3rd Fingers - Chapter 3/8

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3rd Fingers - Chapter 2/8

Disclaimer: It is strongly advised that sane people should not read this blog. Vishal Gupta does not agree with any of the views or opinions expressed on 3^rd Fingers. The only reason Vishal Gupta is posting this series is because his cow has been abducted by us.

I stopped by the bathroom mirror to see how I looked. After all, there were pretty female juniors in my society. Like every engineering college, my junior batch had the most gorgeous (and approachable) girls. Somehow only my batch had missed out of the pretty ones. Anyways while I was doing my hair, I saw Joose rush into the bathroom to find a cubicle to puke. This wasn’t a surprise, considering the fact that his everyday dinner consisted of 3 pegs of vodka in the main course and a shot of tequila in the dessert. But it wasn’t his fault. The entire load of Illumination had fallen upon his small head and he hadn’t been sleeping… at all. I wondered about his sleeping timings. He couldn’t sleep in the classes because he didn’t go to any. He didn’t sleep at night because that was the time when he taught the new generation of engineers how to tie thick steel wires to bamboo sticks. And he couldn’t sleep during the day because at that time he was in the market to bring steel wires (and at times even bamboo sticks). He came out of the cubicle and looked at me with eyes which could be mistaken for coal. Burnt coal. He looked thinner than usual and if he didn’t shave soon I would plant a sunflower in the bushes he carried on his face. His half-dead face looked at me. I thought this wasn’t the best time to talk to him about my room’s broken window. I rather put my broken comb in my pocket and rushed out of my Hall.

My college was going haywire with constructions. Supposedly there was some big VIP coming for the annual function and it sent the management into frenzy. For the first time footpaths were being constructed. I had gotten used to the old street where a speeding cycle could go by hitting you and not stop to regret. The footpaths would change that. Rumors were that a helipad was being built and tried for that VIP’s entrance. Somehow, the roads looked cleaner than usual and all the main societies of my college were asked to prepare performances for his entertainment. Of course my society was not worthy enough of being asked for a performance. For one thing, no one expected us to do real work. For another, what would a bunch of book-freaks really do? Go on the stage and recite a poem? Somehow, the administration preferred Salman Khan’s Dhinka Chika to Harivansh Rai Bacchan’s Madhushala. And I can’t say that I did not understand their logic. Also, all the in-campus eateries were to remain closed on the day the VIP was about to come. This meant that either we’d have to eat the horrible food in the mess or we’d have to stay hungry for the day. We only later found out that the VIP came to the function for only an hour. He said his schedule didn’t permit him to stay longer. I think he was just scared from the protests against him in the campus. Most students believed that he should resign from the chair. These were the students who love to make people resign. But not all my college mates are such shallow beings. Most people didn’t give a crap about whether he resigned, or stayed, or became an astronaut. They were just pissed off because the eateries were closed. Where else do you go on a Sunday when even the brains of mess-workers are on leave and they dump the weeks’ worth of leftover stuff in our plates. To add to that, our mess system had become more bureaucratic. But more on that later.

Finally, I got to the meeting and found my team patiently waiting for me. As usual, half the crowd had not appeared. There were the people who always came and did no work. There were the people who hardly came and hardly did any work. And there were people who looked like they could work, but alas, there was no work for them to do. This was going to change. I and Ishenam had plans for this year. We had already conducted a whirlwind of selections and despite my involvement, we’d chosen up a fairly good team of idle to-be-engineers. It was good in a way. Bill Gates says that lazy people always find out the best way to do things. However, that rule did not apply to my team. Here, the lazy people never did any work. They didn’t even show up for the treats! That’s lazy I tell you. After having control of the team I had discovered that unlike other more “dramatic” teams, mine did not have a chance for face-to-face interaction. I preferred a 24 hour video chat involving everyone but Ishenam suggested a round table conference. I agreed. It did sound more feasible. Problem was that though all of us did have computers, we did not have such a big table. We settled for sitting on the ground in a circle. Close enough! After we wasted 15 minutes in settling people down, we began the meeting.

3rd Fingers - Chapter 1/8

Disclaimer: The contents of this series are not meant to be factually correct, not meant to arouse suspicion, are not against humanity, Hall, region, religion, society, Ramdev or any senior, I am not in the payroll of Professors or any other socially irresponsible group. Though this blog can cause pandemics of the mental kind – it has been certified to be bird flu resistant.

I knew I was dead. I just didn’t expect everyone to follow me even to Hell. But I should’ve known. After all, it was supposed to be redemnation without relief. I had been dumped into a crowded cauldron to boil while Anjali pushed me further deep with her spoon. Joose had promised that I’d get my own kettle soon but a senior sinner was not emptying the kettle Joose had saved for me. The stew I was being boiled in smelled due to lack of funds to buy good words. The green slime below had white bubbles erupting from time to time. I remembered it was the same slime which had offered my CS/EC/EE fellow mates massage sessions in Heaven by the cutest angels. If only I’d known the worth then. Loud drum noise was making my ears ache. The feast was getting ready. If I didn’t escape now I’d be barbequed in wet mess dal. This was desperation time. I summoned all my fat (I don’t have much muscle) and pushed my way out of the pot.

