An Ode to the Angry Clouds

I'm overwhelmed. I went to college. It rained heavily all day and I was out in the rain and I got completely drenched in the rain while I went and returned and it was overwhelming. I've always loved rain - whether indoor or outdoor am I while it pours. But I am disappointed because I see it everywhere, not everyone have the same outlook (of course, they are not bound to; but why not) and the day has been described extremely wrongly (in blogs and status messages) as per what it actually deserves to be!!!

I hate going to college, I hate the stretch I have to walk to get to the place where I avail my daily conveyance, I hate availing the auto-rickshaw or bus (whatever that takes me to the Metro) and then I hate going underground and boarding myself into the ultimate ride of boredom through the darkness of the city's "pride" tunnel along with thousands (that's what it looks like) in the same compartment. But today, I walked out with no inhibitions and hesitations in my mind. I didn't care if nobody else attended class and they declare it a no-lecture day in college, although every other "perfect" day I fear that the same would be the destiny I'd reach out to and decide I'd better not go. No wonder my mother was as surprised as could be, that I stepped out on a day as "dull and messy" as this. As for me, how could I stay back home on a day like today. My mother insisted I must take the parasol with me and use it. I didn't mind, for I knew no umbrella on earth could stop me from getting soaked in the rain today. I was so right. I used the parasol and I was as drenched as I could get by the time I reached metro. I saw brimming puddles flooding the pavements, messy traffic, not many people around and the ones around had a very I-am-doing-the-world-a favour-by-venturing-out-today look on their faces. As for me, I was delighted. I wished the path to the Metro went on and on and on and on....... And then once inside the Metro, it, of course, wasn't possible to enjoy the rain in there, but it still continued to delight me. First of all, it wasn't as crowded as it generally is at that particular hour. Secondly, the seats were soaked. So there were empty seats all around and now the people had a hell-the-underground's-not-rain-proof-either look. Shitheads!! I, like a few others wiped the seat with whatever I could and seated myself (it's not everyday that I get a seat).

"It has been pouring all day. It’s been a long time since I’ve woken up to such a dull morning where even the crows refuse to execute their morning orchestra." - A fellow blogger wrote.

Back home, I found this kind of a description everywhere about the day. It broke my heart. You know what, the city has prayed every single day for a cooler morning since February and the monsoon glory has not settled yet. Scientifically speaking, it's climate change crisis that we do no longer have monsoon as a season but occassional heavy downpours. Even with monsoon taking such a moody plight, we are endangered of being submerged and way underwater in a century or less. Even if it does not rain we are about to be flooded. Settlements both coastal and fluviatile will be washed away with no role to be played by monsoon whatsoever. It's time we prized our existence on the surface of the earth (I am not complaining that not many try and make a difference for a better future) with whatever Mother Nature provides. What I am trying to say is, what is it that makes everyone treat a rainy day like severe pain in the ass??? You know not what Mother Nature's fury is like. So why not enjoy a climatic event that is so trivial and exotic in the context now. Specially, remember if it does not rain, it's humid and hot beyond tolerance and any day, the wrath of the clouds is better than that of the Sun.

A: "I got soaked on my way to work! Is it ever gonna stop raining??"

B: "So it's raining there... can't believe it still gets flooded knee-deep like they used to when I was in cal."

Such is a conversation on a social networking site.
I'd say, A is such a baby and B besides being a cynic and a critic is also so unromantic.
I wouldn't blame it on the present generation. I had heard that Rabindranath Tagore had been severely critisised for romanticising rains in his poems. They said he should channelise his talent to pen down stuff adding to the uproar for freedom of the nation, something with a social relevance and it's only possible for a rich lad like him to find beauty in heavy downpours because for everybody else rain only adds danger and scepticism to one's treading out. So even the Nobel Laureate couldn't induce the social appeal he intended to through his poetry saluting the beauty of nature. It really doesn't take us to stop and stare, what it takes is acceptance of things around that are hardly heeded but they have their importance, grandeur and beauty. That we co-exist.

