Photos- Courtesy my new Camera

A feathered friend arrives ...

Need a rub...

Hyderabad's too dusty, ain't it...?

Ok, done. Ready for take off...

Construction next to my house...

My most prized possesion-BEAN BAG!!!

The view from my room on a rainy day...

The view from my room at night...

And of course, my new Nikon Coolpix L3...

More Chess

Obviously avoid this post if you are still reading this. Its really about chess.

It’s a problem I have. When I am playing in a chess tournament, I lose perspective. It consumes me. Here I have the added responsibility of organizing this one as well. My gym schedule has gone haywire because evenings are now taken up full time. I had a brainwave that I would leave early for office, around 6 AM and work out in the company gym. Did that on Monday, gave it a miss today and probably tomorrow as well. C’mon, one hour of dreamy sleep or giving pain to your triceps? It’s a no-brainer.

Yesterday, I lost a friendly match. Came back home and told myself, "No, No, don’t do it. Eat and sleep. You need to workout tomorrow morning." But I couldn’t help it. It’s a problem I have. When I am playing in a chess tournament, I lose perspective. It consumes me. Spent the next one and a half hour with my Rexene board and ivory pieces analyzing my game and cursing myself for not finding the right move over the board and making the blunder that decided the game. Thankfully, I won easily in our first round game today. An unremarkable game, nay opponent. I mean when his first three moves are e3, c3, and h3, it’s a sort of anticlimax. You really wish he would resign then and there but you need to be patient and play those 20 moves to finish him off. My first three moves? e5, d5, c5.

Ok, can’t really make up my mind on how to continue this post, so will stop it here. Need my sleep you know. Plus, work out tomorrow you dazedandconfused asshole, you can do it.

Somewhere Only We Know

I walked across an empty land
I knew the pathway like the back of my hand
I felt the earth beneath my feet
Sat by the river and it made me complete

Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin

I came across a fallen tree
I felt the branches of it looking at me
Is this the place we used to love?
Is this the place that I've been dreaming of?

Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin

And if you have a minute why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
Somewhere only we know?

Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin

So if you have a minute why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
So why don't we go

This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
Somewhere only we know?

Song: Somewhere Only We Know
Artist: Keane

Dream Job, Part Deux

I wrote this post sometime back on what I feel about dream jobs. And I wrote this post about how I feel about Chess. Then there are a couple of more posts related to chess, here and there. Read these at your own risk. The point of this labored introduction is that I once again feel I know what my dream job really is. And that I think would be if I were a chess journalist in Europe.

The glory is, of course reserved for the Grandmasters. But it’s too late for me to start a playing career, plus I honestly don’t think I have that kind of talent. But wouldn’t it be great if I could spend my life covering tournaments in Linares, Wijk Aan Zee, Monte Carlo and the other great venues for chess? Coz make no mistake about it, Europe is the Mecca for Chess. All the great players are there, popularity of the game is really high in those parts, the biggest tournaments happen there though there are exceptions like San Louis last year but really one-offs don’t count for much. Hell, I don’t know how many of you know that even our own Vishwanathan Anand lives in Madrid and holidays in Chennai and not the other way around.

The company I work in is currently organizing their annual sports meet for their employees. Obviously, your truly has taken charge of the chess event. From organizing chessboards and pieces for the tournament, to searching in futility for chess clocks in Hyderabad last week. From drawing up the schedule and tournament rules, communicating with the 16 team captains of their individual units, to clarifying inane doubts and conducting selection games for my own unit, nothing in my recent past has given me as much pleasure as these mundane tasks, done after regular office hours. And the tournament has not yet begun! I played a friendly game today as well after a long time (those internet games are never the same) with a pretty senior guy in my organization (I found that out only after I beat him, shit! Thankfully he was from another unit) I blundered horribly in the opening, gave away a pawn and a knight for nothing within the first ten moves. Almost resigned there and then but just gritted my teeth and fought back, slowly and steadily. Nana, if you are reading this, you would have been proud J . Forked his queen and rook with my bishop and won the exchange, won back one of his doubled pawns and followed it up with a neat little sacrificial combination involing an NxP on e3 which led to a win of a couple of more pawns. My queen and two rooks then combined very nicely against his cramped forces consisting of a queen, rook, knight and bishop. Full control of the e file helped to exchange pieces favorably at the right moment and by the time his king was his only piece left on the board on a5, my pawn had rolled its way to h2 and it was all over.

