Scribbled Ramblings

A Light Parody

2011-12-23T01:29:00.001+05:30

Fire! Fire! Burning bright

London Bridge is falling down

                    falling down

                                   falling

                                          downnnn

In the darkness of the night

My fair Prince.

Will you build it up with wood and clay?

Or then bricks of gold?

Wash those piercing eyes away,

and the smiles that speak of old?

Singe that darkness, smoothness, brightness

I know.

You caressed to life.

      wove those locks,

      carved those teeth,

       lit those eyes so bright

They died.

Bitterly, sourly.

2011-12-14T22:18:00.001+05:30

If you see a speck of dust-like

glittering, glittering

as you walk along a long bare road

as you snuggle up against that couch

as you grip that steering wheel…

stop.

only a moment.

Put it in your pocket for me?

Maybe fingers twisting

locks of curling hair,

Sweaty palms

Songs in an ethereal falsetto

rare smiles… hide those speckled monsters;

These random lines.

I’ll write

them back from you,

soon.

My mind is

Peacing itself

apart.

“Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.” Matthew 7:6 (NIV)

Chaaya Wild, Yala – Day’s Diary 2 “Five Minutes”

2011-11-16T22:58:00.001+05:30

After hours and hours of winding round bumpy roads we finally turned into one leading to ‘Chaaya Wild Yala’. A security guard stopped the van and forced the auto-door open. Not the first time our poor (unfamiliar with ANY road, but excellent at his job) driver Dhammika’s shouts of “wait wait, I’ll open it” were ignored to what looks like his extreme pain. It must hurt the door after all, to be forced!
I feared the security guard wanted to run through the myriad of belongings we’d packed in our numerous bags for a trip spanning a whole day, but thankfully, he only reached forward in a friendly fashion and handed each of us a wooden plank.
yeah, but it had some kind of writing on it (I’m sorry, I don’t do pictures, the following is purely informative):

etc.
Our company comprising 75% word-people, spelling and editing errors were gleefully jumped upon. Our pleasure being considered (or so I thought) vital for publicity, the jumping upon was treated with due reverence by our hostess. She immediately called up management and complained to them, boasting that “my journalists” were very observant. If you do take the trouble to read the thing though (wait, that’s if you take the trouble to read even THIS), you may notice its rather wittily (and repetitively) put.
Also brave:
So from the start you know, these guys are unusually serious about the nature thing. And then the first five minutes of entering the place:
Things are quite simple. No fancy works of art you’re forced to contemplate and sound educated on, no painfully glaring colors to offend you, no alienation. The entrance is bare, and I’m seeing right through the reception area to the pool and the reserve beyond. Chaaya Wild is nearly a part of the park. Staff in dull green and brown safari shirts welcome me with a blessing, “ayubowan”, holding the traditional bulath kola wrapped around a white lotus in folded palms.
“ooh, nice! is this the nil manel?” one of our company asks. I worry that the question, coming from a journalist who doesn’t know that the national flower is a pale bluish purple, is setting the tone for my stay. [I might have guessed better, I suppose, considering conversation during the trip took vast turns in terms of topic, including: sex, marriages, breakups, affairs and even other related scandals!]
The cucumber juice I asked for has arrived with astonishing amounts of salt in it, and while a waiter gets me another (the manager Teddy - not Roosevelt, he doesn’t know him – has asked me fifty times whether I’ll have the same or home-made ginger beer!) I pretend to get a phone call and leave the comely gathering of visitors-just-arrived.
There is a thalagoi paetiya soakin’ up some suuuuun [the numerous ‘u’s signify a “gangsta” tone. please note and re-read the phrase “soakin’ up some suuuuun”. aloud even, if you like. thank you] at the poolside. He doesn’t take too well to being nearly trampled by an exhausted reporter absent-mindedly talking to her imaginary friend, so scampers off a little way to show off his/her moves. No really, he/she can actually stand on his/her hind legs supported by his/her tail! (I’m trying to make a hint about certain feminist conceptions/misconceptions/insanities here, please understand this.)
The pool is surrounded by cement “sleepers” that are accented by the soothing dull green of the water. It’s not dirt, it’s the tile. Possibly the most striking thing for me about the whole place is that the water is not turned a bright blue or green by the tiles in order to catch attention, but allowed to blend in. Apologies for sounding cliché, but the word is “natural”. Channa Daswatte not only has an incredibly good-looking protege, but manages (one is tempted to say occasionally, upon remembering Chaaya Tranz) to do good work.The color-scheme is sweet-soothing, and only when you’re chilled out enough to lie back on one of these funny and uncomfortable chairs in the lounge that tilt you backbackback and look up at the ceiling [because you don’t have a choice but to lean backbackback] do you notice the flashing batik-work. brilliant.
My cucumber drink is BACK! This time with extra sugar instead of salt – does anyone know why simply cucumber is not good enough!? Close upon it arrives my key wrapped in ivory paper and adorned by a pretty little yellow ranavana flower.
I am running to my chalet, cold water and a bed!

Chaaya Wild, Yala - Day’s Diary 1 “Road Closed”

2011-11-09T10:20:00.000+05:30

I love travelling. Now that’s a contradiction to what I usually tell people of my thoughts on tourism, but that’s because this is travelling in a different sense. I don’t much like seeing new places, meeting new people etc. There’s already so much we don’t know about our own little neighborhoods and even ourselves – I don’t see the point in looking elsewhere for knowledge or fulfillment or whatever it is travellers are looking for. But I love travelling. Journeys. By car, on a bicycle, just me and the road.

So although I wasn’t looking forward to this work trip to Yala, I find myself nearly enjoying it. My company is awesome. One is an “immoral” woman who’s left her three-month old baby at home with many different people to take this trip discussing weed and parties. The other is a freak who pierced her own nose (no, I don’t know any other people who’ve done similarly masochistic things) and is stalking me. No seriously. She Googled me last evening and was sharing my personal information with her colleagues, because she didn’t know who I was. And then she saw my hair. [on a completely different (different?) note, I feel it becoming more and more precise to introduce myself and then introduce my hair as well, incase people confuse myself as being owned by my hair. whatever.] And then there is of course our sweet hostess who is probably feeling traumatized by contact with these three media personnel but is hiding it pretty well.

So wait, if all this is so much fun, why am I on my blog at this moment? Proof of the point I’m trying to make.

What I love best about travelling (what? I thought we got over that already, I love travelling, I just don’t have that desire to get any place in particular!) is the wind. Suddenly its like the spirit of the world is touching you. If that doesn’t sound too wrong, that is. So getting to the point:

I love the wind. Not only does it feel awesome when its whipping through your hair and freezing your nose dry and chapping your lips, caking your eyes with dust, but as it hums past you (or you past it) it drowns everything else out and you’re alone with the earth, even when there are four others in the vehicle with you. All that matters is the wind; momentarily you are allowed to kick gravity hard and fling yourself into the horizon ahead of you and just keep gliding.

But I’m not having that today , because although the tourist van I find myself cushioned up in has windows designed to get the widest possible view, they’re not really windows: they’re glass panes. I’m not feeling the heat of the burning sun or the chill of the gleeful wind, I’ve got aircon. And it’s just too cold. And sure, it’s only just 9.30am but we’re listening to Fergie wreck some old diva song for the B.E.P. to boom through clubs.

We are heading into forest reserves where the sun is hard, trees are proud and the air is stiff. We are heading into bare places of the earth where birds don’t just sing, they also scream and laugh and animals are allowed to think and run where their blood takes them to. We are heading into where sometimes you hear flowers bloom and the trickle of water doesn’t just drown others out, but is the only.

We are heading away from the noise, the fumes, the hectic schedules, the late nights, the annoying ring-tones and hammerings and buzzings and honkings and smells and curses and bosses and deadlines and junk food and everythingbadaboutthecity, but we’re struggling to take it all with us.

Inside this cocoon of plastic, glass and metal muscle we’re carefully preserving Colombo air, club hits, cellphones, laptops and canned drinks. We don’t want to get away. We want to be where we hate to belong. Because when the aircon is off, we remember we have skin, and that things can get under it. Because when the fumes disappear, we suddenly discover how bad we smell. Because when we’re in silence, the voices in our head just can.not. be ignored.

Because in the jungle we know, to be human is to never really belong.

2011-09-26T21:34:00.000+05:30

another sentence

Breakwater

2011-09-12T12:45:00.001+05:30

I am a fickle-minded woman.

Journalist, poet, actor, pianist, singer, model, celebrity, evangelist, counselor, composer, inspiration, instigator, intellectual, academic, corporate bombshell, director, leader, mistress, girlfriend, friend, follower, hater, lover, rapper, critic, social-worker, straight-A-student, role-model, radical, revolutionary, strong, upright, appreciative, fucking perfect.

Why must I be?

I would rather sit in a pool of sweat scrubbing floors and beating rugs because I love.

I am love.

2011-09-08T17:33:00.001+05:30

publishing articles online at misChief.unCut

2011-09-08T17:31:00.000+05:30

We all go through our different phases, most often not recognizing the hilarity of our position as subject to phenomena of life we once laughed at or scorned and believed ourselves above the influence of. And then its also difficult to see ourselves and our own follies in those that come after us. How proverbial, and how stupidly simple.
 I come home late these nights after the Wala Festival most often to no food or lights, on good days to cold food and a single bulb. Every night though, the house is literally empty. My brother now spends four to five of seven nights a week at his friends, and i find myself getting more and more irritated at this. I've already, in bruised indignation, raised the issue with my mother a number of times. I have also mentioned to the younger sibling that the removal of his personal belongings from our house to that of his friend would make possible the better use of space.
But i forget that i too have done this, at worse times and under worse circumstances.

Masturbation

2011-09-08T17:30:00.000+05:30

I'll scream if you deny me
the throbbing-pulsing-hurting-hair-raising-uplifting
I burn and burn to shatter these glass walls of
social, moral
norm.

Here are my insides open:
the pushing-pulling-engulfing-mind-numbing-freeing.
You search and search to scatter these thoughts of
social, moral
harm.

You and I were abandoned;
the gliding-flowing-coursing-streaming-life-destroying
left holes and holes to batter these times of
social, moral
play.

Confession

2011-02-19T01:07:00.000+05:30

It has been such a long and tiring day, and i'm pretty certain I will wake late tomorrow morning with my head pounding and my body turned to some fuzzy substance that can't hold it's shape. But the thought of you as I creep into bed makes me smile. It's unbelievable that after a whole day of ignoring you, I can still call you up and that you hold nothing against me. It's so good, so comforting to know that when I do finally call you in the wee hours of the morning simply because there's nobody left for me to call, you're ready to listen to my body-slam of questions, complaints, projections and displacements without a murmur. And then I remember everything I have done for you. I have called you names, lied to you, broken promises, cursed, ignored, offended.. and I remember how I can't even begin to conceive of how much you've done for me. I run to you though, at the end of the day, knowing you wait for me. I might not have fallen in love yet, but I know for sure that I'm loved. I will love you, yet.

Sunset

2011-02-17T18:33:00.002+05:30

She sits on the steps leading up to the house, gazing over the hedge, past the blossoming trees into the yellowing sky. Waiting for brilliance. As she waits, she sees through the branches of the bush-like mango tree, the distinct outline of a cloud illuminated from somewhere beyond her horizon, and wonders when the sky will burst, wonders why she waits. She wonders what it must be like to feel lonely and useless; to sleep but not sleep because it is only in snatches of fitful half-hours that rest comes, to be constantly hungry but find that once a reluctantly prepared meal of basics is placed in her mouth in pinches it turns to pulp, to stare into the sky thinking but not knowing whether she thinks or not and what of.. She has forgotten what the late bat gliding out of the voiceless sunset on motionless wings knows every new evening. She waits for colour, and waits and waits. But the sky simply grows darker as the first brilliant dots the sky. Not the same, but still..

