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Pie crumbs.

Tuesday, June 1, 2021.

When I was still a teen and heavily into the first generation of YouTubers, I was introduced to the concept/ideology of “reckless optimism.” To a teenager who had till then only seen the world through a keyhole, it made complete sense to me. But as I grew older, I started to meet all different kinds of people. And suddenly, I realized how I’d been exposed to people who were either raised like me for the most part or that the values that my friend circle in school shared were very similar. This, I soon realized, was obviously because we lived through the same situations which usually are responsible for these values. We were given a piece of the same pie of values. It’s only when you go out further from this little group of people that you are introduced to the truth that yours wasn’t the only pie. It was one of countless.

As we go through life, it becomes more and more difficult to hold on to the reckless optimism ideology. You pick up crumbs from all the different pies you encounter; others pick some from your piece too. Of course, I do not expect everyone reading this to resonate with what I’m saying. I acknowledge my privilege when I draw the analogy of the deal I got, to a “pie.”

I think there’s weight to the belief which says there can be no friendships formed in adulthood, really. All you’ve got is your childhood friends and if you’re lucky, maybe your college mates. I think these will be the only people you will ever truly resonate with because you lived through times that defined you as people. Some of my most defining times I have, I’ve lived with these people, seen with these people, and changed with them. And so, to meet someone who went through a similar set of circumstances, (while not impossible) is quite rare after you leave that defining time behind you.

The only true friends you will ever have were the people who went through the grind of life through you. Only they will understand you completely and wholly. So, if you’ve lost touch with this bunch, I must implore you to reach out and find them: your people. No matter how far you’ve come or how long it has been.

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Destiny's prince.

Monday, May 31, 2021.

Babur sends for his zenana to join him in his new kingdom. He has his qualms about Hindustan. The Battle of Panipat may have been won, but his new acquisition is still not consolidated and faces danger from all sides. The Rajputs to the south and the Afghans to the north. Babur has three sons: Hindal, Kamran and Humayun.

Humayun, though counted among the Great Mughals (the first 6 of the dynasty), was a frail child who often fell sick. And it is during one of his bouts of illnesses that we read a legend. One of the many and probably one of the most well-known ones of Babur. In the introduction of Wheeler M. Thackston’s Baburnama, Salman Rushdie points out how this was one of the main stories he knew of the controversial founder of the Gurkani. In the year 1530, Humayun is struck down by an unexplained feverish illness. Babur is so grief-stricken and desperate that he prays that he be afflicted with the illness so that it may leave his child. This, magically, works. Humayun is brought back from the brink of death, already declared impossible by the hakims. As Humayun recovers, Babur falls into an illness, eerily similar to his son’s. And eventually, it takes him to his grave. Babur is first buried in Agra but was later moved to be buried in the Bagh-e-Babur in Kabul, according to his own express wishes before dying.

The founder of the Gurkani left behind one of the most valued legacies behind, his memoirs. Now when we read the story of his life, it actually feels there was always a spark of divinity in this fellow. Almost as if it was all predestined. And so, I think this legend fits him. He went out like he came in - with a streak of destiny.

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At full capacity.

Sunday, May 30, 2021.

I've caught myself wondering very often: where do I find the love I give people around me so freely? I've pondered over this for so long now. But I have reached an answer. And it's this: I've able to give so mich because I receive so much. So much love. So so much. And so even if I'm not trying to, I end up giving a lot of love because I'm almost always at full capacity. Some days I'm too low to realise it I think. And so I'm writing this to remind myself every now and then when I forget.

I am a person who loves with abandon. And I will not change that. I cannot measure out my love for people. I've decided to not fight who I am. There are ways to self preserve without changing this. And I'm happy that I've found them. These alternative ways to be myself and still be able to take care of myself if anything goes south.

Just remember. You're always receiving love. Sometimes, you just might not be able to see it for its worth. But trust me, it's there.