It was the 3^rd time this week when I’d woken up to a nightmare rather than my alarm clock. Dreams have a funny way of intertwining everything in your life in a single scene and telling you how screwed up your existence is. I got out of bed and after relieving myself from the sins of last night I opened my mailbox. 19 unread messages. 4 spam. I had to review 3 poems and 4 articles posted in Talaash last night. Did I tell you about Talaash? Talaash is idle group of my college whom I was given the task to manage this year. I think they figured out I was the king of lazy people. However, such big posts do not come with a rod in the… never mind. My rod turned out to be my 6 feet tall friend Ishenam Chamatkari who actually wanted to do something for this group. He said he didn’t want to be the Governor under whom the team died. I argued that the team was never alive. Last year we hardly did any work and the team was handed over to me when all there was left in it was unsettled debts from different publishers around the campus. Ishenam and I soon figured out that the sluggish nature of our team was not due to lack of talent or tempo. Our publishing was on a standstill because the Institute failed to provide us with a timely supply of green paper. It was not much difficult you see. Ancestors of the society could’ve easily completed the task but they thought sleeping in their 7’ by 11’ boxes which the administration gave us in the name of rooms was more comfortable than running around across the campus waiting for the Indian bureaucracy to reimburse the jackpot amount of 1850/-. However, after careful planning by me (contributing slightly) and a political matchup of Ishenam with the Institute representatives (contributing largely) we got the system running again and now I had to review every dumb spelling mistake the brightest pool of students of the nation presented to me. One good way of improving their mathematics was to make the entrance examination objective. At that time our respected ministers hadn’t considered the effect of the objective paper on the English of the students. Result, the new batch of students ate and spoke math but dreamt of being the next Chetan Bhagat.

But the emails didn’t end there. There were 9 companies visiting the campus this weekend. But the companies were considerate enough to give me time to prepare. Out of the 9 companies, 8 did not want to consider any student who could not code, solder, design and sleep at the same time. This unique combination of multi-tasking was only taught to the geeks of my college who majored in computer science, electronics and electrical engineering. The 9^th company was a bank who had either mistaken the campus of my college for an international B-school or actually expected to find the brightest financial analysts of the nation in an engineering college. Being money minded multinational, they didn’t care about what their employee had majored and considered all the students who chose to apply to it. After receiving over 800 CVs they realised that conducting so many interviews of such bright minds would blow their fuses for good and they skimmed off the top 100 CVs after arranging them in the order of grades. Again, my application came back without being shortlisted and I turned back to my computer for religious solace. When life kicks you in the rear, you have to turn to God. I searched for the best religious songs on the internal LAN drowned into 2 hours of heavenly bliss. Sadly, my devotion to Almighty was rudely interrupted by a call at 9:15 PM which reminded me I had to be in the Talaash meeting 15 minutes ago. I said God made me lose track of time sometimes. Ishenam blared out from the phone and called me to the meeting “in 3 minutes.” I shut the lid of my laptop, grabbed the cycle keys and rushed out of my Hall. My weekend, had begun.

The Rock

A poem a close to me. Written by Navdeep Sihra after a conversation between us. I hope you would appreciate it.

The Rock

Then, the dusk set in-

And the golden Disk disappeared

To the other side of the rock

And he, still hanging,

Kept on thinking about his existence

What had there been, which he might have lost ?

Here, many a sun wasted and many a moon spoilt

Until now, he never saw himself at things

Which made love die in the lover's very eyes.

This rock never held him in promise

But his heart said all otherwise.

Was that mere a passion-

Why was then his eyes wet and soul so bright?

Every jerk now and then,

Writing a new expression-

Garbled his sense of doing and being.

Questioning seeking, sometimes retiring -

Desperate for even a little niche.

And he recalled- a Battle field

A vast armada of tragic flaws and total black out

Reluctant Hamlet -Hesitant Arjuna

Both in need of a walking stick.

Then the call-"Arjuna! Don't live for the End."

"You can't live upto the End."

He found himself at peace

Perplexities- ruffles of the disturbed mind

Chinks and crumbles falling of rock on his being

Looked like Rain drops in the poor man's field.

Thus, he was hanging-

He dared not look below

(for it, he had lost the sense of belonging. )

He was not feeling like looking above

(for,he simply could not imagine.)

He was feeling the rock

Was it love? - the question lost its meaning

Now,his eyes were daubing every inch of the space in between...

He knew not what if conquered

As he could die too with a gust of wind

All expectations pruned - all questions dropped

He was in delirium or simply feeling at home.

मौत

मौत से डर नहीं लगता जनाब

डर तो ज़िंदगी से लगता है

मौत तो अपनी महबूबा है, एक दिन ज़रूर आएगी

ज़िंदगी बेवफा है, कब तक साथ निभाएगी?

ज़िंदगी ने हर पल दुख दिए

मौत तो एक ही बार आएगी

ज़िंदगी ने साथ निभाने का वायदा जो किया था

वो वादा भी अब मौत निभाएगी

ज़िंदगी ने बहुत ज़ुल्म किए

मौत ज़ुल्मो से दूर ले जाएगी

मौत तो वफ़ा निभाएगी

ज़िंदगी बेवफा कहलाएगी

-

विशाल गुप्ता

अक्टूबर १६, २०११