Flashback

2011-02-15T22:17:00.001+05:30

Got this GPRS package from Dialog installed on my phone because not having an internet connection on my computer has become too frustrating to bear. So was randomly (read narcissistically - no i don't know how to spell that) going through my old posts and discovered something. I had a voice. So how did that get in the past tense? It's simple really, but shameful. I made a commitment to losing my opinion and perspective. I got boring! But me hearties, i am back and my nails are the the most edible glittering purple! DUCK!

Business

2010-04-23T21:16:00.001+05:30

The pain is still there. The yawn stops abruptly and his body slumps back onto the hard mattress. Something is wrong with his right shoulder; there's a dull ache that doesn't seem to go away, his fingers are swollen and his whole body is rebelling against its senses. There's a thick fog in his brain. The phlegm is stuck on its way down from his sinuses to his throat and it makes him want to puke early in the morning: at 11:30am. The curtains are open a crack and a hard ray of sunlight strikes him across the neck where sweat builds up slowly; never running or drying, just sticky. He wishes he had got drunk. He swings his feet down to his Adidas slippers, drags them to the bathroom, pulls the blue-green-and-purple eight-thousand rupee cotton sarong from Barefoot over his waist and carefully pisses onto the rim of the commode. Flush. The sarong falls, so he bends to pick it up; he could kiss the piss-pot on the way down. The Apple i-phone blinks, he checks the number on the screen and puts it to his ear as he ties the sarong and walks towards the balcony.

"Baby, good morning!"

She's chirpy.

"Hmph"

"Did you just wake up?"

Chirpy and asking questions.

"Yeah"

"Did you sleep well?"

Still chirpy and more
questions.

"No, I woke up from a dream and couldn't go back to sleep"

"Aiyo angel, I keep telling you no..."

A year and half and still the same rattle. She loves him, he knows; but there's nothing to say and she wants to talk. The phone starts getting hot and his ear sweaty; the sunlight, the dead air and the flies doing jumps-and-saccades around the balcony table don't help. There's a throbbing behind his eyes. He takes up the pack of cigarettes, flips the cover and carefully picks one. The white-gold lighter with his name engraved on it clicks and he puffs, then inhales, wincing at the smoke.

Release.

She's still talking.

"Here, I have some work to do; I'll call you when I'm free"

The chirping stops.

"Ok... I love you"

"Hm..."

He knows it hurts her, but it doesn't matter now. A fly settles on the edge of his mug and washes its hands in his tea.

"Bye..."

"Bye."

The real-estate man hasn't called. The offer is not good, but he doesn't care. The ancestral home with the surrounding paddy, villages and thickets are worth at least five million dollars, but he's desperate now. If he gets five hundred thousands, he can come clean. Anything goes now, everything.

The house? sold.

The car? sold.

The family name; his children's heritage? selling.

But he knows the man won't call.

The there's the woman. He could sell her. She loves him; she'd do anything for him. She's all he has left; and the Magnum 45.

Something New

2008-10-11T10:11:00.003+05:30

I was inspired this morning to share my thoughts on my daily Bible reading. So I began my little ministry.

Weddings

2008-10-07T20:42:00.001+05:30

I was at a wedding last Saturday, and thinking "why is this couple getting married?" I was only a part of the choir that provided the music at the 'ceremony' so I wasn't known to them and don't have the real answer to this question. Maybe even the newly-weds themselves don't have the answer. See, there were ten people on the bride-grooms 'side' of the church and four on the bride's. I'm not saying there need be a huge congregation at a wedding, but the number of the congregation was noticeable because of the looks on the faces of each and every one. Not happy.

The boy was obviously from a Dutch-descendant family. His mother was white and looked like one of those dumb fair-skinned women who think they're still the shit. (Ok, maybe Dutch was the shit in this country; centuries ago, but not anymore.) The rest of the family probably thought the same. The thing that read the gospel at the altar (presumably a relative of the groom) was dressed in a piece of cloth which reached as low as six to eight inches below her crotch. A bloody disgrace I think. So that's the boy's family, and they are not happy. You wouldn't have had to look far to figure out why.

The girl is probably very smart or very talented or both, but she also probably is originally from a rural area. Her father wears the national costume, and her mother an osari; both faded and probably quite old although it's their daughters wedding. They're dark-skinned from working in the sun, and probably very simple. They are also nervous about stepping across the altar to the back of the church to sign the registrations.

So during the registration we (the 'professional' choir) turn to face each other and build the love-story. The girl either because she passes A/Ls with flying colors or through an influential person known to her managed to secure a job in Colombo. She meets the boy. Boy decides girl is good, so they have something. Then they want to get married. Or does the girl get pregnant? But nobody likes it. Either way they end up doing the thing. And we were called in to sing some decency into the whole affair (ha ha yeah right!)

This is obviously the first time that the pastor has seen them, and his homily is addressed to the world in general and applicable to anybody; even somebody who's not getting married. Honestly. The boy watches him intently while the girl smiles self-consciously at the camera which the photographer is aiming at her. The homily is nothing and the whole evening is about her classless dress with pink sequins, her tasteless makeup which hides the face behind a mask of pancake, and the bloody photographer. At some point though, she begins to sweat and daintily wipe her face with a tissue which she hides behind her bouquet. I am fifteen feet away from her but can see the color of the paper change from white to cream-brown. The she begins to wipe her eyes vigorously. At this point the boy gets annoyed and turns to look at her. He gets terribly worried and goes red around the eyes and nose. She's crying. So the homily ends. The choir performs the next hymn and that's about the end of that. The two hurry out of the church and the congregation follows them, straight to their vehicles and presumably homes.

The experience left me wondering what's wrong with our people. All these bloody traditions and meaningless ritualistic habits of ours are what make us a dead and boring nation. If the families aren't happy about the wedding, invite friends. If even friends aren't happy, don't have a wedding. Get a house, register and spend the money on the kids' education or something.

Aiyo! And my research paper is waiting… :(

Personal Essay

2008-10-01T21:11:00.001+05:30

I believe this Earth is flat and that photographs taken from outer-space which display the Earth as a globe or sphere are false; 'maya'. The Earth stretches down infinitely beneath us. The limit of the Earth is the limit man has dug. If someone today digs deeper than any man has dug before, then the bottom of the pit that this man digs is the depth of the Earth. It stretches as we push ourselves towards it. The deeper we dig, the further it gets from us. It is the same with truth. That is why philosophers who began searching for an embodiment of truth now search for the definition of truth. We are a backward 'advancing' species that believes it is ahead of all others. True, we move fast; but we move in the wrong direction.

So, beyond the depth of the Earth is Hell. That is where the man who has dug his own grave goes. The depth of Hell is also limitless. The man searching for truth falls into it and never ceases to fall until he reaches its depth. But truth is nothing – We are only figments of God's imagination – so the man never reaches it. He keeps falling. I know this because I know everything. God told me so.

*The use of the words "he" and "man" here should not be taken in sexist terms: I myself am a female – the writing would be OFF if I kept saying "he or she" or "person".

2008-09-28T22:00:00.001+05:30

I have a problem. Well of course I have a problem, but that's not what I mean, I really have a problem. I don't have anything to write about; and that has hindered me from keeping my oath to write at least a sentence each day.

I just realized I lied. I DO have things to write about; it's just that I can't be bothered with spending time thinking about these things enough to write an interesting post.

An issue popped up recently about just how personal these public posts should get. I started the argument staunchly supporting not giving a shit what you say where as long as you're comfortable saying it, but realized that I had to change my stance once it was made clear that although I'm generally ok with saying anything anywhere, I'm not okay with handling whatever (unpleasant) repercussions being an 'open-book' might have.
Identity. Gehan talks about it in "Pardon Me, But Who Am I Again?". I'm not really concerned with the race, the caste, the language, the type of music you listen to etc., but the last quote from the bat-man-guy is close to what I've been thinking about. What would be the better measure of a person? What he or she IS or what he or she aspires to be? I wanted to base an argument for Writing Skills on this, but my lecturer thwarted the idea. I believed that a person would be better measured by what he or she aspires to be than by what he or she has already done. But does a murderer aspire to be a murderer? So then it seems to follow that it's better to measure a person by what he or she does. Right? Wrong. Because what a person does is not limit to actually doing it, it also involves justifying it. So it's possibly better to look at why a person does/has done something before you measure them. This kid at Bible class put it nicely today. A friend of his has a weird form of encouragement apparently. He just says "why do you do it"? Some of you will understand the beauty of this, some of you may not. What we are is defined by what we believe in; our reasons for living.
We also discussed punishment at youth today. Why are people (children specifically) punished? What does it achieve? Is it effective? I propose rewarding 'good' things as opposed to punishing 'bad' things. Positivity always seems to work. I've read a little about this in terms of behavioural psychology for school, but obviously haven't read enough to actually say anything about it or develop a strong personal opinion. Not that I have a strong personal opinion about anything
Homo-sexuality has been addressed in my hearing at least four times in different environments this week, it's funny.

Ah… for time to discourse!

Choices

2008-09-24T13:08:00.001+05:30

Honestly, University is not something I'm doing by choice. It's something I've been forced to do because of something I promised myself sometime back. The time between my ALs and University entrance was spent in search of "what to do next". The decision was that if I found something worthwhile (i.e. a full scholarship to music school in the US or something similar) I would be allowed to take that path; if not, I would to the Special Degree and get a BA from the University of Peradeniya. This was in order to please my mother and the rest of family because I remembered the disappointment they suffered at my OL results. I didn't wanna let them down ever again. So, that time between my ALs and University entrance was spent searching, but nothing was found. (Actually, an almost-full scholarship to the US was found, but a sense of patriotism and the fact that the school wasn't all that good led me to decline the offer.) So, I was left to keep my word to myself and start Uni.

Two months down the line, I'm looking at the whole experience and I'm still seeing it objectively. It's not as awesome as I expected it to be. It's not as "unforgettable" as people said it would be, and I can't see how I could have "regretted" not doing it, but it's ok. I'm learning something; here and there.

But I still wanna play piano. I want to be able to drown in the strength of my fingers. I want to be lifted up on Mozart's genius. I want to be enveloped in the darkness of Beethoven. I want to be lost in Sculthorpe. I want to be recreated by Blake. I don't even mind some Chopin at this point. But I can't.

It's not that I can't play the piano anymore; it's just that I can't play as well. I know this might be just 'making excuses', but honestly, to play the way I want to play, I need to put in more time than I can afford at this point. It's not that I chose it. I just chose it. I didn't realize that university would mean no more six to eight hours of sweat-inducing, heart-wrenching, gut-pouring piano. I didn't want this. And I don't want to be just another 'somebody' who plays the piano. I don't care what this sounds like, but I'm more than that with my soul on my fingers.

So don't act like I chose this. I chose this, but not by choice.

Resolution

2008-09-23T23:01:00.001+05:30

In sticking to the resolution I made last night, I got out of bed and switched the computer on to write my sentence for the day. The result was this.

Breaking glue

2008-09-22T22:34:00.001+05:30

I'm procrastinating. I'm lazy. Like my only real lecturer says, I'm too self-indulgent. I'm going to write at least a sentence every night. I swear.

The Origin and Purpose of the Bubble

2008-08-16T18:31:00.001+05:30

Love is the offspring and mate of Time, born of Time himself, in order to mother his other offspring. Yet as Time grew, Love grew tired of Time and went in search of other Elements. In order to win her back Time devised a plan. He brought together his most powerful faculties and planned the greatest performance in all time: Creation. Calling Love to view his awesome powers, he formed before her the darling of the universe: Earth. In a final act of gallant hopefulness Time gifted Earth to Love. Completely overwhelmed, Love was full of adoration for Time. Yet Time soon came to realize that this adoration was not for him, but for his creation, for Earth. When Time gifted Earth to Love, he had made the biggest blunder he did not know he was committing: he had given her power. She looked at Earth and saw in each and every being that dwelt therein, a reflection of her self, for they were both of One. In every creature that walked the lands of Earth, in every shadow that swam its seas, in every spirit that soared its skies, not one was not she - except the humans. In the humans she saw a certain uniqueness she despised, in them she saw Time mock her. This made her yearn to claim the humans as her own. To achieve this purpose, she disguised herself and came to Earth: The Bubble. Time, in his anger at having lost his fight against Love, claimed a price from The Bubble: its freedom to expand without limit. Considering this a fair price, The Bubble now exists to entrap humans and absorb their identity, that it might erase the marks of Time from their faces, claim them as Love's own and redeem Love from her mockery.

