Inspiration

If you long jealously
to inhale the subcutaneous glow
that whirls in me
And offer your ear
to the contagious feelings
of the first realization...

Then sneak up on me
my dear fecundity
with your elliptic waist,
and nibble all over
the ratty craven noncore with
your sharp tongue,

so survives only glistening spine
and writhing nerve...
and my vigorous spirit.

The sole new direction
in the tangled darkness
of your tepid heart.
The lone conclusive nemesis
of the ice age in your breast.

Love: Such a long way to arrive at a kiss !

In the mood for love

This film, based on a short story, left me quivering. The premise is that of two neighbors in 1947 hong kong who find out that their respective partners are having an affair. But it really is a exploration of how attraction sits much deeper in our subconscious than feelings of pride or social obligation, and can creep up on us, through holes and crevices that we subconsciously leave open for it, even when our conscious mind is trying hard to stay away from it.

Wong Kar Wei employs slow motion photography with great power to manipulate and intensify the emotions. There are many scenes in the movies which are almost like photographs with slow steady smoke going up in circles as the only moving entity. Also his use of gray and sepia tones along with a medley of tunes from classical opera to Cuban boleros (they were popular in hongkong during that time) is haunting. I have to see the sequel to it now (it’s called 2046).

Irony

Ultra-sonic screams
“love me, please!”
I can only shout them
Cerebellum to cerebrum
Id to ego
And not without jack on the rocks.

My head a puffer fish
bloated with hope and
toxic with envy.
You eat it raw
wasabi and soy
a green perfidy
in a sour brown sea.

Grief rises like beer head
I slurp it in
Without spilling a drop…
And pour some more.

Close the taps! honeybun
on the reservoir of guilt
You are inebriated enough
with it.

Dreams used to be
White blood cells
Recently I have developed
Multiple sclerosis.
I lusted for Nirvana
Desire is what I crave now...

No te amo (I don't love you)

No te amo como si fueras rosa de sal, topacio
o flecha de claveles que propagan en fuego.
te amo como se aman ciertas cosas oscuras,
secretamente, entre la sombra y el alma.

Te amo como la planta que no florece y lleva
dentro de sí, escondida, la luz de aquellas flores,
y gracias a tu amor vive oscuro en mi cuerpo
el apretado aroma que ascendió de la tierra.

Te amo sin saber cómo, ni cuándo, ni de dónde,
te amo directamente sin problemas ni orgullo.
así te amo porque no sé amar de otra manera,
Sino así de este modo en que no soy ni eres

tan cerca que tu mano sobre mi pecho es mía,
tan cerca que se cierran tus ojos con mi sueño.

- Pablo Neruda

I don’t love you as if you were a salt rose, topaz
Or arrow of carnations that propagate in fire.
I love you as one loves certain dark things
Secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you like a plant that does not flower and carries
within itself, hidden, the glow of those flowers.
And thanks to your love, lives dark in my body
The tight aroma ascended from the earth.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straight, without hurdles or pride.
So I love you because I know no other way to love
but this in which I am not and nor are you

So close that your hand on my chest is mine,
So close that your eyes close with my sleep.

About the Author: Julio cortázar(1914-1984) is famous for his fantastical short stories. His stories always have an element of craziness or insanity. Hallucinations and illusions are also used regularly to create a atmosphere of mystery in which reality merges with imagination. One of his first stories to gain popularity was casa tomada (a taken over house) from the collection Bestiario. The story Las babas del Diablo (The dribbles of the devil) was adopted into a movie titled Blowup by Michaelangelo Antonioni (1966). This story is chosen for the shortness of it's length. The original Spanish version can be found here.

