Fleeting ecstasy

The wait is excruciating. The eyes are strained, boring into the camera. The breath is held in anticipation and anguish. The heartbeat does not slow down, rather one can hear one’s own heart running a mile and minute. The knees slightly bent and arms held aloft, the supple wrists are held in an awkward position; almost as if they are deformed. The eyes contract. Your hearts tells you to skip a beat. That’s right, your brain wishes you to stop breathing. You take a sharp breath in. You can see a red object aimed at ‘your’ centre of gravity. The form moves, the legs shuffle a very small shuffle, almost imperceptibly; blink and you will miss it. By now your pulse slows down. The cherry has almost reached the body; you take in another short quick breath fearing that you may faint. Then you start thinking that the arms may come down too late because they are held so high. The ball is faster and zoning into the legs. This is it; it’s never going to come down on time. For a fleeting moment hope gives way to desperation. Then deliverance arrives. The rapier like slash and the bat comes down on time. You let your breath out. The suspense, the thrill and the fleeting ecstasy of watching Brian Lara bat. 

Idiots and idiosyncracies

English is a very idiosyncratic language; especially when idiots (self-proclaimed) like me use it. Here is an example;

Me: Time for spot of lunch

Thai friend: Spot of lunch... ?

Me: It's just a turn of phrase.

Thai friend: Turn of phrase... ?

Me: Never mind.

Thai friend: Never mind what?

Me: I am going to have lunch. Are you coming ?

Thai friend: Of course, I am very hungry..

Me: Facepalm.

The Book of Life

Do you know the feeling when you wake up on a Saturday morning and you don't have to read the book that you have been reading for the past month. No, you have never gone through that you say. Dear friends let me tell you from personal experience that it is one of the most awesome feelings ever. One fine Saturday morning I woke up and I did not have to read Les Miserables (by Victor Hugo). For those of you who wonder I am indeed talking about the unabridged version of the classic by Hugo, the e-book of which can be obtained here. This book, the main story of it at least, is 1202 pages long and by far the biggest book I have read to date (at least as far as I know the biggest book I have read thus far had been Rama Returned by Arthur C Clarke)

In 2010 I had read the other classic by Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre-dame, which was long, but shorter compared to this.

Let me get the reason of reading this book out of the way in this post so that I may concentrate on actually what I want to say about the book and its characters. I found out that the movie version of the book is coming out sometime in November this year and consists of a stellar cast in the form of Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway and Helena Bonham-Carter. Here is the trailer. Also, this book is in my "Books to read before I die" list in my Goodreads library. For people who don't know what goodreads is, please check this out.

Now before I start writing about the book let me say that the rest of the post is for only those who at least know the story by either having read an abridged version, having watched previous versions of the movie, or having watched the musicals. If you have a dim recollection of the outline of the story and don't plan to read the unabridged version then go ahead and stay with me. If you want to actually read the the long form of the book then now is the time to quit this post.

Les Miserables is the time tested classic. The basic outlines of the story still stand relevant. Even the author mentions it. As long as there are children affected by poverty, women who take to prostitution because of poverty and men who take to crime because of poverty this book will make sense. The technology might have changed from that of 19th century France, a nation agitated and in the cusp of popular revolution, to that of today, a world described as being a global village (which is true, as cliched as it may sound). The hues of the characters might not be the same but stereotypes still exist. Hugo is a master of social and spiritual commentary. The book is dotted with Hugo's own bias about the society, about the undermining of the religious values which he felt needed to be upheld, his own partisan belief that revolution and agitation caused sadness and placed an unwarranted stranglehold on the already weakened pulses of the society. All this make this book more of a humanities book than a work of fiction.

The story can be stated in two lines. It is the story of a man persecuted justly or unjustly (depending on whichever side of the fence you sit on) who beats all odds to do good to the society by overcoming all demons present within and outside of him.

