Into The Wild.

Into the wild is what a movie!!Its been quite some time since any motion picture has captured me to this extent.Time and again the wild has called upon man to return to his roots and never have i seen that silent yet strong pull being depicted with such acuity.Sean Penn does a brilliant job again but this time around he is behind the camera and what he captures from that position cannot be described in words.The scenes of never-ending white capes, of savage greenery, of deep crevices and winding rivers were not shot to provide excellent wallpapers which would then go on to define nature on a random monitor.I don't know if i can express myself here but the scenes were shot as if intending to bring out nature in its actual wild and earthly form.

The story follows Christopher McCandless who after passing out of high school decides to give away all his money to charity and embark upon a journey which searches for the true nature of man.During his travels he once says "I read somewhere... how important it is in life not necessarily to be strong... but to feel strong." and then another time he mentions "The core of man's existence is from new experiences".It has been a really long time since words have moved me so much and that too so few of them.Maybe it is their sparseness that brings forth in strength the essence of the story- Truth. Man's ultimate search.The one which might not end when we find life on Mars or discover wormholes in the fabric of the universe.This calls for a much deeper and insightful search into the heart.The word heart has long been under shadowed by its over use and misuse .When Alex(the name Christopher gave himself) cuts out the heart of a wild moose he had killed, the organ is deep bloody red and something more synonymous wihh life might be hard to portray.

All men are not the same.While some may enjoy organized and civilized life and its pleasures and pain others might feel tied down by it.And these are the men who have the heart of a wild beast.No fear, no care, no delusions, only a wild desire to live, explore and watch and learn and be awed by existence itself.I had read Jack London's Call of the Wild very many years ago but the last chapter of the book comes back to me vividly in all its gore and cold-bloodedness.Yet there is no sadness or pity or apathy, quite similar to my reactions when Alex dies at the end of the movie after having consumed the seeds of a poisonous plant. There is a certain poetic justice here which no one shall ever find in a court of law because the laws here are the laws of existence. There is the primitive rawness and manliness to life which makes every moment worth living. The only duties are ones required for survival. And the rest is an adventure of endless possibilities.

"If we admit that human life can be ruled by reason, then all possibility of life is destroyed."
Alexander Supertramp.

Modern Times

It has been a long time since i posted anything on this blog and the due reason was not any disposition towards blogging.I have been amongst the constant readership of Andy's and Dhole's blog.Moreover the Hindi posts by Pandu have been great.Its just that a lot of things have been changing and one realizes the occurrence and importance of those only in retrospect.We have all reached the throes of final year, the time of the great reckoning. The year when one gets placed.An amount is placed on our head...almost literally in an obscure way.People start planning for their future.The time again for serious exams and studies. Gre,Cat,Gate,Ncfm,Cds.......the list goes on.However the basic change in mentality that the brings with itself is one where people are actually getting prepared to leave the hallows of our Alma Mater.The bells have rung and soon it shall be time for us to make our leave and make place for the next batch to take over.A hundred sleepless nights, many a drunken brawls, innumerable trips, placement parties, exams and results, a whole Incident and Engineer still hold the defenses yet time wears them down day by day.We had taken this place to be our home and four years had seemed like an epoch.And the dream lies shattered now.I might be putting it a little to strongly but behind all the frenzied activities that final year brings up lies the sole reason that people want to make the best use of the fast running out period of college life that remains. And everything that happens says that this is the the last one time. Get it right or thats another day subtracted from the best years of your life.It was a dream we all dreamed and lived for three years and the time of the awakening is here. Yet i would not want my days now to be marred by such thoughts and plan to live it to the fullest.

So to you all,
Cheers.

AUDIO - SLAVE!!

No, I am not going to talk about the band as most of u must have presumed. It is an excellent band and certainly deserves a lot of cheers...but we shall leave that for later. I discuss here the root cause and impact of audio as our generation knows it today.

The world is definitely shrinking. Or maybe,its getting too congested in turn giving us a vision of compression. Today is the age of miniaturization. Bigger is no longer better...atleast not always.We see smaller gadgets everywhere...cars,mobiles,laptops,watches,washing machines...what not...u name it and they have it. We are too crammed for space. This change brought about the age of music-on-the-move. The radio has made a come-back in a big way. Mobiles come with in-built mp3 players. iPods are a common gadget. And everyone,and i mean everyone, is Plugged-In.