Continuity of The Parks

He had begun the novel a few days ago. Had to discontinue because of some urgent business. While returning on the train to the farm he had reopened it; letting himself to get interested slowly in the plot, in the descriptions of the characters. That afternoon, after writing a letter to his attorney and arguing with the superintendent over an issue of share cropping, he returned to the book in the tranquility of his study which faced the park of oaks. Sprawled in his favourite armchair, with its back towards the door - it would have irritated him due to the possibility of intrusions - he let his left hand caress the green velvet a few times and set out to read the last chapters. His memory retained without effort the names and portrayals of the protagonists; The novelistic illusion mesmerized him more or less instantly. He relished the almost perverse pleasure of disengaging himself line by line from the surroundings, and being aware at the same time that his head was resting comfortably in the velvet of the high back, that the cigarettes were at hand, that beyond the great windows was dancing the twilight air over the oaks. Word by word, absorbed by the sordid dilemma of the heroes, he allowed himself enter the images which settled and acquired colour and movement, as he was witnessing the last rendezvous in the mountain cabin. First entered the woman, apprehensive; now the lover was arriving, gashed on the face by the backlash of a tree branch. Lovingly she was stashing the blood with her kisses, but he rebuffed her caresses; he hadn't come to repeat the rituals of their secret passion, guarded by a world of peeled eyes and surreptitious paths. The dagger was becoming lukewarm against his chest, and beneath it was throbbing the covert freedom. A salacious dialog ran through the pages like a stream of serpents, and it felt as if everything had been planned since forever. Even the caresses writhing about the lover'’s body as if wishing to detain him, to dissuade him, depicted disgustingly the shape of another body which had to be destroyed. Nothing had been forgotten: alibis, accidents, possible pitfalls. From that moment onwards, each instant had its use minutely assigned. The brutal twice-gone-over reviewing of details was barely interrupted so that a hand caressed a cheek. It was beginning to get dark. Without even looking at each other, focused rigidly on the task that was awaiting them, they parted at the door of the cabin. She was required to fallow the road that went northwards. From the road opposite, he turned an instant to see her run with her hair flowing. He ran in turn, crouching behind the trees and hedges till he could discern in the mauve mist the poplar grove that led to the house. The dogs shouldn't have barked and they did not. The superintendent shouldn't have been present at that hour and he was not. He climbed the three steps of the porch and entered. Over the blood pounding in his ears came the words of the woman: first a blue coloured room, then a corridor, a carpeted staircase. At the top, two doors. No one in the first bedroom, no one in the second. The door of the salon, and then the dagger in hand, the light from the great windows, the high back of an armchair of green velvet, the head of a man in the chair reading a novel.

A Long Distance Relationship that will last forever

Update: This entry was written right after running a marathon. A person tends to be highly sentimental and elated after running for 4 hours and 26 miles, as anyone who is done it will tell you. I am not as emotional as I sound in what follows but I have kept this entry just to reminisce once in a while.

November 20, 2005. For most people this was probably as ordinary a Sunday morning as any other. Late waking up and brunch.



But not for me. And not for 18 of my team-mates. For us, and I think I can speak for everyone of them, it was one of the most exciting mornings of our lives. The one we will remember forever. It was the day when we ran and FINISHED our first marathon. Each one of us has a story to tell about this day and although mine is not as inspiring as the others’, I think it’s still worth telling.



Our day started at 5:00 AM. By 7:20, all the members of the AID-Asha team had arrived and we did our usual stretching exercises. The temperature was slightly chilly - around 4ºC . I was feeling very unsure about myself. I had not trained properly in the last 4 weeks. I had missed the 12 miler due to my Germany trip and had not done most of the smaller runs. Also, I had not done any stretching exercises during the last week. I was feeling all stiff and cramped. I was really apprehensive about running too fast. It was a very uncomfortable feeling.



Then came Tom’s pep-talk. I was too occupied with my lack of confidence, but some of the sentences made deep impact: “This marathon is about FUN and RELAXATION… YES. Relaxation. Be relaxed and have fun. And DON’T GIVE UP.”. I kept playing this sentence in my mind from the start to the end. Whenever I started tensing up about my stiff legs or my pounding heart, I just kept saying to myself “Relax. Relax. Have fun. Have fun. You are having fun. Don’t give up.” I had seen coaches giving last minute talks to their athletes in movies but I could have never imagined the difference it can make.



When the race began, I was in the loo. When I finally started running, there was a huge crowd in front of me, and I could not see any of the team-mates. The pacers were nowhere to be seen either. If not for Tom’s advice, I would have panicked and done something stupid, like sprinting to find them. But I kept a pace just slightly above my usual. In a minute, I saw Shreedhar and then Ady. He repeated Tom’s Advice (in Marathi): “Shanti la dhar re (Hold on to peace)”. I laughed it off then but I was munching on it for quite some time.