And metaphorically rain is always used for bad days, hopelessness, misery, sadness. ( e.g : But it rained by Parikrama, Here comes the rain by A1)... why??? Do you not like to feel the water pour out of nowhere to your sleeves and replace the sweat on your brow??? Do you not like it how the water, absent otherwise, shoos off the summer heat from every nook and corner??? Do you not like the smell of quenched country soil??? Do you not like the fact that you don't tire easily at work in such a pleasant weather??? Do you not like that you don't feel like getting out of bed when the rain makes it pretty dark outside???

And Parikrama and A1 try to learn something from Percy Bysshe Shelley (Ode to the West Wind).
I'm being romantic and I cannot understand why most of you don't afford to be..

The Remnant

My exams are finally over after spanning for almost 3months. So it's beyond my power to try and explain what it feels like. But I must admit it's rather underwhelming. I don't see how that is possible, but that's exactly how it is. After waiting on and weighing every single day since it began, I'm done with it and yet I've just managed to buy 2 books and have read them and that's it for the much-anticipated post-exam extravaganza. What the hell is wrong with me???? Why am I not shopping for the pujas?? It's so deadly late... Exam or no exam i should be out there in New Market, Citi Center, Metro Plaza blowing my father's money in the air. Why am I not outing??? Amusement Parks , restaurants, sleep-overs, getaways have always defined my session breaks, but not anymore it seems.

In the last two weeks of the examination schedules, I don't think I had ever worked as hard and at the same time, I don't think I had ever procrastinated as much as I indulged in that time. So I've successfully kept alive the prospect of ending up as a good-for-nothing (as always) besides a possibility of becoming a workaholic (the addition).
So I believe the ultra-long examination schedule has made me a Supra-Good-for-Nothing. I'm not even doing what is trademark for a good-for-nothing to do on session breaks. The good thing is, I'm out setting new benchmarks on laziness. Honestly, that's no good thing at all!! I'm depressed... No, I'm actually fine the way the days, the hours, the minutes, the seconds, the fraction of seconds (see, how much time I have) are passing by. Just me and Ma, she, complaining on every single detail of what my Good-for-nothingness has grown into and I, giving her a tight hug trying to share what a bliss it is to be in the state I am now in. No. This is not good. How can there be bliss if there's no new addition to your wardrobe in the classical shopping season??? I guess what I needed was an escapade. That, I wasn't allowed. So here I am on the verge of madness or mad already and Ma, with her brimming temper (you really should have allowed me to Goa).

P.S - Here's a solemn prayer - "help me!"

Bring Her Home!!

She left. After months of preparation and tonnes of anticipation ( not to mention, also a bit of apprehension ), it was finally the day when she had to set out to a state directly across the nation from our home. And home will never be the same again without her. I miss her. I want her back.
1st August, 2009 was the day she left Kolkata and it was the first day I was cursing dreams, I was cursing ambitions, I was cursing higher education.
She is my sister and she's a year and 4months younger than I am, which means I spent all my memorable life with her by my side. Days were adventurous because she was with me or I would be sharing it all with her when I was back home. And so I did not want to come back home that night. I wanted to go far away, I wanted to wake up without any memory.
I guess I wanted to escape from the city when I graduated from high school, and she on the other hand had no such fancies. So I could have been the one leaving the city first and she could have been the one facing all the trauma, only if I would have been more competent.
I have hated every single thing about growing up. I have hated my foray into adulthood. And now I have already surpassed the ultimate facade of the whole growing up thing. I have parted from my sibling. And I was such a mess in doing so. I lost my voice, I lost my mind and she was trying, saying and doing it all, and I was only a spectator. She hugged me, kissed me on my cheek, she said "Take care!", and I acted so blank. While I was home with her, while I was in the car, I felt I was doing so well avoiding tears and lump in my throat. But later I realized, it was because she was still there beside me. As I stepped inside the compartment of the train that was all set to take her away from home, away from me, at 8.15pm, I broke down. I saw her going away from me, far away from me. I saw that she wouldn't be home like she has always been, she wouldn't be making fun of me, she wouldn't be irritating me, she wouldn't be fighting with me over every single thing we had to share, she wouldn't vex me to buy her this and that, she wouldn't talk to me of her lame and sick adventures, she wouldn't be watching all the reality shows on TV, she wouldn't wait for me to come upstairs first because she's afraid of the dark, she wouldn't be there back at home when I get back that day and for many many more days. And I'll no longer be the only one in the house who could discipline her (you know, how parents are to their younger kids). And she wouldn't need any such treatment from me no matter how often she comes back from her college. She'll be back with more experiences and stories than I've ever had. She'll come back with more street-smartness than I could have ever induced in her. Moreover, home will not be the same place.

