A story about ethics, or something like that.

The characters: Tiger, Failboat, Spinach, Nikon. And, to some extent, the Man. You know, the proverbial Man who puts us all down? Also known as the System. The actual Man is an Assistant Vice Principal.

The setting: A fictional high school in a fictional multiverse. Note: Tiger is Head Boy of this school.

The background: Last October, after a party to which absolutely everyone was invited, these four split. After a bit of a discussion, they decide to not go home at all, and just...go where the fates and the winds and the cabs take them. So off they went, to normally crowded spots on the beach that were now so quiet, and then, bored and hungry, they went to the airport, post midnight. Everything else was closed. They ate, they chilled, and then they came back to the beach to watch the sunrise. All very cool, and if I belonged to that multiverse, I'd have been jealous.
Now here's the cinch. Still way back in October, one of them published a note about it. On Facebook. Referred to as Nomadic Night.
That was in October 2009. Since then, Nikon has left the school.

The Story:
It's happened a couple of times, the principal telling Tiger that he's received 'disturbing reports', and alluding to Facebook. I did wonder about the jurisdiction of a school over our cyber-lives. I mean, everyone's heard that with times and tech changing, we must too. Everyone's heard that applicants for prestigious jobs are thoroughly googled. I even read an article where college applicants changed their Facebook names so that they couldn't be found. But this isn't a job. This isn't a college application, this is school. And this...is somewhat out of the blue.
So, one fine day in April 2010, the vice principal called Tiger into his office to tell him that someone had seen the note about Nomadic Night, and lodged a complaint. I may need to add here, that there were photos in the note. And the first of those photos was taken at a home bar, with one of them holding up a bottle. Tiger told the Vice Principal that no one drank that night, and that even though they did stay out all night, the bar and the bottle was just a gag.
The Man was not happy about this note, as it gave a 'bad impression' or something like that.
On a bright and early Saturday in April, Tiger was called to the Vice Principal's office in the presence of all the AVPs, and was told that the School Committee had decided to ask him to resign his post as Head Boy. After Tiger's parents met all the authorities concerned, and Tiger submitted an apology letter, the decision was reconsidered at a meeting of the committee. Tiger submitted a resignation yesterday.

My point here is this. The person who put up the note has pretty tight privacy settings. How then, did anyone find it? And also, my main issue here. This is school. The characters in my story are barely 17. On Nomadic Night, no one was near the school, no one FROM the school was hurt, they did nothing related to the school in any manner.
Why then, is the school looking into something so unrelated? It's all...a not-so-thin line about privacy, and how much of ourselves we put online. A party isn't a party till it's on facebook, haven't I heard that before? Facebook is...the public's Page 3. Or something like that. I think I'm losing my point.

Opinions about the incident appreciated.

Finally. Finally

"They're decriminalising homosexuality!", I told mom a few days ago.

"What, it's illegal?" she asked.

Well, not anymore. The Delhi high court has finally legalised private consensual gay sex between adults. The gay community is rejoicing. And of course. Society is still slowly assimilating homosexuality, but at least gay people don't have to worry about breaking the law anymore.

It all boils down to this I suppose, our deep rooted distrust, suspicion, fear, of people who are in some way different. Why should gay people be treated any differently? In fact, you can almost say that their hearts are more open than others...We (at least I) don't discriminate between religion and race when it comes to love. They don't even discriminate against gender. And thus I say that Gay people, bi people, have large hearts. It's all about love. The sex, that comes with the love.

And, well, if it's just lust, you can't help who you're attracted to. You don't choose who you're attracted to, do you?

Religious groups all over India fail to see this (they're all about the sex, you see?)

Taken from the Hindustan TImes articles about the desicion, the following quotes. You can almost SEE the disapproving faces, hear the condemning tones. These people just DON'T see the love, do they? Can LOVE ever be unnatural? And when it comes to the sex, some things that people are into are very kinky indeed (bondage. Sado-masochism.) and THAT'S not illegal. (Ok I think I lost my point here.)

Swami Ramdev says that homosexuals need to be hospitalised.

