Wednesday, January 18, 2006

Yet Another Boring Weekend in Bangalore

If you're wondering why I haven't posted anything for so long, well...so am I. I guess it could be attributed to laziness, or maybe it's just because I'd absolutely and completely forgotten that I'd started a blog. It wasn't until one of my friends, stumbled upon this ghost of a site, and promptly reminded me about it that I start thinking about posting someting new. Well, that was a long time ago, and I didn't really bother about it much, always relegating my creative spurts (they were few and far between, mind you) to the shadowy oblivion of...of...whatever the cerebral equivalent of the recycle bin is. Anyway, I'm not one for lamenting on spilt milk, and shall not dwell on this subject any longer.
After a hard five days of work, I really look forward to the weekends as a time to invigorate my spirits; have a blast, maybe do something adventurous. Yet so far my weekends in Bangalore have truly been uneventful. Except of course that fateful bike trip to Hoganakel, which turned out to be a little too adventurous, or should I say a total disaster. It happened to be this trip, with six of us on three bikes travelling to a place, almost two hundred kilometers away. This was my first bike trip, and I got to admit it, my heart was in my mouth (pardon me, but I have this unhealthy addiction to cliches) for the greater part of the journey. The trip was turning out to be just what the doctor ordered(well, here I go again). The falls were absolutely spectacular, aptly called the Niagara of South India. But then, I guess we were a little too awed by the spectacle that we decided to stay a little longer than we'd planned, and soon before we knew it was dark. I really do not intend to elaborate on the trip back. All I'll say is that we met up with a nasty accident, which left me totally shaken, and my friend, who was riding the bike with a dislocated ankle.
I'm sorry. I guess i've digressed a lot here. This was supposed to be about a boring weekend in Bangalore as the subject reads and I've almost given you an account of the most evenful weekend of my life, that too outside Bangalore.
Coming back to the topic, must say that probably that rush of blood sort of completed my quota for the rest of the year, and perhaps half of the next, for my good ol' weekends from then on were about as thrilling as a Hermit's sex life (sorry, I wish I'd come up with that one, but then the credit goes to my happy friend PGK) . The swelling feeling of frustation finally reached a crescendo last weekend. Three of my friends and I spent the whole Sunday roaming around...where else but good ol' Brigade Road... that haven for all the sorry specimens of humanity, who have absolutely nothing better to do, but perform their perambulatory ritual on the streets all day long. I must confess that at that point I felt like a total LIL (read Loser in Life). Well, as they say, that was the straw that broke the camel's back (an expression that has been indelibly etched in my mind, thanks to my high school English teacher). I decided that come what may, from the next weekend on, I would do someting constructive or maybe just have a jolly good time in any way I could. But wait, hold on a sec, this was the same Bangalore that I've been living in for the last few months. How the hell am I going to do something different? Beats me.
A week has now passed. Here I am, on a nice Saturaday evening, sitting in front of a miserable computer typing some gibberish. Well...maybe I expect too much from life, or maybe I dont try hard enough.

Out of The Frying Pan

Never thought the day would come. After all four years isn't really that short a span of time. But then, at the threshold, didn't it seem like a jolly quick ride? (sure, many of my compatriots would object to the usage of the word 'jolly' here) Four years, that's 48 months,1460 days,35040 hours... (you get the point-supposedly a relatively long duration of time)...and it seems to have gotten over in the wink of an eye! (pardon me, just couldn't help the cliche). So how does it feel? Well...the first reaction would be that of relief, happiness, euphoria, ecstacy... whatever. Four years of drudgery, four years away from good food and a clean bathroom, four years of that oppressive heat, four years starved of art and beauty, four years wishing you were in some other part of the universe. Phew! Over atlast. But lo! that's not all. What about those good ol' hostel rooms, the loud blaring of your neighbour's speakers, the food at the gate (and even the mess!), those terrace parties (where invariably everyone ended up getting sloshed), those sleepless nights, those long hours at the computer centre, the fests, the drama and music, the litting...and above all, those sorry fellow creatures who ended up listening to all the drivel you dished out and likewise and in whose company the aforementioned four years were made more 'memorable' . Looking back at these and many more, can't help feeling a trifle nostalgic. Fours years up, and what we have with us is a truckload of memories and what they call a degree, B.Tech that is, though I shudder to think how much I have gained as far as technical proficiency is concerned. Yet here we are, with the degree in our hands, (not yet actually) at the crossroads about to tread our separate paths.