Yes, my dear readers, I took a tiny break from blogging and traveled a bit. Anyway, it’s damn sweet to receive messages saying that they miss my presence in their inbox. That sounds like a sex pun but it’s not. Actually, my brother and I went to Sri Lanka on a last-minute 11-day trip and we visited four cities while doing a lot of ‘local’ stuff instead of the typical ‘touristy’ shit. If you are planning to fly to this island country, feel free to drop a line. I can guide you a bit. Super convenient place to be, especially for an Indian. Initially, I thought of writing a blogpost on the SL visit but then, as always, got lazy. Maybe someday later. Randomness. For now, I am glad to be back in your life. And I love you. And we will leave happily ever after.
When the great war of Kurukshetra ended, with thousands and thousands of soldiers and warriors having been laid to waste, the Pandavas returned to the palace. It was clear that Yuddhistra was going to be the king—and he was so, for the next 36 years—but he did something only a person of his stature would. He went straight to Gandhari, the mother of Kauravas, to offer his condolences. After all, she had lost 98 children within a span of three weeks. Probably the single greatest victim. The same sentiments were invoked when the exile in Ramayana ended and Rama went to meet Kaikeyi even before his own mother. What is heartwarming about these moves is that the place of a mother remains unshakeable in all our lores. Even Sri Venkateshwara Suprabhatam—arguably the most popular piece of devotional song in Hindu households—starts with the word Kausalya. Yes, Rama’s amma.
Mahabharata is one of the most striking lessons in the futility of desire. On the surface, it appears like a full-blown property issue but land is just another metaphor for all the things that we think we deserve but are never going to fulfil us. Once you get what you always wanted, you are bound to accept the fact that it doesn’t really complete you. What calms you in the end is your personal oneness with the flow of time. Something Arjuna felt when the war was finally over. Had he not picked up his weapons, detailed out in Arjuna Vishada Yoga (Arjuna’s Endless Sorrow), Mahabharata would have been completely different. Perhaps a modern context would be imagining a world where people are speaking in German in the 21st century because Nazis won WW2 in the 20th century. But then, nothing lasts forever. The greatest of empires crumbled when it was their time to fold. If there is one event that holds permanence, then it is the peace that follows the end of a chapter. Fursat.
My uncle once had a bad infection and he was hospitalized. The thing about being under medical care is you don’t enjoy the excessive attention, right? My uncle was different. He thoroughly relished the care people around him were showering on him. This attitude was tested gravity on the day of his operation. There were some medical students in the OT and one of the girls fainted dramatically after looking at his infected toe. She must have watched too many Hindi K-serials and was falling in slow motion or something. Others rushed to her side and suddenly, our man was not the cynosure anymore. To which, he dryly quipped in chaste Tulu to the main surgeon, “Has she touched the floor yet or is the plane yet to land?”
Monsoon should be like Japanese trains. Always on time. Otherwise, it gets nasty. Particularly in the coastal areas. More than the annoying heat, humidity makes things worse. Burn. Finally, in the second week of June, Mangalore received its first proper rain. And as expected, the weather took a U-turn. There is a fresh coat of green everywhere. Looks nice, feels better. When it rains well, the city is cleaned and more importantly, people get some relief. I like to believe that this periodic change plays a part on our psychology as well. We tend to hope that there is scope for the washing of our minds too. We all know how polluted our brain gets. Maybe that's why petrichor means so much to our species. That faint rainy smell hugging your senses. Apparently, a human's ability to smell petrichor is stronger than a white shark's ability to sniff out blood underwater. Must be something, no?
There are football fans and then there are club football fans and then there are Messi-Ronaldo fans. The last category only cares about either Messi or Ronaldo or both. They don’t bother about club matches and team records. They concern themselves with what their most favourite player is up to. That’s it. So, when Messi decided to move to USA, shunning European football, all the business-centric theories started floating. Most see his decision as a boost to his long-term equity. There are several revenue strings that Messi is pulling by signing with Inter Miami. We are talking about millions and millions of dollars in merchandise for years to come. A romantic would obviously want Messi to stick to Europe, possibly return to Barcelona, and improve his already staggering CL stats but it’s quite easy to understand why Messi’s retinue concluded differently. After a point, football is not just a conquest of titles, it’s an avenue to remain relevant in the market even after you retire. Cue: Michael Jordan.
