Watercolour

This is my latest watercolour. A long time since I uploaded a picture. Tell me how it is!

The Taj and other stories.

After weeks of fidgeting trying to find something to write about, I landed squarely on one topic; and thank God for that. I wonder what writers with deadlines do. The funny thing is, when I started to blog, it was sort of a medium for me to express my thoughts, however insane they would be. No one would mind; it is not like you can force someone to read your blog. Interested weirdos can dig in! But now, I have started to feel guilty if I haven't blogged for a long time. It is something like thinking for hours and hours for something funny that you can put up as your facebook status message. I really envy people who can be brilliant and funny at the same time. I don't mean pjs, I mean real comedy. Good stuff. Some people can say just the right things using just the right amount of words and most importantly at the right time. I can't do that. I have to really sit and think about all the ways I could say something and then try to find which one is the wittiest. For Gods sake, I spend hours building up an sms. So, for the past couple of weeks, as the voice at the back of my head grew louder and louder I started opening the blog and staring at the blank 'new post' page. I read my previous articles for help, and man, do they suck or what! Writing for me is like vomiting. It doesn't come until it is supposed to. ( This was written in desperate want of a better sentence.).

This december, I was in Agra with my family. The whole trip was not bad at all, except for the following conversation I had with my mother-

Me looking at the non veg dishes in the menu card of a restaurant. Mom, eyeing me suspiciously-"Kaushal, can you not eat your chicken-shicken while you are with us? God, the smell is disgusting."

Me, admittedly appalled for she called it 'chicken-shicken' and said that it smelt bad, "Well, if you want me to eat grass and roots and twigs for the rest of the trip, fine by me!"

I thoroughly hoped that I had put enough sarcasm in my voice when I said this, but apparently it was not enough. She took it quite literally and proceeded to order harabhara kababs for all of us. Like, are kababs even supposed to be harabhara? Anyways, that was how I became a temporary vegetarian.( I got rid of it as soon as I came back home. Barbecue chicken. :DD) But being in the home of Murgi and Tandoor and not having it was insanely disconcerting. Also, with due respect to my Punjabi friends and readers, there is nothing much left in Punjabi cuisine if you take away chicken except, maybe paneer. And there is a limit to how much paneer you can eat. I secretly vowed to go back there again just to eat Murgi and Parantha in a Dhaba.

Anyways, being in Agra also meant being in the land of the Taj. The whole city revolves around the monument. I have no idea how they differentiate between places because I have seen so many 'Taj residency' and 'Taj view' hotels that after a certain point of time you start questioning the imagination of the people around there.

After a tiring six hour journey from Jaipur which consisted of a not so fulfilling experience of reading 'The lost symbol', I admit I was not very keen to actually make an effort to go see the Taj on the same day. I was dazed and tired and on an all-paneer diet. I needed my rest. But that was not to be, so I sat swatting flies and stifling yawns in a green rickshaw on the way to the Taj herself. After around ten minutes, the guy stops the Rick and looks at us as with part amusement, part pity." Aa gaya sirjee Taj!"

I get off and look around. There is a narrow street further narrowed down by lines of small-time shops selling marble articles, Kachori houses, laundries, phone booths, travel companies, photo studios, clothes shops and hotels- Most of them 'Taj View's, one 'Taj retreat'. It looks like you could cut off the whole section, scoop it up and keep it in any Indian city, and it would make no difference. Where the heck is the Taj? I look at the rickshaw driver. He is sitting, left palm full of gutkha, mashing it with the right index finger, the idol of indifference. I ask him, where is the Taj? He looks at me with a poker face before pinching up the gutkha in his right hand and depositing it in his underlip. Left hand points up to the lane straight ahead. A bunch of Chinese( or an oriental counterpart; I can't really spot the difference.) tourists seem to be going that way too, so we follow them. We come to this small doorway and buy our tickets in. Now I get a view of the first archway towards the Mahal, but the whole thing is blocking the monument. As I slowly jostle through the crowd, I get pearl white glimpses through the arch; like a teaser, or more so, a Parda- a veil; like the fingers of a beautiful woman peeking through a veil. As I get closer, I get a better view. When I get under the archway, time stands still.