After about 5 minutes, there was a downslope and I could see a set of balloons somewhere up front. It had to be the 4:00 pacer, I thought. I felt a tiny twinge of excitement and, for the first time, I wondered about attempting to finish a few minutes over 4:00. But the woman disappeared in the sea of bouncing heads as I came down the slope. I was still flirting with the idea of a near 4:00 finish when I saw a familiar yellow T-shirt. I jumped onto the pavement, to get a clearer running path. Without warning, my shins started hurting and my calves became stiff. I was not sure if this was psychological. But the T-shirt was only 100 feet away so I increased my speed. It was Pravin. We decided to keep the 4:00 pacer in sight. We caught up with the 4:00 pacer ran with her for a while. At 3 miles, my shins were not hurting too much but my calves were still very stiff. I reasoned that it was because of the cold and will go away. So I left her behind. I was initially trying to look for the 3:50 pacer, but soon gave up. The next few miles were uneventful. My calf situation hadn't improved but I managed to ignore it. At 8 miles there were some Asha volunteers cheering for me. At around 10 miles I had become a bit slow and was doing 5 minutes slower than the 9min/mile pace. But I was feeling pretty tired and was reluctent to accelarate. A short way up, Sujit, Rajani and Anish were standing ready to cheer me up. I got a couple of packets of Gu from them. And then something miraculous happened. I think this was the point where my adrenaline kicked in. All the pain was forgotten, all the tiredness vanished. And for the first time, I actually decided to go for a 4 hour finish. I ran the next three miles at almost 8:20 min/mile thinking "This race is a lot of fun".



I stopped after the 14 mile mark and did some stretching. I was still worried about getting cramps. At the 18 mile mark was going at 2 minutes slower than 9min/mile. In a few minutes, I saw Ram. We ran for a while together. At around 19.5 miles I could feel serious cramp building up in both my thighs and both my calves. So after the 20 mile mark I stopped for stretching. It turned out to be a bad move. I got a really bad cramp in my left thigh as I tried to stretch it and had to sit down. I did some self massage on it. That helped and I was back on the road. A short way up, Rajani was waiting with a Camera. That was a real moral booster. I gained some speed repeating to myself, “Relax, Relax”. I kept imagining in my head that my thigh muscles are loosening up and that my heart is pumping slower and my breathing is becoming even, imagining the actual anatomical processes in detail to distract my brain from thinking about the pain. I kept telling myself that as long as my heart is doing okay, I should be fine. The self hypnosis was actually working. In the next two miles I was back to my 2 minutes slower than 9min/mile pace.



