, But at the same time it is impossible for your CGPA to get worse after 2^nd year.

6.      Profs also know that you copy in all quizzes, Assignments and Exams.

Coming to the assignments, quizzes and labs; All lab records and assignments are “Khandani”. Those are what we got from our seniors who got from their seniors and so on. 63 students were there in Mechanical and all our assignments, lab records, practical’s readings were same. "Pathak" is a word which creates enormous pressure among all NITans.

Without attending any classes you can get 100% attendance. An 8am class starts at 8:15am with prof coming and technically starts at 8:30am with students coming progressively. By 9:10 class end s which should have progressed till 10:00am. Either you ask the prof to leave for the day, and he’ll be happy for that or If by any chance you won’t ask him to leave then he generously leaves you for the day. There is always an option of proxy if you don’t want to attend those 40mins. One can give proxy for upto 10 students, 7 in my case at once. The ratio of attendees to attendance resister will always be 1:3. Library is a holly temple and 50% of batch might not have gone to it even once. Our librarian is someone whom you’ll never forget in life.

The only pain during those four years was the frequent power cuts and water scarcity. But even that also brought us together. Going to Karkhai River for bath and sitting till 12am in the cricket ground & at Shamji, scolding the system and Diro will be missed by the current batches, as these two problems are solved now. Our only tension during the four years is about “Chappal Chori” in Computer center. The way people hide their Chappal at CC will show you how creative people can get. A bike will make you a key member to all parties, events and you’ll attain limitless power in mess - Babu lal and Lucky da!! :P

College days are the cruelest days of the life. In these days you always find the right time to do the wrong things or the wrong time for the right things. You don’t realize the change within you or rather you won’t have to realize it. Time has no value for you. You only remember exam dates. You wonder why people are so obsessed with Weekends. You never think about tomorrow. You live life as if there is no tomorrow. You have little respect for strangers and no respect for professors.  Neither the number of assignments to do nor does the number of classes to attend matters to you. I hate these days. What is a life when you don’t care about anything? What is a life when you never get some personal time? What is a life where drinking together, playing cards, using  slangs and making fun of others forms the major junk of time? Is it what they call heaven?

 

Mein ek Business development Manager

Mein Ek Business Development manager

Office mein apna laptop dekh ta hoon

Din, mahine, saalo ko

Yug mein badalte dekhta hu

 

Is Job mujhe Jail mein umar khaidh ki yaad lati hai

Yeh canteen mere collage ki gandi khana yaad dilati hai

Yeh workstation mujhe classes’ ki booring lectures yaad dilati hai

Yeh office ek zoo ki ehsaas lati hai

 

Woh kehte hai yeh tera life hai

Phir kyun mujhe ye ek jhand jaisa lagta hai

Woh kehte hai mein vun jaisa hoon

Phir kyun mein vun se ek dum alag lagta hoon

 

Mein Ek Business Development manager

Office mein apna laptop dekh ta hoon

Documents, presentations, Deadlines ke beech

Ek gtalk ya skype ka ping dekhta hoon

 

Sab kaam chod ke sapnoke gaon mein chala jaa ta hoon

Hai bilkul bakwas batein kartaa hoon

Din ke frustration pura izhaar karta hoon

Uni bakwas se phir kaam karne mann dil karta hai

 

Har raath ek serial dekh ta hoon

Har Friday ko ek nayi movie ki release ka intezar karta hoon

Bigbazar ko hi ek Wall mart samjhta hoon

Har ek weekend room saaf kar neka kwabh dekh ta hoon

Mein Ek Business Development manager

Office mein apna laptop dekh ta hoon aur

 

Sochta hoon sab kehtein hein bohat Kharch kar raha hoon

Sochta hoon sab kehtein hein bohat ghoom raha hoon

Sochta hoon sab kehtein hein bohat phone use kar raha hoon

Par kyon phir bhi akele mehsoos kar ta hoon!!!

 

My last day@ IIM-K

Today, 22nd March 2009 @ 3:12AM…

The one question that’s bothering me for the last couple of months and bugging me for the last couple of days and killing me for the last couple of hours is “Why the hell all the good things should come to an end?”.

Everyone expects a mature behavior from tomorrow onwards from me. But where will I hide the little child’s heart. Everyone expects me to control my emotions but where will I hide the devilish commentary of mine. Everyone expects me to behave in a manner but where will I hide my natural feelings.

I had been staying in hostels for the last 8years. I was sad when I left my intermediate hostel. I was crying when I left my (yes my) NIT Jamshedpur. But today my heart is paining.  When I left the last 2 previous hostels, I know that I’ll be moving to another college. I know I’ll be a student again. I know that I’ll keep in touch with all my friends. But today things are different. I’m not going to college anymore. Student life will be a distant memory from 2moro. I know most of the friends today won’t be in touch with me anymore. It’s not because I won’t call or mail them but it’s because, today I know they have their own life.   

When I first entered IIM, I was praying the god to FF the days. Today it seems he listened to me for the first time I guess. I’ve been drinking lately for the past few days regularly and I hardly remember a day in the past one month I slept with my consent. Its not because I’m a drinker or because I’m a lazy crazy fellow, but because I never wanted to think about this day. Tomorrow I’ll be leaving the campus forever and I’ll be leaving my best mates eternally. I badly want to cry now. But my mind is saying be mature. I’m smiling now but there is lot of pain in the heart.