The story starts with a very good Bishop, who is so kind to the point of absurd naivete. But the Bishop chooses to be naive. Let me explain with an instance. Once the Bishop before he became the Bishop is said to have come across Napoleon Bonaparte and seeing the Bishop the Emperor asked him who he was. To this the Bishop says "Sire, you are looking at a good man and I at a great one". Now this kind of presence of mind requires intelligence. Yet, the Bishop continued to keep his parish door open at all times, citing that a place of worship should never be closed. In walks a paroled convict, who had been imprisoned for 19 years of his life, from the age of 19, for, get this, stealing a loaf bread (this by the way proves that the French and especially Parisians are a little iffy). So anyway he is reformed by the Bishop and his kindness and renews his faith in the Supreme Being and goes along. He goes to another part of France, sets up a glass and beads factory and becomes a model citizen. Now enters into this story a woman of no means, destitute and with a child whom she has handed over to a really dank family in a sublime fit of singular stupidity. Subsequently she succumbs to an uptight (oh my God, French and uptight, that must be a first) police Inspector's treatment of her. But before this she extracts a promise from the reformed convict that he will rescue and look after her daughter. In the mean time the malevolent police Inspector begins to suspect that the man the town looks up to (the reformed man is held as a Messiah of the region, having provided jobs to the people of the vicinity) is indeed the ex-convict who is said to have committed an additional crime. Now after the promise is given to the destitute woman the reformed man is arrested by the police inspector and this also leads me to observe that this is becoming an exceptionally long post.

So to cut a long story short, the reformed man, let's call him Jean Valjean, actually keeps his promise and takes care of the destitute woman's daughter (let's call the daughter Cosette) brings her up as his own kid, loves her to bits and when it comes to the clutch, sacrifices everything to unite her with the guy whom she loves and who loves her in return.

Th social commentary woven as the cross-strands in the story is that human depravity takes a myriad of forms, and fortitude opposite that depravity is provided with courage, goodwill and steely awareness. We are shown the good side of humanity by characters such as Gavroche, Enjloras and even Eponine. The bad side are portrayed by Mr and Mrs Thenardiers. The indifferent ones in the society are portrayed by Inspector Javert, who weighs every decision with his head and sees everything in black and white. Finally, when he does feel some stirrings in heart and lets Jean go, he is overcome by the conflict raging in his head that he takes his own life. Metaphorically, it is a testament to the fact that indifference to the issues deadens you. Feel passionately and one will find a reason to live.

In finality, all I would like to say is that, please read the book or at least watch the movie.

P.S: I am so sorry that the post is so long.

The Rise and Fall

Dear youngest Federers, by the time you are old enough to read this the whole world will make your father out to be egomaniacal no-gooder. Bear with them. Those who say that were the same ones who exalted your father to the status of the greatest tennis player ever.

Federer played tennis like the only way he knew to play, like ballet fused with opera. He was given to temper tantrums and then he realised that tennis meant far too much to him to throw away petulantly like he was doing during his outbursts.

Reams and reams of rows and columns were written of his competitive spirit, his graciousness in defeat, his attacking instincts, the way he graced the game. I really don't want to waste any more emotions on those same aspects. Everybody who knows who he is, knows him for who he has been. People have analysed his forehand, backhand and every other slight of hand, and I am no expert to contribute to any of that. 


For somebody who watched tennis without ever having played it I loved Federer for what he was to me. He meant someone that I could aspire to be. To be the best at what I could be. But all this sounds churlish. I am nothing like any of my idols. I have wished I was. 


Recently somebody remarked to me that Fed should leave whilst still at the top of his game. For me that is a very 'economic' way of looking at things. You know, comparative advantage and all. But there are two counter arguments to that. 


1. What people fail to realize is that people, out of all living beings, behave the least rationally. Otherwise how can you justify the sales of Macbook, iPod, iPad etc. ?


2. And, he is not playing to maximize his economic earnings, he is playing because that is what he likes to do. 


I am writing this after his loss in the Semifinals of Roland Garros and the loss in the Finals of Gerry Weber Open in Halle. I read all the experts saying that after Wimbledon and maybe Olympics he needs to re-evaluate his decision to keep on playing. Interesting that I should read this now when I am having doubts about my own capacity and academic prowess. Gone are the days when I used to remember trivia of all kinds and shapes. I can not only feel but I know for a fact that my memory is waning. My powers of concentration are going down. I can't buckle down and sit for a three hour sit-in exam. Cannot pull all-nighters like I used to. I remember studying non-stop for more than 14 hours straight before my Advanced Level Chemistry paper. Needless to say I aced it after cramming so much. But the most important thing was the high I felt after finishing the paper. I had unnecessarily assumed that I would be crashing and sleeping continuously but the feeling of ecstasy was so much I actually felt like I could go bungee jumping just about then. 