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The necessity of lying. [Movies I love: May 2021 week 4]

Saturday, May 29, 2021.

It was the time when we used to have a CRT television at home. I still remember the model. I was alone at home, as I found myself very frequently during my childhood. It was a Sunday afternoon; I stumbled upon this movie as I was changing channels and because it was just beginning, I just decided to stick around to watch it. I found a gem. There’s no other way to put it, really. This unsuspecting little piece of storytelling, took my very young heart by surprise. I remember the time that I saw it as a tumultuous one in my childhood. I was beginning to realize the consequences of the dearth of parents in my life (they were working abroad). As a younger child, I may not have necessarily realized how it was affecting me, but this was the time the idea was beginning to take shape in my head. I started to realize how not having parents around affects a child’s life.

The movie is about Harriet who is raised mostly by her babysitter Golly, who instils in her the values of honesty, creativity and curiosity. Golly gives Harriet a journal to write all of her observations and infects her with the passion of writing. Everything is going well, till Harriet’s parents are laid off and to cut back costs, they have to let Golly go. Harriet’s world gets shaken up. She suddenly feels alone and misunderstood. Harriet’s journal is found by the class bully who exposes her writing to the whole class. Since Golly has taught Harriet to always write the truth, the journal is littered with less than favourable observations of her closest friends. This leads to a rift between Harriet and her friends and for the first time ever, Harriet is left all alone without understanding completely, where she had gone wrong.

When things really start showing at home, the parents get worried. They turn to the only person they can, for answers. Golly is called for a special visit. On hearing Harriet’s plight, Golly explains to Harriet the necessity to lie about things that could hurt others and the importance of being compassionate. With advice from Golly, Harriet hatches a plan to win back her friends and change herself to become a better person and a better friend. She runs for the class newsletter editor and stuns everyone by her earnest speech that leads to her being elected. Slowly, with her gift of writing, she wins back her friends and makes some new unexpected ones too.

The movie resonated so much with me; I remember just a lot of tears flowing freely by the time the credits rolled onto the screen. For this reason, it still holds a special place in my heart. It got me at a time nothing else did.

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Anywhere Doors.

Friday, May 28, 2021.

I remember discovering my love for reading at a very young age. In school, it started with me reading up all the stories in my English Literature textbook of the academic year, even before the school opened following the summer vacations. I always went in knowing all the stories the textbooks had to offer. For some strange reason, some stories were always left out of the syllabus even though they were featured in the prescribed textbooks. This always infuriated me and the explanation still evades me.

I remember my transition from textbooks to proper literature too. It was obviously the ritualistic coming of age with Hardy Boys and Tintin. But the first novel that I ever read, I remember very clearly because I remember it was awful, was Enid Blyton's "Secret Seven" (one of the novels in the series). And it was terrible. The story, the characters, the plot, just everything was too shabby to be committed to memory.

And then, thanks to the beautiful library in my school, I was introduced to the magic that was Harry Potter. I still remember issuing the first part and being so riveted to the book that I finished it in a day; never putting the book down for more than a few minutes.

Ever since, books have been constant companions. They have helped me become me in immeasurable and unseen ways (some I haven't yet realised, I'm sure). They've been my teachers, my refuge during tough times, and they've made me a more compassionate and kinder person, making me look at the world and it's people with empathy in my heart.

Books are the most wonderful invention of mankind, really. They're the cheapest way to travel, in both time and space. They can transport you immediately into far away lands in another's shoes in times different than yours. Literature is us trying to understand ourselves and each other. Books are the closest we'll come to teleportation like Anywhere Doors.

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A rich colourlessness. [Books I love: May 2021 week 4]

Thursday, May 27th, 2021.

Most people will tell you their first Murakami was Norwegian Wood. It was mine too, I bought it at the Bangalore airport while flying back to Mumbai and I finished it that night before I reached home. Yet, I've decided to write about another Murakami novel today. Tsukuru grabs your attention in the classic Murakami fashion: talking about something as mundane as building train stations and still managing to leave the reader ensnared by his style.