Kamal Farooqui of the Muslim Personal law board says that no Muslim in the world, let alone India, can ever support it.

The president of the SGPC has said that homosexuality is disgraceful and takes you away from the path of God. Um, how exactly?

Look, people. Has GOD ever said anything against homosexuality? I'm sure MY God hasn't. He believes in being yourself. And gay, it's not something to become. It's not a CHOICE. Religion, mind you, is a product of man. And therefore, like ALL products of man, it is flawed in this case.

It all boils down to our refusal to accept anything that's different. Anything.

THEN there are the arguments that say that this is against our culture. But what use is a culture that is static? Society and culture are constantly fluctuating to accept new ideas and discard the putdated ones. Buhleeve you me, if 'culture' was static, girls wouldn't be allowed study. In THIS day and age. YEAH.

Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah of the Delhi high court ruled over the judgement. THAT is the kind of legal body we need. These are the people we need to run our country. We can absolutely NOT stick with old biases.

I'm gonna end with a question that I hope someone will answer. Delhi, Chennai and Bangalore held the Queer pride Parade, both last year and this year.

Why not Bombay?

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PS. : I know I'm probably too young to be writing about such issues. But this is one I feel very strongly about. There is nothing unnatural about being homosexual, bisexual, transgender, straight whatever. I feel that everyone should be allowed to express themselves freely, that they shouldn't have to be ashamed of who they are. Whatever it is that they are.

Facebook is now the new limit of joblessness

Why?
It's so jobless (and bored) that it's crossed over to ridiculous.
On my facebook homepage, I see that friends of mine have taken the following quizzes:

What kind of currency are you?
Your ideal job.
"What do ur Hands tell about YOU???"
"The impossible quiz"
Dream Job
"Which Disney Channel Star are YOU?" (no I'm serious. Does it get worse? Apparently it does.)
"What city (in India) would suit you best?"
How Many Kids Will You Have?

Yup. They do get worse, by the way.
Then there was that wave of pictures where everyone tagged everyone......You know? those pictures : "every class has them" and all that. Pure inane balderash.

Facebook status updates are a different story. Those are actually quite fun to read. Some of them are well put, some of them are cryptic, some are pretentious. Some are song lyrics, Some are plain irritating.
They should do an exhibit with FB updates....
case in point.
Page one on my friends list goes thus: (I'm using everyone's initials here)

SKDS just had soooo much fun!!! Thanx alot Kristian, Seoula, Vernon, Shaggy, Til n of course PETTO(Terence:)!!!
SM : (8) Jab tak rahega samose mein aloo, tera rahoonga, o meri Shalu (8). Pagalpanti bhi zaroori hai ;). :P.
PP "A LE MENTHE." (wtf does that even mean?)
MB dying to go solo.
DF feels lyk rippin sumthin apart....dunno y??
KUP is completely in ♥ with her new haircut...n im not gonna upload my pics until everyone's seen me on monday...i'll admit,i want the attention....=).
AO ......its jst silence silences..(This is from some poem - its silence silences. I can't remember which one, and that's been driving me nuts)
ID has a Maths exam on Monday. In two words, he's dead. In three words, he's SO dead. In four words, he's so fucking dead. In one sentence, he should shut the fuck up and get back to studying.
AR is takin alota these quizes on fb outta boredom! (so bored??)

Etcetera. You see? I don't think I really have a point to make, I just find it funny. Large cross-section of people and all that. Could be a social experiment, of sorts, sifting through status updates. They may even help solve crimes, that's if anyone's stupid enough to go : (insert name here) dropped bombs at CST today haHA.
sigh.
Facebook is cool, oui... all I'm saying is....it currently seems to be smacking of desperation.
weird, innit?

Birthday Blues.

Happy 17th, baby.
At least I'm here and I can somewhat enjoy it. What if I was in Mumbai today?
What if?
I mean it just makes me very angry. Screwed up mentality terrorist. Stupid un-enforced armaments laws.