Nowadays I don't feel that. I feel my capacity to assimilate data dwindling. I cannot keep at a paper for more than an hour the most. Most of all what matters is my mental capacity is diminishing as well.


Once an astute tennis commentator remarked that the thing Fed would have to guard against is his mental stamina giving way in between a match. Fed has always been a 'walk-about' guy. 'Walk-about' is a mental stroll you take to some other place in a match, say, after you have won the first set. So if it is Fed, Fed has won the first set and he cannot mentally sustain the same intensity he has been displaying whilst winning the first set and so he goes for a 'walk-about'. It is strikingly present in Fed. Not so much in Nadal. (I haven't watched enough Djokovic matches to comment on him) He reduces the intensity level of his play and eases up on his opponent. The commentator remarked that as Fed ages it will be even more difficult for him to take the walk-about and then get back into the game. The three-game walk-about would sometimes even extend to the next set. He basically implies that there would be crests and deeper troughs in the level of play. This is very significant. This means that Fed won't be able to do this. Coming back into a match would become that much harder.


This is significant because I feel I kind of agree with that commentator's comments. Let me say at the onset I have always been moody and prone to mood swings. But, as I am progressing in age my mood swings are becoming more pronounced. I know this sounds a little hypochondriacal but if you have been paying as much attention to self as I have been this is huge. 


Ok, all I am saying is that aging is a natural process. How we choose to age, what we choose to do to defy aging and all other related matters should be strictly left to us. We, with stringent self analysis, are the best judges of what we are capable of. Life is anyway full of crests and troughs, a never ending sinusoidal curve. Our choice is to ride the crest and bear with the troughs.


Rant over.

Tips to identifying an 'academic ninja'

Do you know what I abhor the most? It's not being called black, brown or any other colour, it's not being labeled a Tamil nationalist, Tamil passivist or an anti-Tamil bootlicker, hell it's not even being derided as an 'hippopotamus playing badminton', but rather, it's being called a 'NERD'. Everyone thinks I am a nerd. Maybe I am, but it doesn't give anyone else the right to be derisory about it. When did a Sri Lankan getting good grades and caring about his/her vocabulary getting picked on become acceptable? No seriously, as a country I thought topping classes was our 'thang'.

All my lab colleagues call me a 'nerd', ask me for spellings of 'not so obscure' words (once a friend asked me for the spelling of 'decision', I almost ended up choking on my food) and my nickname is name-paedia. One of my thesis committee members even thinks that there is nothing I don't know about. Whilst all this can be some kind of an ego boost when I am in dire straits in terms of lack of self confidence, most of the time it's annoying. It's annoying when your junior colleague uses you like Google, asks you research related things which she thinks she is too cool to read up on and such things and tells me that she has a 'life' and I don't.

So for all those like me, I have compiled a list of tips on how to identify an 'academic ninja', from herein known simply as 'AN'.  An AN maybe identified if she possesses one or more characteristics in the following list:

1. Is inclined to read up and do proactive research on matters which matters to her. 

2. Knows the difference between your and you're, its and it's, or knows that the plural of cul-de-sac is culs-de-sac.

3. Never asks another person something which she can look up from wikipedia, or better yet contributes to wikipedia. 

4. Reads books, magazines, journals articles, monogrammes, and watches documentaries and such things; and please no brain numbing material (how Bieber made his music video doesn't constitute a documentary). 

5. Has worked in a lab, or with a simulation tool or has published case studies. 

6. Or any other characteristic which is deemed appropriate by a congregation of two or more ANs.

So if you qualify due to any of the reasons listed above welcome to the coterie of academic ninjas. Who are others to tell us that we are self-sufficient in the gray matter department. We know it already people. As Bill Gates aptly put "Be nice to academic ninjas, chances are you will end up working for one". (No seriously, he said that, it was lost whilst transcribing)

Badminton: An Idiot's Guide

Today is a day like no other. I had played two hours of badminton the previous evening, after a forced hiatus of two months. My joints are creaking, they are protesting in vain though. I have work to do, much work.