Thus The Bubble waits, in many places at once, for 'ready' humans to entrap and claim. The humans The Bubble claims always come in pairs. Some willingly step in while others must be forced and some others are completely unaware of what happens. Either way, when two people find themselves within The Bubble, there can be seen either of two reactions: "trapped!" or "safe :)". When both humans react with "trapped", The Bubble finds its captives unconquerable and immediately frees them. When the two react differently, The Bubble waits until they are at harmony with "trapped" or "safe". When both are "safe", The Bubble takes flight and Euphoria begins to set in. Drunk on this hallucinatory gas (which probably sparks off the luminosity and the 'glitter of the stars'), the inhabitants sense nothing except each other. While the effects of Euphoria last, and The Bubble is expandable, they adjust according to one another's wants and needs, getting comfortable in the illusion that Time cannot claim them. These adjustments happen in different ways, in different degrees, in different cases. The general rule though, is that to accommodate the other, one must shift one's place or push against one's wall, forcing The Bubble to expand. This moving around requires energy, and this energy is acquired through the inhalation of Euphoria, which creates the illusion of greater necessity for expansion. Thus the cycle continues, Euphoria creating an illusion of need, need requiring energy, energy acquired through Euphoria, Euphoria creating an illusion of need etc… What one is kept unaware of is the fact that the inhalation of Euphoria causes the discharge of personality. This discharge of personality is what allows The Bubble to absorb its inhabitants' identity. Once the inhabitants' identities are completely absorbed, The Bubble bursts, Euphoria expires, and the inhabitants fall to the ground. Some continue in a false sense of the state they were in while they were within The Bubble, living in an illusion of the original illusion. Some recover, forget and continue as they were before they were entrapped, only to be caught again. Some accept the truth, wake up from the illusion and walk away, determined not to be caught again. Yet these are the most likely to be recaptured, for they regain much of their identity and because The Bubble is transparent.

More important information on the captives when I return (maybe tomorrow)!

The Bubble

2008-08-14T18:51:00.001+05:30

I've just been trying to explain to Haren that I'm acting "weird" right now. The definition of "weird" here is, reading long emails written to the ex-boyfriend in the middle of a relationship crisis and appreciating HIS position. Now, why I'm being this definition of weird is this: Love has died. The relationship which was the long-standing definition of the phenomenon among our friends, ended. There are no clear-cut one, two, three reasons as to why she decided she doesn't want him anymore, and he is still pressing her to give him ONE. This exasperates her, and has led her father's phone bill for this month to rise considerably.

She believes she spoilt him by giving him everything he wanted – in terms of intellectual space, authority to take decisions etc… – and ended up feeling cramped and sick of the whole thing. Thus she made a little hole in their happy existence, found it was big enough, and escaped, leaving him to handle the crashing shards of the once-expandable bubble that was their relationship. I want to look at this bubble. I want to discuss its properties and their functions, its purpose and its result, the creatures that get caught in the beauty of its transparent luminosity, and their purpose and result. Maybe one day a few years from now, I can expand this post into my final dissertation for my Philosophy class. But saving the dreams for later…!

The properties of these bubbles are:

Transparency
Limited Elasticity
Growing hardness (no pun intended)
Probably contain a hallucinatory gas which runs out fast

The Bubble just hangs around our environment, our society, our culture, waiting to be occupied. The transparency of The Bubble makes it invisible to anyone without, yet to someone looking out from within, there is that special luminosity, that glitter of the stars, which makes everything without seem dull and lifeless. Limited elasticity allows inhabitants to feel a sense of being accommodated, and combined with the transparency, a feeling of unlimited space. Once the elasticity has run out, The Bubble begins to grow hard (again, no pun intended – this is a scientific exposition), fixing itself in a certain shape and position until it is unchangeable except through destruction (or explosion – pun intended). Reasons for the elasticity to run out are still being debated upon, but there are two possibilities. The first would be the simple passage of Time, which claims this property from The Bubble as payment for not being subjected to him. This exchange seems justified, yet it appears that once Time has claimed the fee for being free of subjection to him, The Bubble is subjected to him. While this paradox is being considered, let us look at the second option we have as 'reasons for growing hardness': a certain mysterious gas contained within The Bubble. It seems scientifically inaccurate to state that it is the gas (let's call it Euphoria) itself which is the cause for the growing hardness, as it is the expiry of this gas which is the actual cause. Euphoria is what initially keeps the occupiers of The Bubble alive. Yet the nature of the gas is such that it is addictive, making the desire for it insatiable, leading to acceleration in the consumption patterns of the inhabitants. This is, in its essence, accelerates of the expiry of Euphoria, which, substantial evidence proves, leads to the expiry of the inhabitants of The Bubble and thus The Bubble itself.

This brings us to the Origin and Purpose of The Bubble, which I will discuss in my next post.

Happy blogging! :)

Initiation… right.

2008-07-22T17:41:00.001+05:30

So after abandoning orientation or 'inauguration' as they liked to call it, I decided I wasn't going back until the beginning of class. Wise decision that, cus apparently Tuesday through Friday were just the same; speech after speech after speech and then randomly walking around the campus looking for a place safe enough from raggers to breathe.

Day one, leaving the Arts Theatre before I was supposed to, proved to be a slightly annoying experience. The moment I stepped out, a guy who looked pretty much like just another student (but one of those "OMG I'm finally at Uni!!!" types) came up to me saying "nangi koheyda yanne". Double take. WTF? I'm thinking I'm gonna tell the guy to bugger off and then feel like I wanna be a generous soul, so tell him I'm not feeling well and I'm going home. Big mistake. What commenced was ten to fifteen minutes of him trying to convince me to stay and not go home because I might miss something important. Hell yeah. A security guard who recognized me thankfully saved the day, making room for me to go home (and then gallivanting, but never mind!). Now I go home fully peeved, wondering what on earth the feller was trying to do when my mother puts the situation in a whole new light. The guy didn't want me to go out alone, simply out of the concern that I might get ragged, the local version of initiation.

When I first got the letter of acceptance to the University, I was surprised by how interested people were about my stand on ragging. I really didn't think it was important. Initiation is alright, seniors have a little fun with you, you laugh and swallow the embarrassment. You are now a fully fledged University student. That's what I thought. Even when my mother and a friend of mine who I believe is very psychologically secure and stable asked me whether I was gonna be pro-rag or anti-rag, I failed to realize the full impact of the situation. I mean, who cares? What's with all this anti-rag shit? What, you scared of getting called names!? So you gonna wear floor-length skirts and plaits? Either way, I decided I was gonna be decidedly undecided on the whole thing, it wasn't something I was gonna face with a political stance. If somebody teased me, I'd brush it off. If someone fucked with me, I'd fuck them back. Simple.

Not so.

Being the daughter of a lecturer automatically makes me an untouchable. I know my way around the faculty pretty well and most of the staff recognizes me on sight. I also know a sizeable number of seniors. All this put together makes it possible for me to avoid being approached. Act de-la nonchalance, I was just going to school.

But today I realized that it wasn't so totally nothing. Walking down the road with a classmate after a Psychology lecture that didn't happen, my disgust with the whole place just grew. Being a pretty girl, she had obviously been noted by the seniors who had named her 'Kadupul' after some flower or the other. She laughed as she related this story. We crossed the road, and I notice about eight boys walking down the road in the same direction we were going in. They were obviously rather nervous students just walking down the road, so I was very surprised at my companion's reaction. She started, did a double take and began walking in fits and starts, not knowing whether to run or stop walking and stand. I chose to let her explain her behavior without prodding, if she wanted to, and just continued walking. Two boys overtook us and one turned back and glanced at my friend. Now, there is nothing wrong with this, and I understand it's a funny phenomenon, this turning-and-looking-but-not-daring-to-approach thing, which is an accepted norm in this country. But something struck me about the look he gave her. It wasn't teasing or inviting, it was plain murderous. The girl stopped, mumbled that this same guy had ragged her the day before and turned and fled towards a group of seniors. They in turn simply took her into their circle and comforted her, while the fuck-bag in front of us continued to walk ahead, periodically turning around to stare at the girl.

I had nothing to be worried about and since the girl wasn't a particular friend of mine, and due to a change of attitude in the recent past I really didn't want to get involved, I bade her goodbye and continued walking home. All the way though, I kept seeing the guy's face as he turned to look at her the first time. He was angry and disturbed and almost threatening, and the fact that the girl began to shiver was honestly, no real surprise to me. I cannot imagine what would have been going through her head and what she thought he would do to her, but it couldn't have been pleasant. I couldn't help wondering how any of this could be fun and what these people were doing at an educational institute instead of leading some defeated troop that belonged to the LTTE up North. These assholes are terrorists. And terror is what we come to University for.

Reaction

2008-07-16T21:59:00.001+05:30

She stands on the corner waiting for a bus that does not appear. Half an hour ago the street was deserted, only one other person visible on the motor-less road as far as the eye could see. A cold wind rushed up from some deep secret place, forcing her to admit to a sense of foreboding by putting her arms around herself. Some renegade leaves escaped from the haranguing brooms of the meticulous street-sweepers skittered past, running from the approaching darkness. Her straight-cut grey jacket and pencil-line skirt provided no contrast against the lifeless buildings or the mourning sky. Nothing much changed.

A door opened nearby, making way for two women. Their animated conversation was subdued by the pressing gloom and one quietly bade the other goodbye as they turned in opposite directions. Another door opened and more people began to emerge. Her eyes search the visible end of the road for transport. Her purpose in leaving work early is beaten as the bus-stop begins to fill with people waiting beside her. A quiet ride home is not on the agenda today. The trickle of cars that had begun to appear with the people earlier grew to a steady stream, filling the air with a monotonous subito rumble. The street had become busy, but busy without the bustle.

The stream of cars grew to a thickly packed stew and still her bus failed to appear. She switches her bag from one hand to the other and draws her hand back through her hair; brain now calculating and considering other options. Still her bus failed to appear. She takes the final breath.

***

The street suddenly becomes an upside down jar. Nobody knows what happened. Everybody runs in the same direction; towards it. The sound stopped her halfway through making the decision to start walking towards the callbox. She hesitated, thinking. The darkness quickly escapes, letting the angry sun through to examine the damage. The mass of vehicles has stopped moving completely. Some drivers step out and start running, others stare in open-mouthed confusion.

If she ran with the others, that would be the good thing; if she ran alone, that would be the wise thing. If she ran with the others, she could be a victim; if she ran alone, she could be a suspect. If she walked alone, nobody would be the wiser. She calmly proceeded towards the callbox, threading her way through the mass of people still running in the opposite direction.

***

Late in the evening she sits alone in front of her TV, a warm mug of coffee in her hand. She watches the screen as bomb victims scream and bleed, dying in the arms of volunteers who disappear with the flames of the second blast. She smiles at her wisdom, frowning at the guilt.

First Steps

2008-07-15T16:26:00.001+05:30

I woke up on Monday morning worried. My first worry was that I hadn't got enough sleep. My second worry was that I wasn't going to be able to do what I wanted to do that day. What I was talking about in my first sentence here though, was the fact that I would head to the orientation at The University of Peradeniya Arts Faculty and come back with a bad first impression.

I have lived inside the campus grounds for fifteen years, and nothing that happens inside it ever motivated me to join and get a degree or whatever. The staff at the University is a mixed lot. Some are deeply intellectual, self-less and inspiring; some are shallow, mercenary and dull; some are in-between. The vast majority though (as is the case with the rest of our country) belong to the second category. The students are also a mix of kinds. Some are highly motivated young people with independence, well-functioning minds and understanding deeper than their age or experience; some are self-important and politically influenced; some are wasted and wasting; some are aimlessly wandering inside the campus following whatever course, taking whatever exam simply because their parents and the system taught them that the only way they can find themselves a future is by getting a useless degree in something they're not interested in. Here, the majority are from the last category. Then there are the campus grounds itself. The University of Peradeniya has by far, the largest campus in South Asia, spread across 750 hectares of prime land in the Hill Capital of Sri Lanka. Only a tiny fraction of this land has been utilized for the purposes of the university, and the remainder still rests as beautiful pine forests and grasslands, home to many wild creatures. I cannot say anything about the education offered at the University, because I have not experience it yet, but all that I have experienced has taught me that it doesn't have much to be appreciated. I knew this was a useless excursion.