(the reason I can't completely enjoy it is becxause of my math exam on 29th. In case you wonder what i got for the budday, my parents gave me a box of Godiva. yummy.)

Kyunki kabhi kabhi TV serials khatam honi chahiye

OR, Kyunki it's over.

Yes, it's over.
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi, the longest running Indian TV show, is, as of today, terminated.
Ekta Kapoor has fought hard, but even the court seemed to think 8 years was too much for Indian audiences.
My reaction? I cry. With sheer relief.
Not that i watched it, but for god's sake, 8 years! In 8 years, characters have lived and died and been reincarnated using plastic surgery. Ugh. For 8 years, Indian audiences have suffered. This is their salvation.
But for those who actually LIKED the show, now there's a void. No more KSBKBT. Whatever shall we do? No more Tulsi, no more.....i don't know any other characters. No more glorious joint family story to take us away from the world.Now we have to go worry about our own problems.
Sigh.
We see now, all over India, the stress of PKSS (post kyunki stress syndrome). It seems to primarily affect housewives and other women.
SYmptoms include sobbing, staring blankly at the TV, and remniscing about kyunki. some may believe that the characters actually exist.
Last year, FRIENDS was terminated. The whole world cried at the thought of no more Ross-rachel fights, no more Joey and Phoebe, no more Mondler. Can we make a comparison here?
Absolutely not, because Friends was actually Bloody Good!
So what do the victims of PKSS (post Kunki stress syndrome) do?
They mourn for a while, and would have switched over to Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki. But that's packed up too.
Void.

PS: I'm NOT comparing Friends with saas bahu shit.

You know Mumbai's in trouble when....

Well, I could be wrong, of course.
And obviously I don't know the full story.
It started with Raj Thakeray's arrest. The backfiring of the whole Marathi Manoos thing.
We were talking about that in school....
Snoopy said it really wasn't fair that people came to the city from GodKnowsWhere and took all our jobs....
I took umbrage and said that if she was talking about Mumbai then she couldn't say that, because it's a multicultural city and almost always has been.
I told Dad about this later, and he said, you know what jobs the biharis and all do? They do the jobs that the Marathi Manoos is too proud to take.
We speak about the betterment of the Marathis, but in the end, we;re one country, we have constitutional freedom to move and work wherever we want within India. Does it matter where?
We know we're in trouble when Marathis act like total racist snobs refuse to even pay Bihari cab drivers their honest fares, and pass snide comments.
We're in trouble when Mumbaikars classify themselves into 'native' and 'outsider'.

A for Apple, A for Aspirin.

Looks like the old adage "an apple a day keeps the doctor away" is being morphed to suit the times...."an aspirin a day keeps the doctor away"
Well, not really, only we learnt in Chem class that aspirin has an anti coagulant effect and is used by high BP patients to prevent heart attacks. Like they're told to take one daily, to lessen the chances.
Promising. The feel-good image of a deep red glossy apple, the sensation of biting into it and feeling the sweet-tart juice run down your throat, all that is now being replaced by an impersonal little pill with a bitter aftertaste. Says a lot about the life we live, doesn't it?
Our Chem teacher digressed from the lesson to say that we were all stressed beyond measure. Parents putting their kids into the grind, starting with school, at 2 and a half years, when they should be, well, kids! Running around, playing, being happy, exploring their world. Not memorising rhymes (she said.). So, is playschool really PLAYschool anymore?
I don't know.
Mine was, I think. Of course, we did learn alphabets and stuff, but it was fun. All through primary school my biggest stresses were probably friend related.
But yeah, now everything's a means to an end that'll never be there, exams in primary school, preschool even, and to what effect?
a childhood lost?

Read in the news recently: Condoms and safe sex are not even mentioned in the new sex-ed modules being planned by govt. The plan is, instead, to advocate abstinence and being faithful to a single partner.

Agreed, abstinence is the best way to avoid STDs and pregnancy, but, well, it's obvious not too many people are going to go for it. Sex is no longer the taboo, confined only to the bedroom and the mind. Once again, we're finding out just how good it is.

