A day in college without my love…

Early morning I got up with anticipation to meet you,

Got ready and dressed up with fanaticism to see you.

Soon I realized, it is the semester when I won't be meeting you,

Petrified, as I knew, a long lonely day it would be without you.

Lecture started but all I could hear is “I miss you”,

Every minute felt as if, locked I was, away from you.

No words of knowledge I could grasp and gulp,

No emotion I could digest, except, I was devoid of you.

With no hope to meet you in the break, I prayed for a call from you,

However, today was amongst those unlucky days when I received none from you.

Only memories I was left with, memories of us having food together,

Memories so jovial that the break got over but implacable remained my wait.

Wait it was not less than agonizing pain,

Wait I hoped I never have to feel again.

Albeit I knew, my wait today is mere hope to hear if not meet you,

Waited I did, but wait, waited you too…

How selfish I was, I realized all of a sudden,

Feeling I felt, so must have you.

This thought made me end my day with self-content,

It made me realize the value of a mere moment with you.

Next morning I got up with novel anticipation to meet you,

Got ready and dressed up with novel fanaticism to see you…

--- By a Lover Boy in College :P

Did I Dream my Fame???

Did I dream my Fame???

Was it nothing but a game???

On me the curtains had once rose,

Like a super nova once I had shone…

There was this day when destiny came knocking at my gate,

Nobody I was then but had already dreamt skyscraper fate…

They called it a talent hunt show,

Like millions I too saw it as my fodder to grow…

In an endless crowd I once stood all night,

Along with a million fellow men, I once waited for my light…

Entertainers fought alone, for a beautiful tomorrow, on the stage,

While an esteemed panel with hawk eyes scrutinized to gauge…

When it was my turn, with trebling feet, up to the dais I walked,

But one look around and I was clear what my soul so desired…

I knew I had to pour my heart out from the moment they say start,

And so I did and so did the world till I reached the very last…

What a wonderful life, I thought, as it was headed to a finale of sugary affair,

Deep within I knew, soon my dreams would be breathing in rosy air…

As I battled for the top I forgot what waited beyond,

All I wanted was Today to be My Day, All I wanted was Today to be That Day…

As the show-anchor walked to the culmination of it all, our beats popped,

As he read from an envelope, noise dropped and the time as if stopped…

I fell crying on my thanking knee when the sweet victory was named mine,

Got toppled into a trance as if I had had too much of wine…

That’s when I recalled what I once uttered to my dear God,

The Nothing me had once cried out loud…

I shall Bang on Your door and then plead guilty,

Cause I can do no more than ask for Thy mercy…

On me the curtains had rose,

With arms wide spread, like a super nova I had shone…

Papers, Radios, Televisions, Cameras all spoke of my glorious story,

But nobody warned that soon all, for me, would feel nothing more than pity…

As the clock dumped a few months, buzz died; there was no stage anymore,

Newspapers spoke of me no more, Cameras followed me no more…

It took me time to learn living and accept the reality,

It took me time to see life as a ceaseless journey in perpetuity…

Years have passed but my heart still beats for the shine of that stage,

It’s the next season of shows and it’s the dais, I still believe, where I belong and craze…

As I mentor my juniors today for their moment on stage, I seek less of blinding Fame,

For I know now that its very thought is no more than just lame …

Yet when I recall those days,

Yet when I think of that toiling phase,

All I hear my heart say, Did I dream my Fame???

Was it nothing but a game???.............................................. :)

It Rained………It Rained………

Dried up and almost dead,

I looked upon the heavens to quench my thirst…

Having turned almost red,

I pleaded to Thy, for a shower out of His mercy chest…

In spite of blisters covering my body,

Sun shone upon me showing little clemency…

Low in sprit, Low in life,

I tried desperately to quarry my ground with numerous attempts but all futile…

Having bled off all my greens,

I feebly looked around and found nothing but an army of million dead beings…

Left with ounceful meaningless breath,

I could do no more but die a painful merciless death…

Past flashing pass my eyes,

In jiffies I tried reliving my growing up journey…

With heat clogging my veins,

I still had my last smile cherishing my voyage from tenderness to energy…

Covered with dead bodies,

Earth wept tearless cries…

When merciful Lords seem to have run out of mercy,

Turning into compost its children, on cracked soil, remained stationary…

Soon the clouds broke loose to quench earthy thirst,

With Lions roar the skies opened and burst…

When Thy repented on Your heated anger,

Heavens collided venting out intensified lightning roars…

As water poured in volumes to calm the Earth,

Steam ascended from the enraged world…

But soaked in Thy tears the Mother soon forgave,

A tender bud blossomed off a million graves…

As I was reborn and all ground was wet with spirit of life,

You smiled and the site of rays of light drawing seven colored wonders across horizons became rife…

