Till death do us part

Couples who do not love each other are abnormal.

Couples who do not fight are even more abnormal.

We love, we fight;

We laugh, we cry;

We argue, we agree;

We splurge, we scrounge;

One likes music, the other reads;

One likes outdoors, the other is stretched on the sofa;

One likes the sunlight, the other has vampire blood;

One is hooked onto movies, the other sleeps the moment the lights dim;

One likes women, the other likes men;

Who likes who could make a marriage more interesting.

😛

We begin by being physically attracted to each other.

Then we learn to love each other.

We can’t stand separation, however small.

We delight in small pleasures.

We bask in important achievements.

We earn

We save

We own

We grow

We settle

We stabilise.

We become parents.

We struggle to understand our children.

We understand our parents better through our children.

On many things we disagree.

We all pass through a phase where everything that was once attractive, is now a matter of dislike.

What made you smile now makes you scorn.

The surface is scratched, and what you find underneath is not what you expected to see.

Then, as fog clears with rising sun, this phase also passes by.

The cracks heal, the scratches disappear.

You learn to accept and not be judgemental.

In the end

In the long run 

The marriage that is successful is the one 

In which the two learn to know how to respect each other.

Dedicated to two of the best couples that I have been blessed to get associated with who celebrate their anniversaries in the coming week.

Happy anniversary my friends.

Being the private people that they are, I shall not name them.

Pursuit of happiness

The CEO of a mid-sized company

Knitted his brow and frowned in thought

How can I make the firm grow bigger, and swell its coffer

How can it reach more, and make the competitors sore

He noticed not his loving wife, nor the adorable kids

All he saw were numbers, till they numbed him

He had no life, no fun, never saw the life under the sun

Till one day to his stunning horror

The management showed him the door.

The volunteer in the NGO

Beamed each day in delight

His thoughts were not shrouded in results of the quarters.

His life cycle did not revolve in 3-month brackets.

All the day he attended to people in pain

Never losing his ear to ear grin.

His problems were global, his jobs swelled with

A war in Syria

When ISIS flexed its muscles

When Trump taunted Kim

Whenever X targeted Y

While who is X or who is Y was never clear

The Z was always the constant.

The innocent bystander who always bore the brunt.

He spent his life in tending to the Z

Ready to let go his much needed zzzzzzzzzzzz

A bank balance he did not have

But a life in balance, certainly yes.

This volunteer in the NGO is today nervous

For he has to interview a former CEO, no less!

 

Zero Sum Game ?

Humans have a tendency to conserve energy.

If there is a shorter road, an easier way, a simpler method our mind is 

programmed to embrace it.

Unless you are a Kipchoge. 😊

And so, it remains a mystery as to why humans spend the bulk of their energy in complicating their life.

Is the total happiness in the world, a fixed number?

Is happiness, then, a zero-sum game? That, if someone is happy, it has to be at the misery of someone else?

Looking at certain people I would be compelled to come to that conclusion.

Are you happy is not just a simple question anymore, it is rocking the very foundation of human society.

It used to be a simple question and is still a simple question when posed to a child. 

Though the threshold of the age of the child is dropping continuously which is a major concern.

"Of course, I am – fit as a proverbial fiddle" – this answer is certainly fake. A happy person does not explode with happiness. Cheery demeanour, back slapping merry and outward manifestations are usually a fake screen to hide the real disappointment brewing inside.

"I don’t know, probably I am, no major concerns" – this is in all prospects a human being as close to happiness as we know it.

"It can be better" – this is just a micron-thin coating begging to be scratched. Scratch it and you will encounter Armageddon.  Wisest thing is to absorb this and slink away.

Instances of happiness are multitude. Each happiness is attached to some material thing or other.

The absence of happiness with a person of such disposition is still manageable as this can be compensated by more, albeit meaningless, possessions.