Monogamy, si, a noble idea. Mom gave me huge long lecture recently about how we just get into relationships for the fun, how we should focus on our lives first and not on relationships, seeing that they take up a lot of time and energy.

She's right, I suppose, and that's the reason I'm a bit scared of relationships as opposed to fling-things. Though, as kay sniffily told me, a lot of people don't share my opinion.

So yes, all this is very good and all, very good that they're FINALLY introducing sex-ed (god knows we need it....). It might be a bit giggly and embarassing at first, but it'd be infinite help, seeing that a lot of us learn about sex and other things related either from porn or from friends who are VERY open with conversation, or online on those sites that ISPs love to block. Those of us who don't, are rather confused, though no one admits it.

Sex ed would stop men in their twenties writing to the Mumbai mirror sexpert with queries like "Will kissing my girlfriend on the lips make her pregnant?" Yes, I've seen this and similar ones more than twice in the past fortnight. The reply is almost invariably a frustrated "educate yourself."

But 'tis rather strange that the words "condom" and "safe sex" get not even an honourable mention .........My tenth grade bio book went only as far as to mutter shamefacedly about copulation. One word. that's it. Our bio teacher didn't even do that part properly. but then again, that was Bio.

My point being that maybe we should be taught everything there is to know, and we should choose the path we wish to tread.

Abstinence, any takers?

Apparently not, and not all thaaaat many for borth control either.....the proof lies in our population.

Don't try to convince us. We don't believe you.

Most creative professions have their little challenges, the dark horses, the Everests......the little hates...like Ami on Miami ink hates having to do fairies, I think advertisers must detest doing ads for sanitary pads.
Periods are a pain, period....okay, full-stop. You'd think it's easy to get used to, seeing that it's inevitable and happens every month....but it's not. Fact remains that we hate it and everything about it. Hate PMS, Detest the cramps, and loathe the ickiness...
Therefore, when we're in a state where violence seems rational, we really don't want to see the happy-happy pad ads, all SO untrue.
Most ads seem to say, use our product and you'll be comfy doing anything, playing soccer to climbing gates to running through sprinklers.
Not true. comfort lies not in the brand used, It lies in yourself....
So.."Have a happy period"...??
Not possible. Not even probable. Tolerable, maybe. Happy, no. Not unless your product can stop cramps and PMS and everything else we hate about this monthly show of blood. So keep dreaming.
I wonder if the girls in the ads have their period when the ad's being filmed......
Anyway. No biggie. just the "have a happy period" REALLY pissed me off.
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hmm. mess mess everywhere.
now reading: 100 years of solitude, finally.
now feeling: sick. no prizes for guessing why.
now wanting: sleep. and satisfaction with life.

Sneh messaged, she was pissed after watching the news, about "this guy who murdered his daughter. It'll be the hot topic of discussion tomorrow anyway, so I'll tell you then..."
Not satisfied, I went to hunt TOI archives for what turnes out to be a week-long series of articles about the murder of Arushi Talwar.
One really starts to wonder where the country, in fact the world is going.
Girl found murdered, Domestic help suspected for many reasons. But prime suspect not to be found. At least three days later, a retired officer steps into the case and finds corpse of prime suspect on terrace.
How'd he get there? Prominent bloodstains on the stairs, near the cooler, everywhere. One wonders how the police managed to overlook this, and now I'm wondering the same thing that the TOI is, why wasn't a dog squad brought in??
Oh dear, police transfered here, there, everywhere, out of Noida. Is this a police force or a bunch of......My god, What's happening to us??
I'm in shock, I'm horrorstruck.

Quote TOI, May 19th.

"Many questions remain unanswered in the Arushi murder case: Who put Arushi’s mattress on the terrace, even as the police could not find the key to it? Who had the keys to the terrace door, which had to be forced open by the police? Where is Arushi’s mobile phone, which is reportedly in use even after her death? If she did die a day before her body was discovered, who called her friend from her mobile? Why was the flat, in which the murders took place, not sealed and the forensic team not called in immediately? Arushi’s post-mortem report mentions a ‘‘whitish discharge’’ on her body. But the forensic team has not preserved a sample of it. With every senior Noida police officer having visited Arushi’s home after her body was found, why was only station officer A Nanoria found negligent and shifted to the police lines? "

Why, indeed.