The story follows Tsukuru as he navigates the uncharted but ubiquitous territory of loneliness. His life takes an unexpected turn at sixteen when he suddenly finds himself with no friends. The story tells us about Tsukuru's newest romance at 36 now, with a woman called Sara. But Sara discovers cracks in Tsukuru's soul and asks him to fix it if he wants to be with her. And thus begins our protagonist's years of pilgrimage. He goes back to his hometown to find out what changed all those years ago and demands explanation from all of his friends on why they abandoned him.

What follows is a story stirred with heavy sediments like trauma, mental illness and miscommunication. I remember how sad this book had made me. It speaks to the deepest recesses of the human soul. Murakami can make you feel the saddest you've ever felt and still glue you to his words till you reach the end of the book.

A coming of age with unexplained trauma, this book is unique because it goes backwards. It shows us the potrait first and then takes us back, one stroke at a time. To tell us how frail our own memories can be; how brittle out conscience and how malleable our belief. The human mind is so soft when marinated in a rotten conscience, that it can me made into any shape whatsoever; tampering what we think we know into what others think we know.

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A parting song.

Wednesday, May 26, 2021.

I’ve met some of the best people I know, during my travels. And when it comes to the most rewarding trip, it was most definitely the one I made to Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur in the January of 2021.

I almost didn’t go to. I had planned to go to the Chadar Trek in Ladakh, a long-standing unchecked box on the list, but ultimately decided to attend the Jaipur Literature Festival, at the last minute. And so, after coming back to Delhi after a little trip with my college buddies, I struck out on my own to explore the three cities I find the most fascinating due to their rich cultural heritage. I found a friend for life in Delhi and also got acquainted with a really cool video producer who then used to work for NDTV. The friend I’m talking about deserves a whole other write-up to herself, and still, it wouldn’t be enough. So, I’m going to write about the friend I made in Jaipur.

I reached Jaipur a day earlier than when the festival was going to start, to explore the city. I spent 6 hours in the Albert Hall Museum, leaving only because my self-operated audio tour guide ran out of battery. (Turns out they’re not meant to be used for that long.)

I grabbed lunch nearby and went on across the lane to the old citadel of Jaipur, across the Rambagh gardens. I spent most of the day alone and decided to save my visit to the City Palace for the evening as it came with the promise of lesser crowds and a bonus show at the end of the tour in the night. As I arrived for my visit that evening, I was accompanied by just one other visitor who was there to see the Palace at night too. We accosted each other and after an amazing freely guided tour by one of the royal security guards, we spoke about why we were in Jaipur. He told me he was a literature student from Lucknow and was in Jaipur to attend the Literature Festival. This obviously got me very excited and I told him I was there for the same purpose. We enjoyed the hell out of that night showing at the palace and even saw the Maharani going into her part of the palace in a carriage. We then decided to grab dinner together.

He told me he was also an avid musician and had a degree in classical music. He was trained in Hindustani Classical semi-formally after getting his literature degree. He opened up slowly over the next few days at the festival. We would rendezvous after the festival each day and hang out in the old city and try its street food. All the while, I tried to get him to sing. But he never relented. On our last day, we decided to go to the Amer Fort together. I have to say this here, I have never enjoyed a historical place more. And laughed so much while doing it. We spent the whole day roaming in the city on foot and shopping for our family. And then it was time for his train.

We sat on a park railing in the old city, next to a bustling street. And as we bade our goodbyes, my friend launched, unexpectedly into a beautiful song. I knew then, why he wanted to do music all those years ago. I could feel it in his voice. I thanked him for his rendition. And he told me why he had decided to sing, finally. He said it was because he wanted to. Not because I wanted him to. It somehow made complete sense, when he said it so earnestly. I know we haven’t met since then, but I know a beautiful soul when I meet one. I couldn’t be more grateful to Jaipur.