Yesterday, I was reading about Erling Haaland’s achievements in his debut season for Manchester City. Quite an astonishing feat for a 22 year old monster. I won’t be surprised if he pips Messi to bag the Ballon d’Or later this year. While going through his numbers, I started wondering that statistics reveals only as much as we intend to peek. There is no way we are going to get inside the skin of a footballer. I mean, we will never have the stats on which footballer scored a hat-trick despite having a hammering headache that day. Or how many penalties a goalkeeper saved on a full bladder. Stuff that are insanely tough to overcome but athletes quietly do on a regular basis.
When you are weak, your environment will weigh heavily upon you. When you are strong, your environment shall let you breathe easily. That’s just how things are in nature. There is no morality to it. Being humans, we are conditioned to think everything within the box of good and evil. But that’s not how the world around us works. The megalodons had to leave when it was their time to leave. We are temporary and so are our concerns and despair. The trick is to find happiness in those little things that costs—mentally and physically—too little.
If you are a fan of The Office (American version), you must watch its bloopers on YouTube. Imagine going to work at a place where the biggest problem is untimely laughter. While filming, the actors kept breaking character because they couldn’t hold their expression any longer on camera and LOL-ed out hard. Amazing work culture. Which answers a question I posed about decade ago on Twitter: why are the characters’ eyes always teary red. Well, that’s what happens when you are trying to shoot an episode but are constantly laughing with your colleagues. And eyes don’t lie.
Speaking of laughing all the way to the bank, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant have made upwards of $50 million in syndication for writing the British original of The Office. They created just two seasons (14 episodes) in 2001 and have been minting money since. Marketing gurus often say that you can’t stop an idea whose time has come. I have a slightly different take here. You must capitalize on an idea before it’s too late.
Are you feeling low today? It’s OK. Just a phase and like all phases, it will change, not necessarily end. It changes and so will you. However, you shouldn’t let time take control of your timelines. You must do what you can to change the status quo. Find ways to improve yourself. List out things that you need to work on. Go for a walk. Push yourself for a run. Write down your thoughts. Beat your own targets. Do these little things that would help you build confidence. Avoid negative news and seek stories that inspire. The world is never burning eternally but some of us like to seek comfort in that gory sight. Stay away from such soul-sucking people. Cynicism has never solved anything. Rise above your narrow conceptions and embrace the world. We like to say that nothing matters. But if that is true, what is left of you? You are something in this equation, aren’t you?
Once upon a time, we all agreed that we were going to grow up and become wiser. Turns out wisdom is not a guarantee. It’s an unexpected end result. Like cherry blossoms in the month of June. We can only understand the circumstances we find ourselves in, read the room and try to make the most of it. And if we manage to survive all the iniquities, all the foreboding, all the challenges, all the bullshit, then we will have a small box called wisdom with us. It’s precious because we seldom know how to unlock it.
In the 4th season finale of Succession, you are forced to ask yourself: is that it? All the dirty manoeuvres these three heir-apparents made amounted to nothing. Absolutely nothing. The three musketeers win only when all three are equal in each other’s head. In Ken’s case, he is above the rest simply because he believed so. His vision is flawed and he is essentially a decent but broken man. In Rome’s case, he was closer to his father so he was the anointed one by design. Unlike his dad, he doesn’t have the stomach to fight the long battles. In Shiv’s case, she just felt she is smarter than the boys. Well, she might have her heart in the right place but her smartness displayed Stockholm Syndrome. The last two minutes of this brilliantly scripted show is sacred. It has no dialogues and tells us everything we need to know about a war well lost.
Over the years, I’ve been hearing “you must write a book” so many times that I was convinced it was a bad idea. Regardless, earlier this year, I asked my readers to send me their favourite paragraphs written by me, so that I can think of compiling a book out of them. A lot of you enthusiastically shared it via email, Instagram and Twitter. And I am grateful. So far, I’ve been able to finalize only 33 paragraphs, which is not enough. Obviously. Need to have at least 250 or so. The truth is, I am deeply critical of my own work. Everything I come up with reads good enough but nothing sounds great enough. If I like something now, I wonder how much will it resonate 10 years later in a book that is probably collecting dust somewhere. Or maybe I am thinking too much, looking for an excuse to not go ahead with this project.
Good read.. 👍 I am new to this app. I have no shame in saying I had to google a few words to understand what it means.