See, there’s redemption for me yet, within those 64 squares.

For you, Dad

Today is my father’s second death anniversary, according to the Tamil Calendar. I got up at six today, took a bath, maneuvered myself into a dhoti, and waited, barechested, except for the sacred thread hanging across my neck and left shoulder, for the two brahmans who were going to perform the ceremony, to arrive. My mom had readied the assorted thingies- brass cups and spoon, mats on the floor to sit upon, some tulsi leaves, rice, ash, sandalwood paste and some kind of black seeds.

They were 15 minutes late. Some problem with locating the house, they said. We started off. I sat cross-legged in front of them and repeated mindlessly the prayers that they said, all the while making various actions with my hands using the various paraphernalia listed above. In between, I had to stand up and make small circles around them, and do the full-length namaskarams some 5-6 times at regular intervals as and when they indicated. The whole thing lasted for about half an hour, by the end of which I was only repeating the last few words of every line in the prayers. They didn’t seem to mind anyway.

I was relieved when it was finally over, after the payment was made to them which also is part of the ceremony I guess, and struggled to my feet (I am never comfortable when I sit cross legged on the floor). I brushed away the rice, seeds and stuff from my body and hair and adjusted my dhoti, which by now seemed to have an attitude of its own. My mother offered them coffee, which they accepted. One of them asked me if India had won the cricket match yesterday night. I didn’t know so I put on the TV and both of us watched the news channels. We had won by some 50 odd runs. They made some polite small talk inquiring about where I work and what I do and all before leaving.

I changed into a yellow half shirt and brown flat trousers, had my breakfast, washed away the dried ash from my forehead and left for work on my bike.

Mangoes!

They are here!

I am no foodie. My most famous words spoken as a ten-year-old were, "Eating and bathing are a waste of time." Uncles and aunts never fail to mention this fact before we run out of conversation.

But I love mangoes. Eating them. Don’t ask me about all the various types of mangoes, when they come, when they go, where they grow and that entire finer nuance. I love eating them all. Period.

As standalone fruit for desert, or give it to me with sambhar rice or even (gosh!) curd rice. Mango shake, slurp. Mango juice, slurp slurp. Its going to be a mango a day for me till the end of the season now.

They are still not sweet enough in the market nowadays, a bit on the sour side but then I don’t wear my food critic hat when it comes to mangoes. I think I would probably eat up a bitter gourd if it dressed up as a mango.

Somebody has to peel and cut them for me though. And I don’t eat around the seed. Heh heh…you know me. Incorrigible.

What the ....?!

Ok, so I am no snobbish intellectual. But I probably have a higher IQ than the average person who reads this blog. Shit, I know I contradicted myself there, let me try again.

"From now on, little by little, you must prepare yourself to face death. If you devote all of your future energy to living, you will not be able to die well. You must begin to shift gears, a little at a time. Living and dying are, in a sense of equal value." (Chauffeur to Woman, thailand)

This little gem of a quote is from a book, a collection of short stories, that I just finished reading called ‘After the quake’ by Haruki Murakami. But most of the time the book left me feeling a little stupid and bewildered. It was as if I wasn’t intelligent enough to fathom or decipher what the author wanted to say! Either that or Mr. Murakami (or the guy who translated the book) is a pretty dazed and confused guy himself. Let me give you a flavor of his stories, though you should avoid reading any further if you are planning to read him.

1. ufo in kushiro
Woman leaves man after 5 years of marriage. Man decides to take a break from work for a week. Man’s friend asks him to deliver a package to someone Far Away. Man delivers package to Woman2 in Far Away and ends up in bed with her, but can’t get it up. They both agree that he has come a long way. She also says it’s just the beginning. End.
dazedandconfused verdict- Are they planning to get married??

