Addicted to the smell of new books?

No online experience can match it. Sorry Flipkart, you fail.

As I walked into a bookshop today, I felt it. The amazing experience…the splash of colors, the distinct smell and the thrill of exploring a treasure. Yes, I have this experience every time I have walked into a bookshop. Online shopping is cool but it can never give me the plethora of so many colors, the warmth and the intoxicating smell of new books. I have known a lot of people to be addicted to that smell and probably some have written about it. It truly is inebriating…you just don’t feel like leaving the place. Simon Sinek is so right in his talk that technology can only make things go fast but it can’t replace the experience. You have to, have to experience.

My separation with the bookshop, like always, was tough. As tough as fitting all the books in the bookshelf of my apartment is getting. And you may want to share them but you don’t want to part with them.

Looks like it’s a month of talking about my passions…first music and now books.

If life would give me that opportunity, I will more than keenly just snatch it. Days where on a huge couch I can have music on my earphones, the book and its exalting smell along with the aroma of freshly ground coffee…heaven, bliss! I don’t understand why would people need to look for other pleasures. Ah yes, added to that if I could have my 40 minutes on the treadmill, fresh salads and chatting sessions with Sumit, moms and dads. Life...! 

Go, get your wings

I am truly amazed at its power. I have been perturbed, bothered and irritated for reasons that are important to me but which when I share with others are just reduced to being minuscule or something I have to be patient about. It’s only then I turn to it and why do I? Doubtlessly for its overbearing power to pull me out of my current state and at least get me back to normalcy.  I take a bow for its greatness, various forms and profoundness.  

I bow to Music, in all its kinds, forms and varieties.

So many variations, so many languages, so many notes (high and low) all in a concoction of so many different lyrics. Lyrics which have the mystical ability to connect me with god and see beyond or make me introspect or make me see the supernatural.  Lyrics which unlock my otherwise tormented imagination and I see myself afloat and liberated, liberated from time, expectations and everything socially righteous. Lyrics so deep that they make me euphoric, so euphoric that I cry as they touch my deepest thoughts.  

So many rhythms wedded to perfect beats and the voice of the artist, sweet voice.  The impeccable rhythmic creation which has the immense and amazing power to entice me out of an emotional turmoil and carry in a melodious realm. The beats which make me want to dance as if there is no tomorrow, dance as though there no worries and discover myself in the movements. Beats which make me feel free, free from everything stifling and my own shortcomings. 

Music is so so powerful. It connects you and me, it connects me with god, it connects me with the real and the unreal and it connects me with me. 

What an original idea!

There is absolutely no harm in borrowing ideas. Absolutely none. But I strongly have believed that creating your own ideas (no matter how mediocre) always gives you an edge. You don’t have to always wait to create something outstanding, small beginnings are good enough. So why is it so important for the idea generator to create ideas? Here's why:

Borrowed Ideas	Original Ideas
Never trigger imagination. These can only inspire, amaze or fascinate but nothing more than that.	These fuel thoughts, stir imagination and stimulate action.
No sense of achievement, whatsoever	An amazing sense of creation
Limits thinking to what somebody else is thinking	Thoughts know no boundaries. You are the master of your thinking and can direct it wherever you like.
Usually does not result in any meaningful discussions	Can render an interesting discussion or can seed a new idea
You and your originality are never heard	You learn to express and open up
Your mind gets clogged with too many theories and that too of others	You are clear about what you think and what your idea is
You become the follower	You are seen as the leader

And it’s all good, it is all just fine

Dismay gets darker with each minute,

Inertia pulling it all in a bleak vacuum,

Tick, tock, tick, tock… tipping silence,

I look closely at the emptiness and it makes sense,

The dismay looks petty and minuscule,

 Bleak vacuum passing hints of freedom,

Time to experience what is truly real,

Hear harder for the lyrical music in the tipping silence,

Let not things control your happiness, seize it irrespective,

There suddenly is beauty and loveliness around,

World, spinning for me and for me alone,

I am real with a life too short for triviality, 

And it’s all good, it is all just fine.

Letter to the Delhi Hooligan

Dear Delhi Hooligan,

Congratulations on your new hooliganism.