But before all that, I decided to try my hand at laying down a few guidelines for an amateur playing badminton. I seriously took up badminton in the summer of 2010 (summer in Thailand, of course). It was more of a relationship building exercise rather than serious sport. All my new friends in the university I moved to played in the evenings so they invited, I went the first day and haven't looked back since. Now the thing is I am pretty bad at playing it compared to my Thai friends. Thais have this natural ability to be agile, be flexible and such things. Now I am on the more rotund side, and not so agile by any stretch of the imagination. My forehand is OK, but my backhand is puny and sucks. There is no other way to describe my playing style other than saying it's weak, and hence I am going to drop any pretensions I have about my play and say this idiot's guide should be read with tongue firmly in cheek.

They say art mimics life and who are we mere mortals to deny that human sport is the highest form of art. Roger Federer's grace, Brian Lara's high bat-lift, or Yevgeni Plushenko's phenomenal ice skating all represent forms of beauty to rival that of Beethoven or Da Vinci. Please note that I have the highest respect for all sports and players of sport and intend no insult by this blog post.

Roger Federer, the epitome of form and functionality in tennis (Reuters/Mark Blinch) 

That being said I have watched cricket since I was seven, have been watching tennis with a keener eye since 2009 (and for anyone interested about the kinetics and kinematics of tennis this is a good piece by David Foster Wallace) but I have never played those two sports, even at a strictly amateur level, whilst I have been playing badminton regularly.

Here I talk only about doubles badminton (I do NOT play singles with anyone in Thailand). This idiot's guide is all about making you understand the different types of badminton players out there. Reading the rest of this piece will give you an opportunity to identify to which type opponents on the other side or even your partner belongs to. The thing to keep in mind is that the types are not mutually exclusive. One player can belong to many types where he is characterized by a combination of those types. OK enough fooling around.

The Really Good Player - This is the player who is really good at playing all around the court. He has got your back all the time, and plays very well close to the net. He is agile and he does his Superman impersonation to even get impossible shots. If you have him as your partner you may win, but that weight loss goal you had might take a hit as you would not be running around the court as much as you would like. If he is your opponent then only God can save you.

The Gentlemanly Good Player - He is a variation of the Really Good Player, where he is very good and he knows it, but he allows his partner to run around too. If his partner is pathetic (like me, most of the times) he will take his partner's shot without making the partner feel inadequate. He will encourage the partner to attempt shots and play within his/her comfort zone. He is the ideal partner for someone like me.

The Opportunistic Player - This is the player who takes shots only if it suits him, regardless of whether it's his shot (in his side of the court) or not. If the shot is difficult for him to take, even if it's on his side of the court he let's it go and looks at the partner accusingly. Also if he feels he can make a good point of it will steal his partner's shots. I think I have this streak in me.

The Silent One - If this guy comes as your partner then be prepared for a lot of accidents. This guy does not call for his shots, lets the ambiguity linger in the air and most often than not both of the partners will end up missing the shot. If there is a silent one in your opponents then the way to play is to place the shot right in the middle of them, causing them to collide (it's evil I know, but you got to do what you got to do, and the smashing of racquets has a nice ring to them)

The Trickster - This guy has so many trick shots playing against him is like playing with the "Joker" of Batman comics. He plays the drop shot, fakes slap shots, gives you the head fakes, does the spin drop. Basically he is up to no good. Playing against this guy will make you lose your breath ten minutes into a match.

The Condescending Asshole - This guy takes the 'Gentlemanly Good Player' persona a little too far. He is the one who applauds you for trying to get to a drop shot even though you fall short by a long way. He is the one who says 'take it easy' when you miss an easy shot, well basically he is the one you feel like dunking with your racquet as soon as he opens his mouth. If he comes as your partner, may God help you keep your temper.

All badminton players will belong to one or more categories. I hope this will help amateur badminton players figure things out.

In all earnestness

Sometimes  a moment of time seems to last an eternity. (*Disclaimer: I am not on acid, coke or any other such hallucinatory narcotics) I close my eyes, and that instant seems to be perfect. Everything, my conscience, my sense balance, my inner equilibrium, all of them align themselves into a perfect,coherent picture. The clarity which follows, the intensity which accompanies and the productivity which ensues is addictive. In vain I search for such moments all the time, but they are few and fleeting.