All the same, I had promised myself that if I had no other plans of educating myself further by the time my letter of acceptance came through, I would sit through the three, four or five years I had to in order to get my degree. So I had to attend the orientation, and get oriented.

Saying my first impression of the whole thing was 'bad' is a serious understatement. I am a person who doesn't stick for impersonal bull longer than necessary, and after two hours of speeches, decided to walk out. The other 1000-something students (like the rest of the nation) decided to stay glued to their seats because they were told to. For four and a half hours, the Arts Theatre was a mass of freshers listening to one idiot with nothing to say after the other ranting in front of a malfunctioning mike. The first woman who came onstage was supposed to 'welcome' everyone. What she actually did was recite a list of names and titles which took about ten minutes and then add "on behalf of the Arts Faculty of The University of Peradeniya, I warmly welcome you to the Inauguration of the New Students 2008/2009" in Sinhala. This might have been alright and bearable if the woman was aware of how to make sounds using her vocal cords and related organs and how to move her lips. She was obviously oblivious to both possibilities.

The next person in front of the podium and more than a thousand students was the Vice Chancellor. Honestly speaking, I can't remember a word of what he said, because my brain has decided that whatever he said was not worth remembering. I added that last bit because I was listening, since I wasn't too bored (yet!). The basic gist of the address was along the lines of "this is the best place you undeserving twits could be, so you better just do what we tell you". It's ironic how people find it easier to tell others how undeserving they are when they themselves are the same. I mean, considering the state of the country and the prospects that the future holds for my generation, the Universities are lucky they have any applicants! A few more things about the speech remain in some distant corner of my memory:

It was boring
The man kept saying "I'm sure I don't have to repeat myself" and kept repeating himself
It was boring
After every paragraph (written on a number of half-sheets) the Vice Chancellor would translate himself into Sinhala and repeat what he said in English. With the repetitions.
It was boring

This pattern of practicing for some speech contest based on 'What the University can offer you and what you should give back to the University' continued from 9am to 1pm, when the students were given a break to find lunch before their English Placement Test at 2pm. Every speech was followed by a translation in Tamil. Due 'Orientation' was received.

What on earth are these people thinking? I wish I never had to go back!

Refresh, Restart… yeah Right!

2008-07-13T21:38:00.001+05:30

I have been back in the hills for a few hours now, and those hours have taught me that goddamned drama follows me wherever I go. This blog is so full of 'full-of-myself' I think I need to revamp the whole damned thing. Obviously I need help. Anybody supplying for free?

Pondering

2008-07-11T20:22:00.001+05:30

I have been thinking about the void mentioned in my last post. Something somewhere tells me now that it was just fresh memory that made it feel like a void. Now it seems more like a scar. Not an ugly thing that distorts the features but a beautiful mark which accents them; something that defines a part of who I am.

Scars are personal things. Some are large, ugly and most disturbingly visible. People will want to know how you got them. Some will ask, some will not; depending on their discretion. When they ask, you might decide to tell them, you might decide not to tell them; depending on your discretion. It seems that explaining what caused the scar seems the wiser decision, in order to prevent speculation. These are the visible scars. The small marks in the dark places are precious; you struggle to keep them hidden. Once in a while though, someone gets close enough to discovering the writing on your skin, so you choose to pull your sleeve back and let them see it. The unspoken agreement is secrecy. Some people don’t understand.

Some scars are so precious that you covet them. They are valuable enough to lose your oldest friend over. If they were ever really your friend.

Pause to Reflect

2008-07-09T18:07:00.001+05:30

It seems like I've come to another phase of blogging-everyday-before-not-blogging-for-another-century. The commencement of university is not for another few days and joblessness has made me resort to a favorite pastime. I know you all USED to have nothing to complain about, since my writing was immaculate and wonderfully entertaining, but I also know that now you DO have something to complain about since my style is cramped. Fuck that.

So one of those age-old friends was over all day today, and both of us being female, this resulted in some… drama…? Emotional trauma. For me.

It used to make me angry when people, men, scoffed at the idea of a girl and a guy being best friends; the reason being that I'm a girl and my best friend is a guy. That anger was defiance. It still makes me angry when people tell me that a girl and a guy can't be best friends. This anger is bitterness. My girlfriend and I discussed this relationship, and I decided that I need to dissect it now.

One thing that strikes me is the fact that it was always the men who were skeptical about it being a completely platonic relationship. There is something romantic about a girl and a guy being only friends, maybe in the 'non-happening-ness' of the whole situation, the static purity of it all, which appeals to the female mind. At first, this seemed to be the reason the girls gave it a chance and the guys just laughed - because they didn't see the romance in the whole goddamned thing! But then, the genius cousin came up with a better explanation (as usual). Apparently guys don't differentiate between girlfriends and girlfriends. (That's probably because they can't. They are the less intelligent species after all!) They can't see (or even if they could, understand) the huge difference the ITALICS make. On Venus, the 'regular' girlfriend is just a friend. You hang out with her, chat with her, crack sick jokes with her and do crazy-ass shit with her. You don't get emotionally involved with her; neither do you feel sexually attracted to her. These things you save for the girlfriend (with the italics). On Mars, these two types are interchangeable. Now, since the average Venusian is unaware of this, complications arise. As did with us.

At the end of the day, one of us, or both of us ended up being a fool. Now I understand that a guy and a girl can't really be very close friends and maintain a completely platonic relationship. Woe be unto you if you believe otherwise and wish to prove your beliefs. Somebody, somewhere along the way is going to get hurt. Most probably both of you.

I know I still hurt because of what happened, and I know he still hurts because of what happened. I could blame him, or I could blame myself, but I suppose I can't justify blaming anybody. I realized today, that even after almost a year, the pain runs strong. I just don't feel it often because it runs deep. What's worse, losing your best friend or losing the love of your life?

I don't know the answer to that question, but I just realized that the void created by either is very, very difficult to fill; if it is possible to fill it at all.

Returning the RagDoll

2008-07-08T22:05:00.001+05:30

What a long time it has been since I wrote last. I finished my last post some months ago with the vehement assertion that I had "grown up". Sad (or happy) to say, my opinion has changed. Haren jestingly noted that he found it hard to believe, and four months or so after writing that post, I too can't help but laugh when I read it. A lot, I mean a lot has changed. Easiest would probably be to start with the last thing that changed.

As of Monday, the 14^th of July, 2008, I will be another aimless university student following a useless course which will qualify me for a degree as a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Peradeniya. How or why I came to this position is not clear, and I really can't believe it. This, like the SATs, is another example of how I do things (ie: fill out and hand in applications), knowing fully well the repercussions, yet not expecting them to happen when they obviously will. Either way, I am now in the middle of a jumble of birth certificates, financial documents and six black-and-white passport-sized photographs with my "name and student number written clearly on the back" and a really bad cold. None of which I want.

The above mentioned phenomenon which just happened to me has caused me to leave my job, my house, my life and my love back in Colombo and move back with the motherhood here in the peaceful hills. Not that I'm complaining though! The job was getting a bit tiresome, and as humble advice to people who can't conform: DO NOT TAKE REGULAR (OR irregular for that matter) 9-5 JOBS. I'm serious. This is a very good lesson I learnt during my after-als-and-nothing-to-do period. I can't conform, and I should stop trying to, because I only fail. My house was becoming a beautiful home (to the surprise of very many people who were aware of the state of my bedroom here in Kandy) yet the house-mate and the constant stream of visitors was starting to get to me. Those new friends of mine, the "sweet and focused" girls I met a few months ago, got a big hard kick in the rear for being paranoid religious fanatics who don't know it. Sorry. My life still goes on. Earning was fun, and I had developed to the stage of being able to handle responsibility of having to find and fund my own meals. My LOVE is the next new thing :)

It seems a bit ironic that I finally found somebody who can actually give me everything I ever wanted in my man, only to find that nobody really wanted me to be with him. Social prejudice is a weird and messed-up thing which ruins people, lives, minds and most sadly, happiness. This definition needs to get on the Oxford Dictionary. I think most of you (at least two of the three people who read this blog) will agree with me. So I decided that I was going to let social prejudice find itself a pastime (various grotesque ideas related to reproduction come to mind) and let myself be happy. I am :)

I admit, the unbeatable *wink* style has got cramped thanks to writing boring pieces on press-conference and other bored-freelance-journalist related compositions, but I plan to get back to being the awesomely talented and prolific writer I once was ;)

"Patience Iago!"

Blargh!

2008-03-10T17:29:00.001+05:30

The same music pounds in your head each and everyday, the same computer screen stares back at you, not giving anything, not taking. The randomizing has ceased and been replaced by absolute randomizing; a pattern of doing the same things due to not having anything to do.

New friends are scary, but somehow always "better" than the old, probably because you don't know anything about them. But these girls are sweet, focused and not like me. I will surrender to their influence and "change". I am already a better person because I have decided this. My mind often tells me I'm hallucinating. My mind has also decided not to listen to itself. I now listen to somebody else. I sometimes tell myself I can't hear. But this is me hallucinating again. But I don't listen to myself when I tell myself I'm hallucinating. Telling myself wouldn't really help anyway, because I can't hear.

I don't listen to what I say anymore. I listen to what I think. I'm discerning between the two types of thought these days. The thoughts you think and the thoughts that occur. I suppose the thoughts you think are the second stage of the thoughts that occur; like the egg and then the larvae; which means I'm differentiating two things I can't differentiate; like black skin and white skin. But you CAN tell black skin from white skin, although we choose not to. But I choose now to decide which thoughts of mine move from the "occur" stage to the "think" stage. These are MY thoughts, which lead to actions which are MY actions, and they are MINE and I have every right to decide which thoughts go where. I have every responsibility to myself, the people I love, the community I belong to, and the rest of humanity itself, to decide which thoughts go where.

You see, I really AM growing up.

Changes and GLF continued

2008-02-09T00:10:00.001+05:30

Three weeks away from home and it's not really obvious that so much has changed in my life. I look the same. I talk the same. I think the same. But nothing is really the same cus I feel different. Thanks to Saturday evenings at church. It's funny, I wanted things to change, I always wanted things to change, but nothing changed 'til the time was right. Now nothing has changed but I feel right.

I still don't know where my life is headed, I still don't get along with my mum, I still don't wanna be home, I still can't understand him, but I'm happy. I am aware that "everything's gonna be alright…" and that nothing can go seriously wrong, and that's good enough for me. Too good, really.

Coming back home to an over-protective mum is pretty traumatic after spending three weeks with a really cool grand-aunt who sees you for an independent individual, and I'm not really taking it too well. But it's all good. I've been designated 'celebrity' in a sarcastic tone by a certain bitter individual and so I'm living the life. I'm back home, I've got places to go and people to see, that I will go and see.

Okay, cut (the crap) to the chase, I started dissecting GLF and must finish. Thus we travel back in time to Friday the 18^th of January, Galle Fort:

Event 018: The Power of Poetry with John Mateer, Tishani Doshi, Jeet Thayil, Indran Amirthanayagam, Sophie Hannah & Vivimatrie VanderPoorten

Some of the events at the festival found the attendees disappointed that the special guests were not present due to personal/security reasons. Yet this was one event that I would have been glad to learn a speaker (or maybe even two!) absent. There's this tiny stage at the Maritime Museum and seven people stuffed on a stage is NOT pretty. The conversation was a bit random, and some of the poets (noticeably Indran!) were caught going off at tangents at length, making it rather dull.