Around the 22 mile mark as I was falling back into the feeling extreme tiredness, a few more Asha volunteers cheered me up and Kasturi took pictures with a very fancy SLR. I got very charged up. Then, at around the 23 mile marker came a short up-slope that looked steep but mostly harmless. I was WRONG. As I ran over it, I thought my legs have disappeared and I am going to faint. I felt all dizzy and out of focus. I just let myself fall under gravity over the down slope on the other side. I HAD to stop to gain perspective. After eating some Gu, I started running slowly and was thinking, "So I am not finishing in 4 hours after all :( ". I started finding excuses for not doing it in that time. Then a guy in his mid 40s came from behind me and said, “I have been watching you and you have done okay till now. But you know what, you are not giving it your best shot and you are gonna regret it at the end”. And he passed me. That was very irritating. But it worked for me. I started speeding up. But the 24 mile marker just wasn’t showing up. I would check my watch after what felt like an iternity and it would just be a minute. When I finally reached it, I had exactly 18 minutes left to finish in 4 hours. That meant slightly faster than 9 min/mile and I was feeling a tiredness like never before. My head was buzzing and my vision was blurring intermittently. But that guy had done it. I thought, “what the heck. Shreedhar is attempting to run a marathon in spite of having serious health issues, Pravin is trying hard to finish at around 4:00 in spite of having fever for the last few days, I would be a real yellowbellied chicken if I didn’t try to finish it below 4:00. The Asha-AID volunteers have worked very hard for last 5 months. Tom has been very helpful and inspiring. I will be seriously undermining their efforts if I didn’t attempt it. That guy is right. I will regret it if I don't try”. So I started accelerating even more. Chanting in my mind “Left--Right. Left--Right. DON’T -- GIVE UP. DON’T -- GIVE UP. ALMOST--THERE. ALMOST--THERE.” My only worry was that I should not faint or it would defeat the whole purpose. I decided to talk to people, since as long as I am talking, my brain is active so it’s unlikely that I will faint. Unfortunately, no one was in a mood to talk. So I kept overtaking people one by one and saying “hallo”. That was enough. It kept me going. But in this process of trying stay concious, I missed the 25 mile marker. According to my watch, it was obvious that I had passed it. I decided that since I can’t be too sure when it passed, I will start sprinting when I see the 26 mile marker. It never came. The soles of my feet were burning like crazy. I was becoming agonizingly aware of some muscles in my body that I didn't know existed. Then suddenly, there were a lot of people along the road cheering very hard, “You are looking good, you can do it. Go Asha. Almost there”. One very cute little girl was sitting on her Dad’s shoulders holding a hand out for a high five. It was getting highly emotional and my speed was increasing automatically. Everyone around me was speeding up. And I could feel the end was close. But still was not sure how close. The excitement was contagious. I could almost smell the Adrenaline. The air was infused with it. Then some guy said, "You are done, It’s just around this bend". My watch was showing 4 hours. I thought – "Sh%t". I started speeding up as much as I could, but there were too many people in front of me. When I turned around the bend, I saw the timer showing 3:59:58 and I felt a serious urgency to run my a$$ off. Just before finishing I saw the clock showing 4:00:05. I was sort of phased out for a while after that. I was standing there but didn’t know what exactly I wanted to do. A woman in front of me said “right or left” or something like that. I didn’t understand what she was saying but just went to the right side. Someone said “Let me help you with your shoes”. I didn’t even reply. I was trying to look for AID-Asha volunteers but couldn’t recognize anyone in the pattern of blurred circles. I walked out of the running zone and someone wrapped a metal foil around me. I was very grateful because I was shivering. I felt like lying down right there. But I wanted to be found by the AID-Asha people before I did that since I was not sure if I will be okay once I let go. Finally, I heard someone calling my name. It was Sreedhar. Relief oozed in me and I immediately slumped on the ground, feeling happy that I was part of a team and not alone.



My chip time (the actual time from when I crossed the startline to when I crossed the finish line) turned out to be 3:57:56 (3 hr 57min 56 sec). Three days have passed since then but the high of finishing my first marathon below 4 hours has still not receded. I must say that it would have been impossible without my team-mates and Coach Tom and the Asha-AID volunteers who were there at all times to take care of our comfort. Half of the credit goes to them.



Here are stories from my other team-mates:

Pravin's Blog

Malathi's Blog

Amit's Blog

Ady's Blog

Vivek's Blog

Shreedhar Kale's Blog

Photos:

taken by Kasturi

taken by Diwakar

Parting - Bertolt Brecht

Der Abschied

Wir umarmen uns.
Ich fasse reichen Stoff
Du fassest armen.
Die Umarmung ist schnell
Du gehst zu einem Mahl
Hinter mir sind die Schergen.
Wir sprechen vom Wetter und von unserer
Dauernden Freundschaft. Alles andere
Wäre zu bitter.

Parting

We embrace.
Rich cloth under my fingers
While yours touch poor fabric.
A quick embrace
You were invited for dinner
While the minions of law are after me.
We talk about the weather and our
Lasting friendship. Anything else
Would be too bitter.

Abysssssssmal...

How would you feel if your day goes like this:

you wake up because of a phone call. Hoping that it's from back home you run to pick it up only to find that it's the good for nothing lady with a voice like that of a cat with a fish cartilage stuck in her throat trying to sell you direcTV for the 100th time.

You can't go back to sleep because now you are terribly hungry.

You go down to the kitchen only to realize that there is no cereal or milk left

Gulping down some orange juice and eating the toast that has been lying in the toaster for more than a week, you go to the dept. to teach a class.

