“Who was that guy, papa?”
“Son, Come. I must tell you a story.”
“Once upon a time, when I was young and ambitious, I expected the world. I had ideas, tones of them but I was smitten by this one very crazy one. I turned it into a reality and started my own venture.
In order to start my great venture, I needed capital or money. So I met this suave young man who worked at a bank. He lent me great sums of money at astronomical interest rates and in his fancy pants, turned into some fancy li’l toys called CDOs. He sold these fancy toys to great many individuals with great joy. While making me burn a hole in my pocket, he told me how big a "risk" HE was taking. Funny people I tell you. These were the Investment Bankers.
Then having pumped capital into the venture, I thought we had it all in place. Until my dear colleague popped up and told me the organizational structure isn't all right. Right. So he suggested let's call in someone from whom we can solicit advice. I said okay, let's try it. So in came some handsome suave late 20 somethings, armored with black briefcases and a stern look borrowed from James Bond. Somehow I had quite the opposite impression, that there will be a few old people who had been in the industry for a long time, but heck who am I to say. So they gave me great advice for obscene amount of money, even in today's time the amount I gave away would be obscene, only to realize they gave me nothing new they hadn't dished out to their last customer. Besides, most of their plans were not even practical. They like to call themselves Management consultants.
So I thought at least now, everything seems alright. Now, my great idea will be noticed by the audience and they'll maybe remember me 10 years from now for what a great innovator I was. But my business partner noticed an aberration. No one knew about my great innovation. In came a few young sassy girls and younger fresher boys. They devised strategies to market my great product, target audience, and some other technical pfaff I cannot remember as I was pre-occupied gazing at this young female with great bosom. They charged me huge sums of money but when I asked them in depth about my product, my innovation, they drew a blank. Absolute zilch. I thought maybe they are supposed to be like that, reclusive and concentrate only on the campaigns they are designing. They called themselves Marketers.
At least now I had the satisfaction that I had done everything that a venture needed to do. After talking to all the aforementioned people, I nearly forgot all about my great idea and my level of passion nose-dived. Another colleague then told me there were rifts between employees and dissatisfaction was high, almost mirroring my own feelings. So in came a few other people, I had lost interest in how the girls were looking by now. Some of them charged me exorbitant amount of money for what they actually did, get people to work together cordially. While the others were seen working late into the night, they left at 5 pm sharp. Every day like clockwork. They called themselves Human Resource Manager.”
(2 minutes Silence)
“So what happened, papa?”
“Well, 3 months later I shut shop cause I was neck deep in losses."
"The gentleman you saw, well, that was the last person I owed any money to for the failure of my venture. 10 years it took. Ha! And I thought I could be an entrepreneur.”
"All I ever wanted was the satisfaction of innovating a great product."
“Well, not only am I a lousy entrepreneur, I think I am a lousy story teller too.”
I only wish pigeons start pooping on the window sill instead of the Air Conditioner. My only new year hope. So it’s that time of the year again, when people make bourgeois list about bourgeois things that happened or wish hadn’t happened or those who got searched the most on internet. Interestingly, Bieber is the common denominator in almost all. I despise most of it. It is befitting then to alleviate and raise the decibel of my self-hatred through a list of my own. An endeavor at picking a few out of the ordinary / bizarre stories I heard over the years and bring them to the kind attention of my 3 readers – I, me and myself. (Bite me Salman Khan). Here are my handpicked 8 stories. Someone raised a question though. Why 8? 10 is a decent number. The professor can tell best.
Story 1
Enter Computer Lab, Basement. Final practical, MATLAB. One glance at the question problem asked, you know it. That you don’t know it. Could you care any less? Perhaps not. But you never cared much about a middle market college degree anyway. Funny thing, you didn’t set it, but even the screensaver says so. “I-Pee-University”.
Bizarre? Almost. Funny? Heck yeah!
Story 2
Year 2010. Enter a pretty young sassy thing seeking directions in Commonwealth Games Village. Can you resist? Duh no! Small talk and a minor erection ensue. She thanks you, exchanges number. Somethings off, she’s laughing. A LOT. I know I am not THAT funny. What is it then.
Zipper? Check.
Bat poop Deo ? Nope.
Grey hair? Hell yeah. Maybe she saw my bad side, left.
Cut to Lunch. She’s new, wants someone to keep her company during lunch. Small talk is rather random. VERY random. You leave her back at her workstation, pinky swearing to meet at the end of the day. She asks you to stay. Asks, um, Have you heard Kash koi mil jaye?
Neh.
You should.
4 Minutes later. Rounds of laughter. Ridiculing the poor guy. For all I know, I could have just as easily been the composer. Anywho, something’s off again. She’s laughing SO much.
Um. Are you okay?
She nods
Why are you laughing so much?
(She laughs again. 2 minutes later)
.
.
Nipun, its my that time of the month.
(Inside my head) WHAT? Menstruation and excessive laughter?
Nipun, its my that time of the month. (Head rewinds to conform the diagnosis.)