With my new life I smiled and I grew,

And so did a million others covering the Earth making it bloom…

A dance of Life and Death,

An Act of Sorrow and Bliss…

A destiny so written to repeat itself every season,

It all began one fine day when the Skies opened and…………It Rained………It Rained………

A Day...

Rise and shine!!! A new dawn is set to break,

Quickly off your Bed, Nine Hours of office are at stake…

Your Bread and Butter ain’t free any more,

So you better button up, ink your pen, for thy, Life-Book’s Page awaits…

With the blessings of mum, our hero leaves home in warrior ways,

Battling a cloud of sweeper exhausts’ aero-dust, dogging the barks of the territorial strays…

With hurried steps he moves towards the nearby bus stop,

Crossing The Lords house, he bows with a request for a good day’s-crop…

Beggar that Man is, he wastes no time to prove the point,

With a heaving breath, “I hope I ain’t late for my morning bus-ride”…

A sigh of relief with the sight of a formation of his travel-mates,

But as he nears, his fear has him begging again, “I hope my ride ain’t delayed”…

Joy is what every Man seeks,

Only to let it be drenched in a jiffy shower, ain’t that weak???

A plight of Man that even Lord might have failed to read,

Happiness is all they seek only to loose it to an ocean of endless need???

Soon he finds himself ridding in an over-crowded bus, passing busy Bombay streets,

Annoyed by honking machines puking smoke chocking him and all living breeds…

Like a rookie Tightrope artist, he struggled keeping his body-weight at balance,

But the wire is soon to break, more humanly soles barge-in with crushing wave’s nonchalance…

As if the crowd was just gasoline waiting to be set ablaze,

A spark and The Devils’ own recipe had soon started to be staged…

Conductor with no money-change and a passenger reluctant that he too had no alternate ways,

The public transporter soon transforming into a hatchery emitting tension rays…

To all others it hardly mattered and none bothered to help cool tempers,

Stops came; people boarded and alighted, all choosing to be just bystanders…

Even our hero less hero-like simply waited till it was his turn to de-board,

Feeling helpless he chooses to let the matter take its own course to erode…

A chase of monetary valued paper that defines our future,

Tension of loosing it molds our character,

Free-living to batter to Global Economy; transformation did make us more organized,

But this journey has also sadly made man less humanized…

Finally in the office a long day awaits him with rather routine work,

Wishful for a weekend, he quickly begins with his mailbox lurk…

Is his life a Greek myth of Sisyphus, at times he wonders???

Why Gods made such meaningless venture, at times he ponders???

Still at the end he feels content that blood gushes in his veins,

Having documented another day he moves on to unknown dreamy lanes…

The fascinating brain within seconds opens for him a boundless-world’s gate,

Another 6hrs of numbness and abstractness will soon have him a new Calendar-date…

Yet another day, yet another page,

With a day older experience, he will soon have a new world to gauge…

Rise and shine!!! A new dawn is set to break,

So you better button up, ink your pen, for thy, Life-Book’s Page awaits…

Pankh jo phaelanae chahe, udaan he rok de gae…

Pankh jo phaelanae chahe, udaan he rok de gae,

Geet jo gana chaha, aawaaz he cheen le gae…

Pal bhar mae, jo kushiya thi, gum mae badal de gae,

Suraj bas abhi nikla he tha, phir ye andhare nae kaesse bazi maarde…

Massoom thae vo chaherae, mossomiyat sae bhari thi vo baate,

Doosti ke chadar ko oodhae jab dhaekhtae thae hum vo bade bade sapnae…

Ghar kae aangan sae lagta tha badi suhawani hai ye duniya…

Hassi ke kil kilahat ke pichae chupp gaye thi vo saare pareshaniya…

Jiwan ussii ko mannae lagethe jo tha asliyat sae kafi pare,

College kae lecturoo ko bunk karkae samajnae lage thae khud ko tees mar khan bade,