The lady reveals herself. The pearl white skin with a pink tinge shrouded in evening mist, the sheer size of it and the grey-blue skies providing the perfect backdrop for the most beautiful landscape. I stand there taking it all in. For a full minute I don't move. Around me, the incoming race of people has stopped too, all eyes on the Taj. You know, you have seen it so many times on tv, in pictures. Even done a virtual tour on your encarta encyclopedia. The four minarets, the huge dome- the crown- the taj, the glistening white marble and the walkways. You think you know how it is. But, boy, it is way different. Its like the difference between guitar hero joystick and a Fender Strat. That moment I made a vow- I am going to see all the seven wonders of the world. I have six left now...

The rest of the evening passed in standing in a huge queue waiting to get inside the Mahal. We stood outside for two hours to get a thirty second tour of the insides, which were so dark that you couldn't see anything. But I loved the Taj the first moment I saw it.

The only other time I loved it was from the top of the Agra fort the next day. Shahjahan was supposed to be in a house arrest here and he had requested it to be at a place where he could see the Taj. When I saw it from there, I knew it was a perfect place. The yamuna snaked in front of me as I stood there. The evening mist skimmed on its waters. Suddenly someone shouted- " Look, the Taj!"

All heads turned up and people from different nationalities, colour and race held there breaths as one. Up ahead as the river bended out of site, it loomed, peeking out of the mist, the orange rays of the setting sun giving it a halo. Vivid and impressionistic like a Monet, with the mist giving a sfumato. Cameras flashed. The mist grew and as the sun finally dropped out of sight, the fog covered it beyond our gaze. The Taj retired to sleep.

And then all went dark...

When the gig is over....

A post after a long time, and my first experience of blogging from the college computer centre, which sucks.
Anyways, so many things happened since I last blogged. I had my first hospital experience, which sucked, too. An ICU is a very queer place, and is queer in a very bad way. When you are strapped with about thirteen wires of ECG, respiration measurer, pulse rate, heart rate, blood pressure measuring devices which run around your chest and arms, and you want to scratch your butt, well, that ain't gonna happen. And the continuos beep-beep sound of the machines is all that you hear, in my case, for four days. Your life becomes an ICU. Your life becomes a succession of beeps.
I recovered and after a few days came back to my college. Two things which affect the life of every BITSGian awaited me- Waves and test 2( in the latter case, afflict.). This time Waves was more tiring than fun, you know. Infact I had more fun in the pre-waves week than in Waves itself. Had an amazing time right before Waves though. Painted after a month or so, and that felt real good, courtesy the new improved Kala room with a wifi and an A/C, the easel and the free live music provided by the music club. Had an unforgettable trip to Panjim, which consisted of visiting my two favourite shops in the world- Furtado's music shop and the Art shoppee. I played a mexican handmade acoustic guitar worth 35 grand, which was kickass. And Art shoppee is always a bliss to visit. And I got myself sanguine and bistre( they are colours. Sound so amazing don't they.). And I had food at Daily Bread, courtesy Sammy which, again, was kickass.
I will never forget the running around I did for the inaug performance and nearly everything else. We were so damn stressed that a couple of nights before Waves, 3am, Sammy and I endedup laughing our heads out rolling on the floor for no reason as if we were high.
The actual Waves was hectic. I could not watch any events except a couple. I didn't go to the DJ nite, I never do. KK was good. And I missed Parikrama, because I was so tired on the last day that I ended up sleeping at 9.30. The exhibition we'd organised was a hit though.
And then there was Test2. Though I dont want to write about it. It came and it went away.
I don't know if they actually mean it, but the brochures proclaimed that in Waves, the 'winter was never this hot', and it being an amazing culfest and shit like that. I don't know about any of that. What I know is that Waves was a realisation of responsibility. It was a realisation of reality too, stark reality.
I have this queer way of judging how good a programme was. You know, when you experience something truly good- a mindblowing performance, an awesome concert, your mind goes into a high. You forget the reality. Your life becomes the performance. It happened to me while watching Hariprasad Chaurasia and Birju Maharaj, what the heck, even when I saw the Pink Floyd Pulse concert on my laptop, I got 'the high'. And then when the gig ends, you slowly come back on the ground. You suddenly start remembering your problems. Your crappy CGPA, your personal problems, the underlying lack of direction in your whole life. Now the more time it takes for you to 'come back to ground' the better the gig was.
I am still high on the Waves experience...