How can I forget meeting some very special people over here? I know today I’ll never meet one more meetesh, who always gladly took all my deeds in good manner. The multi talented and ever helping Sridhar won’t be there tomorrow to help me. Suresh will become a serious man from 2moro. There won’t be any more stories by Samba. My ever loving brother, Subbu, will be in Delhi fighting his own life. Where will I find a sophisticated Kalyan and a cartoon like Supriya, who on the passage of time becomes one of my best friends. Where will I learn the latest gossips when he gossip Hasini (:P)  Sush will be alone. The rads, jks, shanks, jains, guptas n simrans will be a distant memory.

From tomorrow onwards I’ll be entering a new life, A life where I can’t say what I want but to say what the other person wants to listen. I can’t do what I want. A life that is full of challenges (I guess). For the last 22 years as a student I’ve faced lot of challenges. But with the company of friends I never felt that I’ve faced any challenges. But from tomorrow, I’ve to move forward on my own. It’s a tough life ahead. I don’t know whether I’m ready for it. But I can definitely say my golden days (College days) are over.

I now understood the real feeling behind the song Summer of’69.

A Long Journey

30^th Nov 2008:

After 8hour long bumpy and humpy journey I reached Bangalore at 6AM in the morning along with my parents. Last night journey was still in my mind, Kozhikode to Bangalore. First, the struggle to get 4 sleeper tickets then a royally screwed bus and finally the journey itself. One can easily compare my last night’s experience to watching Ramu’s AAG. After reaching Bangalore we went to railway station at 6:30AM.  In this damn corrupted world one can get luxury in two ways. You either have enough money to pay for it or you should know whom to bribe. It was the second in my case. So we freshened up in the VIP guest rooms in Bangalore City railway station. Then we went for shopping in the cool weather of Bangalore. Mom had enough time to buy 3 sarees and Dad was busy in improving his photography skills.

Our train was at 2PM and we reached railway station by 1:15PM. On the way back from Garuda mall, I observed lot of police been deployed near Vidhan-Sabha (I like this word). Railway station is entirely loaded with police forces. It was understandable in the light of Mumbai Mayhem. I bought Hindu, TOI, India today and Business today, as if I’ll read all of them. I know while buying that I won’t read more than one. But from the last few days I’m reading a lot and watching a lot more. Not because placements are around the corner but because I know this time my future’s at greater risk because of the terrorist attacks

We boarded the train at 1:30PM and few minutes later I started reading India today, of course some thing related to Mumbai only. I remembered watching in NDTV “how we won on terror again” last evening. Then suddenly I came across an article, one of the few places where terrorists attacked got reopened. It’s hard to believe that we people forget everything very quickly unless we are one of the victims of it. A lot of things happened around my life in the last two years and I always thought life should move on. After reading the article I felt proud that after the incident life @ Mumbai, the city which never sleeps, got back on track. I again said to myself, life always moves on.

Train stopped at some station, 1hr after Bangalore. Two Muslims boarded my compartment. In school days I used to judge whether one is Muslim or not on basis of one legendary (Barni’s style) sentence “Daadi hey woh tho Muslim hey”. They came and sat next to me. One of them is young, probably around 25 and other might be in his early 60s. For one minute I was feeling as if some terrorist sat beside me. For the next half an hour I roamed around the all AC compartments to look if they are more or what. For the next 2hrs I was worried as if my train got hijacked. Thoughts of that kind were only coming to my mind. Mom was constantly asking what’s wrong. But what will I answer her. So, I finally decided to sleep to avoid thinking in that direction.

I left my GF – my lappy – with my mom and went to an upper birth to have a little nap. Suddenly I was feeling cold. I remembered the last evenings show, “how we won on terror again”. Now I doubted did we really win? I am a normal guy who dreams only of metro life. I am the “aam aadmi”, as explained in the movie “A Wednesday”. I was never near to any of the cities which are main targets of terrorists. I didn’t even go to the peace march organized by my college mates because I never really felt the horror. Then why I am feeling fear? As one of my friends always said, I’m a go-easy kind of boy, then why this feeling today. The terrorists’ main aim was to embed fear in the “aam aadmi”. And today, for the first time to me, a Pakistani is looking like an enemy & a terrorist and their Indian counterparts like traitors.

More than 6 terror attacks took place in the last one year. But why this latest attack affected me so much? Is it because I spent two wonderful months in Mumbai? Or is it because I dreamt of being a regular visitor to Taj for the last 5 years?

Did we really won the battle? I strongly doubt it now. We struggled to get back the hotels and we reclaimed them after more than 56hrs. Our precious fighters got killed. More than 180 people were killed. Our intelligence completely failed in predicting the attacks. There was lack of coordination among the rescue forces. The govt. – God knows what happened to them – never took stern action against terror. Today high profile Deputy CM of Maharashtra says “Bade seharon mein esa chota kaam hote rahta hey”. I felt an urge to kill that fucking bastard first. One 9/11 attack on America made them attack two countries and in India many 9/11s happened and this year there have been 7 attacks so far. When will we take measures to curb the terrorism?

Today I feel like the terrorists have won the battle. Not because other cricket playing countries are not willing to come here to play, not because India is in the top 20 unsafe places in the world along with countries like Iraq, Chechnya and Afghanistan but because as a common Indian I am terrified of travelling. Today for the first time a Muslim bro is scaring me. For the first time I really doubt the future of the country, with every politician started playing the blame game even before NSGs reclaimed even one of the hotels. Today for the first time, my home town Srikakulam seems to be better and safer than any other place in the country.