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Stop. Think. Change.

Tuesday, May 25, 2021.

Stop. Think. Change.

You’re bound to repeat your mistakes,

Unless you dwell on where you went wrong,

Pause. Hit the brakes.

Meet yourself first, there’ll always be something you’ll long.

Stop. Think. Change.

People live out their whole lives without ever,

Finding their own blind spot,

Labeling it a futile endeavor,

But my dear, this heart’s the only one you’ve got.

Stop. Think. Change.

This cycle will break,

But you’ve got to want it,

You’ve to look in, for your sake,

The time you give has to be explicit.

Stop. Think. Change.

Invest your time in yourself,

The returns aren’t immediate but last,

You’ve just got to be patient,

You are always more than your past.

Stop. Think. Change.

I know it’s a very childish poem. But I really want to put this here for me to read years from now. To remind me to stop sometimes.

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The Gunpowder revelation.

Monday, May 24, 2021.

Babur spends his time ruling Kabul, never forgetting Samarkand and his home of Ferghana. He will never go back to these cities ever. Little does he know his destiny lies south, in the land beyond the Hindukush. He receives a secret message from the Afghan nobles at the court of the Delhi Sultan Ibrahim Lodi, an unworthy son of a successful father, Sikandar. Ibrahim Lodi is in his ninth year of reign when treachery strikes his legacy.

He rides to meet the Timurid army his informants have told him about. It is reported to be 12,000 strong. Ibrahim is confident. He has numbers on his side. He outnumbers the enemy by at least 9:1, with an army of reportedly 100,000. This is not including his roughly 300 war elephants. Terrorizing creatures on the battlefield, enough to send the enemy scattering in fear.

Zahiruddin meets the Lodi army at Panipat. The year is 1526. He forms a tulguhma formation. His army follows tactics borrowed from the Ottomans. It is divided into flanks and into smaller units best suited to surround the enemy from all sides effectively. However, the tactics aren’t the only thing the Timurids have brought to the Indian subcontinent from the Ottomans.

Little does Ibrahim know; he is in for the scare of his life. He is going to experience the brutality of the miracle that is gunpowder. Never before seen in this part of the world. He engages with the front of the Timurid file and charges confidently, knowing he will be able to break ranks and decimate the foe. As his army draws nearer, the front file of the Timurids starts growing wider, parting in the middle. To expose a line of mounted artillery that uses gunpowder and canons. The tide of the war changes suddenly.

The bullets fly and the artillery tear into the Lodi ranks and the sound of the cannons booming scare the Elephants so badly that they turn and start crushing their own soldiers in the chaos. Babur has half his work done for him. The Gurkani flag prevails. The long history of the Sultanate in Delhi ends.

Zahiruddin Muhammad Babur finally establishes an empire worthy of his lineage. Though he doesn’t feel very strongly about the place he has conquered. He complains of the weather frequently; hardly likes the fruits that grow in this country and accuses the gardens of India of being too drab to be even called gardens. Despite all this, he lays the foundation of what will come to be the most prosperous empire in medieval times. Shaping a continent and its culture, forever.

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The flimsy promise of posterity.

Sunday, May 23, 2021.

Revolutions are the deepest trenches that we can dive into, to learn the true power of ideas on the human mind.

All organisms have survival as their sole goal. All drives arise out of this. All actions are done with this in mind. Humans are different, however. They have been and are still found to walk to their death as if they might’ve simply overpowered the basest instinct of all; that of survival.

It is dissonating to think how humans have seemingly participated in innumerable wars through history. The drive to kill the enemy can be explained by the primal nature of territoriality, you’ll argue; but what about ideas that drive men to their death? A man walks into a field outnumbered by his enemy to make a final stand in the name of patriotism. A Rajput runs at his enemy when cornered, naked without armor, like an angry barbarian with the steel of his sword equally naked and thirsty for blood. They shout for glory and die an “honorable” death on the battlefield.