As I walked away from the station, I looked at the bridge, the pavement, the taxis, the ghat - all these things had always brought the essence of being back home from far away to me before that day. That day it became the place that took away my sister, my childhood, my partner in crime, my best friend, my confidante, my room-partner, my constant companion through thick and thin for all my life away from me.

4 days later when my parents will return having delivered, settled and established her in her hostel, I don't know how to not look for her with them at the door. I don't know how to be without a sister for about 2months and sometimes more. I don't know why growing up has to include such episodes. I don't know whether we'll all be together again for as long as we have been. I don't know how to move on.... All I know is I could pray for a miracle, a new day, a rewind, anything that would bring her home......

The Unnoticed Social Scoundrels

I don't know whether the world around me has been so inhumane for ages since creation or is it like the older people love to say, it's the fault of the present. I've been so appalled by the way not one, not two, but all medical stores of my locality behaved today. I've been suffering from a secondary infection of herpes simplex. The doctor gave me minimal doze of required medicines; which is why I like this doctor. He hardly scribbles anti-biotics in the prescriptions and he prescribes as few drugs as possible and moreover, most of the tablets he prescribes are less than a centimeter in diameter. So mind it, the doc is a god.... But I now hope that he was all that was needed to heal the disorders I suffer from. It's definitely not that way. I'd also need the drug stores.... the fucken drug stores.

I needed 3 pain-killers and 4 winolaps... And guess what!! They don't sell it that way!! Excuse me, but that's what the doctor prescribed me to get!! Yes, but you see, they were surviving with last of the last supply, what if no others buyers of those drugs stop by, they'll run in a loss!! So they'd sell the whole file or none at all!!
I felt like killing myself...... I'm such a thriftless person, but how can I be so thriftless in case of medicines... How can I ever buy more medicines than what I need just to ensure that those poor (they are anything but poor) drug store owners don't suffer a loss of half a file????
Fuck you... Fuck you bad!!!!!

Whatever!! They are so impossible!! They know I'm in need..... I'm in dire need of those drugs, so why not sell off the whole supply that was left to me.... I wouldn't mind taking more, because I'd anyway need some, perhaps, they thought!! But I wasn't to get along with such insincerity in service even on my death-bed... I came back home without two of the three prescribed drugs.... Did I save my money? I don't have an answer to that. Did I save my health?? No.... I've ended up as a loser... Money stands no importance beside health... But that's not the point.... I think the right question is - Did I save myself against exploitation?? I think I did!!

The actual reason of why I got so thougtful is that I am so unexceptionally pissed off with the whole episode. The second reason is, is that their genuine policy??? If it is....... I'd have no reason for further dismay regarding other social drawbacks, disturbances, indifference and non-diligence.... I am not at all a medicine-savvy person, so I don't know!! But I can't help but wonder, how could they do this?? Exploiting people's needs is probably a crime... I don't know whether it's the retailer's policy, or the supplier's policy or the manufacturer's policy.... Whoever it is, YOU PEOPLE ARE MURDERERS.... Who the hell are they to decide what amount is to be sold?? It's the doctor who decides what amount is needed and should be bought!!
I, or anyone on the Earth is so completely entitled to get medicines ( not bread and butter or chocolate or clothing ) only the prescribed amount.... What will I do with more??? Indulge in an overdose and die??? Keep it in case I need them again, so what they have a thing called expiry dates and are the one thing, I can imagine, not meant to be saved for the future???? And in the process, suppose another needy of those those drugs actually drops by at their store, I hope they wouldn't mind saying - "We just handed over the last of our supplies to someone who didn't need them. Of course, we couldn't wait for you to fall ill." But isn't that what they are supposed to do?? Isn't that what they make a living out of?? But I guess, they are more proud to be able to get rid of their supplies sooner..