Tishani attempted to connect the conversation with the title of the event and eloquently put forward the idea that poetry arises from a feeling of powerlessness. Some agreed, some didn't, and there were too many opinions to keep track of.

Sophie kept telling us how modern 'poetry' was not poetry. The basis of her argument was that poetry is essentially a branch of music, and music, essentially consists of regular rhythm and melody. Thus it follows that since poetry cannot have a 'melody' as such, it MUST have a regular rhythm. I argue that in the modern sense of the word, rhythm is rhythm, whether it is regular or irregular. Modern music sometimes has no set time-signature OR key, but it is nonetheless, music. Most beautiful music at that! Her argument is then continued by John, who writes free-verse. The no-rhythm man reveals that some 'poets' write prose, break it up and arrange it in lines of different lengths, then call it poetry. True. Yours truly is an addicted felon! But is that a reason to lash out against free-verse as a whole?

Jeet remains blissfully ignorant of the whole conversation, and when asked for an opinion goes "I'm sorry, I was drifting, can we read our poetry now?". Every time. But hey! He's clean-shaven (bald?), wears a sarong with hiking boots and has a geometrically constructed face. He looks arty enough to be excused. So he read. This was the first of six readings with left most of us with a striking revelation about poets: not all can read as effectively as they write. Tishani especially (no offence) killed the poem she read. The poem itself was amazing, but one had to ignore the voice and imagine seeing the words on paper to enjoy the experience the poem had to offer. Sophie, on the other hand, was an absolute treat. Being a performance poet obviously helped. At the end of the poem there wasn't a soul not laughing, at least smiling!

I went to see these people expecting inspiration. Sadly, I got a lot less, but still, the tiny brilliant moments were worth the disappointment.

Message

2008-02-08T15:09:00.001+05:30

"Seek the Lord while He may be found,

call upon Him while He is near"

Isaiah 55:6

Obeying the Command - GLF

2008-01-31T17:38:00.001+05:30

I'm half dead. seriously. I've been all over colombo today, half in a tuk-tuk, half walking, doing nothing in particular. i have also just exchanged a green piece of my heart for a pair of shades i know I'm never gonna wear. i feel like shit. but haren commands me write a full report of the Galle Literary Festival and so here goes...

the festival was the best excuse that came by for me to convince amma to let me spend some time with pavi at matara. thus monday found the two of us up at 4am, on the way to colombo. a couple of killer hours spent roasting in the mid-day sun found us on a bus to matara, a five hour journey which i am amazed at having held myself through. this has to be the worst trip i have made so far. i am never gonna do that again. take my word on this. a full two-days was absolutely essential to get over the fatigue and thus wednesdays' programmes were sadly missed. not too sadly though i guess, since it was just the opening ceremony and a tour of the Fort (which i wasn't really interested in) that day.

thursday was different though. the bus ride upto Galle from Matara wasn't too bad or eventful, except that we got off the bus a few miles too far away from the Galle Fort to feel too good about ourselves.

this was the first time i ever walked into the fort (or any fort for that matter!) and pavi's description of it's beauty and grace did no justice to the amazing moment i shared with the place as i walked out past the inner side of the entrance. it's a different world. it's impossible not to imagine pale-skinned "white men" walking down those little streets feeling terribly important and superior yet looking hilarious in their khaki "tropical" gear with faces turning slowly, yet steadily and painfully from pink to red. there is an air about the place of a terrible calm. i say terrible because it feels forced. like the peace in the air, unshaken but simmering calmly in the mid-day heat, pushing down on the dwellers-within, forcing them down with the pressure of the heat. only the occasional sea-breeze gives relief. fleeting relief, hot and salty, a painful memory the moment it is gone. the place was poetic. perfect.

and thus the first day for us began. with a moment. pavi had been here before and she was sure she could find the Barefoot Gallery. NOT. we walked and walked and the bloody heat killed us and pavi was acting so totally like somebody from the opposite sex: "we don't have to ask for directions! I know the way!!!". right. half an hour (yes, half an hour during which we had walked up and down and roundabout the fort twenty-three times missing the exact spot we needed to be and FINALLY decided it was not TOO embarrassing to ask directions) later we had discovered the gallery and the registration desk (and a loo!!! i will just mention in passing that i spent most of my time bugging pavi that i need to take a leak, i need to take a leak, i need to take a leak...) and the fact that we were gonna be broke for the rest of our lives thanks to this excursion. luckily it turned out that pavis' accent and my bandanna and my (apparently) weird sense of normal costume combined had landed us in the "tourist/resident" category. some moments of agony later during which we considered dropping the whole thing, we were allowed in the "student" category. meaning we got in for roughly an eighth of the original fee.

this brings me to a point haren made in his post about what he didn't see at the festival. (sorry! he he...) the festival WAS great, but 800 bucks seems like a hellovahellova lot to pay for an hour of sitting around and listening to some whackos listen to their own voices. that wasn't what the festival was, but I've decided to put it negatively just now, to get my point through. i know amazing people, many amazing people who can't afford to pay 800 bucks an hour. hell, even i can't!!! i can't help but imagine how many people would have walked the idea of attending straight out of their minds simply because the price-tags on the little event passes were a little too shocking. i suppose this is neccesary in a way, to keep the crowd filtered, to make sure only people who feel strongly enough about this to spend so much get in, but it does also lose the festival a lot of amazing people. imagine if i didn't go!?!?! LOL...

okay, i still haven't got to anything worth reading...

event 004: English in Sri Lanka with Michael Meyler and Richard Boyle

This session was alright, the topic wasn't of particular interest to me. the discussion focussed mainly on how the English language had been adapted over time, with use by the Sri Lankan people. although much wasn't to be learnt, many were to be entertained. Michael Meyler is a teacher at the British council who has just had his Dictionary of Sri Lankan English published. he is not an expert but has experienced Sri Lankan English in his work, and a random list of singlish words compiled for his personal use later became what he called "the first dictionary of Sri Lankan English". Richard Boyle on the other hand, knows his stuff. South-Asian English is his line of study, and Michael found himself contradicted when Richard said "actually, this is NOT the first dictionary of Sri Lankan English..." and went on to mention the title and author of the book that WAS. slightly embarrassing moment there... but it was all good.

one of the phenomenons suffered by the language, brought to light, was the "verbication" (or verbifying or whatever!) of nouns and vice-versa. example: horning. much laughter was induced by the implication of vulgarity in the sound of that word. in the UK, the driver is tooting the horn. in Sri Lanka, the driver is horning. or maybe he's just horny???

event 009: From Page to Stage with Tracy Holsinger, Delon Weerasinghe, Senaka Abeyrathne and Indu Dharmasena

this was VERY interesting. definitely a highlight. the discussion started off innocently enough, with people (most of them well-known) introducing themselves modestly and all that. the line of discussion was about the process of writing a play and getting it on-stage and what comes inbetween. Delon, Indu and Senaka all three write plays. Delon made the amazing point, which although it might be obvious to the playwright, probably did not occur to the average theatre-goer: to write a play, you need to think in dialogue. that was the only point he made which is worth mentioning. no, that was the only point he made. fullstop. except of course, unless you consider the fact that he revealed a shocking secret about himself: he writes crap. he didn't really do this on purpose, he just mentioned in passing that "playwriting is all about marketting: you can write an amazing play and not get published, you can also write crap and sell millions" or something to that effect. so that's what happened to him. he wrote crap, but with amazing marketting capabilities, managed to sell. obviously this statement did not recieve a positive response from the audience. actually it didn't recieve a positive response from anybody, even those on the panel were pretty taken aback. i only wish it didn't recieve any response at all, because intelligent people who appreciate art don't need to waste time and energy debating with dumb-ass theories leaking out the mouths of artless businessmen. i want to take a moment here to question the organizing committee as to why on earth he was sitting on that panel. actually, what was he doing at the festival at all? he should have been licking stamps at some dead, fly-infested government office.

Tracy is not a writer, but we all know her as a prolific director, and she had many stories to share about going beyond the expect level of involvement, getting creative and actually working with the writer during production. she also used the opportunity to inform anybody interested about her upcoming productions and audition dates and such, but nobody grudged her opportunistic attitude, thanks to Delons' absurdities.

the round of questions brought up an issue i addressed in my previous post. the panel was asked what they thought of the belief that the Sinhalese theatre in Sri Lanka is far more advanced than the English. opinions were mixed, some saying it was absurd and some saying it was absolutely true and some saying it was a debatable matter. it is definitely debatable, but not conclusive. I'm not keen on repeating myself, and thus i won't go into detail of what i think of it.

this session was as i said earlier, definitely a highlight, and I'm sure eveybody walked away feeling (like me) that an hour was not sufficient, and with much to think about.

event 014: Writing: The Pain and The Pleasure with Indran Amirthanayagam, Julian West and Randy Boyagoda

Indran is a poet. an amazing poet. the poet. he speaks in poetry and he inspires me. he writes for the people. he writes for me.
Julian is a journalist who has had a very very eventful life. her inspiration to write came from a moment near-death, lying half-naked in the baking sun with bullets whizzing past her. she thought she will survive it. she decided she would. and she wrote about it.
Randy is a writer. meaning he is a reader. a passing sentence in a newspaper article inspired him to write about something he knew nothing about.

the three of them, as you can see, are totally different. their opinions are are similarly "totally different". since we were discussing getting a first publication through, somebody from the audience asked "what would you say to a young person who wants to give up a day-job to write?"

the responses from the panel:
Indran - it depends. you could be a terribly useless writer, thus it would be stupid, but you need to discover that you are a terribly useless writer.
Julian - do it. if that's what it takes, do it. if you need to live in a one-room shack and work by candle-light to get it done, do it.
Randy - marry rich.

Deepika Shetty beautifully managed the moderating, leaving the audience again feeling that an hour was not enough. just not enough stop listening to people with beautiful minds say beautiful things.

thus our activities for the first day came to an end leaving us tired and hungry, but impatient to get back the next day. the next day shall be described in the next post because i am NOW tired and hungry!!!

Catching with the Lion

2008-01-22T18:08:00.000+05:30

oh lord! it's been centuries. I've been totally uninspired and not taken up strongly enough to write about anything at all. the Galle Literary Festival was absolutely amazing (definitely on the first although less so on the subsequent days) and i definitely found myself inspired. at least for the moment.

i am right now in some remote corner of kalubowila, in a huge house, and a relatively small room cramped full of sound equipment, watching three middle aged (in caution) men stamp the floor and jump up and down around a mic half wispering, half screaming "rung dha gath gunda" something something... ignoring the fact that they look pretty dumb immitating a tribal dance in denims, absurdly tight t-shirts, numerous chains and bracelets plus sunglasses (the room is pretty dark mind you!) the whole thing is quite dramatic. the dim lights and the low sinister hum of the airconditioner adds to this, and it's almost possible, with a little stretching of the imagination to see a dark night, a gloomy forest, the trees dripping with the Lion King's tears of anguish, and the three fugitives, running away from their only protection, while the spirits of the underbush swiftly follow... hunting them unseen.

Sinhabahu. the tale of our origin. in english. the topic was raised at the festival last week that people have a notion that english theatre in Sri Lanka is not as rich as the Sri Lankan theatre. there were many in the gathering to agree and just as many to disagree. i think it's a two way thing. as is everything else. the sinhala language is much more developed than english, and it follows that the stories tend to be more effective since the script is more effective. yet on the other hand, the english theatre, in it's production tends to be more versatile and thus creative, making the experience of watching the play more entertaining on the whole. this particular production uses a translation of the original script by Ediriweera Sarachchandra, combined with a completely new soundtrack and a fusion of dance styles. the point being to retain as much of the original production as possible, without boring a modern crowd.

i must deter at this point to say that rehearsal has become quite hilarious right now. The Lion is overdramatizing to the point that he is melodramatic and Suppa Devi (his queen) is quite calm and lacking any sort of drama. the end result is a totally meaningless dialogue which sounds like parts of two separate conversations cut and pasted together. director Dharmajith now asks us what we think... a question greeted by absolute silence and suppressed histerical laughter.. that told, back to the original line of conversation.

the original line of conversation. i can't really remember. so let's forget it. I've got a tonne of stuff I've promised myself to do before the end of the week, but it looks like my mothers plans for me might ruin all that, but we'll see.

and thus, after some MONTHS, i greet you (nobody) with another totally uneventful and boring post about nothing, and then take my leave... to watch some more hilarious recording and day dream about... he he...