What are these ideas? Patriotism, honor, glory? The human brain has a rewarding system for driving actions. What’s fascinating in cases like these, is that humans become carefree about perishing. In only the promise of a posterity in memory; of glory after death; they put their lives out at stake. The reward is promised after you stop existing. Quite the gamble, no? In some cases, it can be less violent too. For example, a man planting a mango sapling in his late 60s, knowing full well that he may not live to see it bear fruit or enjoy it. The driving force here seems to kindness. But again, it comes with the ever so slight promise of posterity. Another question that comes up now is whether this bargaining for posterity only starts when people are faced with the prospect of death? I’d like to think no. It also comes when they’re faced with having to lead a life of oppression. And so, the driving force for fighters against colonial imperialism world-over becomes another fundamental thought, freedom. Freedom fighters are ready to die for their cause like the soldier but it comes with the mango planter’s kind heart. They plant the seeds of revolution and perish, not waiting around to see the tree bearing fruit.

So strong is the power of belief, that humans get ready to gamble away their lives with no assurance. The soldier who dies may end up to be on the losing side of the war. The old man planting the tree doesn’t know if his plant will ever become a tree, for sure. The freedom fighter cannot be sure the seeds of revolution will ever lead to the fruit of liberty. Yet, they do it. And this is where humans are different than other organisms. They believe.

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The Absolute Genius of Wes Anderson [Movies I love: May 2021 week 3]

Saturday, May 22, 2021.

Not everyone gets Wes Anderson’s humor. But you can not argue the man knows how to write screenplays like no other. I found myself so many times replaying a scene to chuckle again. I was laughing and awestruck at the same time looking at this genius’s work. I always catch myself every five minutes wondering how he does it. It's so unique, his way of storytelling. Reminds me so much of Wodehouse that we were forced to read in school (which I’m grateful for in retrospect).

Ralph Fiennes is such a brilliant artist. He can make you believe anything. He can make you hate him as Voldemort. And he can instantly win your heart like he does of everyone in the movie. Zero’s character is instantly endearing and Saoirse Ronan is amazing as always. I wish I’d found her sooner. Such a gifted actor. Anderson movies get a lot of hate and criticism. I fail to see why. Tilda Swinton is transient but she blends in so well, you’ll be surprised to see her name in the credits. And then we have some Anderson constants. Adrian Brody and Bill Murray among them. I fell in love with Wes’s style when I watched The Darjeeling Limited. His movies are always, ALWAYS a visual treat of the highest order.

I always used to wonder what it would’ve been like to watch greats like George Lucas’ first Star Wars in 1977. How completely mind-blown everybody must’ve been; or watching a new, less-known actor called Robert De Niro in Mean Streets. It must’ve been a true revelation at the movies. Watching Scorsese as he discovered himself, watching as Spielberg weaved magic before all these names were made part of academia. I was born too late I feel to experience this first-hand. The reputation of these directors precedes their movies these days. Wes Anderson (though very well-known now) gave me a taste of what that must’ve felt like, all those years ago. This is the work of a true and rare genius that comes only a handful of times in a generation of cinematic movements. And I consider myself very fortunate to be experiencing it at a time when this genius is alive.

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Hacking the process.

Friday, May 21, 2021.

I’m old school, you would say. Wouldn’t be the first time I was being told that I might’ve been born into the wrong generation. I accept your accusations graciously and present here, my defense.

Online dating is flawed, in my humble opinion. Here’s why. As we grow up and form a personality; shaped by our experiences, our memories, our upbringing, and our exposure to pop culture, we become complex creatures. We become a multi-layered organism. These layers are a necessity in the society we have built. As we are forced to take up multiple roles and interact with a bunch of people every day but in differing capacities, these layers become important to reserve parts of ourselves only for the more relevant people in our lives.