2. landscape with flatiron
Girl and Lover meet with a Male Friend at the beach where Male Friend makes a bonfire. Lover is a bum who plays guitar in a stupid band. Girl ran away from home when she thought her dad started looking at her in a strange way. Male Friend ran away from home to make bonfires. He is afraid of a fridge, which comes in his dreams. They talk. Girl muses about committing suicide along with Male Friend. He tells her to wait till the bonfire goes out. End.
dazedandconfused verdict- Now which one is more loony among them??

3. all god’s children can dance
Man follows old man who he believes to be his father from a train station to the ends of the city. (Flashback- His mom seems to have had ‘knowledge’ of many men). Where he proceeds to lose sight of him and ends up in a baseball field. Where he starts dancing. End.
dazedandconfused verdict- I think he had an incestuous relationship with his mom.

4. thailand
Woman in Thailand for holiday. She swims, reads and eats sandwiches. Before she leaves, her Chauffeur takes her to an Old Lady in a village. Old Lady tells her there’s a white stone inside her and that she should catch a snake which will eat the stone. She goes home. End.
dazedandconfused verdict- The Chauffeur’s gay.

5. super-frog saves tokyo
Man comes home to find 6 ft tall Frog at home. Frog tells him they have to fight Worm and save city from a quake. But before they can fight, Man is shot. Frog meets him later and tells him he averted the quake but couldn’t defeat the Worm. Frog explodes, worms burst out from within Frog and crawl all over Man.
dazedandconfused verdict- I loved this one, its really funny. No, really.

6. honey pie
Can’t make fun of this one actually. It’s just your regular beautifully written story. I was a little disappointed actually since by then I was already penning thoughts in my mind for this blog.

Overall verdict- Since I don’t do reviews, I will pick one which I agree with- "The stories here are well crafted and lyrical…They are sometimes absurd, sometimes quite funny, but they all have real epiphanies and real moments of feeling."- Rocky Mountain News

I think its about time that I watched a couple of Govinda movies.

Arjun Singh Zindabad!

Being sufficiently drunk and hydrated after drinking copious amounts of water, I have now decided to write my second general gyan post (The first one is a rant called ‘A Good First Impression’ written some time ago) on this blog.

Why? There’s an answer but I will slime and say, "Because I am dazed and confused, that’s why".

So what’s it going to be about? These are the candidate posts:

1. More than fifty people burnt alive in Meerut. There’s a huge potential for a rant there. But there’s a real danger of me ending up sounding insensitive. You know that’s why I hate crowds…oh..there you see…

2. Salman Khan sent to Jodhpur jail for five years for killing a black buck. Am sure I can think of some humorous ideas on this topic. Like if I were a desperate autograph hunter, you know where I would be likely to break a law now, don’t you?

3. Bangladesh seem to have Australia on the mat in a cricket test match! Is nothing sacred in the world nowadays?! I haven’t done a cricket post as yet, maybe its time for one?

4. Draft proposal on reservations for OBC at 27.5% taking the total reservation at all centrally funded educational institutions including the IITs and IIMs to 49.5%. It is reported that the general populace (forward/upper/general caste, what are we called??) will not suffer since the total number of seats at these prestigious institutions will also be increased proportionately.

Ok, so you are smart and have figured out that I have already decided what I am going to write about and all this nonsense above was just to buy time as I circle around the topic looking for an appropriate sneak in.

Before I launch into the thick of it, I will make the following assumptions against my better judgement:

1. The Honorable Minister Shri Arjun Singh is a very wise man.
2. He has a diligent and intelligent team of bureaucrats who have the interest of the nation at heart.
3. They have the data and reports with them prepared by eminent advisors, which recommend conclusively that this reservation policy will go a long way to alleviate the situation of the downtrodden.

Ok, so why have I made these nonsensical assumptions? Though I would like to say that this would help me to argue the true merits of the case, you know that the real reason is because by doing this I reduce the scope of discussion and make my own job (post) easier (smaller).

But for whatever it is worth I have the following to suggest to the Honorable Minister.