Bizarre? Check. And Check!
Story 3
Eccentric. Arrogant. Genius. Sometimes Vile. This species is really very fascinating.
Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Matt Damon. Just a few needles in the haystack.
A Harvard dropout.
Not many have met or known any offspring of the aforementioned species. I see the Halley's comet and my life shall be blessed. No, seriously.
Anywho, had the good fortune of meeting a Harvard dropout, now a writer. All at the tender age of 21. Tender, Yes!
The guy X has signed a book deal with company Y. X&Y, you shall hear in due course of time. Coincidentally, also my favorite Coldplay Album!
Bizarre? Neh
Intriguing to find out if he turns out to be another genius? YES!
Story 4
How one is reminded not to believe what they see.
For if my mom were to see my Google search History, she'd find "Metallica cancelled" and "Psychosis/ Depression" (Thanks to House M.D.) in the most searched column.
Story 5
I wouldn’t know if it’s blind, mute, deaf, or if it suffers from Brain aneurysm. I do know, it is quite fascinating. Love.
Heard my sister’s college besties are now marrying each other. Maybe not bizarre. But since I find myself at the cusp of my college life, heart warming it is to have seen them in their first year and to see them happy and engaged now. I find it difficult though to comprehend how they made it work for nearly five years. What is more surprising is they lived away from each other for sometime.
As a friend would put it:
As it was, then again it will be and though the course may change sometimes, Rivers always reach the Sea.
Witnessed a cliché of college friends marrying each other? Check.
Story 6
"He is dying. There is nothing we can do." says the doctor.
Anaphylactic seizure.
“I love you” she says, holding onto his arm.
“Shh. Don’t say.” He says.
“Words are the single greatest source of misunderstandings”*
Story 7
I think it was a MUN I was attending, or some fancy conference. I ran into this professor. Fat, Burly, grey hair, not many hair, thick lenses. The usual. It is however amusing to see grown ups consumed by a single idea. The professor, through his 8-10 years of research had concluded that the only thing that has been common to mankind is the will to organize, thus in order to be different or to be remembered, challenge the organization. He illustrated further how we were building this organization, ala Matrix. Humans made the calendar so they could keep track of all important dates. They remembered their birthdays, death days and important events. Then, they also kept their Names, so as to be trained to know which name to respond to. Would the early man have bothered to do so? We started wearing watches, started making Maps, putting everything we knew into books and stored them in a Library.
It is then most unusual that people we adore are non conformists. Rock bands, ever since the Beatles in 60s to U2 now, seem to be everyone’s favorite. The agents of chaos are most revered.
I don’t know if he’s right or wrong. What I do know is: Grown ups are odd. Very odd.
Story 8
Ahemdabad 2009 I think, local flea market. I see a woman in distress, she’s well dressed. Maybe in her 30s. She has a kid, who is not at all flustered. Grown up’s always have something to worry about. If you told the kid he has lymph sarcoma of the intestine, he’d still be playing and cheerful. Grownups are strange. Very strange. That’s not the point though. She is worried how she’ll go back home. So she asks this another woman, a complete stranger, for her cell phone. The other woman is tanned. Judging by the cross around her neck, she’s Christian. Now when was the last time I saw Christian in Ahemdabad, cant recall. The tan says something. Goa I’m guessing. She has a backpack which still has an airplane tag. Maybe a transit flight, but why would she come to a flea market. Maybe just for kicks. So anyway, she takes her time examining the borrower, like a bank scrutinizes your cash flow. She is convinced in two seconds and out comes her high end BB. Hmm. I wonder if she had given it to her if she was wearing something bought from the very flea market she was standing in. Intriguing nonetheless, that a tourist is willing to lend her highend phone. Perhaps all is not lost. If the doomsday prophesy does come true next year, maybe she’ll lend a few bucks to get an unknown a ticket on the Noah’s ark. Humanity may prevail.
* Source: The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
The harried soul wanders within and without. Anxious, he desists thinking what may unravel before him. Like a fugitive, he runs, he fears, he is uneasy.
He turns the key to his old white ambassador, as he steps outside his office. Three failed attempts and a jump start later, the engine starts whining. His thoughts and car are now running in opposite lanes.
Harshit Sharma was a sharp, quick-witted and suave minister in the cabinet. The kind who go to fancy French restaurants to eat Foie gras or Foie de veau, learning the phonetics of which, is an art of its own, billing it under the government was another art he picked up along the way. He was an optimist too, or so it seemed from his statements to the media, one being “A stopped clock is not right twice a day, it is right throughout the day. It tells you the time of every country in this world, once” on the recent embarrassment when a clock tower was not working, where foreign officials were inspecting preparations for Commonwealth Games. The failing of the clock was rather ironical, given the CWG Committee was running behind schedule, way behind. Opportunism, however, was his piece de resistance.