*mwahz!

Thank-you for the Music

2007-09-13T10:22:00.001+05:30

I am trying to remember when I last left an account of the latest ‘happenings’ in my life. I can’t. So I will sum up these few post-exam weeks with “boringly busy” or “busily boring”, whichever suits the moment. Yesterday was tiring as hell, and so was today, but today… it was something more.

I spent the day at Dees’. This meant an argument early in the morning with mum about why I’m going, what time I’m going, how I’m going, how I’m coming back, what time I’m coming back and all sorts of absolutely irrelevant and unnecessary little details about the visit. It did not help that Dee had called late last night (or more precisely, early this morning) and told my mother something to the effect of “this can’t happen”… so after roughly an hour of arguing (after like an hour of sleep too!) mum leaves and I decide that I must also leave. But this act of ‘leaving’ as many of you will know, comprises many other smaller acts (ex: breakfast, choosing attire, changing the choice of attire, trying on the attire, taking off the attire, showering, putting on the attire, changing the attire etc…) which take up roughly another hour. So the nine-thirty rendezvous was delayed to ten, and actually happened closer to eleven. Anyway!

My gosh, I had missed this woman! The first hour or so we spent on a sequence of events similar to that described above which took up my time between deciding to leave and actually leaving (minus breakfast and the shower) during which we decided (or tried to decide) on what I would wear for that not-all-important event taking place on Saturday evening which I was not even sure of attending. But this is not what I wanted to talk about!

Ah, yes. First remarkable event of the day: It’s not exactly an event, it’s a movie.
“Big Fish” starring that absolutely adorable guy from Moulin Rouge with the absolutely GEORGOUS voice (yeah I can’t remember his name, something like … Finney? No way)! *faint! Directed by Tim Burton. Sounded good to me. The story is basically about a storyteller. His story is the story of his life. The problem is, he (like some other people we know) exaggerates a bit, and this leaves his son (who believed the stories until he was a little too old to believe them) thinking his dads’ a fake etc, etc… the movie doesn’t really prove a point, but it’s a great watch, a few typically Tim warped moments, some told-a-million-times-over but hilarious jokes and the feeling at the end like some searing hot liquid that burns your throat and brings tears to your eyes but makes your stomach warm and bubbly, leaving you happy. Really. The end is just amazing. Maybe the whole point of the movie is that there’s no point. A persons’ life story doesn’t really have to prove point as long as it’s interesting, because in the end, it’s just a story.

Either way, everyone needs to watch that movie.

The Second remarkable event of the day was a revival of the ancient tradition of whacking vague chords on the piano and calling it ‘improvisation’. Actually it’s more like mystic composition but I can’t expect normal human beings to understand the concept, so… yes, Dee and I sat at the piano together after about a year, the last time we did the same together being the 1st of October, 2006 at a certain event dubbed ‘Viva la Musica’ where I think we manage to scrape through with quite a good farce, together with Shez tapping a kala-gediya. The experience was amazing. “Amazing” here my hearts, does not mean the regular kind of amazing. It was so amazing, it lifted us up off the piano stool, threw us on the floor and had us shaking and tearing with laughter.

I had forgotten completely how good it felt to just play random chords and tunes on the piano with somebody else, and have that stuff ring through your flesh and bones into your soul. Damn, I had forgotten how good we were at this thing called improvising. I had always felt the power of the bond which is created through making music together. But after months and almost years of not doing this, I had forgotten. The experience brought back so many memories of choir practice in our little school chapel, sitting around the piano just humming random harmonies and rapping random rhymes while Dee played random chords. It also brought back memories of those hours during which she and I made the other choristers sit around the piano and listen to our painfully personalized renditions of Evanescence and the like.
It’s sad her parents are packing her off to Colombo, but it’s also good cus she’s finally getting the chance to do something the way she wants to. So I don’t know how I should feel. I think I’ve decided to be neutral about it, and look forward to seeing her in colo (without her parents!). these meetings are bound to be ‘happa’ as I’m making sure she takes ‘Our Sketch Book’ with her [ this book by the way, is a great book of our compositions which have very enlightening names such as ‘A-minor’, ‘D-minor’, ‘Five-three’ and ‘Staccatto’ – we have got as far as the table of contents].

(sigh!)

I think I’ll miss the woman more than I plan to, but that’s the way these things happen isn’t it?

Look out for the phenomenal debut album!

Kids

2007-09-09T23:12:00.001+05:30

Younger siblings, especially thirteen-year-old male ones will never – NEVER – know when they really GOT to keep their gap shut when the rest of the household is arguing about things they don't understand, and this (if you happen to have a younger sibling, especially a thirteen-year-old male one) will ruin your evening/day/week/month/year/life.

<kick>

Political Posts

2007-09-08T20:51:00.001+05:30

I generally find it amusing when bloggers choose to rant and rave about the country's political situation in their posts. I suppose this has something to do with the fact that I know nothing about politics. But it also seems like those who rant and rave about politics don't really know much about it either. I suppose this too, has something to do with the fact that I know nothing about politics. Anyway, I'm dedicating this post to something I know nothing about. Politics.

See, it's just a little past 8:00pm, and I've just been watching the news. The highlight today was a brawl at parliament. Yes, a BRAWL, at PALIAMENT. I'm not going to pretend I know what the whole thing was about, cus (just in case I didn't make myself clear enough) I know nothing about politics. But it was quite amusing, the whole thing.

These are people that "the people" voted in to represent them. So if (IF) I voted these people in, then I'm displaying myself as a fist-happy idiot. Right? Right. But no wait, politics is politics, and so maybe, just maybe these people don't really represent "the people" and they just put their money and muscle towards getting into parliament so they can acquire more money and muscle. In that case, our parliament consists of a group of business-minded morons right? Right. So okay, let's forget the 'moron' part and think of them as highly intellectual businessmen. Then/still they would be concerned with money and power.

Now 'Money and Power' makes me think of Coolio and also a certain group of little boys from a certain little gamey school down here in our little haven that call themselves the FreeWorld Wanksters. These guys put 'money and power' side by side with 'respect' and call the whole soup gangsterism. So now, I think we're dealing with gangsters. Or wanksters. Either way…

I'd say that the definition of gangsterism is loyalty – doing unto others as you would them do unto you and sticking together no matter what, for the sake of keeping the peace in the hood – but some others would say it is 'respect'. So since according to the previous scientifically proven fact our parliamentarians are gangsters, their main concern must be respect. But if respect is their main concern, I think it's alright to say that somebody somewhere needs to redefine "respect".

I watched that whole thing on the TV and laughed. I mean, damn! We used to conduct out interact meetings with more dignity despite the fact that 'happa' incidents like the President sleeping with the Secretary who is the Treasurers' girlfriend created immense amounts of friction between the members of the club (which makes me wonder… maybe these guys got 'issues' no?!). If the younger generation of the country laughing at you is the sense of respect these guys got, well then I guess it's understandable that people rant and rave about it even though they don't really know what they're ranting and raving about!

Growing Up

2007-09-06T22:57:00.001+05:30

I cleaned up my room today. This is phenomenal and blog-worthy because:
1.) My room is (WAS!!!) the biggest freaking mess on earth. (Should have taken pictures to prove this, but too late!)
2.) The muck on the floor has been accumulating since April, and the floor itself hasn’t been swept since then
3.) The table and bookshelf were removed from my room a week ago. I.e.: all my books, cds, and crap lie strewn across the floor wherever they are dropped.
4.) There is dust EVERYWHERE and cobwebs occupy an eighth of the space
5.) I had the girls over less than a week ago, and their wedding attire, party attire, accessories, shoes, makeup etc… are still heaped up on my bed.
6.) My clothes from the trip to the “remote village in the middle of nowhere” (very smelly and gathering mildew) are heaped up in a corner. (The clothes hamper lies somewhere underneath it I’m sure.)
So yes, I proved a point no!? Anyway, like I said, I cleaned up my room. This took a rough period of about eight hours, with the help of the maid. Unfortunately, the completion of the whole task didn’t leave me as satisfied as I expected it would. Thus I shall label this event of “cleaning up my room” the first anti-climax of the season (The season, by the way, is “right after ALs”). Yet despite its’ nature, it did have its’ moments, which I will now go through in no particular order:
The old Love Letters: Now, those that sucker no.1 sent me are still inside that little pale-blue bag that I always kept them in, and I read them every time a long-lost friend comes over, dwelling on how sadly romantic he was etc etc… These don’t really inspire any emotional changes within me really, although I must say they are quite well written and should succeed in deceiving any poor creature in my (excellent) state of mind. So anyway, it’s not the rainbow coloured cards or the perfumed (gag) letters I’m talking about, but those secret ones that I wrote him, without anybody’s knowledge. The ones I wrote when I was so totally pissed off I could say all kinds of really really nasty things to him. The ones I discreetly decided I would tell NOBODY about. These letters are written in scrawling letters on pieces of random paper, presumably take from the dustbin, and they made me feel good. The handwriting makes it obvious that I was pissed as bleeding hell, but the words! Damn! You’d think I was twenty-six and not sixteen, reading that stuff! Ha! Okay, yeah, so that made me feel real good, but I won’t dwell on it, cus it might – just might – result in some unprecedented level of gloating.
Taking the old posters down: THIS experience was… different. I had long outgrown most of the artists on my wall, except probably Eminem, but taking them off the walls was very significant. It left the walls blank (after the imagination is stretched far enough and one ceases to see the millions of pencilled in rhymes and verses on the paint) , impressionable, which made me think of my mind as blank and impressionable, cleaned up of all the muck stuffed in there during AL coursework.
This brings us to the end-result which left my room looking cleaner, neater and actually bigger, and ME feeling all grown up. I’m serious. It was hilariously elating. I just had to share it!

Spitting out the demons

2007-09-05T16:14:00.001+05:30

This blog is not dying. Because I am angry and I have a headache, which means I'm inspired again.

I am angry. I say I am angry because my eyes hurt and I'm sleepy, but I can't sleep. I can't sleep because I'm thinking about how fucked up my life is. I think this is the glitch cus my life is NOT fucked up. I am an average teenager with a million stupid problems and I love to think that my problems are the biggest, so I just believe my life is fucked up whereas it really is not. I'm going around in circles. But then again, that's okay since I can't go around in squares. So I will go around in circles and possibly ovals thinking about everything in my life which has the potential to be fucked up, but is really not, as long as I choose not to label it "fucked up".

The "fucked up" cycle: A cycle can't start anywhere but I will start with what's foremost in my head right now (always). It can't be mentioned. The second thing on my mind is the same as the first and thus can't be mentioned. I am going to be elusive and call it illusive. The Ego. My ego is in pain. Oh poor dear darling. But my ego is in pain because I have subconsciously chosen to keep it in pain. But if I am consciously aware that I have subconsciously chosen to keep it in pain, then I can consciously decide to undo this subconscious decision right? Wrong. Well, right. So I have consciously decided to undo the subconscious decision, but at the same time I have also subconsciously decided not to give in to my conscious. Which is probably the stupidest move a human (or animal) mind can make, but that's called imperfection. Or the subconscious. It's a vicious fucking cycle you see. But I know where it started. It started with not listening to what mamma says and getting laid. See when you get laid, the sucker keeps taking you somewhere you've been before but you feel like you haven't been. You're tripping. And you can't get out of the trip because when the trip is falling in love, then getting out of the trip is falling out of love. But you can't fucking fall out of love. So you get on another trip called falling out of love. And this trip involves falling in love again. But this time you can't be sure if you're actually falling in love or just tripping. But then since falling in love is anyway a trip, you're always tripping. The only thing you can know is the only thing you keep coming back to. You're still in love. With sucker no.1

This leads to sucker no.2 who is still very much amazing. But this is crazy because that sucker no.2 is really a sucker, and not just somebody who gets called a sucker out of a sense of "sour grapes". So fuck that. Another conscious subconscious denial of the conscious. This 'alliteration' of words helps to create a sense of the confusion inside my head.