I love those moments. I sometimes think my whole life is worthwhile simply because of those moments. My brain practically brims over with dopamine (I can feel it) and I get this unimaginable 'high'. Let me dub these moments as 'joy'.

Now the cinch of my thesis in this piece is whether these 'joyous' milliseconds happen naturally or do they happen as a result of all the hardwork accumulated over time. Often times, luck or chance also play an important part in such discussions. Paraphrasing a person's quote which goes 'Luck often favours the tenacious' I truly believe every slice of fortune is a result of your effort towards achieving what you want.

I am an implicit believer in the school of thought that if you are happy for everything, you cannot truly be happy for anything. I know the statement sounds counter-intuitive. I mean, c'mon, if you are happy for everything it's a good thing, right. It means you have more happiness. But is that truly the case? Now will be the perfect time for me to come out and espouse my theory of 'what happiness is' and 'how it may be achieved', but I am going to spare all of you all that melodrama.

I believe understanding these 'moments' of sanity (yeah, let me call it that) is as simple as dissolving salt. Yes, take a pinch of salt and take a litre of water (or 4 quarts if you happen to live in USA, Liberia and two more countries) (my idea being that take an ample quantity of water, in relation to the pinch of salt) and what ensues is water with salinity. The same way, if all that effort was water, the 'moments' will be the pinch of salt. What remains after the water evaporates, are the memories of those moments.

Just that.

Do Gods have off days and other such queries

I have always wondered whether God(s) has/ve off days. I have used the uncertainty plural so that anyone with any religious non/belief can grapple with this profound question without feeling left out. It in itself is a very simple question. If I had asked myself this when I was sixteen I would have answered with 'God has no man-like properties. He is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient.' Bam! End of story.

Umm... but now, this is a difficult question to answer. The world has taught me diplomacy. It has influenced me in such a way that I take a moment or too to actually phrase my answer, in fear of offending the person who is posing the question. This is very unfortunate because a simple yes or no answer would suffice to this question, because at the end of the day this is way less of a question than the eternal 'Rajni or Kamal', 'Lara or Sachin', 'Federer or Nadal' types of queries. (The answer to all three questions are worthy of many hours of argument) But let me not trivialize this issue.

I ask in all earnestness. The 'thing' is I think in a way which leads me to ask such questions. Yes, I ask a lot of questions, from a lot of people. At least I used to till I discovered Google and Wikipedia. But even now these splendid repositories of knowledge and algorithms cannot provide me with satisfactory answers.

Some of the questions I ask are plain weird, especially from people: One such question I surprise people with is "Will you feel sad when I die?". I know, very stupid question, right. Most of the people stumble, blush, look away and some actually say 'yes'. The reason why I ask this question is because I have a list, a list which has the names of people who I feel will cry when I die. By the way, the list is 219 names long.

Another point I learnt a long time ago is that when it comes to questions related to matters of the heart (not vascular, but metaphorically) it is a good idea to know the answer that you are going to get before posing the question. I know it sounds self-defeating, if you know the answer why ask the question in the first place, but I almost always follow the principle. I have heard this theory helps lawyers too. So if you know a person who thinks Nadal is a better player, then if you are a Federer fan, please avoid asking him who is the greater player. That way you will end up saving time, so that you may write blog posts like these.

Joy in Mundanity

I was having a beast of a day. Seriously, everyone was screwing with my patience when it was clearly not in the mood for it. I was finding that one and half years of research work might be let down by a petty, ruler wielding administrative staff. I could put it right by spending my normal monthly subsistence money on it, but asking that from a grad student in a foreign country is too much, just too much. Not that I did not have the money, but as a financial expert would say; the three most important things for survival in a capitalist economy is cash flow, cash flow and cash flow. That much of an economic shock would be catastrophic for my future plans, and I was stubborn. But I digress now.