Harshit checks the time in his Rolex Cestello. Seven P.M., as he misses the clutch again. He tried best to allay his wife’s myriad fears. He was doing a shoddy job at it. Clutching the wheel tight, he thinks of all the good times he spent with her. The unerring choice he thought he had made. How they would live happily ever after, the delight with which he applied vermilion on her forehead the first time. He clutches his chain, with the picture of him and his wife. Sudden outburst of angst engulfs him; he stops, near a field.
The sun in the background, paints the sky orange, retiring for the day, tired and gloomy. Harshit stares pensively at the dwindling sunrays, trying to find the answers. Meanwhile, Sorghum dance to the tunes of his confusion, next to his feet, tickling him uncomfortably, much like his vile and malicious neighbor Member of Parliament, Mr S.V. Verma.
He looks at the sun again, watching it set. A wry smile shines upon his face. He hears the sound of wind gushing, and watches the birds flying hastily back home, the ever changing pastel colors, red, orange and now violet like a developing photograph, it switches colors. The emulsification not just restricted to the sky. Cartwheeling perilously between good and bad, he is lost. Estranged memories from the corners of his cerebellum now crawl slowly in.
1984. Around that time, Harshit was a young blood. His kurta, clean,well creased and crisp, much like his character.
“Why waste the youth growing up?” He used to chuckle.
He was rather unworldly, in that sense.
13th June – His father was assassinated. In a rather unfortunate turn of events, right after he had stepped down as home minister, an Indian made rifle’s bullet found its way to his heart. The panic after the riots had barely receded, when his sudden demise, the second shockwave, hit the country. The storm hit Harshit hard; the sudden transition was exemplary, as he took baby steps into manhood, becoming the only breadwinner in the house. Once in bed till late evenings, he now saw the first sunrays every day.
Over the years, he became worldly wise. Numerous opportunities came knocking on his door, even if they didn’t; he made them knock on his door and his door alone. He was a quick learner too. He grew self reliant, self centered in many ways. Entering politics, thus, seemed like a foregone conclusion.
Back in May ’82, he married his father’s friend’s daughter, Gita. Gita was earmarked for a glorious husband. She was pretty, educated and polite. Harshit would go on rallies all over the country, accompanied by his wife. Over the years, though, they grew distant. She suffered a miscarriage in ‘87, through which Harshit was busy working on political campaigns. She stopped accompanying him after that and he wasn’t bothered either, as getting ahead in career was the focus of all his energies then. She, however, did keep a dignified silence throughout.
Woken up by a cold wind, swishing past his ear, he gets up and shakes his head. He collects and arranges his thoughts and gazes at the sun quickly, as his brain starts talking again.
“The funny thing with the sun is that it never really sets. It just moves from one place to another. Sunset is a misnomer, in that sense”
“It is never loyal to anyone in particular.
If it were to be loyal, it’d burn him.”
Sudden rush of blood, brings him back to his usual unequivocal, devilish self. In a jiffy, he buttons his shirt, hand combs his hair and pulls his pant up, although not necessarily required.
“Fidelity is so passé”. He laughs heartily.
Empowered by his ruminations and the deeply fermented drink, he lays all his fears to rest, peacefully. He runs to his car, rummages through the pile of clothes, papers and tools, to finally unearth the finest bottle of Single malt scotch whiskey. One of his idiosyncrasies was drinking only Single malt scotch, it made him feel rich and powerful and part of the crème de la crème of country’s riches. After a couple of mouthfuls, he places it back, opens his collar button, and folds his sleeves in repose.
He smiles in silent lucidity, his thoughts clearer than ever before, his vision not so much. A light shines up on his face, as he sees before him a knife placed callously. .
“It is incumbent upon me to kill her.” He says in his coarse voice.
He turns the key, the engine moans and starts, without needing a jump start, this time.
A man with deep seated issues, when he gets into deep deliberation, he rarely notices what’s in front of him visually. He fails to see a speeding truck behind him. It hits his car once, twice, he growls, shouts. The ‘99 make Ambassador twitches, meanders and slows down. He tries to start it again, confident that it will. It hits him again, and the car is crushed.
A lady jumps out of the back, salivates money to count it. Ten thousand.
She is relieved, Harshit’s fate was sealed by the negatives of him and his secretary together, she positively felt. She drops the photographs and the necklace with Harshit’s and her picture in it carelessly, but then picks it up quickly. Rejoicing the deliverance from misery, she looks particularly happy.
The sun is completely set, and the moon begins to smile nefariously.
A quick driver, a slow flame A loud whisper, a silent shame
A misspent youth, a magnificent crash
An ill-fated teenager, a nipped-in-the-bud brash.
A silence, screams for a voice
A touch, benumbed by wrong choice
A smell, intoxicates my sense of clarity
A vision, blinded by sudden calamity.
The Devil conspired with a truck one day
Twelve years of amity ended one day
I searched the house for my toys that day
I play with them since that day.
(PS - His house used to have this peculiar smell, even after entering his home after 7 years I could recognize that smell, that is why "A smell" in the 7th line)
