Bangalored !! what the hell..

I came across this word, albeit colloquial, in a forward late in the evening at office today. After some research I beamed at my discovery. After Shanghai, Bangalore is the only ‘real’ city name that can be used as a verb (some biblical city also holds this distinction). Whereas you could be shanghaied anywhere in the world, chances that you are bangalored in Bangalore, or for that matter, elsewhere in India, are remote. Essentially, if you are bangalored it means you have lost your means of bread and butter (else where somebody would crib his job has been shamelessly ‘snatched’) and some one in India has found his, and in all likelihood it would be in Bangalore. It could have been any city, somebody could have been mumbaied too but, being the silicon capital of India, this poor city has to bear the brunt of this ugly connotation.

Connotation aside, there are quite a few more serious and graver brunts this city has been hopelessly bearing as an outcome of some poor soul being bangalored in some diametrically opposite location. Among others, one such far from being delectable, humongously annoying and tear-inducing aftermath is .. “ TRAFFIC UPDATE on 91FM!! Very slow to no moving traffic reported on.. “. So that’s one ubiquitous but lethal pest that has inflicted itself on this once peaceful small city of Bangalore for quite some time now. And this pest is here to stay.

In hindsight I feel it was a wrong decision but I voluntarily took it. Sis moved to US and we moved back to Vijayanagar last week. That’s a whopping 20 km either ways from office (more on this decision later; another of the bangalored phenomenon fallout). And mine is one of those souls that sinned in the previous birth. I feel miserably nauseated in any vehicle that is closed to the outside world on all sides and doesn’t have an A/C. So any form of public transport, be it my office bus or the traffic hindering BMTC bus, is directly ruled out. One fine evening last week I dared to use the TI bus and the repercussions were disastrous. So I am left with two choices, my 4-wheeler or my 2-wheeler (Agreed I’m a fitness freak, but walking is not an option here!). After over 2,000,000m of driving it has dawned on me that driving a car demands a lot more concentration and presence of mind as compared to a mobike. And so it is my KARIZMA (125kmph top speed, haven’t tried it though; for reasons unknown, with all sincerity, some people prefer calling it carishma) that I have been using to traverse this distance every day. Today was the third day. And I HAVE ALREADY GIVEN UP!!!

For a biking enthusiast as myself, more the time spent on the vehicle the better the feeling. But in a dekho tho jaano kind of situation that exists on these B’lore roads, how could I miss out the all-crucial word ‘moving’ in the above sentence! Cubbon Road is like what, 1 km-1.5 km long? At my jogging speed I could have done 4 rounds up and down this road in an hour. But this fateful evening I was on this darned road from 6:41pm to 7:43pm with my stationary 223cc, 18 odd brake horsepower good for nothing show piece of a bike. How is that the traffic in the opposite direction always moves so smoothly? Or is it just a clever manifestation the eye conjures up to push the soul to the limits of sanity! I am known for my patient demeanor within family circles. But hello! This is insane! Thank God! None of them was around this evening. Some other day when I’m in better spirits I’ll retrospect, analyse and enjoy these traffic snarls. Now I’ll only crib crib and crib.. I am obsessed with the word doom. This is a city doomed to dereliction and despair. This is a doomed city. My dad calls it a dead city. And so it has become. Doomed as doomed can be. Never would any of the old time localites have imagined that the foremost boon this city is bestowed with, the weather, would one day spell doom on the very city. Doomed. Doomed.

Too much, too early

That was The Hindu's front page article in Metro Plus yesterday on teenage pregnancies. Indeed Bangalore is on a fast track catching up with everything good or bad in the West. One such hardly delectable influence, so the author says, is the attitude of our teenagers towards casual sex.

Through out the write-up there has only been a mention of teenagers being unaware of the consequences of such a tempestuous act. But what exactly are the repurcussions? I know its not such moral an ast as just watching late night FTV, but still, if a surreptitious abortion is all that is to it, then why bother? That way I feel the article failed to impact the readers' mind by not being as open as it appeared to be.

Impact or otherwise, the 30 odd minutes after I read it, my mind rolled back into my teens and what I made of it. By teens I mean the dangerous 6teen-9teen span. More than anything, how I shaped, has been a direct outcome of the company I chose. As I sauntered down the memory lane, it really heartened my mind that my giLibantas (that is what my Dad calls my friends) have been the 'right' type always. Peer pressure at that age decides many of your decisive actions and thoughts and in my case it drove me in the progressive direction. Just picture this. I studied in a pre-university college which in its campus, housed undergrad students also, that included 'babes' of utmost quality. But my friends' circle was so concerted in its efforts to make a meaning outta life, that I had no other choice but to stay focussed too. Occassional bantering did exist, but collectively we were 'enlightened' souls, consciously aware of what was expected of us and what was not. The miniest of the mini skirts then, was as ogle-worthy as a bland salwar kameez that my maid's daughter used to wear, and I have no regrets for being so disinterested.

Frankly, teenage is just not the right age for any kinda 'committed' relationship with the opposite sex I feel. There lies an entire life ahead for this. 'If not know when?' .. is an obvious question that will arise, but being as 'single' as ever, I believe even 30 is a decent age ;-). Dunno where this is heading. I ll stop here.

Untitled

On an otherwise boring and jobless day, (even my regular chat mate hasnt turned up today or looks like shez busy working) blog page browsing seems like fun. Was jus skimmin thru Skywalker's page, high profile Wimp's and a few other arbit pages. Someday I too wish to draw some jobless (read effecient ;-) ) readers and elicit response from them on my page. AMEN again!

Before that, I've gotta lay a game plan to extract rasa(juice) from kasa(garbage) as these guys do. Now dont tell me its pure talent:-(...

Déjà Vu

Its been almost 2 yrs since I created the first of my n (>2) personal pages here. Tried all of these.. rediffblog, blogger, blog spot. And then nothing. All were created under similar circumstances of sheer joblessness, with a sudden outta-the-blue blogging impulse. Being a veteran at creating and 'hush'ing (sounds more power packed, this BITS' counterpart for IITM's 'pack' and REC's 'ditch') blog pages, this time I wont promise myself that this page will continue to exist. But I have seen a bit of the world in this past year. Maturity comes with experience and so does the sense of commitment. Commitment! yeeooow.. brings back ol' memories of the lone 'commitment' (in its traditional, dreaded by me, boy-gal relationship sense) that I failed to stand up to. Hmm.. no crying over spilt milk. Newaiz, back to blogging I am and hope this page marks the beginning of a long list of commitments expected from my side (gee.. isnt tht a smarter way of saying..'commitments that I have to make'??). AMEN!