Engineering ke kitabae padhnae ka samay kaha tha sahab zyado ko,

Doosti aur pyaar-mahobat kae apnea kissae jo likhnae mae mushkool thae saare…

Paesso ke thee na koe chinta na thi aanae walle waqt ke parwa,

Jeetae thae hum bus ek pal mae aur ussi mae dhund laete saree kameeya..

Kitabo kee yaad to bas exam ke kuch din pahale he satati thi,

Baki kahani to bas Cold Coffe aur Movie Thetaro sae sajani thi…

Engineering to kar li, puri duniya jo kar rahe thi,

Mann to kabhi lagta nahi tha par mark-ae (marks) jo lanni thi…

Likhae aur Kalakari kee jo prathiba jannm lae rahe thi,

Mechanics kae hadsae nae salla bhujha de lawh jigyasa kee…

Udaan jo bhari thi hamnae umeedo sae bhari,

Socha, kam mae to jald he choo laeni hai vo bulandiya saari …

Himmat ko hum dund laete thae yaddo mae taere,

Doosto ke dosti mae chuppa laete thae duriyaa vo taerre,…

Par Udaan… hehe… Udaan thi vo kaese,

Jo maere alawa sab kuch he udaa lae gae…

Baethe rahe hum wahe aur saari duniya he ghum gae,

Niklae thae jo ghar sae Raja Harishchandra ke rah pae, apnae aap ko bhi ess sangarsh mae aaj bhulla baethhe…

Jinh paeso ke parwah na ke thi,

Jiss Kal kae baare mae kabhi na socha…

Aaj ussi kae samnae ghutae juka baethae,

Aaj ussi ko apni duniya banna baethae…

Aae-Baba kae paasoo ka jo kadar na tha, Unkae sangarshso ko aaj samajnae lage…

Par makan jo Sunhaera sajaya tha, Ussi ko gawa baethe…

Pankh jo phaelayae thae humane umeedo sae bhare,

Appnae he siddhantto kae bhar kae nichae dhae gaye sarreee…

Pankh jo phaelanae chahe, udaan he rok de gae,

Geet jo gana chaha, aawaaz he cheen le gae…

Pal bhar mae, jo kushiya thi, gum mae badal de gae,

Suraj bas abhi nikla he tha, phir salla ye andhare nae kasse bazi maarde..................

Promoting Piracy... Coolest Thing To Do, Right???

The coolest thing to do for Gen X over the Internet is DoWnLoAd... And DoWnLoAd some more... :) With Google at your service all you got to do is type whatever you want in the search box and Google morphs into your personal Jinni... Your wish becomes its command... and wallah!!! You have googols of sites listed, offering gazillion choices across categories... Software apps, MP3s, Movies, Games and everything else ;) all's there waiting for your consent - “CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD” :)

It was a revolution when Steve Jobs introduced the world to Mac in January 1984. Internet was just a baby then and only a countable few used it. Soon PC happened with a soltero motto, Windows for everyone. And now is the age of The Kindles and The IPhones. Internet junkies are huge in numbers and the gateway to it is in the other room or possibly via the GPRS enables cell phones vibrating in your trouser pockets. Logon to your Internet enabled systems and everything on the Web is a few key taps and mouse clicks away. Like us humans if Internet too had a Mom, then things would have been quite different don’t you think? Say for example, the moment you hit download this movie (illegally i.e.) she comes up morphed as a pop up Alert box which reads, “Baeta, this ain’t the right thing to doooooooo!!! (Loads of oooo’s to give it a rhyme ;) hehehe so you better read it that way… sorry, carry on… :) ).” She would always pinch your conscious the moment you try to do something that ain’t right (provided you still have the innocence left in you that makes you feel that taking something without permission ain’t correct after all :) if not then you should better read on, may be this article pinches this thought into you exactly like Internets’ Mom would have if she existed).

