An ode to the outdoors

When I was growing up, "I love nature" sounded very uncool to me. For me, loving nature was for people who hung big posters of Himalayas/ Bengal Tigers bought from Boring Canal Road, in their living rooms back home. I clearly didn't know too many real travelers in those days. My parents, who liked getting out quite a bit, approached traveling with amazing accuracy and planning. Strict, do-as-much-as-you-can, see-everything-you-can, city holidays those were.

Anyway, for all the uncoolness I associated with loving nature for many, many years, turns out I love it. Give me a patch of green, and I will give you a flashing smile. And for that, I don't even have to get out of the manic city traffic. A patch of tree line road, the dense greens outside my balcony, this big patch of green I see from the terrace, that goes on forever - anything will do!

My quick getaways are pretty lame a lot of times, we drive on to a some picnic-y location, and then we drive around to find a secluded place that has some green, some water, some peace. And it is a holiday stashed away safely for reference when I get sick of the monotony. Sometimes even a drive to the middle of nowhere just outside Outer Ring Road does the trick.

If I spend my weekends at home, I usually get pretty restless by Sunday evening. And then we sit and think about all the cool things we could do. Turns out, none. All I really need on a Sunday evening is to get on that bike, and do some hawakhori. There is nothing else in the world that is more liberating than a bike ride. It makes a muggy day look good. This love for outside might be one of the biggest reasons I have, for not enjoying eating in a restaurant so much anymore. Unless of course it is open on all sides. Or it is food served on the side of the road, bang in the middle of "outside".

This may be bordering on some sort of obsession, this love I have for outdoors of pretty much any kind. But somehow I don't want to unlearn it. It keeps things simple.

Sometimes I think I have grown up to be very different from how I thought I would be. Oh well. Thank God.

Ah life!

When your weekend plans depend on whether or not a Saturday is better for a hangover than a Sunday.
When you think you should order some salad with that loaded pizza you are ordering in for dinner.
When you are pretty sure you are the oldest people in a yuppie nearby pub.
When you drift into your peaceful zzzz's even as Matthew McConaughey does his antics on TV, charming smile and all.
When an endless Sunday afternoon nap actually makes you feel good.
You should know you are getting older old.

When Sunday nights don't seem half as bad as they used to only 2 months ago.
When there is always something to look forward to even at work.
When you breeze through your days at work, in an industry that seems to otherwise survive on chaos and madness.
You should know you have probably found where you belong.

Whoever said age is a bad thing? Smug smile and all.

Image courtesy: http://www.vaultharlem.com

I do need some education

Image courtesy - http://sgaissert.wordpress.com

Piyu tagged me in this post, and it got me thinking. Everyone around wants to learn something. I will be honest with you, I have never really wanted to learn anything. I am not kidding! I studied what I studied because I first thought it sounded cool, and then I wasn't allowed to quit. I could probably tell you things I have wanted to study - all "at that moment" sort of things. Journalism after watching Burkha Dutt (in her better days) on TV for an hour, policewoman after watching Udaan (the TV series I used to see when I was 6, not this recent movie that everyone's raving about and I hated - horrible acting!), psychology when I could not for the life of me "understand" people. Then I realised I never really cared! English literature when I thought I read/ wrote something I loved. The latter was subjected only to my opinion.

I wanted to learn how to draw once. That was only because I assumed it would help me pass Engineering Graphics.Until of course this friend of mine I strongly believed should have studied design instead of the uninteresting things we studied but never learned, also flunked the paper.

I have had my moments - photography, guitar, singing (I daydream about being able to sing in front of a bunch of people and getting a standing ovation. That is exactly what it is - a daydream. You have to hear me sing to believe it. Photoshop, even. But I don't think about it long enough. I once learned Kathak for some 3 years. Imagine! Quit one day because it was beginning to bore me to death. The fact that there were sudden rumours of my guru ji being involved in something illegal, made it easy for me to convince Ma. I had joined art classes, but that was only because my art teacher strictly thought I needed extra lessons to keep my brush within the margins. Even that was a tall order for me! I started playing drums in the school band. One week. Taek Won Do - 3 days. Singing. With harmonica, mind you. I never got beyond Sa. You can say that I don't have the discipline to learn anything. I can try to sound cool by saying that the theoretical first few days of learning something bore me enough to quit, and it might just be true. No wonder my college years were such a torture initially. Because of my complete, unapologetic inability to sustain the first few days of learning. But then again, what does education have to do with learning? (And that I really mean.)

There are things I want to learn. I am not sure if one can. Like shopping well. I shop. Not too expensive, nothing extraordinarily cheap. Most of my clothes are quite nice too. But they are all the same. Similar colours, similar patters. Cotton and denim. That is it. And I won't count the wedding sarees and salwaars, because they were all packed to perfection exactly one week after the wedding. There is hardly any variety in my wardrobe. I wish I could go on a shopping spree and find 5 pieces of clothing, all completely different from each other and from the ones I already own. Even if I buy a new top, it will look like one of the older ones. I don't know how I always end up doing this! How can unlearn this?