These layers safeguard us from oversharing and crossing boundaries set in different social interactions. For example, keeping your professional life separate from your personal one. But this isn’t the only function these layers have. They also serve as a filter, if you will. For new entries in your life. This can be for whatever reason. It can be a new friend, a new workmate, or even a romantic interest. As we get to know the person better, we start peeling off our layers. Showing the deeper, more meaningful, more reserved layers to the person. The same is done by the opposite person towards you too. This shedding of layers happens naturally and progresses in order, i.e., from the outermost to the innermost layer. The reason this order is important is the same reason the layers exist, and that they exist in that order.

Now, what dating apps try to do (and succeed at) is hack this process completely. Tell me honestly, do you ever introduce yourself by telling someone what you would like your first date to be? Or even what you think makes a relationship great? I’d like to think these questions crop up in conversations much subsequent to the first. And not everyone is privy to this kind of information about you in everyday life, wouldn’t you agree? What these dating apps get us to do is to dig deep within our layers and put on display our more guarded thoughts and perspectives or even highly personal predispositions.

While these may seem harmless or even fun, they defeat the purpose of the layers being there in the first place. They cheat the natural process of getting to know a person and place excitement in our hearts. This excitement is, it is important to realize, quite baseless. We only will ever put up the more interesting, least conflicting parts of ourselves online. Sure, you end up also filtering out a lot of people at an earlier stage than later, but this too is unnecessary because the people you do end up filtering out are still people who have access to you (or who you have access to) unnaturally, almost in a way that feels forced.

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The killing of ideas. [Books I love: May 2021 week 3]

Thursday, May 20, 2021.

This is the first dystopian book I read. Sure, I had read Orwell’s “Animal Farm” much earlier than this work of his, but when I had first read Animal Farm, I was 12. It was literally just another story for me. That's the genius of Orwell. He can write a dystopian book and have it read like a children’s story. How often have you heard that happening really?

So, in that way 1984 was the first book I picked up, knowing I was picking up a book about a dystopian future. When Orwell had begun writing this book, he was in the year 1948. This work is him extrapolating his take on the consequences of the political change he was seeing around him. This is striking in many ways. Thinking of a surveillance state in 1948 may have been construed as paranoia. But we know now it to be reality. For at least a decade, at least, if not more.

Orwell successfully is able to bring the downfalls of a failed democracy, that has resulted in a totalitarian society. We are introduced to Winston. A regular run-of-the-mill guy. He lives happily in his place as a small cog in the machinery that is the Superstate, or so it seems. The state has deployed “Thought Police” to refrain and persecute free-thinking and individuality. The country is ruled by “The Party” which has its leader, “Big Brother” who is a cult icon. Though it is hinted time and again, via Winston’s dwellings that he may not even be a real person.

Winston, our hero, is secretly a rebel at heart. He secretly wants to revolt and overthrow the rebellion. Enter Julia, Winston’s love interest. But she also happens to be his colleague. Love is forbidden. Orwell manages to convey in this simple fashion, deeper insights about freedom and the power of common thought and ideas. I remember reading in Dan Brown’s novel “The Lost Symbol”, about how ideas could also have weight. Like actual physical weight. He compares it to a grain of sand: alone, and it has inconsequential value, get enough of it and you can make the moon. This is how totalitarian regimes are able to sustain themselves. By not only suppressing free speech by burning books and newspapers or silencing people. What they actually achieve in the process is the killing of ideas. They snuff out the freedom of the mind.

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Learning to swim.

Wednesday, May 19, 2021.

Mohsin Hamid, in his book “Exit West,” says, “[but] that is the way with cities as with life, for one moment we are pottering about our errands as usual and the next we are dying, and our eternally impending ending does not put a stop our transient beginnings and middles until the instant when it does.”