I broke down. I completely broke down. I just plonked back on my seat and sat there without knowing what to do. Then I figured that I might as well make myself a cup of coffee. The thought of making coffee lessened my anxiety. I filled water in my hot water boiler and switched it on. Took my white, two-handled conically shaped coffee mug and the spoon and rinsed them. Opened the coffee bottle and measured out three fourths teaspoon of instant coffee powder (I have a way of measuring out three fourths) and let it fall into the mug. Then as the water reached boiling point, raised the boiler from its casing and tipped and let the hot water flow into the mug. Stirred it until the coffee powder fully dissolved and mingled and the whole concoction became dark brown. Opened the sugar container and measured out one and half teaspoons of sugar into it. Stirred the mug until the sugar dissolved as well. Rinsed the spoon and kept it on the table. Brought the mug to the table and took in the aroma of the coffee brew. By now, my anxiety had completely dissolved along with the sugar and coffee powder. By immersing myself in the seemingly mundane task of making coffee I had detached myself from stress and fear of being let down. I had completely diverted my concentration to something which required it and hence had become less strung out.

We often malign the mundane tasks in our lives, seldom noticing the near-cathartic experiences they might provide us in times of great stress. Be it taking a morning walk in the park, to making ourselves a cup of tea, they have the power to single out our consciousness from being bothered by a seemingly knotty problem. Yet a lot of people are opting out of these mundanities. If we do so, we are foregoing the right to enjoy the mundanity for what it is; a breather to get away for a few minutes from those very things that are making us give it up. For now, I believe there is absolute joy in mundanity. Don't let anything take it away from you.

Colour me, colour you

I have always wondered what it would be like to think in terms of colours. It has been a fascination since adolescence. To see a scenario or a mental picture of something and then to demarcate a colour for it. Its a very interesting experiment, trust me. 


Sometimes on a Saturday evening, here in Thailand, whilst walking along the 'shady grove' (the name I have given to a stretch of road adjoining the football field in my faculty) life seems to be a happy 'cream' colour. A Saturday spent tying up the loose ends gives a feeling of content nothing can disturb, nothing. 


On a Monday early morning, whilst waiting for the shuttle bus, time seems to be painting a portrait in cobweb-by gray, dull and not sharply defined. The same morning, the cup of coffee I have seems to be a teeming 'lively earthy brown', almost like the muddy rain waters, which give sustenance to the parched earth. 


A busy day is like 'copper sulphate blue', very nice to see, but the usefulness right about stops there. A lazy day is more like a 'burgundy', dark... yet soothing in its own right. 


I like the 'dark gray' the gathering of storm clouds brings about. Reminds me of the musty smells of the public library in Colombo, which is in turn associated with pure, unadulterated joy. I always tell my friends an evening spent drinking coffee, reading a 'good' book is metallic silver for me, the feeling of consanguinity  and contentment. 


Sometimes I feel 'dark blue', where my ego has been hurt, and I feel anger setting on. Then the 'dark blue' often turns 'boiling red', reaching a fever pitch when I say something that I would eventually regret. When looking back at the times I have lost my temper, which is normally during my 'peachy pink' times, a sense of shame takes over.


The colours I wear reflect my moods: full black when I am feeling a sense of something 'not so good' about to happen (bottle green-y feeling perhaps), splash of colour when my perspective on life is 'neutral yellow' (not bad, not good), brown when I am feeling especially 'fresh-y red'.

With friends like these...

I have been meaning to get back to work. But personally I need to write this blog about a group of friends I have. Especially since one of them integral members is leaving the country to go in search of greener pastures. (OK, one idiom done for the blog post, I promise no more cliches here) I underwent four years of .. um.. I don't know I can put this in a way so that I don't offend anyone, but let me try, underwent four years of mild torture to get my Bachelors in Engineering. It was tough for me. I was underwhelmed and overwhelmed at the same time, which if you are wondering, feels really bad. There was euphoria one moment and then abject failure the other. It was like a bungling sequence of REALLY bad movies, one after the other.

In those four years of Raskolnikovian (he of 'Crime and Punishment' fame) life the only considerably good thing I did was become friends with the 'group of friends' I am going to talk about in this post.

Now before I go on I need to tell you something about myself in those four years. In the best of times I have a cheery view of life, laced with a touch of cynicism, but my oh my at bad times everything looks bleak to me. I am the eternal pessimist, and along with that sometimes I get paranoid. I also have bi-polar tendencies, where I have childish enthusiasm for something and the next moment it's gone replaced with absolute derision for the same thing. Yes, I know I am making myself look a very difficult person to get along with, in truth I am a little bit like that.