Then we find that she had been killed a whole 18 hours or so before her body was discovered. Someone had carefully slit her jugular vien and her carotid artery. Someone had clearly thought this out.....

And finally...in a stroke of God knows what.....they finally arrest the father. And this is what shocks me, hurts me the most......makes me lose all hope in mankind.....How can a father kill his own child thus?
And why? Because she found out he was having an affair....because she told him she didn't like it......he just.......eliminates her?
What's happening, what's happening to this world.....with no emotion, no love, no....

Oh god.....It's horrible. Just horrible.
And what's even more horrible is the incompetence of the police....apparently they shot their mouths off, saying this could be solved in just a few hours, and then failed to see their most important clue.....

How, how is this happening??
Sneh's right, this world is bastardizing itself.
Aarushi Talwar, may your soul rest in peace....................I pray for you....

The point being?

“Whatever you say about this new principal”, mom told me, “he’s the only one, and there have been three since I joined the Centre, to actually greet, shake hands with, and hug the children”
Ok sir, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. You’re a good guy, I see…

I took advantage of an impromptu sleepover at Sneh’s on Thursday to enjoy their dishTV connection. NDTV was on that day, with a debate about the IPL cheerleaders, whether they should be banned.
“Their obscene costumes appeal to the viler base instincts of the Indian male!” spluttered one of the participants, “And they take attention away from the game! I mean, we want to watch cricket, someone hits a four, but instead of a replay there’s these girls in skimpy skirts!”
Yet another participant said maybe the costumes were a bit…on the invisible side, but cheerleading as such is not a bad thing and not really distracting.
Hmm, I don’t think the guy holding up the “I’m here to watch the girls NOT THE CRICKET” poster shares that opinion.
And besides, said the more sympathetic participant, what about the costumes worn by dancers in Bollywood movies? Isn’t it almost the same? All right, maybe some of the cheerleading costumes are a bit low in the neck and high in the leg….maybe whoever hired them should respect Indian sensibilities a little and get costumes that cover the midriff…..But cheerleading as such, not bad. They do their job well, these girls.
Almost as if to prove a point, a song-teaser of Tashan shows up, with Kareena in hot pants and a tiny sport bikini top thing, grooving away.

“So what’s IPL all about really?” I ask Sneh. Having no cable TV, no Pehla, no jingalala, no dishTV, it kinda blocks me out a bit.
“Nothing man,” she replies tetchily. “Players ke boli lagate hain. They auction off players to all these industrialists and people who have too much money who want to form a team. It’s all about money.”
“So it’s nothing to do with place really?” I ask.
“No” her sis says, “The senior players, they play for their region, like Sachin’s playing for Mumbai, but the other players are sold to the highest bidder.”
Yesterday morning, on NDTV at Sneh’s, I saw something about “Will IPL get better ratings than Primetime television”
So what, really, is the point of having this tournament? Because the whole thing seemed to me like an irrational video game thing. Are we having the tournament just for the ratings? Or for the money? Or what? Once again we see this fragile world built on a shaky foundation of money, cash, moolah, prosperity, that makes this world go round, it seems.
The class (my friends, those I talk to now) disagree. When IPL discussion started I was greeted with a barrage of conflicting opinions… “promotes harmony among the team players, Brett Lee and Sreesanth get along so well now, didn’t you see that” … “Regionality promoted!!” (This was Sneh again)… etc.
Today after tuts a friend got a text, Kolkata night riders had won today. She hadn’t wanted them to win, she said “Shah Rukh Khan overdoes things.”
The mind boggles. SRK now owns a cricket team? O_o