1. Sir, please check your OBC list again. The other day, a gentleman on TV said that there are more than 3500 castes in the list. Even affluent communities like the Lingayats of Karnataka and the Nairs of Kerala are included in it. I am sure you want to avoid the embarrassing situation where an investigation from Aaj Tak/Indian Express/Outlook finds one day that while 75% of the Open Category students have to finance their studies at IIMs via loans, only 25% of the reserved quota find it necessary to do so. And those too for tax exemption purposes. Request you plug in an income criterion which is credible enough to fulfil your noble intentions.

2. Sir, I hope the reservation policy doesn’t mean that people from such backgrounds would get a free entry into the hallowed educational institutions. I hope the cut-off percentages are relaxed and not done away with. For eg. How about a 90th percentile cut off for the IIMs? (I know something smells bad, that’s because I just pulled this number from my ass) I am sure you and your team with the help of the IIM boards and faculty could come up with a reasonable number as well, which will ensure that these guys won’t flunk the course.

3. Sir, it is said that seats will be increased so that the open category students are not affected. I must congratulate you on your wisdom here sir. Only a far thinking person could have come up with this idea. But as you must be aware, more students mean more requirements on infrastructure. More hostels, more classrooms and more quality faculty. I hope you will give the IIM and IIT boards sufficient time (two to five years) to ramp up. Lots of clearances required from your own ministry, you see.

4. Sir, and finally, it is my humble request to give a waiver of two years to the IIMs and four years to the IITs from this policy while they are ramping up their infrastructure. This will also give your ministry enough time to track the success of the policy in other centrally funded educational institutions and document the stellar performance of disadvantaged students when they are provided the right opportunity. This will help you to counter all those contorted allegations from the elite educated IIT/IIM minority (really, twits they are) and the partisan English media.

At you service sir, always.

Tigers in Red Weather

Just finished reading this book by Ruth Padel. Found it captivating, in parts. Had wanted to read up on tigers for quite some time now. Of course, this book attempts to be about a lot more than just tigers. The author also happens to be a poet and I guess she couldn’t resist appending a collection of poems at the end of the book.

Here’s one-

Wallace Stevens ‘Disillusionment of Ten o’Clock’

The houses are haunted
By white night gowns.
None are green,
Or purple with green rings,
Or green with yellow rings,
Or yellow with blue rings.
None of them are strange,
With socks of lace
And beaded ceintures.
People are not going
To dream of baboons and periwinkles.
Only, here and there, an old sailor,
Drunk and asleep in his boots,
Catches tigers
In red weather.

How You Remind Me

Never made it as a wise man
I couldn't cut it as a poor man stealing
Tired of living like a blind man
I'm sick of sight without a sense of feeling
And this is how you remind me
This is how you remind me
Of what I really am
This is how you remind me
Of what I really am

It's not like you to say sorry
I was waiting on a different story
This time I'm mistaken
for handing you a heart worth breaking
and I've been wrong,
i've been down,
been to the bottom of every bottle
these five words in my head scream
"are we having fun yet?"

yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no
yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no

it's not like you didn't know that
I said I love you
and I swear I still do
And it must have been so bad
Cause living with me must have damn near killed you

And this is how, you remind me
Of what I really am
This is how, you remind me
Of what I really am

It's not like you to say sorry
I was waiting on a different story
This time I'm mistaken
for handing you a heart worth breaking
and I've been wrong,
i've been down,
been to the bottom of every bottle
these five words in my head scream
"are we having fun yet?"

yet, yet, yet, no, no
yet, yet, yet, no, no
yet, yet, yet, no, no
yet, yet, yet, no, no

Never made it as a wise man
I couldn't cut it as a poor man stealing
And this is how you remind me
This is how you remind me
This is how you remind me
Of what i really am
This is how you remind me
Of what i really am

It's not like you to say sorry
I was waiting on a different story
This time I'm mistaken
for handing you a heart worth breaking
and I've been wrong,
i've been down,
been to the bottom of every bottle
these five words in my headscream
"are we having fun yet?"

yet, yet are we having fun yet [3x]

Artist: Nickelback
Song: How You Remind Me

Cribs and Responses

Well, today actually TWO people asked me why I had failed to update my blog since last Sunday. Understandably, I was quite flattered to know that some of you actually miss the drivel that I put out here. Yeah, I also know there could be other uncharitable and inane reasons for their asking me the question but I prefer to assume what I have and we shall leave it at that.