So, the second year of my four years, I became friends with these human beings. Three of them were in the same department as me so all the study sessions were goofy, fun and agony at the same time. Then I met their mutual friends in other two separate departments, two 'nerdy' (so guys, you know who you are) who also accepted me into the 'clique'. Along the mad scramble to earn 'credits' and pass exams, I still managed to have fun, thanks to them. Whenever I took myself seriously (which I do ALL the time) they were there to remind me to take a proverbial "chill pill". They have visited my home, met my parents and sibling, eaten 'home food'. One guy's mother's food is the next best in Colombo, almost in par with my Mum's. We shared lunch packets, harangued each other for birthday treats, and all other treats (:D). We have gone to the beach together, KFC and Queens weren't spared of our presence and all through this they put up with grumbling, chronic bad moods and the mood swings, kudos to them.

Then the pinnacle of it all came to be in the year 2009. Some 'bright' (I think it's you M, you know who you are, own up now!) person decided that we need to go on a trip and that trip needed to be to the second highest mountain peak in Sri Lanka, Sivanolipaatha Malai or Sri Pada. At the beginning  I personally thought that this was not going to be... Come on, me pulling myself through seven hours of climbing up and then another gruelling seven hours getting down. ROFL.

Come one fine Saturday I was finding myself in the Galle to Fort mini-bus going towards the Fort Railway station to catch the train to go to Hatton. Yes, we were going on the trip to climb that mountain. By the way, one small anecdote, if I may be permitted. I was not supposed to be travelling alone in the mini-bus. I was actually supposed to wait for someone in a bus halt closer to my home, get into the same bus as he was travelling, but I being I, decided that the bus that I chose to get into was the one my friend was travelling in. (Sorry A!) So yeah anyway, I got to the railway station without any untoward incident, and then I actually enjoyed the train ride as it was filled with card-playing, isso vadai eating camaraderie. Then, the friend who is leaving to greener pastures, let's call him S, told me during a quiet moment, "Sujo, we have to climb up, all of us have to climb up, there will be no leaving anyone behind". I replied "Um. yeah. Supposing I can't make it, you are welcome to leave me behind and go". For that S, "No, everyone has to get to the top".

The same night, we left the house we were staying in (it was my father's friend's place) and left to undertake the most physically challenging thing I have done in my entire life to date. We had come prepared in terms of all the stuff we will needed. There were three girls and four guys in the travelling party, so all the guys shared the loads amongst them. Some times the girls too shared the loads, but the only person who did not do any sharing of the load was me. I was grumbling, panting and making all sorts of complaints along the way. Now looking back, I do not know how they put up with me. If I had been me, I would have left myself somewhere along the wayside and gone along. But yet my friends did not utter a simgle word of reproach or regret at me having accompanied them. The only time I stopped complaining was when I had a shot of coffee. Then for the next ten minutes life was rosy and all, and then again I would start. Seriously guys and girls, thank you very much for putting up with me.

This post is not just for that time, for all the times my friends had put up with me. I know it must have been difficult. Thank you. It is much appreciated.

Zero

Zero. 


My high school maths teacher taught me that the single most important invention or discovery by either the Indians or the ancient Arabs (the jury is still out on this one) was the discovery of zero. He also went on to say that zero was like God. It meant that man had understood something that he could not see (effectively having zero of something meant not having any of that) In essence, man was closer to codifying calculus, economics and all those by-products of mathematics. 


Zero means a lot of things in my life too. The number of times I have watched Brian Lara bat live, number of consecutive pay cheques I have taken home, the number of Valentine's Days I have celebrated with my significant other, the number of times I did NOT enjoy a hot cup of coffee or a Jeffrey Archer book. Actually far too many to list in its entirety here. But some of the most significant instances that is of pertinence now are very saddening.


Zero.


The number of times the Sri Lankan Government has apologised to the people in the North of this country. 


Zero.


The number of times the LTTE apologised for the Kathankudy Massacre.


Zero.


The number of times the LTTE apologised to the Muslims who were asked to evacuate the North in 1990.


Zero.


The number of times both sides apologised for the so called "collateral damage" in their bitter war.