And the first thing that came to my mind after reading this was, “How true.” We do lose ourselves in the hustle of a metropolis. The noise and the crowd drown our individuality out. We wake up every day and leave our houses to go join the tide. Not swimming really. Just lazily floating with the others. Finding it easier, we make sure we complain to make it look harder, but in reality, we have it so much better than others who try to get into the tide every day. It is necessary that we realize our privilege of being able to take part in the tide. Heck, even be allowed into the water for that matter. Many try and are not allowed to even enter it, something we take for granted.

Every once in a while, a person reaches their threshold in this lazy tide of capitalism and turns against the tide, swimming in the opposite direction. Actually swimming. So bizarre does this seems to the rest of us that the act is constructed as an act of courage. Of bravery rather than just sense. It has become so obvious to me after I stayed away from Mumbai for a period of almost 6 years: the city life isn’t nourishing. It sucks the life out of you slowly. You try to regain it in the outskirts, in the hills surrounding your city may be. You’re able to reclaim some part of it when you visit the sea, maybe. But eventually, it overtakes your reclamation rate.

So ingrained is it into our lives, that we aren’t even made aware of any other reality. For all of us raised in the middle-class households of a bustling metropolis or in the suburbs, it was just natural, this way of life. So much so that most of us built our life around this hustle; decided our careers around this hustle; planned our lives out around this very same hustle. It is only much later that I realized that this hustle isn’t what life is supposed to be. It might be good for my bank account or even the “exposure” that town people like to brag about. But honestly, it is deleterious to my body. It is toxic to my soul. Life isn’t lazing down some river with a crowd so thick, you don’t have space to even move your arms. Life is about swimming. About stretching your limbs out to their max and feel the tide on your face and swim against it with everything you have. As I say this, I chuckle to myself. It’s funny to me, I never did learn to swim in my childhood. Both metaphorically and really. But one of those is changing slowly.

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Why I travel.

Tuesday, May 18, 2021.

I was once traveling from Raichur to Mumbai on a train that stopped on the wildest stations. As is usual with me, I was sitting next to the window with no music in my ears and my head full of the most random thoughts. As we were leaving a station, I noticed a crow flying at the train window’s level. As the train picked up speed, I watched it with an empty mind, with rapt attention. And eventually, the train overtook the bird’s speed. I watched it go out of view opposite the train’s direction. For that small interval, where the train was faster, for those few seconds that I watched it, I watched with awe. To my empty, disoriented mind, it seemed like it was flying backward. This was obviously corrected in my mind soon after. My mind made me understand relativity and it accepted that the bird was just flying slower than the train. However, the thought of the backward flying bird stayed in my mind. It was embossed there forever. It launched me into a whole volley of thoughts that I don’t recall now.

Travelling hadn’t been a solo endeavor in my life yet. But I can tell you very clearly, that was the day I knew I was going to fall head over heels with it. I have traveled for a multitude of reasons. To explore, to escape, to discover, to delete, to try, and to trivialize. Sometimes all of this at once. While most people in my life will point out and acceptably so, that I am generally an introspective person, it has always been my observation that the act of travel has peaked my introspection more than any other activity in my life. Even more than trekking. Trekking helps me stop thinking. Travel makes me think more.

In retrospect, whenever I’ve decided to take a solo trip anywhere, I have been going through a storm inside in some form or other. Unconsciously, I have always ended traveling to put my qualms to rest. And I can say this with conviction: it has always, always helped me.

I have given this much thought, ever since I’ve realized what was happening. Here’s the closest answer I could find within me: some places have a silence to them. They wrap around your mind, blocking out the white noise that’s usually present in the hustle of everyday life. You can think clearer and deeper than you can in your small apartment or within the four walls of your workplace. You get glimpses of this clarity in your commute to work sometimes. But I always in short bursts. Only these places that I speak of give you an uninterrupted experience of this white noise-free nirvana of thoughts. Rationalization is usually at a peak for me in such places. I am able to think and reach workable solutions to problems that plague my tiny, insignificant life of mundanity.