From Doodism to Noobism and (as)many things (as can be put) in between!

So, I am fresh from reading the first three and a half chapters( okay...two.) of Russell's 'History of Western Philosophy',( By the way, Russell is Bertrand Russell. A guy actually asked me if it was Russell Peters.) and I haven't written anything on the blog for a long long time. So long that I am having trouble typing in the dark. Anyways, spurred by the highly intellectual and clever sounding statements in the book and the fact that I am back home and having troubles trying to adjust my body clock so that it matches humans( atleast my parents.), I have decided to let my mind wander a bit and document its proceedings as it, well, wanders.

I had begun blogging a few months ago with a post on the CGPA induced discrimination on campus. There is another kind of apartheid- more on a socio-cultural basis, which flourishes on campus- especially a closed one. When you dump a thousand teenagers from different backgrounds inside a 200 acre space with books, laptops and DC++, you are bound to have differences of opinion which evolve into certain ideologies and lifestyles. Spurred by the innate cultism which is the hallmark of the IIT/BITS system of education and the seemingly never ending enthusiasm of the students, these ideologies thrive in the campus soil. Thus, being a student on campus makes you, voluntarily or involuntarily, and to some or the other extent, an ardent follower of some or the other ideology. If not, then you become a saturaday night philosopher, trying to unravel the mysteries of the vast plethora of a mini civilisation the campus is. A few of of such ideologies studies and documented are Doodism, Dudeism, Godlikeness(This is not much of an ideology because you cannot follow it as such. You either are God or you are not. And it is not for you to decide.) Proism, Cultism, Noobism, Gamerism, Magguism/Ghotuism, Special friend(ism), etc. Let us look at some of them in brief-

DOODISM( and not 'dyoude') -

I have decided to elucidate this ideology first not because it is more important than the others, ( it is not) but because it is one of the more recognised ones. And the reason is quite simple- Doods are seemingly some of the easiest species to spot around the campus. Even a noob(we will come to that later.) anthropologist will be able to spot a dood with his designer slippers, shorts, ipod and sack attire roaming around with the least care for the existance of any fellow mortal in proximity. But then, he is a noob. A real dood is not characterised by what he wears. If that were so, then every lousy son-of-a-bitch would get up everyday, NOT take a bath, wear his sundass slippers and 'Reejok' shorts( greeen with red stripes.) and roam around campus hailing "WazzZZaaa" to every other lousy son-of-a-bitch he met and be called a dood. But, sadly, especially for the wannabe doods, that is not how it works. Imagine a campus where every person would own an 80 Gb ipod filled with Alice in Chains and Nine inch nails and the like and puma slippers and nike jerseys. And when I say everybody, I mean everybody. Then, a dood on that campus could( and this is an arguable hypothesis.) wear burgundy pleated pants with maroon and blue checks shirt and hum 'Teri pant phatri, teri sandal phatri...' or 'Sonava ke pinjde me band bhaaiii...' with the same attitude as in the regular case. This is because a dood is characterised by his attitude( a very very important word for anyone who wants to be a dood.) The 'least care for the existence of any fellow mortal in proximity'. This is precisely why they wear so much deodrant-least care for the existance of any fellow mortal in proximity!! Doods generally have a good fluent english accent and are not afraid to speak out in front of authority. Even if the 'speaking out' consists of heavily drunk and very heavy renditions of ' come crawling (hic) faster! Obey your MMMMASSSTERRR!!!', trying to be in sync with the ipod while the Chief Warden is trying to interrogate you about you being late and drunk outside the college gates.( The matter ends with the dood passing out. Before that he has politely asked the Warden if he(it) is the dog from the Hutch ad, and whether his kids are humans by day and puppies at night and then sung a quite ingeniously derived version of 'Master of Puppies').