The reason that there has been a slight delay is actually quite simple. I had already decided what my next post was going to be about. I had planned for pictures of my new beanbag, my new camera, view from the window of my room, me in various stages of undress…oh yes, I had some plans. But I couldn’t transfer the photos from my Nikon Coolpix L3 to my adamant computer who refused to smile or say cheese. It seems I need to install some drivers since am stuck with an ancient operating system called Windows 98 (Okay you monitor, stop staring at me). I will probably figure that out this weekend so now I am left with the task of writing a blogpost.

Cribbing. Don’t we all love to do that? About work, weather, life or any other insane thing which catches us on the wrong side of our spiritual river. And I guess we all have our favorite person who gets the full benefit of our laments. In my case, it’s my poor mum. I’ve been thinking about it and my cribs generally elicit five types of reactions

1. The Laugh- Sometimes, my cribs happen to be funny, apparently. Like when she asks me about my day at office and I choose to tell her about my gym routine (my thoughtful company provides one) that day since that maybe the only thing of consequence I might have done that day.

2. The Silence- When she’s too engrossed in that soap on SONY in which this girl gets artificially inseminated by mistake in a hospital when the medical files of two patients get mixed up.

3. The Solution- I hate this. I don’t like anybody trying to solve my cribs. A ‘So what have you learnt from this experience?’ attempt makes me disappear into my room pronto.

4. The Agenda- Now this would be funny if it weren’t so bizarre. MY crib conversation is completely hijacked by what she would want me to do in my life. For eg.

Me: I have a bad throat.

Her: You shouldn’t have gone on your bike to office.(?)
Or
Her: You should say your prayers (??)
Or
Her: You take too long to eat your dinner (??)
Or
Her: You should stop drinking beer (??)
Or
Her: You should get married.(???)
Or
Her: You should buy a house. (????)

Me: Huh??

5. The Astrology Funda- This is my favorite. I don’t believe in it but the whole idea of all the moons, suns, and planets being responsible for all the troubles in my life is quite liberating. And she makes it all sound almost believable, what with all the technical jargon she throws into it. You see, my pimples are supposed to disappear from April 16, when the moon becomes retrogade and Mars moves into the 5th.

I love her.

A Message

my song is love
love to the loveless shown
and it goes up
you don't have to be alone

your heavy heart is made of stone
and it's so hard to see you clearly
you don't have to be on your own
you don't have to be on your own

and i'm not gonna take it back
and i'm not gonna say i don't mean that
you're the target that i'm aiming at
and i get that message home

my song is love
my song is love unknown
and i'm on fire for you clearly
you don't have to be alone
you don't have to be on your own

and i'm not gonna take it back
and i'm not gonna say i don't mean that
you're the target that i'm aiming at
and i'm nothing on my own
got to get that message home

and i'm not gonna stand and wait
not gonna leave it until it's much too late
on a platform i'm gonna stand and say
that i'm nothing on my own
and i love you, please come home

my song is love, is love unknown
and i've got to get that message home

Artist: Coldplay
Album: X & Y (2005)
Song: A Message

A Strange Vivid Dream

I hear a loud shout. Bang! It’s late into the night. I rush out into the hall. This is not my current home. This is D58 Ajay Enclave, Delhi where I lived when I was 14. But I am 27 in my dream. The room is brightly lit by the huge chandelier which has more than hundred glass reflectors with five 40 W bulbs embedded in it. My dad used to make me clean the dust and grime off that thing every alternate Sunday. But he isn’t in the house now, its only me and mom, like now. A strong wind is blowing right across the room, right to left. From the door on the right which is there at the middle of the long hall to the left door right at the end of the hall, the curtains at the far end, straight ahead are half lifted, their windows are wide open too. But wait a minute, this can’t be D58 Ajay Enclave, it never had a door on the right! More like my Besant Nagar home in Chennai, where we stayed a year ago.