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Possibly the Greatest conqueror ever and the mixing of cultures.

Monday, May 17, 2021.

Chinghiz Khan or as he was known before, Temujin, was responsible for the largest uninterrupted empire in the history of the world. Another great that usually gets mentioned when talking of world-spanning empires, is of course Alexander of Macedonia. But one more personality finds a place in this list. Scholars even argue he might be greater than even Chinghiz or Alexander.

He was born near Samarkand, in a place called Kesh, in modern Uzbekistan to Taraghai, a small-time noble in the Chagatai Khanate (a part of the Mongol Empire that was bordered by the Amu Darya in the west). His name coming from Temujin: “Timur” (lit. “Iron”). Timur, unlike Temujin or Alexander, had no claim to royalty. Though, he did claim lineage from his paternal side to be related to Chinghiz. This is what makes his case stronger.

Born in one of the Mongol clans with no claim to royalty, Timur rose to power due to a mix of the perfect measures of political cunning, ruthlessness, and military genius with sheer will and incomprehensible ambition. Unlike Chinghiz Khan, who left 40 million people dead in the wake of his conquests and razed almost all of his conquered cities, Timur always brought back artists and craftsmen from his expeditions. His exploits created a melting pot of cultures that was to thrive and influence centuries of culture, art, and architecture. It really brings to our attention, the need to acknowledge how military ambition has always been one of the primary driving forces in the mingling of cultures. This in no way makes bloodshed reasonable. There is no defending violence nor encouraging it in the future. Modern warfare is no longer about cultural mixing, rather it has become about cultural extinction (much like Chighiz’s exploits).

Acknowledgment is different than encouragement. Acknowledging how a culture was formed and tracing its origins teaches us preservation and provides us with a better understanding of history. This should not be mistaken to be glorifying war. Romanticizing Emperors and their ambitions can and always has come with dire consequences. Emulation has always led to more bloodshed and mindless violence. It is important that we realize our world has come farther ahead than ever to rely on something as rudimentary and regressive as war to be the driving force in the mixing of our separate cultures. Globalization and the exchange of information have made it easier than ever to exchange ideas, art, and literature, bringing us closer together as we create a never-before-seen truly global culture.

It should also be understood that in creating this global culture, we are in no way sacrificing our own culture. Indeed, we are immortalizing it by making it a part of the bigger culture, that is bound inherently, to sustain far longer than any of its individual components.

[prithvy97-blog]

A song of genius.

Sunday, May 16, 2021.

“Song for Zula” by Phosphorescent was first introduced to me by a very close friend on his newly bought Bluetooth speaker, back when they were still a rare occurrence. I’ll be honest, I couldn’t make out what all the lyrics were, but the song caught my consciousness and was stuck there. I never relistened to it after that day till one day suddenly it floated back up into my head, from the forgotten recesses of my mind. I searched for the name again, (I remembered only part of it). But thanks to the uniqueness of the name, I found it easily.

This time was different. While I was introduced to the song already, this is when I really discovered it. I listened to it with lyrics this time and the magic of the song opened itself up to me. The way the song talks about love is the closest I’ve known any piece of literature to come to explaining the essence of this enigmatic feeling. Love indeed can be all of that. Different for everybody. For some, it can be a passionate fire that is all-consuming. For some, it can be as liberating as the wind atop a mountain. And for some, it can truly be, as the song says, a caging thing.

What’s even more interesting to note is, love can mean all of this to a single person too. We need not look at different people’s perspectives. Love can mean all of this in one person’s experience just in different places in time. This makes us reflect on how contradictory love can actually be to the idea of itself. This is why it may be the least understood of all emotions and hardest to describe. While the song doesn’t provide us with this elusive answer, it acts as a stimulus to take us closer to what may be the closest, we’ll ever reach to the answer. This is why I think this song is genius. It manages to do what others have achieved in a larger volume of words; in novels and screenplays. And somehow manages to do it better than most of them.