During the class, you hear a growling sound and turn back to see if there is anything wrong with the heating system only to find out that the sound is actually coming from the involuntary vibrations of the epiglottis of a certain indivisual in slumberland.

After the class you have to go and meet your adviser

You decide that you need a break and decide to check out the BIG SALE going on in Express and Mexx, but when you drive down to the Mall you find out that the BIG is not really big... You still end up buying things

While coming back, you enter a jug handle and are flabbergasted to see a car coming right at you. You exclaim: What the F*** is this guy doing

You emerge from the jug handle thinking that the things can't get worse than this to see a cop car waiting for you and a cop standing in front of your car. It was in fact you who was doing the crazy thing - The DO NOT ENTER sign that you thought was for the other road next to the one you took was in fact for you...

Why do bad things happen to good people ?

On Girlfriends and Thesis Guides

Chaitanya S Guttikar *

This article describes the uncanny congruences between the way a
relationship develops between a boy & a girl and a Grad student & his/her
thesis guide. We assume that the graduate student is from Mathematics/
Physics departments or other departments where he/she is not already
associated with a thesis guide before he/she joins the Grad school. For
the anologies between such adviser student relationships and arranged marriages, see [G].

To make the anology clear let G denote a (possibly prospective) thesis
Guide or a prospective partner and let S denote a grad student/boy/girl who
wants this person G as his/her guide/partner. For simplicity, we will
assume that G is a female and S is a male throughout this discussion,
although, the reader can easily varify that the analysis given below
applies to all possible sex combinations of G and S.

The data** reflects that the process goes approximately like this:

Step 1: S gets impressed by some/all aspects of G and decides that
this is the person of his dreams and starts flirting with the idea of
approaching G.

Step 2: S soon realizes that he lacks the courage. G is too good for
him. Decides to become a stud in whatever way he can (e.g. by aquiring
knowledge of 'n' number of things) so that G will be impressed or at
least will pay attention.

Step 3: S has no clue what exactly will impress G since G is just too good.
Another person S', who has been through this process and has got a G' of
his dreams, counsels that S is already impressive enough and if he doesn't
at least start "flirting" with G, he will never have a chance, especially
because there are so many other S" dreaming about G...

Step 4: Taking the counsel, S gathers up courage to start flirting with G.
As he enters the room, G is sitting there, possitively impressive.
In a very courtious and friendly manner, G smiles. S tries to smile.
Then some discussion takes place which S cannot remember afterwards.
All he remembers is that he was dumb and didn't know what to say to most of
the things and still G didn't seem to be as annoyed as he had expected. May
be, this sort of encounter is a rountine for G... But alteast, G said
"we could meet again sometime". There is still hope.

Step 5: Then follow many meetings in which G and S get to know each other
better. S realizes that, though G is very impressive and still the person
of his dreams, G is still human. And that they seem to share the same
excitement about certain things and that .....

Step 6: Meanwhile, S has also started flirting with other G's. After some
time, he decides that a particular G is better than all other Gs for him
and decides to go ahead with this particular G, keeping the other Gs as
fallback options. From now on G will denote this particular G.

Step 7: Still, S doesn't have enough courage to "propose". What if G is
just being friendly and doesn't have any other intentions. meanwhile, G is
wondering,"When is this guy going to ask me ? I have been giving so many
hints that I am going to say 'YES', but he just doesn't understand. We
could get down to more interesting/practical things once we have sorted
this out."

Step 8: Social pressures*** start building up on S. He cannot procrastinate
any longer. He has to do it - Now or Never. He decides that he doesn't
want to do it when there are many people arround so it's best to ask G if
S could come to G's room sometime... G says "YES anytime, How about
tomorrow at ..." Anxiety has reached it's climax when S enters G's room.
G is sitting there, smiling as usual. S is in no mood/state to smile.
Marshalling the very little of valour that is left in him, he fumbles
"Will you be my ....". A second passes in which G, who was reclining in
the chair gets up and goes to the cabinet. S sees it as if everything is
happening in slow motion, why is G taking an eternity to answer, I am
going to burst in a moment if he doesn't answer, I am sure it's a NO, but
say it, let's get over with it... G turns, (very slowly according to S),
and says "YES ofcourse". S is not sure if he heard correctly. But he did.