But, unfortunately or fortunately, no one can control how you use the Internet but you. The world is at your figure tips just coz of the WWW (Even this article:)). The power that it unleashes is massive and too huge for one person to own or control. So it’s better felt untamed and freedom be bestowed on individuals who wish to use it. Now that you have all the powers and rights to call the shots on what you wish to do with it, don’t you think you should be a little more responsible??? I agree on the fact that NO ONE in this world is Dhoodh Ka Dulla Hua… But unless you are dichromatic, I am sure you would understand the shades of grey; the extent you decide to MISS USE the WEB… Some people virtually travel great miles and bury their mother boards under mammoth ((0)*(1)*)* string of bit downloads nights after nights. Once the stuff is on our local drive, we start flaunting it in front of our chaddi baddies…

Rohan says, Hey Dude!!! Did you get your hands on The Chains Of Olympus -The Best PSP Game Ever and the Red Dead Redemption… I DoWnLoAdEd (:)) it the other day… man it’s Mind-Boggling!!! You want it??? I have it on my machine… I’ll get it for you kal…

There you go!!! This is what it was talking about… Buddy wake up!!! Not just did you illegally DoWnLoAdEd it, you have already started acting as an Ambassador for Promoting Piracy madi…

All of us use a music enable gadget that we refuse to leave home without, right… and what’s the point in having it if you don’t have your favorites on the playlist... So what do we do??? Should we shop for our favorites on EBay or Planet M… Naaaaaa!!! that’s not realistic… I ain’t the son of Ambani that ill buy my music... I mean come-on after a few weeks I’m sure there’s gonna be fresh meat in the music market for me to hog on… But I sooooo need the “Ye Dooriyan” track from “Love Aaj Kal” on my ipod man!!! And I am sure I would get it on the WEB… So what if the artists has put in Khoon Paseena (okaaaayyyy…they were sitting in air-conditioned studios and did not bleed either… but still…:) ). If I shop for it, I’ll have to shell out my Papa’s hard earned money and he would never ever agree on buying me this stupid few months craze lasting mp3… But I need it no matter what…. Ahh ha!!! WEB baba ke Jai… That’s what we all do right… And once we have it on our devices we go all gaga about it and make those who still haven’t committed the sin of DoWnLoAdInG, ask for it too…Tools to share it have already been created… The Torrent Engines (P2P software apps), USBs, Smart Cards, Bluetooth and many more are readily available options for you to share your sins. I am sure this wasn’t on the minds of those who invented USBs and Bluetooth :)… Why do we all forget that someone made FM stations (now over the internet too) to satisfy our momentary wants, at least for our music taste buds. Ya of course, you have to learn meditation before you can listen to FM… hehehe… I mean you got to wait patiently till they shut up BaddBadding and play the darn music… Ohh ya forgot… all of us want an Ipod and a collection of songs that we can call our own (be it illegally… you can always ask your mind to brush this word under the carpet saying, all do it so what if I did it too… All I did was an innocent mouse tap on the link that said “CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD”:))… by the way… I have the “Ye Dooriyan” track on my machine if you want it :)

We all crave for entertainment but paying for it takes a little weight off our pockets. But that’s one weight no one would mind carrying actually ;) hehe!!! Cinema houses these days charge anywhere between INR 100 to INR 500 down South Mumbai during the peak hours. If you wish to watch it for 80 bucks then you better get up early and make sure your girl-friend too reaches the movie screening venue before 9am :) Haha!!! That’s a daunting task don’t you think… I’m sure guys can but for Girls… Naaaaaaa… Most of the fairer sex need well over an hour to just decide on attire and makeup :) (Girls don’t kill me after reading this please :))… So ya basically 9Am show is out of the question at least for the love birds :)… But this is a group of people who would never ever go for downloading I guess… Paying INR 150 – INR 250 for a late-morning or early-noon show in a cozy Air-conditioned Last Row Cinema hall is fullon paisa wasool for the couples. For the rest of us (hehe) most of the time, “CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD” it is… BUYING the latest flick is a difficult option when a free copy is always available over the net or with your Chuddy Buddy :) Hmmm… serious temptations na!!! Well let’s hope some business guru comes up with a smart offer like a monthly pass or something for us movie hungry youngsters… All you MBAs out there, I really need your help on this :)