Beware, however, the person who is perennially unhappy, whose countenance is a scowl or a knitted brow, whose eyes dart around locating emotional chinks in the armour, and who has a false big laugh, whose eyes never smile, the one that is constantly scheming, who spends all the time evaluating if others are happy or miserable, whose happiness is derived by the equation 

         X- (sum of others happiness), 

the starting X itself too meagre to satisfy one individual of normal composition; for, this person has an inherent non capacity to feel happy or to nurture positive thoughts.

And like a black hole sucking everything that passes by, this person is almost a dementor from Azkaban, sucking out happiness from those around.

There are happy people and unhappy people. The world is full of them. Then there are people who are incapable of being happy. Like the school bully, who derives pleasure by kicking the sand castle built by other kids, or the proverbial monkey that climbed a tree and destroyed the nest of the birds because the birds could have a place to stay dry in the rains while the monkey did not.

Or like the tale of the magic fish emanating from Russia where the peasant, on being offered whatever the peasant wanted by a benevolent Angel in the form of a magic fish, with one caveat that the neighbour gets double, pleaded that his one eye be gouged out.

J.Krishnamurti said that Truth is a pathless land, the same is true for happiness too. It is natural too, as, can there be happiness without truth?

Darkness is dispelled with light. Thus it will be simpler to eliminate causes to bring in a greater level of happiness. What is a life lived if it was not lived happily?

Things to eliminate – as a simple ABC to happiness

Anger

Bitching

Comparison

The best things I learnt in my life I learnt from reading.

So, to quote Atticus Finch “Whatever the provocation Scout, I forbid you to fight”

Ignore the provocateur and move on, for the happiness of the provocateur hinges on you losing your composure and your happiness, stemming from the belief that happiness is a zero-sum game.

It is not.

Friend Indeed!

There are acquaintances.

There are friends.

Then...there is Bharati.

It is impossible to be good to everyone; whatever you do, it is ceratin that some people will probably say unpleasant things about you.

The doctors start learning being a doctor by the famous oath "Primum non nocere"

We try to live our lives the same way.

Middle class, god fearing, upbringing coupled with a honest to a fault father in one of the most corrupt government instituitions possible, left an early mark on the value of honesty and integrity which continued as a guiding pole star in your tumultuous life.

When your father was held in greater esteem post retirement whilst his erstwhile prosperous colleagues were treated with outright scorn, it resolved the early mark into a lifelong practice.

It was rather easy, as the practice was not a performance to an audience but emanated from within.

A way of life, so to say.

Years passed. The father is no more. The chosen path did not give any material benefits.

Temptations were always abound.

But a steely determination held on.

Recently one of my recent colleagues moved places and happened to work with another colleague of mine from yesteryears.

It is impossible to be good to everyone;

Thus it came as no surprise that the earlier colleague from years gone by mentioned, in a cahnce conversation, an observation that questioned my character and integrity.

My recent colleague, ever the timid person, 11 times out of 10 demonstrating decorum, was left flabbergasted.

He was rehearsing proper statements that would convey indignation while not losing semblance of civil behaviour.

Elli Wallach famously quoted in the timeless  "The Good Bad and the Ugly". shooting from underwater from a bathtub

"When you gotta shoot, shoot; Don't talk"

Bharati, wife of my recent colleague, unknown to herself, is a disciple of Elli Wallach.

She stood up, bristled (it takes little to bristle her up anyway) and said

"We do not know if you know him well. But we know him. What you say is impossible"

And walked out gracefully.

R.E.S.P.E.C.T. -- Bharati.

I am not basking in this as a show of compliment. It is a vindication of what my father stood for and managed to impart to me.

Thanks, Dad.

Right hand on shoulder while the left is delivering the haymaker !

Beware the smiling assassin

For there is no worse kind

The twist of the knife is

Oh! So painful

When the hand belongs to a friend!

Betrayal by an enemy

Is a contradiction in term!

Knowing this well, surprised are we still

When the killer blow comes

From the hands of a friend!

Et tu Brute!

Would not have been

A gut wrenching cry

If Brutus were to be an enemy!

The cry and its anguish

Stemmed not from the

Fatal stab, but, that it came

From the hands of a friend!