Also seen yesterday morning at Sneh’s, making me think at first “Hey, I wanna audition!” but later giving me thoughts alomg the lines of soul-selling : MTV Roadies 5.0. Now I like Roadies, kinda. I watched a bit of Roadies 4 when I was in Delhi-Bombay year before last, and I kinda liked it. Sneh’s sis later informed me that Roadies was a copy of some other show. I guessed Fear Factor. Which I greatly enjoy. Much more than Roadies, now. The difference between the two? Politics, politics, politics. Who goes ahead on Fear Factor is solely determined by how well they do the tasks. No vote-outs, no conspiracies. On the Roadies episode I watched, their ‘money task’ was to eat various Thai ‘delicacies’. Worms, frogs, locusts, squid, sea snakes. Ugh. For phenomenal amounts. I’d rather not have the money. Really. I mean…(yeah, even on Fear Factor I don’t like the tasks involving eating gross).
The ‘advantage task’ was a Muay Thai boxing match (now that I’d enjoy. Really.). It was only after 6 hours training that the Roadies found out they’d be fighting each other.
“Think about what’s more important here,” said Vijay, the MC, “Your survival on this show, or your ‘dosti’” God, I hated that. The way he said it. Because here it doesn’t matter who you hurt, you just need to get ahead. Roadies seems cool on the surface, all those daredevil tasks, the bikes, but what I couldn’t ever do is the metaphorical grasping hands just to pull the other down, I couldn’t befriend someone knowing I might have to betray her sometime in the near future.
Nihal was the one most expected to get voted out, but in the end, it was Varun who got unlucky.
Nihal grinned triumphantly into the camera. “You might have beaten me up today bacchu, but I did the politics.”

“People say such great things about the youth of India”, Sneh mutters “what to do if the youth is only like this??”
Sigh. Whatever happened to honour?
Money talks. I wish it’d shut up.

Reality Check: This is what the world is.

God, something's really hit me in the heart.Gulf News tabloid has this weekly thing where they publish posts from blogs written by Middle East nationals. Not for them those self-ranting blogs that we write, we who live in metropolitan cities and crib about exams and traffic woes and heartbreaks. No, some of these hit you and bring you back to reality like nothing else. Mostly they're about Dubai, rants, as I'd call them, but what I read yesterday really shook me.

Diary of a Palestinian Mother

The Gaza Genocide
We celebrated Yousuf's fourth birthday today. We ate cake. And we counted the bodies. We sang happy birthday. And my mother sobbed. We watched the fighter jets roar voraciously on our television screen, pounding street after street; then heard a train screech outside, and shuddered. Yousuf tore open his presents, and asked my mother to make a paper zanana, a drone, for him with origami; And we were torn open from the inside, engulfed by a feeling of impotence and helplessness; fear and anger and grief; despondence and confusion.

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And there's a photo there, of relatives of a Hamas Fighter, mourning at his funeral. And as happens to me a lot, the words I write fail to do justice to what I'm feeling.
These are the brave ones. These are the ones who have every right to complain about their misfortune. These live unpredictable lives, hanging by a thread, they are the ones who truly do not know if there will be a tomorrow. Their lives, their homes and their happiness can be wiped out in a matter of minutes, so effortlessly, by bombs dropped by people who probably don't care, people who're just following orders.
These are the ones who have every right and opportunity to break.
And yet they don't.

These have seen and experienced more hardship than we ever will. They are the strong ones, the ones we need to admire and the ones we need to learn from. People like us, we'll never truly understand what it is to be them, the ones who live in the midst of war.

From them we must learn
To be thankful for every new day that we're alive, thankful that we are sane, full and healthy.They can't take this for granted, for they never know when it will all be whisked away.To see the little joys in our lives for these matter more than the large sorrows.Butterflies, the laugh of a baby, purring cats, pictures in the cloudsWe must learn to shift our focus to the good in our lives.We know we're lucky. Somewhere at the back of our mind, we know. But things like this make it really hit you.

I'm sorry I'll never be able to understand what it's like to live among pain and still find happiness, to live, being grateful for each and every minute of your live, to smile for your child when your heart's breaking, to tell him you'll be safe when you yourself aren't sure.....
I bow my head to you.
I have much to learn from you, Mother From Gaza.