Which in turn leads to sucker no.3. This one made me realize that once you get bitten once, it gets worse every next time you get bitten. This is a pathetically sad truth. Yet it would be a very happy truth if this was universal, which I am not yet sure about. I think I'm going to conduct a poll on this, and see if it's universal. But I'm thinking natural selection will leave sucker no.3 out of this whole thing. I am aware that I am confused about nothing. There are only two possibilities and I know which possibility is wiser to accept, based on the healthier nature of its outcome, but this is conscious, and my subconscious is the one that rules.

I am angry that I allow myself to be consciously ruled by my subconscious, but then again, don't we all?

I am happy that writing helps.

While chatting

2007-09-05T16:00:00.001+05:30

"Sometimes life turns out to be better than dreams"

Shez

Prologue

2007-08-28T22:11:00.001+05:30

I am half dead. No, closer to fully dead. Today has been blissfully hectic, and I managed to pop a few of mums' blood cells as hoped.

Made some bucks in the process as well.

I'm pretty happy, considering the fact that I managed to take a couple of very ego-satisfying photographs. Plus I don't mind jerking off to the middle of nowhere now, because it will probably be followed by a fatiguing trip down to Colombo to sing at some Gandhi memorial thingy…

Hectic heaven!

Freedom

2007-08-27T21:57:00.001+05:30

So the crap is done and now we're free. Fat lot the bleeding anti-climax. Woke up late and prepared the short-story, dressed and left for school. Paper was "okay" as usual. But I discovered something in the process of answering it. Writing is feeling. When the words automatically pour you realize that you're living what you're writing although you've never been there yourself. This is probably absolutely priceless. The experience of writing. Reading these words I type now would probably mean nothing to anybody else, but saying this moves me, moves me so, that the only thing more important is the experience I'm describing. The writing. I did honestly almost cry with the girl. I was there; I lived those few months with her as she lost her mother and almost lost her whole family. I was there as she fell through to the pits of depression, as she decided to fly, and as she actually did, letting go, and accepting her loss. I lived that life with her, in one hour.

I was telling you my story, the most important thing that ever happened to me.

It was real.

And I want that fucking A.

I came out the hall feeling terrible, but as usual, all those dejected looking people inspired me to smile a bit and be happy and look forward to another day of being disappointed and fighting with my mum about useless shit.

Q: Do I get my hair ironed at the salon or do I let my mother do it at home?

The answer is obvious to me, unfortunately it's obvious to my mother as well, and our opinions differ. So we argue; I want to go to the salon and get it done there, because:

My iron is old
My iron is burnt
The clasp-thingy is missing
I don't have the time or patience to sit around while mum messes with my hair
I don't want my mother to do my hair because I'm pissed off with her for vague reasons during this time of my life
I know Amma will say no and I wanna do something she doesn't want me to do because I wanna piss her off cus it's unfair that I'm the only person pissed off these days

Amma wants to do it at home because:

It's cheaper
She likes playing with my hair
She doesn't have to wait with me at the salon which means she can go for her stupid 'woman-to-woman' meeting
She can control what I'm doing to my hair
I don't want to do it at home

A: I do it myself

This seems like something of a compromise, but that's the kind of deception mothers are paid to come up with. I don't get what I want, but she gets most of what she wants. Plus she didn't go for the stupid meeting

Q: What do we get the couple?

I wanna get the little feng-shui crystal balls that light up the whole house with this unearthly brilliance in the morning when they catch the sunrise. They're cute and they're happy and they come in these little boxes so wrapping (which inevitably falls to me) is easy.

Mum wants the stupid chimes cus they sound nice (like bleeding crickets early in the morning).

I have more reasons for getting what I want but mum gets what she wants because… well, because she's mum and she's annoying.

A: Chimes – which I have to box and wrap and listen to before they're boxed and wrapped – urgh!

Tomorrow is going to be hectic, and I'm already loving it. Most of the people I met today (upon realizing it was the last day of my A/Ls) asked me what I felt like. My prompt and honest reply was "busy". Right after the paper I had to go to the studio and confirm the bookings, the times etc.. and (yes!) there was something wrong with the arrangement and somebody had got the time wrong. This meant another million calls to people who weren't answering their phones because they're sick, because their phones are on silent mode, because they're driving, because they're having legal sex for the first time and because they just can't be bothered… but anyway I loved that… walking down the road, real fast with the phone on my ear, my tie flying off and my hair in a mess. Felt like I was in charge again. After that there were a million things to buy, last minute flower-arrangements to check, make-up tips to share and snotty remarks to make at my brother who wanted to know my plans for tomorrow.

Oh I am going to love the drama tomorrow. Mum's gonna have a heart attack every few hours and I am going to boss the whole bleeding party.

I am coming back to life, real hard.

Watch out!

;)

Oh LOL and I acquired a piece of interesting information (call it gossip if you like). Dear mister I-need-to-fuck-a-bitch-with-French-manicured-nails has been dumped. THAT is why he asked me out yesterday. That is probably why he asked me out again today. Rush Hour 3 – yippee!!! (urgh!) WHY do males in general not have the volume of brain-cells necessary to understand that when you hurt a girls' pride she's never gonna be the same after that? EVEN if you're really upset about the fact that your father just had a stroke (oh! Poor baby!)?

Oh I think I'm feeling good again…

Now to fuck with my hair and sleep, dreaming dreams of a hectic home-coming…

Sunday, August 26, 2007

2007-08-26T21:35:00.001+05:30

So what I have a very important paper tomorrow? No better reason to waste the day on a mother-daughter shopping spree which pretty much achieved the purpose – not of emptying mums' purse but fixing the atmosphere between us. I actually told her about the funny phone call last night and managed to whine her into taking me to see an angel afflicted with diarrhoea. I think I'm going to be disappointed with my English grade. I really hope not, but I can't help thinking it's very possible. I am nowhere near finishing that short-story I'm supposed to have ready for tomorrow afternoon, although I've got a rough idea of the plot. I haven't seen a past-paper since about a month ago and I won't be surprised if I'm shocked at what I will have to confront tomorrow. I'm already disappointed with myself. I've not studied enough and I'm probably gonna fuck this up, the only paper that I really worked for and that I really wanna do well.

I'm going to allow myself to be diverted again, this time by my brother. He has acquired a funny sort-of twig. He picked it up somewhere in the jungle behind our house and fashioned it so now it looks like one of those old-fashioned pistols which curve at the handle-bit. Mother-dear is vehemently against violence and so he has had to stop himself from giving into the urge to point it in my face and tell me to "surrender and take those absurd earrings off!"etc… the new entertainment is beating time with this twig-pistol on any severely vibrating surface (example: the dining table) which creates the most unpleasant sensation in the ears. Perfect when one suffers from tinnitus. Well, anyway this noise is seriously annoying and it's ruining my mood, which has been better today than the last few days.

So yes, to continue with the details of my (comparatively) wasted day:

Wake up late
Argue and read the papers over tea
Refuse breakfast
Set off shopping (end up baby-sitting)
Get a hair-cut
Encounter a retard – this actually happened 'cus my mother (having brought up two lunatics) failed to recognize the guy for the psycho he is. We're standing near the car waiting for mum to turn the key in the lock (because the stupid remote gadget thingy suddenly kinda hurled its' internal organs in various directions) and he comes and stands real close – I mean REAL close – to Amma and goes "primrose ekata yanne kohomada?". Now he looks about my age but speaks like he's half a century older, which is phoney but my mum doesn't think it's a good enough reason to quickly get in the car and rush off, so she proceeds to give him directions to the place. The guy smiles, says "thank you" and turns around and walks in the wrong direction. Amma tends to gesticulate a lot when she speaks, and this is very much more true when she's giving directions so now it's OBVIOUS that this guy is off his rocker, but SHE, being even more so calls him back and says "puthey, anik peththatai yanna oney!" so the guy smiles again and says "thank you" again and walks ten steps in the correct direction and just stands there looking at the other side of the road <sigh!>. Yes, another random event, but 'random' is my thing, so there.
Get felt up a few times by homo-sexual police officers
Try on a million-and-one pair of earrings
Politely tell the ex-boyfriend that you don't wanna go out with him tonight because you have a paper tomorrow afternoon and you need an early night (and because he fucking fucked a goddamned bimbo that looks like something out of the Underworld in that Tim Burton cartoon!!!)
Get another hair-cut
Come home and try on the whole Tuesday do – jewellery, make-up included
Read The Chronicles of Narnia
Get random insults form your mother about the state of your freshly-shaped (after a century) eyebrows: "Oh my God! I just notice! You look like something out of a science-fiction movie child! WHAT did you do?!" "Here, let me fix that" "Aiyo! You look HORRIBLE!"
Blog
Enthusiastically (not) eat an excuse for bread-pudding which tastes of that acrid stuff they apply when doing the whole 're-bonding' thing

Today has been a relatively useless day (for the umpteenth time!) but I'm happy. I've been listening to a lot of Christmas music (it's WORK!!!) and I'm sure that helped. It's funny how the sound of bells or something kinda intoxicates you. Also crashing plastic cars one against the other and 'blowing them up' with a three-year-old who can't remember your name and calls you by your brothers' name (especially endearing when you're female and your brother is male) improves the generally low tolerance levels.

No wait, I just finished the cycle I think.

Oh and my mums' boyfriend called again.

The Magicians’ Nephew

2007-08-25T15:51:00.001+05:30

"The trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you often succeed"

C. S. Lewis

Some more complaints

2007-08-25T11:44:00.001+05:30

I'm simply NOT having the saree of my dreams for Tuesdays' homecoming. Not even if I pay for it AND have somebody other than my mum make the jacket. Because it's criminal to spend so much money on a saree. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her)
I am NOT having my hair done for Tuesday because the only woman whom I will allow to put a scissor to my hair (apart from myself) is somewhere in Colombo with her cell-phone off and a blank calendar and you can't really say whether she'll be back in time, and I suppose you can't exactly find out either. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her)
I am NOT getting my teeth fixed before Tuesday because I can't remember the dentists' phone number and my mother just can't be bothered with telling me what it is, and because I shouldn't waste time going through the Directory scanning every Herath (because I have an exam on Monday) because I'm not wasting her money calling people at peak hours about my vanity because it's a Saturday and the dentist won't be working and because it's just stupid. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her)
I am NOT staying out late with Shez on Tuesday night because I'm being tied up, shoved in the fucking dinky car and hauled off to a remote town in the middle of nowhere called 'Eheliyagoda'. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her).
I am NOT not going to Eheliyagoda and staying alone in Kandy because the maid won't be here since she needs to go home, and I just can't stay alone and because I'm being tied up, shoved in the fucking dinky car and hauled off to a remote town in the middle of nowhere called 'Eheliyagoda'. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her).
I am NOT staying at Shezs' place while the rest of the household the travels various other parts of the country because it's not nice to burden them like that for three days straight and because the maid won't be here since she needs to go home, and I just can't stay alone and because I'm being tied up, shoved in the fucking dinky car and hauled off to a remote town in the middle of nowhere called 'Eheliyagoda'. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her).
I am not singing for the wedding on the 1^st with the choir I helped found at their first official appointment because I'm not staying at Shezs' place while the rest of the household travels various other parts of the country because it's not nice to burden them like that for three days straight and because the maid won't be here since she needs to go home, and I just can't stay alone and because I'm being tied up, shoved in the fucking dinky car and hauled off to a remote town in the middle of nowhere called 'Eheliyagoda'. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her).
I am NOT living my life because my mum fancies that I don't live my life. (because my mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her)

Oh gosh! I just realized something. My mums' boyfriend isn't talking to her!