With the kind of technological advancement we have seen in past few years, getting access to a whole lot of gadgets and resources is pretty much easy. Common!!! I cannot have a Computer running on DOS or LINUX right… I need at least a Windows 7 if not an iMAC :)… but paying for it… that’s a little difficult. Latest Windows 7 upgrade would costs me anywhere around USD 200… USD 1 is about INR 44.667 as per RBI’s website… Wooohhh!!! Chal na Mamu, if I get my pc assembled using parts from lamington road and a pirated Windows copy then I can save enough for a booze party with my mates ;) so why the heck go for Original… But technology is an area where a few Angels are working on Open Source. Open source is a good way one can avoid promoting piracy at least in technology arena. I mean there are easy alternatives available over the net that are good substitute of proprietary stuff and that too for FREE… All you need is a little eagerness to look for them and readiness to let go desire for BRANDED PROPRIETARY STUFF. Of course the Branded stuffs are always an edge ahead… But Open Source is FREE:) what else do you need. When it comes to compatibility, well most of them provide support for outputs from the proprietary apps too. We have The UBUNTU OS free of cost that you can have your machine running on. Then there is OPEN OFFICE from the JAVA GODS as an entrant alternative to MS OFFICE. We have a whole lot of trial version available for Antivirus softwares. If you don’t want to take the pain of 30 day Trial downloads then go for AVAST or the AVG. Try GIMP for your image processing needs instead of a Photoshop. Go for VLC player as against the pirated Video players. VLC is capable of playing every darn vid file format, so worry not :). 7-ZIP is a powerhouse open source alternative for WINRAR. Then we have a NOTEPAD ++ as against the TEXTPAD. All you Student Developers go for JAVA I say. The JAVA IDEs – Net Beans and Eclipse are free of cost :) as against the MS Visual Studio for DOT NET. Of course the Free Apps have their limitations but it’s FREE after all :)

All said I understand that this age is called KALYUG as per Hindu mythology for a reason. So the mantra should be to remember that not being Dichromatic would help a lot…. Capability to see Shades of grey is the need of this present time… Summation of a little discretion from each one of us would result in a great cut down on piracy I feel… Dichromatic Thinking is a thing of Satyug and its existence in this fast paced high demanding extremely accessible world is not possible in entirety…. And hence this article and the links below :) … This is my contribution to the Left Hand Side of the Algebraic Summation equation I spoke about earlier in this para :) I hope you do yours too :)

• Nokia Website offering Free Music: http://music.ovi.com/in/en/pc and http://www.nokia.co.in/services-and-apps/music/main-music

• Few Links to download Open Source Softwares mostly from Geek Group: Geek.com ; http://sourceforge.net/about ; http://geek.net/ ; http://slashdot.org/ ; http://www.ohloh.net/ ; http://freshmeat.net/ ; http://en.softonic.com/

• OS : UBUNTU: http://www.ubuntu.com/

• OPENOFFICE: http://www.openoffice.org/

• VLC Player and Server: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

• For all you engineering grads and Developers : http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/indexes/downloads/index.html

Chalo guys gtg… Enjoy :) and keep sharing more open source links as and when you find :) :) :)