It is known that chemo

Is as painful as cancer

So is looking for a reason

When the hand that delivered

The killer blow belongs to

The hands of a friend!

Find the reason

You are left disillusioned!

Don’t find the reason

You are left miserable!

Can’t find the reason

You are left confused!

Won’t find the reason

You are blinded!

By the misplaced, undeserved love.

Catch word in

Unravelling this shamble is

Reason, the why of it and not the how!

Take the R out

And you see that

Your erstwhile friend is now a

Fiend !!

So, when reason

Takes leave, as it often does

For reasons unknown (😄)

Make sure that the

Burden of carrying the cross

Belongs, not to you, but to

The hands of your fiend.

Brave New Word !!!

Language is a living thing. It grows and each year new words are added to its vocabulary. Even though a complete edition of an Oxford English Dictionary could weigh about 10kgs (or a GB in soft version) I offer the following new words to be introduced in the next edition.

Or at least considered for inclusion….

Stalejokecue:

You are in a party with few of your regular friends. The conversation flows, as does the alcohol. One of the newcomers happen to mention that particular word, that is a trigger for your insufferable pest of a friend to launch into his endlessly repeated and absolutely humor less stale joke. And you squirm and survive yet another ordeal of this till the next time when another hapless one utters the stalejokecue.

Traygymnast:

Ever flown economy class and seated in the middle of the middle-4-seater section. Then you already qualify to be one. The skills you need to call upon and demonstrate in having your dinner/lunch on that miniscule tray, where the difficulty level is further compounded by everything in wrappers, pickles in containers that will not open, and when they do, spray the entire content on you or your fellow passenger, clashing elbows as the person sitting on either side of you undergo the same torturous routine, where each dish comes with a plastic cover that you do not know where to stash away, and when you are totally exasperated the hostess comes with an offer that you can’t refuse ‘Sir Scotch or Vodka’ make you eligible to be called a traygymnast.

Iscream:

Ever been to an ice cream parlor, recently. The mental condition that you reach on the endless choices you need to make, the flavor, cup or cone, number of scoops, toppings, type of topping, hot or cold and so on is to be called, with a flair for the wordplay, iscream.

Petripizza:

Similar mental turmoil as outlined above, this time in a Pizza Hut. Your condition at the end of homemade, stone cooked, chef’s special, green or black olives, soft crust or hard crusted, grated or sliced cheese and so on will leave in a condition to be known as petripizza.

Simplens:

The person who reads up Ken Rockwell, idolizes Ansel Adams and does a four month research on DPreview to select the best DSLR that money can buy and then shoots all his pictures in

Staircount:

That reflective, uncontrollable habit of sub-consciously counting the stairs when you climb up or down.

Impervix:

This person is a constant in almost each organization or a friend circle. There is NOTHING you can do to insult him. All your sarcasm, wit and outright abuse skittles over him. He can\t be insulted. Period.

Chaosologer:

This person sits up way high in an organization. The journey to the top is achieved by this simple trait. When everything is running weil, create a chaos, blow it out of proportion, complicate it beyond recognition, make people tear their hair in a frenzy and then restore it to its original condition by removing all the complications that were created in the first place and stake /take claim for having solved it. The study of this esoteric science is called Chaosology.

Lexiphil:

A person that gets high on words. Has an obsession to use the new word that was learnt in every conversation. It is a lexicon and not a dictionary, someone is an adept and not an expert, it is a serendipity and not just a chance…..

Caretwohooter:

This person is exactly the opposite of the lexiphil. Not the one for nuances. Remember and remind are interchangeable. (I remembered him last evening!) Loose and lose are the same.

Essemdee:

This person is the Social Media Disaster! Always present on all forums Facebook, messenger, twitter, whatsapp, multiple whatsapp groups, Instagram, snapchat ……. And spends all the time reposting from one forum to another and often ends up forwarding it to the same forum

Vikram - Vedha

Last time I wrote a blog on a Tamil film was for Aranya kandam, a film that broke all stereotypes and had a fantastic twist at the end. (read about it here)

And after many a summer, here I am writing my next blog on Vikram Vedha.