Whether it be the executive on his way to the office, the child coming back from school on a bus or a by-stander at the crossroads everyone is listening to something. Not that this in itself is a bad thing. However,what is happening behind the scenes is that we are slowly but surely giving less importance to our other senses. We have stopped observing the people next to us on the road,we have stopped looking out of the car to marvel at the greens next to us. We are living in a parallel world instantaneously. And our attention is divided. If one was to pull down ones car window and listen to the sounds surrounding oneself one would realize that I am not lying. We are becoming Audio - Slaves. No,we already are there...just that we are in a spell and when the spell breaks we shall all be BLIND.

"all I have to do is just close my eyes
to see the sea gulls wheeling in the far distant skies
all I wanna to tell you all I wanna say
is count me in on the journey don't expect me to stay ."
Pink Floyd

Strangers

It is very seldom that one reflects upon the importance of strangers in their lives.However the reflections or their absence is not what we are talking about here.

Indian mothers are very wary of the concept of strangers(not without reason maybe).We were all taught not to speak to that man with those delctable sweets, to run from a smile, a hoarse voice and a pair of hazy eyes.

But then all of a sudden something happens which is
least expected by our parents. We grow up. We start exploring the wonders of the new found world which exists beyond the corners of ones own street.Each one of us remembers the first time we riked our cycles on to the main road. We flew on twin-wheels along with the cars,the bikes and those big trucks. I suspect some might have carried out hat venture on foot/any other means of transport but it did happen nonetheless. Then came the sweets shop, the 'paan' dukaan, the 'sabji' bazaar,the pani puri 'thela' and life flowed like a thick syrup along the streets and we were eager to turn one more corner to taste the air there.

However, it was the expansion of the physical world.We would still refuse the toffee/chocolate unless we paid for it ourselves. Somehow for some unknown reason money validated a lot of things. I for one took quite some time to grasp the idea of money, I understood the numbers printed on them but the whole concept avoided me for long.

And thus our life became confined to the people we met in schools, in tuituions, at our own homes, colony, locality and the places where our parents took us, added to the list validated by money(namely the 'pani puri wala's, the vegetable seller, the 'paan wala's etc because one paid them). If you were ever seen trying to operate the top('lattu') with a kid from the slum nearby or any other unknown kid for that matter in all propability you were scolded back to the safety of your house.

But the time came when one day we broke that cover too.It could have been that man at the bus stand and the cricket match India lost,it could have been the old man who goes for a morning walk and his toothless grin.We started interacting with starngers. A few would go on to become a part of our lives and most would be gone in a few hours but they all leave a lingering smell in the air.Their memories crop up at the starngest of times and they make good stories to tell.These fleeting relationships somehow transcend a lot of absrtactions like respect, trust, caste, creed, sex.They are, at times, the closest person to person interaction one can have.

Starngers walk away knowing more about you than some of your closest friends and leave behind their own secrets to guard forever.

Words.

extremely strange creatures they are.....ever changing ever evolving.It is almost as if they have a mind of their own...At times they are like your best friend, flowing with you....articulating anthing you wish....and yet at times inept at expressing themselves.....as in what words are there that better describe the words pain,thought,blue....i could go on for ever.....and yet they can be powerful enough to move huge armies to war....inspire humans to do that which is impossible....to wound a person deeper than any dagger could have....am not saying that i have discovered something new....just a mere observation.A fragment of my thoughts...an impression left behind by meandering feet.

Drunk in Goa.

I wish i could drift on,
Drift on with the flow,
Let all waves flow over me,
Let the tide engulf my pride.

And the ebbing sea carries me on;
To never,never land.

Fishes and octupuses ,
And a few sea-horses too...
In never,never land.

A few Goan songs
And candlelit beer
In never ever land.

Fireworks in the nightsky
And the last cigarette butt;
In never never land.

Abroken pen,a wet diary
And an unfinished poem.
In my never never ..........