I hear a shout from the balcony. I am now in the middle of the hall. I run towards the door leading to the balcony. I stupidly pick up a cushion and hold it high over my head in a striking pose as I look in to the long dark balcony. There’s a guy at the end of the balcony. I can make out a dark, stocky form about 5 feet 5 maybe. He has a gun in hand! He fires it below on the road. I drop my cushion and peer down from the window in the hall down in to the road. The view now is from my friend Ganesh’s third floor house in Janakpuri, New Delhi. We stayed in the same locality when I was 10-13 years old. I see a dimly lighted narrow street like it used to be. There is a young guy on a bike at the crossroads of four small lanes right in front of the house. He is revving his bike and swirling it around warding off some three people that seem to surround him. The guy on my balcony is suddenly in the street now and he shoots the guy on the bike from behind into his back. The biker and his bike fall to the road, the biker on his stomach, right in the glare of the streetlight.

I look into the balcony, now back in my D58 house. The guy with the gun is still there, shouting something to his mates down below. How can he be in two places at the same time? I think quickly now. I need to close the doors leading into the house so that he can’t come back in, there’s another door which leads into a bedroom where my Mom is sleeping. I run into that room, she’s still sleeping (How’s that possible?!). I am now in my Janakpuri home. I quickly latch the door leading to the balcony in the dark and run back into the hall of my Ajay Enclave house with a door on the right. I stop in my tracks. There he is, in the middle of the room, staring at me.

"Come here", he gesticulates towards himself with the hand that holds the gun. I go towards him. He sits down on the sofa. I sit on the sofa next to him. He is dark, very dark, with curly black thick hair and a big moustache. He has a round face, its full of sweat. His eyes are a bit yellow. I smell liquor in his breath.

"So", he says softly, I can hardly hear him, "you thought you could kill me with a cushion". He smirks. He had seen me. (All this is in Hindi, obviously, I am translating it now).

"No, no", I stammer. "I-I thought it was a cat or something".

"A cat!" He starts laughing. I relax a bit. "Did you see what happened?" he asks softly.

I nod. "Why did you kill him?"

"He was a ‘scout’. Poking his nose where he shouldn’t be. Not minding his own business." He stares intently at me now. "You are not a ‘scout’ are you?"

Is this the moment of truth? I suddenly realise I will need to take a decision about this sooner or later. But first, I have to answer his question.

"Of course not sir, I am no scout."

"Good", he relaxes suddenly. "You are a good boy." He now strangely takes out a visiting card and starts writing a mobile number on it. It already has a name. "You can get in touch with me on this number if you want."

I take it from him. Now, less afraid, I ask him.

"Why were you shooting at the guy from MY balcony?" He seems a bit puzzled. I add hastily, "I mean…I don’t understand, why?"

He thinks for a second or two. "Had to shoot him." He stutters a bit. He’s really drunk. "Spilled his guts out", he adds with some satisfaction.

"Have to leave now." He gets up. I walk him to the door, watch him go down the dark stairs. I close the door behind him and double latch it. I come back and sit down on the sofa and heave a huge sigh of relief.

And then I see the gun lying on the center table.

I grab it and run behind him down two flights of dark stairs, but he’s gone. I slowly climb back up the stairs and come back into the hall and I suddenly find it full of people, neighbors and relatives. My mom is standing on the other side of the room, looking a little sad but very tired, like the day when we heard that my dad had died.

There’s a venerable old man sitting down at the door, among a sea of footwear. I think he’s the apartment building secretary or something. He looks up at me, smiles, holds up a chappal in his hand and asks me a very strange question.

"Is this your chappal?" I stare at him. "You see", he patiently adds, "we think the killer left his chappals in the building and we are trying to find out which ones are his". He asks me again now, very kindly, "Are these yours?"

I hide the gun behind my back and answer him.

"No, I-I don’t know."

That’s when I get up with a start. It takes me a few seconds to realize that it’s a dream. This house doesn’t have a balcony like that, I reason.

I look at the time. Its 2.30 AM.