Spoiler Alert: If you plan to watch the film, which you must, please read this blog after watching the film.

Intelligent crime films are always a turn on. Being Cyrus and Aranya kandam were the last of the two in this genre that excited me.

This film was strongly recommended and the premise sounded interesting and I had never seen this guy Vijay Sethupathi before and decided to watch the film over the weekend.

I ended up watching it twice over the weekend and am still in a daze.

What just happened? This film is a total knockout.

This is Oscar material. Cat and Mouse reversed.

My non-Tamil friends can appreciate the film thanks to sub-titles, however it is the group that understands Tamil who will appreciate it more.

It is the same difference between what I and a Czech native would experience from a Kundera work.

Based on the mythological Vikram and Betal where each story ends in a moral question, this film sets about adapting it to perfection in the current world of cop vs gangster.

Vijay Sethupathi’s performance is riveting. His casual delivery of rural slanged Tamil, with just the eyes conveying the simmering rage from within, clarity of thought, unwavering in purpose, his almost school teacher attitude in explaining obvious things to an adamant officer (are you with blinkers? Won’t you ever learn?), the body language that oozes magnetism are all so perfect that he would have an impossible task of bettering this performance in his lifetime.

Vikram Vedha will be to him what Casablanca was to Humphrey Bogart, A Few Good men was to Tom Cruise, To Kill A Mocking Bird was to Gregory Peck, The Dead Poet’s Society was to Robin Williams, A scent of a woman was to Al Pacino, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s nest was to Jack Nicholson, Nayagan was to Kamal Hassan, A Wednesday was to Naseeruddin Shah…

There are multiple websites that thrive on picking out inconsistencies, errors, discontinuities and contradictions in a film. Those sites will have a herculean task in taking apart VV.

The director duo must be credited for a cast iron story line with no loose ends.

Each small part of every frame is relevant and explained.

Each apparently trivial aspect takes on an importance of gargantuan proportion as the story unravels.

Be it the scar on Pulli’s hand, the left-handedness of Chandra, a linguistic curse of a goon or a recollection of a chance confession of Simon.

The mock respect that Vedha shows to Vikram (Viram Sir, Vikram Sir) and his confidence in narrating the three stories which gradually but confidently blurs the clear demarcation between good and evil, are testimony to his versatility.

His entrance scene, reminiscent of Kevin Spacey in Se7en, is shamelessly thunderous.

Often we attribute non-existing nuances into the narration. Maybe it was just my imagination but I would like to attribute the aspect to the talented director duo. In the first scene where the two meet each other, Vikram is in a pristine white shirt and Vedha is in black. The shade of Vikram’s shirt / T-shirt gradually changes to grey and reaches a matching black by the time we reach the spellbinding climax.

Also just before the film ends, it was the turn for Vikram to ask Vedha (Role reversed) “Vedha Sir, (a mock respect returned, this time Vikram calling Vedha with respect, a significant shift from the earlier addressing of him as dog, scum etc…) what should I do now?”

And one word about the background music.

It is flippant at the most unexpected moments, tender when Pulli and Vedha are together and haunting for most part.

The BGM breathes life into the film. This is how a BGM score should be.

Here is a sample. This has the "Catch-phrase" - Oru kadhai sollatta Sir? (Shall I tell you a story?), the flippant music and the beat that breathes life to this film...

There is one particular scene towards the climax where Vedha excels in my honest opinion.

Completely exasperated with the pigheadedness of Vikram, he has this hyper scene where he is giving an example of a stupid villager who lost something here but was searching for it there because it was well lit where he was searching.

The above paragraph does no justice to this mind-blowing scene.

Hats off to the director, the dialogue write and Vijay Sethupathi for this gold mine of a scene.

And what a stunning climax.

I like open-ended climaxes, where we get dragged into the filmmaker’s mind and start guessing what would happen.

My one earnest request to Pushkar-Gayathri duo – please do not spoil this masterpiece with a sequel.