<urgh!>

Some Complaints

2007-08-25T09:56:00.001+05:30

I just woke up. Sleep still clings to my skin and drips from my eyes… its freezing and my mums gonna kill me if she sees me at the computer. But I have to have to say something that happened last night. I got a phone call. From one of those angelic people I wake up thinking about that I mentioned yesterday. She said "Nam, are you like, busy or something?" and I said "No ma, what's up?" and she started crying. And she cried and she cried and she cried so hard it scared me. I thought she went out with somebody she shouldn't have gone out with. It scared me. But she was crying, and that was all that was important. What made her cry was not important, and what I was gonna say was not important. What was important was the fact that she was crying like I hadn't heard her cry since fifth grade, and she was letting it out. After recovering from the initial heartache of listening to her I ventured to ask what was wrong. It was worse than I thought.

This would not be her definition of it, but I think what was wrong was the fact that half this frigging world is so damned ignorant. Let's call her K.

K's mum has problems with the sister-in-law. And/or vice-versa.
Now when adults have problems they need to keep them to themselves, and not get the children involved. When did anyone with a milligram of caring sit her niece down and tell her how horrible her mother is? When did a grown woman – and a mother at that – begin to think it within her decency to tell a nineteen-year-old girl that her mother is a conniving bitch who stole from her husband and her husbands' family and just did 'whatever' with that money? When did a normal human being tell a daughter that her mother kept the other children hungry? When did anyone with a brain think it was diplomatic to say "you don't have to pick"? When in fucking hell did you bitch on a kid's mother with her and expect support?
I think this aunt is fucking crazy and I need to bitch on her, and that's all I'm doing cus K won't because…
K lives to make others happy.
Does nobody realize that happiness is not given as a gift but simply generated? And what's the deal with keeping bitches and fucking do-good-ists happy? It's not possible to keep that type happy and if you're trying lemme tell you – it's a waste of time. So your aunt baby-sat you when you were tiny. So she kept you in her bleeding mansion during high-school and let you use the pool and the garden club and whatever else was there to entertain your friends. So fucking WHAT if she kept telling you your family was not right and your dad was this and your mum was that and you were the offspring of 'bad' people? Of course, she's doing all this out of the goodness of her heart and it had nothing, NOTHING to do with feeling good about herself. I'm sure.
One thing though, this aunt has understood one of the fundamental laws of life – in the end it's just you for yourself and only you. Alone. So making other people happy gets you nowhere unless you're happy yourself. It's just so goddamned obvious, how come the rest of the world isn't as smart as me to realize this? Because…
Some people study the wrong things.
What's the deal with being a doctor or an engineer? What's the deal with Science and Law? Its sad how the world we live in is still so trapped in its' mediocre ideas of 'education'. I still get looks when people hear about what I do and plan to do. If I wanna just bleed my fingers on the piano and sing my heart out for a cause and remain a broke-ass kid for the rest of my life, it's my deal isn't it? I don't wanna be a doctor "like my mother" because I got the inside dig and she's not happy. I don't wanna be a lawyer because I can't give my kids law. Fuck the law. I was made to break it. I wanna give my kids music; I wanna give the whole world music. The real stuff that makes your insides bubble, just like that. K wants to give the world her peace. She wants to talk. Because talking and letting things out helps sort out the problems and she wants to sort out the problems. The big ones. Like war and peace. (Yeah, peace is a problem but we'll talk about that later.) So what she'll not make as much money as she would if she went to med school? She'd still be happy. Cus she's doing something that helps her to achieve a goal she believes is worth it.
You got to believe in what you do man, that's how you get rich. That's how you get happy. Why can't grown 'mature' adults understand this? Because…
Oscar Wilde knew it when he said:
"I am not young enough to know everything"

I don't know what I'm trying to say. All I know is that K's mum is one of the most amazing women I know, and some fucking aunt with a brain the size of a peanut (or no brain at all) is just not worth getting upset over. Especially since she's got a brain the size of a peanut. And the laws of life should not allow people with a brain the size of a peanut to make the most amazing people on earth cry like my angel did yesterday.
Oh fuck the world again!
Bleeding short-story to write also…

Cheers when you’re low

2007-08-24T17:31:00.001+05:30

The million worst things that could happen to you. Ever.

Your mum (after telling you she doesn't mind splurging once in a while) refuses to buy you that magenta/fuscia – turquoise sequin adorned saree you've been dreaming about for roughly the past century because "Child, I am NOT going to spend so much on a bleeding saree you're going to wear once!"
You take two kids to the store opposite the street and it turns out their tyrannical mum doesn't know they've left the one you were in earlier, PLUS they've never ever crossed the street before – ever. Although they've been alive and WALKING for the past ten years or so. And so the tyrant wrings their ears right there on the street while you look on guiltily and hopelessly and your mum gives you the look. Fuck the haters smirking from across the street.
You run out of precious credit on your phone, and REMAIN so for the next few days because some sucker who is on a different network has decided that you're a nice one to bug with nuisance calls (possibly 'cus 'patta kunuharapa' from a pink-ass teenage female is entertaining? Shit!).
Your twin soul has invited her friend (aka The Bitch – who is not YOUR friend) to her house and leaves for town just before The Bitch arrives. So The Bitch calls you up (one instance you DEEPLY regret living close to your best mates' place) and says "hey! I'm at Shezs' and she's not here! What do I do??" and you, have no choice but to go over and entertain her with fake-ass small-talk for the next hour or so although you can't fucking stand her guts OR the sight of her (especially after that FREAKY short hair-do that makes her look like she's got a stick of candy-floss glued to her head).
You go to a family friends' place 'cus they've got a son who's like HAWT and a sophomore (who is being PAID to study!) at Harvard to discover that your mum's REALLY interested in the warped bio-physic he studies at college. No possibility of that cosy chat you were hoping for.
You are the Sudoku champ but you fuck up that simple puzzle they set for the fucking 'Common General Test'. Your friend who's never seen one before gets the damned thing right.
You find a person to blame everything on and then realize that person doesn't really exist.
You're have a long-awaited terribly-missed conversation with your psycho-sister about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named only to discover you're STILL not over that other bastard who looked like he was made of matchsticks and couldn't fuck a tree (although he did you pretty good) and was DEFINITELY NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR YOU AND FUCKED ANOTHER BITCH (who looks like something from a 'save the starving Ethiopians' advert) BEHIND HIS FUCKING DESK AT OFFICE!!! Plus the guy you liked soon after that episode (the one who didn't know you existed) is STILL SO HAWT!
*faint!
That disproportionately divided half of you leaves on a train bound for Colombo while you stand on the platform and half-heartedly stare 'cus, although she's coming back in two days, that's a hellova long time to be semi-existent…

Which brings me to the woman herself. It's something I've been thinking about lately, how amazing real friendship can really be. I've known her just a coupla years but some things we've been through together, I know will keep us this way for ever. It was difficult not to stand protectively behind her as she stood on that platform waiting for the train. It was difficult not to tell her a million things she already knew about her safety. It was difficult not to tell her that maybe she should take the gold chain off and put it on when she's safely in her aunts' car. It was difficult not to walk slowly behind her as she went up to the right carriage. It was difficult to watch her confront the guy who was sitting where she should be, and not go punch the suckers' face in. It was difficult to smile and wave as the train slowly pulled out. The hardest part was turning around and walking back to the vehicle and going home. She's no child of mine, she's just two months younger, but it's difficult not to think she needs my protection and it's difficult not to need to protect her.

It's good to wake up in the morning and think of a few people that mean the world to you and know for sure that they wake up thinking of you. It's great when you're feeling bad and you need a hug and they know before you have to tell them so. It's just elating when you can say "I love you" and they say "I love you too" and you can see in their eyes that they mean it. The best part is that there's nothing more to it.

Its funny how I always took this for granted, never realized that it wasn't a common thing but something special God gave me. Switching schools and good friends moving out and moving back in has made me realize how many people out there don't really have real friends. The type you can cry on and use their t-shirt to blow your nose, the type you can spit on and scratch 'til they bleed just to vent your anger. The type that's the earth you stand on, the sun that lights your way, the wind that blows in your face, the blanket you wrap around yourself in the cold and the water you stop to drink when you're tired.

I have this, and when I remember, I am happy.

Not complaining yet

2007-08-23T21:47:00.001+05:30

I don't know why it has to be a headache that always inspires me, but that's the way it is. So here I am, venting my anger and frustration at the pathetic state of my existence on another stupid blog which will last about a week or as long as this phase does. Last night I slept as soundly as I did all of last week, which is not really much to be thankful for, unless one considers the fact that staring at ones ceiling until dawn slowly gropes her way into your room through the cracks in the curtains keeps the nightmares away. I had been having a terrible week, and last night seemed like the climax (until today happened) which meant that every bleeding thought that entered my mind was negative negative negative. This left me angry (with myself, the rest of humanity, all of Creation and the Creator Himself), frustrated (because I was angry with myself, the rest of humanity, all of Creation and the Creator Himself) and fatigued (for some reason I can't comprehend). Anyone with half a brain will tell you that this is not the perfect recipe for a good nights' rest but the exact opposite. Thus, the headache.

Now, this headache, I think, is generated from a point right behind my right eye. It's not exactly pain, but feels more like a bubble inside the eye is slowly expanding, and the pressure forces the brain against the skull, and that lets me feel my heartbeat – in my head. It is constant. It has been here since I (didn't wake up and) got out of bed in the morning, it has enhanced the irrationality of my mothers' arguments over coffee about expenses and my presence (or absence) at home, and it accompanied me through the streets in the afternoon, on a most fruitless trip.

[I must at this point let myself get sidetracked by something I just remembered. My brother-in-law will attend my brothers' wedding in a few days, and he must have nice clothes to wear at the occasion. Now he already has the nice clothes, but he needs to have them dry-cleaned, and of course, I have to be the one to go to the launderers' and get the shit done. The place is very neat and they've got white marble tiles on the floor and this huge lobby-like place with white (very classy) couches where one waits 'til ones' garments are brought out, BUT the man and the two girls at the counter are deranged. I walk though the glass doors (the place has this aura which makes one NEED to do the catwalk and the total 'attitude' act), give the guy the receipt and look away like "yeah, hurry up; I've got better things to do than stand here so you can stare". The guy stares at me for a bit (I don't really think it had anything to do with the violet-indigo-blue-green-yellow-orange-red scarf I was wearing around my head) and then hands the receipt to the girl. The girl walks off to this little glass-walled room at the back and says something to the guy inside who stops what he's doing (ironing a very expensive-looking suit) to pull out a three-piece suit (my brother-in-laws') from the closet behind him. Now I'm feeling good 'cus I've got something done today – the suit is ready – until I realize that the guy pulled it out to start ironing it, which, the girl returns to tell me, will take about another half-hour. Urgh! So I start walking out (with the same total catwalk thing) and then realize that the bloody receipt says that the suit should have been ready yesterday. So I turn around (Prince Charming copies Cameron Diaz hair fan) and proceed to initiate a conversation with the guy behind the counter, which goes a little like this:

"what's the date?"

"sorry miss?"

"the date today"

"Thursday"

"no the date"

"(brahaspathinda kiyanne Thursday ne!?) Thursday"

"no the DATE!"

"ah! Twenty-third"

"yeah, and this receipt says the job shoulda been done for yesterday?"

"yes madam, but you did not come to collect it"

WTF???????????????????

Okay that was terribly random and not such a bad thing, but I was pissed off you see, I needed to pretend something went wrong today. Plus I needed to prove that there are stupider and 'insaner' people than me – although how far I was successful I must leave someone else to judge – Getting back to whatever nonsense I was talking earlier…]

The headache. It was with my while I got soaked in the rain, it was with me when the freaking three-wheeler broke down IN the rain, it was with me as I sat in my room at three o'clock in the freaking afternoon waiting for lunch and it did not leave even when I got my meal. Oats by the way (?!). By this time the ringing in my ears had also set in and I was settled with having a terrible day. And…

You know what? I think I'll just say I had a terrible day and just leave it at that, because I have to get up at eight o'clock in the fucking morning tomorrow to start writing a short story which I have to complete for Monday morning. Monday morning and I haven't even started thinking about it…

I just wanted to say "Fuck the World!"