Its not hard to find a dood on the omlette pav gaadi saying" Can I have one Mirchi bhaji and a palti to go please?" while the baffled goan guy ( I mean to say that he is originally baffled. God sent him on earth that way.) becomes more baffled.( I have seen this happen guys. The dood was acting as if he was standing in a friggin burger king.)

On the whole, doods are hated on campus. But one has to understand that some part of the hatred is because of jealousy. Many are jealous of the doods. Some who give it the status of hero worship become sidekicks. They are usually made to stay on the side and get kicked. They hang out with the doods( as much as the doods let them.) and laugh at their crappy jokes.

Then there are the wannabe doods or the dudes( pronounced dyoudes. This is because a 'dude' is just another ordinary guy!). You can seldom differentiate a dude and a dood. The trick is to find out who fulfills the dressing characters of a dood more. The one who looks more doodlike is usually the dude.( Have you read the 'idiot's guide' series of books? I keep wondering how come no dude has come up with the idiot's guide to become a dood. Maybe they like to keep it a secret.) Another and a surer way to differentiate is to go and ask the guy something about rock music. Because, I am sure, through personal experience, that some dudes seem to think that Lamb of God and Judas Priest are actually choir groups. They tried to listen to some metal, but they found it made their head woozy. They tried headbanging and it was horrendous. So then they for settled the 'rock' of Linkin Park and Nickelback and Avril Lavagne. So, you know, just start talking about Porcupine Trees and see if the conversation leads to thorns- literally.

Today we studied, albiet briefly, the characteristics of the dood family of ideologies. Next time, when I have insomnia and a few hours to spare, we will look at the other interesting lifestyles on campus. The above observations are completely emperical and done for the purpose of elucidating. Interested insomniacs can gtalk/gmail/ or whatever me to discuss the theories presented above. Thankyou.

charcoal never dies....

A couple of sketches I did a about a week ago-

This one is of a guitar, eviedently. My guitar. I was just starting off to sketch when I wanted to warm up a bit, and I find that the best way to do it is some rapid sketching. A teacher of mine once taught be about contour sketching- he called it sketching with your eyes. What you do is sketch an object without looking at the paper, but following the lines on the object with your eye and moving your hand on the paper correspondingly. What I observed was that a contour sketch of an object had an amazing feel to it. You never get the proportions right; it takes years to do that. But it looks beautiful in a much more sublte yet energetic way than a regular sketch done by overdrawing and paying attention to detail. Maybe thats what it is- too much attention to detail, which goes wrong. A good artist is not one who paints something exactly as it looks like. If that were true, then the signboard painters who thrive on painting Amitabh Bacchans and Hritik Roshans and Angelina Jolies( occasionally) would be milloinares. I am not saying that what they do is not art; infact, what they do is one of the most difficult things you can ever accomplish, and hats off to them. But art, in its bare sense is a way to express yourselves. And every individual has a different way to do so. It is that original style which an artist has to find, and once he finds it, nurture.

Okay, so we went a bit off track( some call it 'train of thought'. I call it a 'paranoid rambling'.) Anyways, so the sketch. It is not a contour sketch, but it is close enough to it. I was sitting with a charcoal in my hand looking around the room when I saw 'her'. I rushed through the sketch as fast as I could.

The next one I did was supposed to be a study for a painting of a blues guitarist I had in my mind. But halfway through it, I decided to go with the flow than with the plan. Inspired by painting I'd seen before once, on some blog I think, don't quite remember where. But heres how it is-

Again, its charcoal. Anyways, tell me how they are!