My patterns of love, hate, and indifference are extremely erratic. If I am let down by someone I REALLY care about, I just turn away. Indifferent. But it is the non entities I lose sleep over. I just need to know they are alive. That is enough to irritate me. Turn me into a bitter person. Irrespective of whether that person is around or not. And there is a chance that these people neither betrayed me nor personally did me any harm. What the hell! Another thing that I need to unlearn, and learn the opposite of. Only I don't know what the opposite is.

I want to learn how to really read something that is important but uninteresting. Rent agreements, bank letters, forms. I have the attention span of a... I don't know. I can't think of a simile. But I can never read anything important. Important to everyday existence that is. Except Marshall Goldsmith of course.

I want to learn how to weave magic with words. Be cryptic yet make sense. That is not my style (if I have one that is - I have an obsessive need to put this disclaimer every time I talk about style), I know. But I want to learn. And I know I can't. One can't learn something like that. Right?

I sound as (adorably) pompous as Frasier when I say this in my head, because I cannot relate it with the image I have of myself. Or the one that a lot of people who know me, have of me. Of late I have wanted to learn Indian History. Not study. Learn. I wish someone had taught me how to put history lessons in perspective back in school. As you grow up, you realise that a lot of your present finds its roots in history. School emphasized on that, but they never told us why or showed us how. The more I read/ watch TV shows, an odd NGC show, Saira Khan's Pakistan, Story of India, the more I want to get that elusive learn-all book of Indian History. Not a refresher course, there is nothing to refresh. (It is a strange feeling to have foreigners excite me about Indian History).

So that is that. Do you know who can teach me all those things? All except Indian History. Quick question - is learning always a result of teaching? I know the converse is not true.

On an aside, the weather is magical these days. Happy-sunny and happier-rainy in parts. I was reading Jhumpa Lahiri's Unaccustomed Earth for the 100th time (I have nothing else to read right now, and there are some books I keep going back to for no apparent reason). There are these lines that say something to the effect that the protagonist hasn't lived anywhere long enough to really belong. Beautiful lines, but I can't find them in the book right now. I felt a sudden connection to those lines. I have been so far for so long from the one place I ever belonged, that I no longer feel that sense of belonging. Go figure. And then I switched cities so often that I never grew roots. Same country, and yet such stark, in-your-face difference in cultures. That is a story for another day. I remember a time when people lived in a place for so long and left it even for vacation at such long intervals that they knew everything there was to know about a place. The people, the galis, the sabji mandis. Everything. I don't see that happening now. I think that is a good thing about small towns. Or bad.  I am now beginning to think Bangalore is going to be the place I eventually grow roots in. I will know this place like one knows home. It is not Bombay, so it is not even difficult. There are days when I have my doubts. But then one evening after a crazy day at work, I return home to an overkill of green and the aftertaste of a heavy shower. This is where the auto stops. In front of the gate of my building.

And suddenly I feel all my doubts melting away.

Good times don't last..

Malory Towers, adrak ki chai, rains, and me. That's how utopic my Sunday evening looked just before I spilt tea all over the floor and spent a good 20 minutes cleaning it. Now the rhythm is gone. Mr Murphy, I love you too - not. Catch you on the other side of making some lajawaab tangdi kebabs.

I am quite the rockstar. I keep telling you that, don't I? :P

B.O.R.E.D

Got a call from an HR consultant last evening (these calls happen to me ONLY when I am NOT job hunting). For open positions in some Analytics KPO. I said I wasn't exactly looking for a change. And definitely not to a KPO. The consultant was shocked (Bangalore.. Outsourcing.. KPO.. Get?). You ask why? Because an Analytics KPO is for two types - the extremely bright ones and complete fools. Where do I belong? Bang in the middle. Worth it? Totally!

On that note, I also went FB trolling (Errr.. Now that I am back on Facebook and all) after very long today. Oh and the exhibitions continue. So does Facebook PDA. Get a room! Why am I back on FB? Because I missed a few friends and random nonsense conversation with people I share parts of my history with - school mates and college mates and ex colleagues. Some kindred souls. People's travel albums. People's kiddie pictures. My kiddie pictures. Worth it? Totally!

There are so many totally faltu blogs around these days. What are people thinking? It wasn't the same in the good ol' days. Worth it? Not so much! (That's why I used to have a blogroll!)

So. Note to self: Should make better plans for tomorrow so I don't go internet crawling all over again like a loser. On some days, it can get quite annoying.

The green green grass of home..

That's a quintessential rainy Bangalore evening for you, mark the stark contrast. How can I not love this city? I so do! Never mind the tech parks!