Just when we think we have seen the worst of your atrocities, there you are with another unimaginable one to shock us. You never seem to limit yourself. You have managed to stretch way beyond the limits of the most heinous evil that could put even Satan to shame. Three cheers to you for your fearlessness. Leave alone the fear of law or the police; you are not even fearful of challenging the very basis of humanity. As I along with every other Indian pray and wish, that from now on you just have the most abominable 'what you can no longer even call life'. I can’t start to imagine how aggravated or frustrated you must be and what a liability your life must be on this planet to even start thinking of something which you have done. Any person who knows you even remotely must be so disgraced and embarrassed. How suicidal your parents or spouse must feel. Hope you did not beget any monsters as yourself; we are struggling to eradicate you and your likes in the first place.

Though I still fail to understand what you seek. If it is only about your carnal needs, we could give you some alms. In fact, we could have a hooligan fund where you could draw from, whenever you have the 'urge' rather than running around like a maniac. Go ahead, take some charity and find somebody willing, go, shoo....

Dear Delhi hooligan, your nuisance on the roads and at public places was enough for me to despise Delhi. Sometimes you were in the guise of the rich Delhi brat who shot me for not serving liquor or you shot me because I asked you to pay the toll. At other times, speeding in your drunken state, you decided to slaughter my life which you thought cheap. You robbed me outside the malls, you pinched me on the bus, you winked at me while I was in the market or you passed a lewd remark when I was simply walking on the street. I fail to understand what pleasure you get from doing any of that when I don’t even show any remote sign of appreciation for any of your action. Wouldn't your efforts be better spent at someplace where they would be better admired? I don't know if you are the person standing next to me in the metro or the auto driver. I don't know if you are the vegetable vendor or the person at the ticket counter. How many people can I mistrust?  

All thanks to you and the lack of justice to the growing numbers like yours, I hate to be called a Delhiite, an Indian.

Story of Uselessness

Some things are just so useless. So useless that you seriously and sincerely wish if you could do something to wipe them out.

While traveling on the metro, there are some stations where people neither board nor disembark, ever. And these are exactly the stations where the doors seem to be taking the maximum time to open and then close. This is when you wish that there was an intelligent metro system which wouldn't stop at a station if there are no takers.

Then after waiting for ages in the immigration queue, when you’re finally in front of the immigration officer, he seems to be endlessly staring at your passport picture and then your face, your face again and your passport as if matching the color of your kohl in the picture and now. Can we have biometric systems in place to identify us if identity is all these officers are concerned about?

We have people who at the toll will be arguing for 20 something rupees and seem to have all the time in the world. Why can’t we just have a crane pick up these cars along with these people and put them straight behind the bars?

There are people at the bite counter at the movies who would wait till it’s their turn and only then bother to think about what they want to order. They have the insensitivity to not only gaze at the menu for the longest time but call up their partners in crime to discuss the order. Can we just throw them out of the queue?

There are people who want to take elevators for even a single floor. Can we just have some mechanism where the elevators don't move people across one  floor and rather push them to the stairs?

There are people who send emails without a subject or with subjects which make no sense whatsoever. Why should anyone look at your email if you wouldn't tell me the contents? Can we have email audits or universities teach students about effective email writing?

Well, the story of uselessness can just go on forever. Different perspectives, different uselessnesses.  

Would you rather come for my cafe?

What makes people walk into a congregation? What motivates them to rather participate in a session during the time which they would otherwise be reading the newspaper or catching up with the grapevine?  What makes them leave the warmth of their chairs while sipping a steaming coffee and walking into a room full of strangers to hear about something which they have no clue about?

Could it be personal enlightenment?  

Is it the realization that the need of the hour is to learn something new, constantly?

These are the questions I ask myself every time at the end of each of our cafes.  We borrowed and customized the café concept from Gurteen. It’s not a lecture and it’s definitely not training. It’s about experts casually conversing about some areas of their expertise or about the lessons learnt during a series of projects which they were part of. The experts are more than willing to please and the participants are always more than what we estimate.

We never send out any personal invites or meeting requests but the idea is to send open invitations where people feel free to walk into the venue, pull a chair, hear the expert and by the end of the session share a cup of coffee with the expert and network. So each time at the beginning of every session, we are nail biting and anticipating whether people will turn up or not and (at least till now) it ends up with all of us running around to arrange for additional chairs.  It’s been working out well for us. We have an enthused participation without any compulsion, bonus or relation to KRAs. Perhaps at the end of the next session, we could interview people and ask them what motivates them to be there.