Further Directions for research:

Although the dynamics of the process of both these processes is by now well understood, an analysis and
satisfactory explaination of why these congruences exist, is still lacking. It could lead to a better understanding of
both the species "Girlfriends" and "Advisers" and bring some predictability and order to the situation.

* This paper has been inspired by very useful discussions with Louis-Pierre Arguin and Sairam Subramanian.

** A sample of 20 graduate students from Math/Physics departments
of various graduate schools arround the Continental USA was used. The male
to female sex ratio in this sample was 14:6 so the results represent the males
better than the females.

*** The term Social pressure represents one or more of the many contraints that
shape a graduate student's life, e.g. Funding, girlfriend, girlfriend's parents, ego and
self respect etc. For a more exhaustive list, refer to the appendix I at the end of [SG].

References:

[A] Arguin, Louis-Pierre, "Flirting - A new Definition and examples" .
Princeton Journal of Graduate Student life, 2003.

[AG] Arguin, Louis-Pierre and Guttikar, Chaitanya S., "On Wine, Women and
Wisdom", Preprint, arXiv.HS.2003765545.

[G] Guttikar, Chaitanya S., "Ph.D. guides and their students in certain
engineering disciplines and congruences with Arranged Marriages in India",
Journal of South Asian Graduates' Association (JSAGA), December 2003.

[GS] Guttikar, Chaitanya S. and Subramanian, Sairam, "Social Pressures, and how to cope with them."
published by Society for the Welfare of Grad Students Getting Married and Just Marrieds (SWGSGMJM), May 2003.

Mothers !

Here is a peice of a standard conversation that takes place between an Indian Mother and her "child" in the US doing his/per Ph.D.

C: Hallo Aai*

M: Hallo, Have you had dinner ?

C: No. I just came back from the dept. Now I will cook some dal and eat.

M: It's neccessary that you have dinner on time. It's not good for your health to skip
meals. What did you have for lunch ?

C: Buffalo wings and salad and an Apple.

M: That's all ???? (Silence for 2 seconds) You should eat more. This is too less. You work so hard...

C: First of all, I don't work as hard as I should and secondly I don't need more food, Aai.

M: Yes you do. And you need more food. You have become so thin.

C: In fact I am in perfect shape. I never felt more fit.

M: NO... You need to eat more. And take enough rest. You need rest.

C: I don't. I sleep for 7 hours already.

M: But brain takes up a lot of energy. So you need to take rest and and eat chocolates or Almonds or Cachewnuts while you are working.

C: Aai... Can we talk about something else ? How is the construction work at our new house going on ?

M: It's going well. It will be over in another month. We didn't install the bathtub that you had asked us to because baba thought that it was not necessary, at least for now.

C: And how are your tutions coming along ?

M: Quite well. I am enjoying them. Oh that reminds me. The father of one of my students is visiting NewYork and he said he could visit you. So I am sending a leather jacket and a sweater and a pair of handgloves with him. It must be getting awefully cold there.

C: Oh no........ Aai.... Why do you do this. I don't need leather jacket. I have many jackets and it's anyway good to wear more layers than just one big fat jacket. And I don't even know this guy that you are sending the things with. YOu shouldn't do that. Mainly because it's not needed..........

M: You do need a leather jacket. Aarati's sister, who stays in newjersey was here a week ago and she was telling that a leather jacket is absolutely neccessary in winter. And this is guy offered to take those things himself. I didn't ask him.

C: So what... Aai I am telling you I don't need the jacket. So don't send it if you haven't bought it already.

M: No, I haven't but you do need it and Baba* and I are going to buy it in the evening and the person is going to collect it tomorrow morning when he comes to drop Tejas off for the tutions.

C:..............................................

M: Have a proper dinner and then go to sleep in time.

C: okay..... Should I hang up now ?

M: okay. Bye and take care, Son.

C: Bye Bye Aai.

Surely, Neccessity is the Invention of all Mothers !

* Aai = Mom, Baba = Dad