Beyond College Gates

Raj Malhotra, the central character of my story, at first look seems to be a guy right from the genera of movies created by “Yash Raj”. But wait… guy not with the looks of a Hero form Yashji’s movies but a heart :). Whilst in College, he believed that the world is full of people who are sweet, simple and humble (humble – ya right, hehe!!!). LoVe “WAS” the Alpha Human emotion according to him. He has his own small pocket dictionary of “The Rights and The Wrongs”. His roots are very modest yet, he never considered Money as supreme. These Modest roots had imbibed a “Little is More” feeling in Raj’s character. Raj Loved spending time in his closely nit Birds-Nest. Simply put, he lacked the qualities of making of a “Big Shot” or a “Genius” or even a “Mr. Popular”. Raj is plain sincere who always wanted the coziness of his loved ones around. He hated the idea of running behind money 24x7. His Family Tree Bonding was not that great. Raj never got to gel much with his cousins and relatives. Uncle, Aunty (Raj’s parents) had their own Life-Book and they made sure that Raj was kept away from the darker chapters. BUT Raj’s mom could never bare the painful events which eventually took serious toll on her emotional health. This was the biggest shaping force in Raj’s conservative, humble and introvert character. In spite of this, Raj loved being around people. He loved everything that had human interaction minus the feelings synonymous to competition and jealousy. BUT he always remained a rabbit, kept hopping from one group of people to the other. May be he dint want to get too close to all but the special one. Or, possible he does not want anyone to discover him completely. A Mysterious Guy :) … wooooowww!!! BUT one who hid his fears and weaknesses as a mystery. Raj was never the intelligent kinds. He could be easily overshadowed on intellectual topics… Though he was doing an Engineering course he had no IdEa about even the word EnGiNeErInG… hehe… He never wanted to become an engineer in the first place BUT the problem was, he knew what he DIN’T want to do and was never sure about what he would love to do :(. During the pre-grad schooling days, he suddenly discovered his talent at fashion designing and sketching. Wait!!! here again is the famous BUT - he never did much about this newly found skill to make it into a career. As quickly as he had discovered this talent, he forgot it too… In his Grad School, he found his special one - sweet, cute and adorable “BIRDY”. Hehe…This fellow had already planned his future with this BiRdY without knowing what awaits him beyond the CoLlEgE gAtEs. She was his first love (at 20 yrs of age ;) ). Unfortunately, his thinking was very far from reality until the college got over.

His first job took him away from everyone. Away from his parents, his BiRdY(she eventually developed strong wings :) ) and all the coziness he ever wanted. He opted for it though. Raj wanted to know how it feels to live alone. He wanted to feel the joy of making his own decisions. He wanted to experience freedom that he never got to feel while staying with his parents. Not that his parents stopped him from exploring himself. He had built a virtual wall of fear and anonymity around him. He was afraid that his choices would hurt his parents. Probably he was unsure about his own choices. This was his only chance to do what he wanted to do; to make his own decisions and learn from his mistakes without hurting anyone. It was this choice that jolted him to reality.

The 7 months probation in his first Corporate Organization was fab. But it did not take him much time to realize that it was just another illusion. This was his first lesson in the marketing term – USP/UVP (Unique Selling/Value Proposition). With the sunset of training period began a roller coaster; a roller coater that shattered his dreams but did teach him a few more corporate gimmicks. This Ride got him face to face with Corporate Beats like “Jo Pakda Gaya Vo He Choor”, Resource Utilization, Revenue Churn and Business Continuity, Quick Sand Projects, Chaotic Project Management, HR Lollypops, the famous Skill Management and Risk Mitigation Plan Mockery, and the Buttering Effect (which he still has not learnt) ;) etc. In his first project itself Raj confronted the characters his elders had warned him about. These dreaded characters were Mr. Politician, Mr. Seat Warmer, Mr. It’s All About Me, Miss Havoc, Miss I Am The Best, Mr. I am The Boss, Mr. What Can I Do and so on… Hehe, Raj was almost on the verge of quitting and going back home without even having found another job. BUT (again the favorite word in Raj’s Life hehe), for reasons related to lost confidence, darker chapter from his parents’ book and a little bit of give-up cum easy-going attitude, Raj is still sticking around this bitter reality…:)

Raj - a boy who got transformed into a Man. A Man who now believes in love BUT ( :) ) understands that just love won’t suffice. Raj baeta finally grew up…. Unfortunately, he is amongst those who need a big jhatka to wake up from their dreams. This is a story about a kid’s first step into the corporate jungle. A transition that takes him Beyond College Gates and opens a complete new play ground for Raj to play in. Raj in this new playground is just like a child at his first day in school… Lot to learn and explore and unlearn his love for coziness and many more things … All of which would happen only once Raj shrugs off his hesitation… Beyond College Gates, that’s when Raj meets Reality and falls into a whirlpool of conundrums forcing him to change his thinking ways if he wishes to stay afloat unless he finds a Rocket to fly him off this stink hole :) :) :)