End of the World, as I know it

A part of me died when Brian Lara retired. From my childhood, since asking my Dad "Who is that short guy who thinks he can outhit Desmond Haynes" to when lapping up every single delivery he ever faced in the 2001 Sri Lanka series, I have grown up, whence he has inspired everything I did. Hell, I even started taking my G. C. E. Advanced Levels seriously after he hit *that* 400 n. o. against England in 2004. I remember years with his personal milestones. I remember numbers because of some his phenomenal scores (for e. g. 375, 153* and 400*). His batting always involved some amount of risk, and risks always thrilled me. There was nothing more I wanted in this world than to see him bat live, in person. Alas, that did not happen.

Another person who evokes the same sort of sentiment in me is Roger Federer. From feeling sorry for Sampras in the 2001 Wimbledon and then to appreciating the fact that the baton of Tennis "Godness" has indeed been passed safely to this ponytailed, head-banded Swiss player was important. He played, what am I saying, plays with metronomic precision. Something to do with him being a Swiss, they say. I don't understand, never having been to Switzerland, little, always neutral Switzerland. The joke is that when Fed and Stan Wawrinka (Swiss No. 2) play, the games take only one and half minutes each because they play so fast, with minimum of fuss. Federer does not emote. Hell, he rarely sweats. When you imagine Nadal, you see the sweat stained shirt sticking to his ripped body. When you imagine Federer, you can feel the hawk like gaze but nothing about the sweat.

OK I am rambling.

The point is Federer is in terminal decline as well. I should have seen it when the 14th Grand Slam title, which should have been but which wasn't (Australian Open 2009) happened and the tears which flowed so freely should have confirmed it. But the 14th came later, at a venue which had been his nemesis (Roland Garros) and all was well. For the time being, he had arrested the tide of decline, and the eventual Wimbledon title (15th) brought about euphoria. Then he lost to someone whom I consider as the Face of Future Tennis (Juan Martin Del Potro) in the US Open of the same year. Alarm bells rang, albeit at a soft volume. Then came Sweet Sixteen, a number I have come to cherish because of Federer and from then on, the Number 17 seems to signify everything magical, and unattainable. The whole world is holding its breath for Sachin's 100th 100, but I for one, am longing for 17. I know that he can't play forever like the way he has played before, yet I bluff, and my brain refuses to move on. The question is will I get the chance to at least see Federer play in person.

Very soon the bastions who held up my world with their atlas like strengths will be gone from my everyday life. Life will go on, but the World I knew, the World I had grown up in, would have been changed forever as well.

Sigh.

Living in a strange land

Sometimes I feel I do not belong, which is justified because I do not belong. Believe me, I don't. I don't have fair skin, nor the lithe body. I don't smile easily, at least not when I am confronted with a guy who seems to not understand you even with a gun to his head. I am not akin to breakout of foolish laughter, sheepish grins. In fact sometimes I find smiling so tedious, I feel like hiding my face rather than being obliged to smile.

I don't talk rapturously, do not eat like I have the whole day to spend with that particular food, wield a fork and spoon with the kind etiquette that is religiously demanded. I tell you all this to persuade you that I do not belong. I come from a nation which demands the sort of practice from its young which makes it easier for them to win any rat-race, and be equipped in dealing with any sort of test-system. My most productive years were spent understanding how gears and mechanical drives work. I take more warmth from a nice book and a cup of hot coffee, rather than in a chilled drink and a 'smart' phone. I do not see the need to get up every morning and make it a requirement to style my hair. I do not need to apply cosmetics to even feel confident enough to face up to the world. I do not conform to the norms set in front of me of a girl of 'that' particular age. I do not have a partner, and two more lined up in case the 'one' does not work out. I don't spend money on expansive telecom packages. I save diligently, spend even more diligently.

The pressure to conform is startlingly too much. You are expected to lower your standards, if the 'normal' is lower than your exacting ones. Not that I have a problem against people who have lower standards than me, but at the same time I cannot take it if they have a problem with people who have higher standards than them. Yes, I am talking in 'me' and 'them' language. Divisive, I know. The sort of thing which will get you ostracised before you can pronounce 'ostracised'. But, the thing is, I really do not care. I am not here to make friends, neither am I here to conform to your standards. They say, for all the talk of wolves living in packs, the individual wolf is, essentially, a loner. And you will never find a hawk in a school (I use this word, for lack of a better word).